Russian Ukraine shenanigans

[disgruntledemployee]

4 hours ago, gearhog said:

It's not discernable to you because the senseless killing of hundreds of thousands (millions?) is inconceivable to you as a valid reason to cease hostilities.

It's seems inconceivable to you that UKR wants to fight for its freedom/independence/etc.  Your past words make it sound like the US is forcing UKR to fight off the invaders.

Name once instance, from anywhere, of anyone here who has said Russia was an ally. You can't. All of your reasonable justifications to continue war have been defeated, so it seems the lot of you must resort to inventing false positions or statements to argue against.

Logic, not wishful thinking, will always dictate the ultimate outcome of an event. What are you going to do, make a post every time reality doesn't jive with your position? 

Logic does not always indicate the ultimate outcome of an event.  Logic might have been obvious with the UK in WWII that they should have negotiated with Germany, but the stubborn stiff upper lip determination got in the way.  I'm sure history has other examples.  Nuts!

Fortunately, most people are not like you. Most people believe protracting a foreign conflict where millions continue to die is not in our best interest nor Ukraine's best interest.  

I'll support the assumption that most people think war is bad.  You mention UKR's best interest.  Who gets to determine that, Russia, Putin's Ho, or them?

Thank goodness for real democracy. 

HA!  On 5 Mar 2025, Gearhog stated that the events thus far of the 2nd Trump administration is real democracy in action.

Events are clearly going to diverge at an increasing rate from your poorly considered desires. 

Events counter to a desire doesn't always make the desire wrong.  Like the desire for freedom.  If Russia controls UKR and they lose freedom, does that mean the desire for freedom is "poorly considered"?  Asking for a nation.

I suggest you surrender to the fact our support for this conflict is ending, or you're just going to be yet another in a long line who whine a lot, but never actually do anything to contribute to your cause.

You equate supporting UKRs independence to whining.  Well, your 'sucks to be them' attitude is getting old.

You win some, you lose some. Pickyourbattles.

He was a Level 99 Douche.  He your mentor?

Dude, you write some gaslighting stuff here. 

 

[tac airlifter]

On 3/3/2025 at 11:39 AM, LiquidSky said:

Considering the sheer number of agencies reporting it and that our allies are commenting on it, I'm inclined to believe it over a random rep.

I don't think this will change how you feel, but for the record you were completely wrong.

if I were you, I would be asking myself: what other strongly held opinions do I have based on things I assume to be true but are in fact, not true? How else am I the victim of a propaganda machine?

[LiquidSky]

4 hours ago, gearhog said:

Never saw it.

Russia should just quit? How does that even enter into your mind as a realistic solution let alone as being in the realm of remote possibility? What a mind-numbingly ignorant position. That's something you'd expect to hear from your average TikTok account, not an educated military officer.

How does Ukraine attain a position of strength? Their population is being drained of warfighters. The world can supply them unlimited weapons and money, but no one is willing to replace Ukraine's soldiers with their own... including you.

 

 

 

How convenient. And now that you have, still no reply. 

Because aggressors can always turn around and go home. Look at Afghanistan, we just quit. Look at Vietnam, same thing. Do I think Russia will? They did in their own Afghanistan. They can again.

Strength through allies backing them with arms and Intel. Soldiers they have plenty of international volunteers. My entire squadron would fly in tomorrow if asked. We were ready on night 1 and we're still ready. Unfortunately we have ADSCs and the Ukrainian foreign legion isn't seeking pilots. If you stood up the modern equivalent of the flying Tigers you'd run out of positions before bodies.

[gearhog]

13 minutes ago, LiquidSky said:

How convenient. And now that you have, still no reply. 

Because aggressors can always turn around and go home. Look at Afghanistan, we just quit. Look at Vietnam, same thing. Do I think Russia will? They did in their own Afghanistan. They can again.

Strength through allies backing them with arms and Intel. Soldiers they have plenty of international volunteers. My entire squadron would fly in tomorrow if asked. We were ready on night 1 and we're still ready. Unfortunately we have ADSCs and the Ukrainian foreign legion isn't seeking pilots. If you stood up the modern equivalent of the flying Tigers you'd run out of positions before bodies.

You quoted me and said "I literally answered this the other day", but the only question I had asked was if you were just going to complain every time reality doesn't align with what you wanted to happen. What is it that are you so intent that I reply to? Quote it or repeat it.

So you're listing our military failures as justifications as to why we should give military support to Ukraine? Well, I'll give you credit: that's a completely new and unexpected way to look at this. I don't think anyone has ever made that argument. It might be the least intellectual point attempted in this thread, but at least it's original. I got nothing for you.

If Ukraine has plenty of international volunteers, why do they have conscription? Why are we seeing countless vids of them abducting their own citizens from the streets? Again, this is just basic logic. Your points are really, really bad.

"I'd totally help if it weren't for my ADSC."

"I'd totally help if I were allowed to fly airplanes."

Funny how all of the ways you say you want to help conveniently have conditions, while all the ways you can actually help have none. Show me one receipt.

Let's reel it back in to reality: Your SQ isn't getting called. You're not going to help or make sacrifices. Russia isn't just going to pack it up and put it in reverse. There will be a negotiation. Both sides will make concessions. The killing will stop. Life will go on. We'll look back just as we do on AFG, IRQ, Vietnam and say, "Well...that was f'n stupid".

 

 

 

 

[BashiChuni]

5 hours ago, LiquidSky said:

How convenient. And now that you have, still no reply. 

Because aggressors can always turn around and go home. Look at Afghanistan, we just quit. Look at Vietnam, same thing. Do I think Russia will? They did in their own Afghanistan. They can again.

 

Russia will not turn around and go home because home is at their backs. regardless of how you feel, the Russians perceive nato seducing Ukraine as a dire threat to their country. They have complained about NATO expanding east since the breakup of the USSR; I have cited numerous historical articles, speeches, intelligence assessments, and videos in this thread proving so.

it's a different sort of calculus for them than what we were operating under in vietnam, iraq, or afghanistan.

i predict you will disagree with their rationale and reasoning, but know thy enemy and such.

Edited Thursday at 04:06 AM by BashiChuni

[raimius]

18 hours ago, gearhog said:

So you're listing our military failures as justifications as to why we should give military support to Ukraine? Well, I'll give you credit: that's a completely new and unexpected way to look at this. I don't think anyone has ever made that argument. It might be the least intellectual point attempted in this thread, but at least it's original. I got nothing for you.

How are you not getting the concept that a stronger foreign power can lose to a more committed group on their home turf?

Did you miss the past 25 years?

[gearhog]

2 hours ago, raimius said:

How are you not getting the concept that a stronger foreign power can lose to a more committed group on their home turf?

Did you miss the past 25 years?

Because it's a hilariously overly simplified comparison.

For starters, we were a stronger power fighting a conflict 6-9 thousand miles from home. Russia/Ukraine are fighting a conflict 0 miles from their border.

There are thousands of other variables, (social, language, economic, ideological) that make this situation different, just as in the earlier WWII examples. It's lazy to attempt to frame this conflict as the same as any other just because you can claim there is a strong player and a weak player, one was somewhat more committed, one was somewhat less committed. Nonsense. You could say Israel cannot win against the Palestinians because they're super committed. Your rule of thumb doesn't seem to apply there, does it?

You're cherry picking a single argument. That's just one of my points in a post with several others. If you want to talk commitment, I would like for just one of you to explain to me how your individual support for Ukraine goes beyond pecking a few keys to whine about how we (collectively) are not dumping hundreds of billion$ more into this fiasco.

Edited Thursday at 09:57 PM by gearhog

[HeloDude]

2 hours ago, raimius said:

How are you not getting the concept that a stronger foreign power can lose to a more committed group on their home turf?

Did you miss the past 25 years?

Cool, then I’m looking forward to Ukraine defeating Russia/pushing them out of their territory (including the Crimea) with everything we have given them up until this point.

[Biff_T]

 

 

[VigilanteNav]

On 3/5/2025 at 4:41 PM, BashiChuni said:

bro you can't even spin it to be a "pro russian coup". the government removed in 2014 was pro russian. why would putin stage a coup on his own guy? lol. the evidence is overwhelming of western involvement.

from 2014: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/30/russia-ukraine-war-kiev-conflict

 

If you only read those articles you referenced, I see how you take it as overwhelming evidence of western involvement and therefore the "coup" happened only because the west directed it.  Yet, a few issues with these...

First article: Its an opinion piece written by Seumas Milne.  Among many questionable views he has is this beauty from 2006:  In a 2006 Guardian article, Milne argued: "For all its brutalities and failures, communism in the Soviet Union, eastern Europe and elsewhere delivered rapid industrialisation, mass education, job security and huge advances in social and gender equality. It encompassed genuine idealism and commitment ... Its existence helped to drive up welfare standards in the west, boosted the anticolonial movement and provided a powerful counterweight to western global domination.

I dunno, but I might disagree with this author's take on world events. If you agree with his take, then the downfall of the Soviet Union was a net negative for the US and Reagan was wrong to tell Gorby to tear down his wall.  

Second article: no proof in that that the US/West directed the "coup". 

Third article:   this one was more thought provoking but yet still leaves doubts as to the ground truth of who really made the "coup" happen.  For example, per the Rand study here, Putin immediately started the Crimean operation within days of the "coup".  What are the chances the Russian military (so famous for its centralized control, decentralized execution...I kid) was able to pull that off within days without a whole lot of planning?  

Lessons from Russia's Operations in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine | RAND

Guess we can agree to disagree on the 2014 "coup" in Ukraine.  From the article I referenced:

But the truth underlying the events of February 2014 is far more interesting: The preponderance of evidence suggests that it was Moscow itself that triggered Yanukovych’s departure in order to launch a pre-arranged Plan B—the invasion of Crimea and an engineered “uprising” in eastern Ukraine—after Moscow’s Plan A—a new treaty with a pliant government in Kyiv that placed it under Russia’s de facto control—was about to fail. Indeed, the timeline shows that preparations for Plan B were well underway before Yanukovych’s removal from office. All this, in turn, demonstrates that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s plans for Ukraine were far more predatory all along than merely preventing the country’s drift toward NATO, as many of Russia’s Western apologists contend.

You can call this spin but I'm going with it as more than likely what actually happened especially seeing as how Putin has operated over the last few decades.  Not to mention the famous quote of his that the fall of the Soviet Union was the worst geopolitical disaster in the history of the world.  With that mindset, his main driving force is to recreate it and he can always use the threat of NATO to rally his people to get behind his efforts toward that effect. 

With that said, going to leave this argument at that from my end.

Onto what the future holds:

More solid analysis from the ISW on what's going on in Putin's nugget.  Sure doesn't look like he wants Peace. 

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, March 6, 2025 | Institute for the Study of War

 

 

 

 

 

 

[raimius]

20 hours ago, HeloDude said:

Cool, then I’m looking forward to Ukraine defeating Russia/pushing them out of their territory (including the Crimea) with everything we have given them up until this point.

Missed the point.  I'm saying the outcome was not and is not a foregone conclusion.  It does depend on many factors.  

 

...not saying Ukraine will decisively win.

[raimius]

20 hours ago, gearhog said:

Because it's a hilariously overly simplified comparison.

For starters, we were a stronger power fighting a conflict 6-9 thousand miles from home. Russia/Ukraine are fighting a conflict 0 miles from their border.

There are thousands of other variables, (social, language, economic, ideological) that make this situation different, just as in the earlier WWII examples. It's lazy to attempt to frame this conflict as the same as any other just because you can claim there is a strong player and a weak player, one was somewhat more committed, one was somewhat less committed. Nonsense. You could say Israel cannot win against the Palestinians because they're super committed. Your rule of thumb doesn't seem to apply there, does it?

You're cherry picking a single argument. That's just one of my points in a post with several others. If you want to talk commitment, I would like for just one of you to explain to me how your individual support for Ukraine goes beyond pecking a few keys to whine about how we (collectively) are not dumping hundreds of billion$ more into this fiasco.

Sure.  Oversimplified, just like the majority of arguments here.

What would I do, as king for a day?  Sell Ukraine just about anything they want, including our old stock at a discount.  "Arsenal of Democracy."

[gearhog]

1 hour ago, raimius said:

Sure.  Oversimplified, just like the majority of arguments here.

What would I do, as king for a day?  Sell Ukraine just about anything they want, including our old stock at a discount.  "Arsenal of Democracy."

I've used the word "fantasy" multiple times in this thread to describe these completely unrealistic positions/goals.

You're explicitly telling me you're fantasizing. You're not going to be king. Nobody who thinks like you is going to be in a position to decide in favor of the things you want to happen. Some of you need to step back and consider the totality of the circumstances. You're focusing on variables that aren't going to change. Allowing oneself to dwell on pipe dreams and delusions is unhealthy.

[BashiChuni]

 

[Stoker]

On 3/6/2025 at 4:59 PM, HeloDude said:

Cool, then I’m looking forward to Ukraine defeating Russia/pushing them out of their territory (including the Crimea) with everything we have given them up until this point.

Germany in 1917 looked invincible, Germany in 1918 was retreating about as fast as they could walk and the military dictatorship handed over control to the civilians and said 'make peace, we're doomed.' We see the lines on a map, you don't see the guys on the other side making sausages out of sawdust and scraping the hospitals for new recruits.

[Clark Griswold]

Good discussion from Bronk on Carroll’s channel 

Not in full agreement with Bronk but he makes good points, mineral deal sounds like a shit burger we probably should reconsider.

[FlyingWolf]

A Brit walking through the vanilla pro-US-defense-of-Ukraine perspective was not very compelling for me.

I've still got mixed thoughts about this, but the Europeans thinking more about their own defense strikes me as a pretty big silver lining.