The Invasion of Ukraine

[Martin_B]

For f.ck's sake, America, you are a nuclear power, you alone have a military that could wipe the floor with Russia in a conventional war, and are part of a major defensive alliance. Stop tiptoeing around Putin and holding aid back from Ukraine while his army and airforce butcher civilians.

Does the US have a military which could wipe the floor with Russia? The US likes to sit back and use aerial bombardment to demoralise their opposition, but there aren't the targets for that sort of bombardment here (using smart missiles to take out individual tanks seems like overkill). As seen in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US military on the ground aren't particularly special; they can get bogged down by guerilla tactics like any army.

Also, if the US (or NATO) enters the war directly that could escalate the war significantly, and Putin doesn't seem averse to putting nuclear options on the board (or is very good at bluffing that he might).

[Woodchopper]

For f.ck's sake, America, you are a nuclear power, you alone have a military that could wipe the floor with Russia in a conventional war, and are part of a major defensive alliance. Stop tiptoeing around Putin and holding aid back from Ukraine while his army and airforce butcher civilians.

I assume you refer to their concern about the prospect of US controlled ex-Polish fighter planes flying from a US airbase in Germany to be delivered to Ukraine.

If so, I assume that the US or other NATO members are worried that it might cross the escalation threshold. I don't have a problem with that as if the war were to escalate far more civilians will be killed. The US may find a way to make the transfer (perhaps via a neutral country and over the Black Sea). But I'm ok with them being cautious.

[EACLucifer]

For f.ck's sake, America, you are a nuclear power, you alone have a military that could wipe the floor with Russia in a conventional war, and are part of a major defensive alliance. Stop tiptoeing around Putin and holding aid back from Ukraine while his army and airforce butcher civilians.

I assume you refer to their concern about the prospect of US controlled ex-Polish fighter planes flying from a US airbase in Germany to be delivered to Ukraine.

If so, I assume that the US or other NATO members are worried that it might cross the escalation threshold. I don't have a problem with that as if the war were to escalate far more civilians will be killed. The US may find a way to make the transfer (perhaps via a neutral country and over the Black Sea). But I'm ok with them being cautious.

And how well has letting Putin do what he wants and timidly backing down every time he postures gone to date? Supplying arms to Ukraine does come with risks. Not supplying arms to Ukraine has enormous risks. Russia is either defeated in Ukraine one way or another, or they'll do this sh.t again. The reason we are here is because Putin got away with it to date.

[lpm]

Putin has lost in Ukraine.

There's no pathway to a win because he defined win as "install puppet government that ceases hostilities and crushes its own dissenters and insurgents".

He failed to define secondary wins or fall back positions.

He is left with no exits. There's only long grinding war killing civilians and his soldiers. While sanctions corrode his homeland.

The only sensible outcome for Putin is negotiation, get given Crimea and retreat in return for some lifting of sanctions.

[EACLucifer]

For f.ck's sake, America, you are a nuclear power, you alone have a military that could wipe the floor with Russia in a conventional war, and are part of a major defensive alliance. Stop tiptoeing around Putin and holding aid back from Ukraine while his army and airforce butcher civilians.

Does the US have a military which could wipe the floor with Russia? The US likes to sit back and use aerial bombardment to demoralise their opposition, but there aren't the targets for that sort of bombardment here (using smart missiles to take out individual tanks seems like overkill). As seen in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US military on the ground aren't particularly special; they can get bogged down by guerilla tactics like any army.

Using smart missiles to take out individual tanks is exactly what NATO is able to do, due to the sheer quantity of guided weapons they can deploy, including ones specifically designed for taking out columns of tanks/other vehicles, like the RAF's Brimstone missile.

NATO pilots are also much better trained and are equipped with better aircraft and better weapons. Though not a member of NATO, Israel has demonstrated that an airforce equipped with F16s and F15s can run rings around the kind of AA system used by Russia.

Also, if the US (or NATO) enters the war directly that could escalate the war significantly, and Putin doesn't seem averse to putting nuclear options on the board (or is very good at bluffing that he might).

The issue here isn't that NATO is going to enter the war, it's that if Putin were to escalate in conventional warfare, he would lose. If he were to escalate to nuclear warfare, he'd lose, but so would everybody else. It's easy to think of Putin as irrational, but he's not. Evil, yes, but he's been making rational decisions based on the observable results of similar decisions. He invaded Ukraine because every time he's invaded or attacked before, he's got away with it, and the west has tiptoed around his belligerence, he miscalculated how well Ukraine would resist, but he did it not because he's mad, but because history gave him reason to believe he could get away with it.

Western militaries fought directly with Soviet pilots over Korea and Vietnam during the height of the cold war, and it did not lead to world war three. In the last decade, Turkey shot down a Russian Sukhoi and the US utterly annihalated a formation of Putin's Wagner Group at Khasham.

Ukraine needs aircraft that can fight against the Russian invasion of their country, and it seems Poland was willing to transfer some suitable aircraft, ones that Ukrainian pilots know how to fly, and Ukrainian ground crews know how to maintain, so long as the US facilitated the handover, and the US isn't handing them over. Appeasing Putin is why we are in this mess in the first place.

[jimbob]

There is also the question of whether it's inevitable that NATO would have to fight Russia

Not just my view

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl ... ml?r=91822

[lpm]

Nato can do pretty much anything.

Which means you need to say what limits you would impose on Nato, EACL.

- supply of armaments to Ukraine's military?
- air attacks on Russian columns?
- air-to-air combat?
- air attacks on Black Sea fleet?
- naval power in Black Sea?
- special forces ops on the ground?
- air attacks on airbases inside Russia?
- Nato tanks move in from Poland?
- land combat?

It would be straightforward to drive Putin's troops from Ukraine, leaving behind a lot of burning armour and planes, but what then? How are you defining a win?

Is a win really an enraged Russia that's lost a chunk of conventional military and has a population hating the west for killing their soldiers? Is a win really a humiliated Putin who has wrecked his country and is paranoid of his own bodyguard and believes the integrity of Russia is now threatened by a Nato invasion?

[El Pollo Diablo]

Depends on your point of view. I'm looking at a win as being the extermination of humanity.

[EACLucifer]

Nato can do pretty much anything.

Which means you need to say what limits you would impose on Nato, EACL.

- supply of armaments to Ukraine's military?
- air attacks on Russian columns?
- air-to-air combat?
- air attacks on Black Sea fleet?
- naval power in Black Sea?
- special forces ops on the ground?
- air attacks on airbases inside Russia?
- Nato tanks move in from Poland?
- land combat?

It would be straightforward to drive Putin's troops from Ukraine, leaving behind a lot of burning armour and planes, but what then? How are you defining a win?

Is a win really an enraged Russia that's lost a chunk of conventional military and has a population hating the west for killing their soldiers? Is a win really a humiliated Putin who has wrecked his country and is paranoid of his own bodyguard and believes the integrity of Russia is now threatened by a Nato invasion?

These are legit concerns, which is why, at the moment, I'm advocating for option one, but option one to be done properly.

[Stranger Mouse]

Depends on your point of view. I'm looking at a win as being the extermination of humanity.

Could be your lucky day

[lpm]

There's several variants of option 1

- very quiet delivery of mysterious crates by land, the crates full of arms and aircraft parts
- open delivery of arms and aircraft parts
- dismantling MIG-29s and quietly shipping the parts in and Ukraine reassembling them
- inviting Ukraine pilots to a Nato airbase to collect MIGs and fly home

It seems to me pretty straightforward to quietly deliver to Ukraine as much armaments as they want. Maybe hard for Ukraine to then distribute from Lviv to the front line but that's the challenge for any military.

My instinct is that in 2032 we'll see that there was a big advantage to quietly supplying arms rather than blatantly getting involved. Myth building in Ukraine, reduced hatred of the west in Russia. Ultimately our goal is to make Russia want to join us as a friend and ally.

[EACLucifer]

There is also the question of whether it's inevitable that NATO would have to fight Russia

Not just my view

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl ... ml?r=91822

This is basically it. Everyone is saying how bad it would be for NATO to fight Russia, but if Russia isn't stopped sooner or later, it will happen anyway. Avoiding provoking Putin or giving him a pretext is pointless - he engages in unprovoked aggression and fabricates pretexts.

Throughout the thirties people knew it would be bad to go to war with Germany, so they let potential allies fall one by one, alone. That was a mistake. It would just as much of a mistake to let Putin take Ukraine, Moldova and Bosnia, only to find he's after NATO members next.

[EACLucifer]

There's several variants of option 1

- very quiet delivery of mysterious crates by land, the crates full of arms and aircraft parts
- open delivery of arms and aircraft parts
- dismantling MIG-29s and quietly shipping the parts in and Ukraine reassembling them
- inviting Ukraine pilots to a Nato airbase to collect MIGs and fly home

It seems to me pretty straightforward to quietly deliver to Ukraine as much armaments as they want. Maybe hard for Ukraine to then distribute from Lviv to the front line but that's the challenge for any military.

My instinct is that in 2032 we'll see that there was a big advantage to quietly supplying arms rather than blatantly getting involved. Myth building in Ukraine, reduced hatred of the west in Russia. Ultimately our goal is to make Russia want to join us as a friend and ally.

Our ultimate goal should be to break Russia into pieces, with fredom for Tatarstan and all the other peoples subject to Russian oppression.

ETA: I'd settle for a Russian federation where revanchism is no longer state policy, and where ethnic minorities and LGBT people have equality.

[lpm]

Let's hope to god Liz Truss doesn't say the first bit out loud.

I suspect the second bit is more in reach now, than it was a couple of months ago. A long and nasty journey to get there though.

[WFJ]

Our ultimate goal should be to break Russia into pieces, with fredom for Tatarstan and all the other peoples subject to Russian oppression.

ETA: I'd settle for a Russian federation where revanchism is no longer state policy, and where ethnic minorities and LGBT people have equality.

Which would be f.cking crazy military objectives. So it's a good job you're just an internet warrior sat at home and nowhere near the helm of US/Nato policy making.

[EACLucifer]

Our ultimate goal should be to break Russia into pieces, with fredom for Tatarstan and all the other peoples subject to Russian oppression.

ETA: I'd settle for a Russian federation where revanchism is no longer state policy, and where ethnic minorities and LGBT people have equality.

Which would be f.cking crazy military objectives. So it's a good job you're just an internet warrior sat at home and nowhere near the helm of US/Nato policy making.

It didn't say they were military objectives, I'm just talking about what a desirable end result would be, in response to the idea that we could make Russia into a friend and ally - because we tried that after the cold war, turning a blind eye to things like Russia ongoing occupation of eastern Moldova, and it did not go well.

To be utterly clear for the idiots in the room (ie you) this is not something that should be a military objective. The military objectives right now should be twofold; getting Russia out of Ukraine and stopping Russia from repeating this sort of thing in the future.

[EACLucifer]

Let's hope to god Liz Truss doesn't say the first bit out loud.

Indeed. The goal needs to be to get Russia to back down sooner rather than later due to the appalling ongoing effects of their invasion, and giving them a rallying cause doesn't help at all with that.

I suspect the second bit is more in reach now, than it was a couple of months ago. A long and nasty journey to get there though.

There are no good roads forward at all. Even if things do get better, it's going to be very painful to get there. Decision making has to bear this in mind. Before ruling methods out because they could go bad, decision makers really need to be very clear about how things could go bad if those methods are not used, too.

[lpm]

Our ultimate goal should be to break Russia into pieces, with fredom for Tatarstan and all the other peoples subject to Russian oppression.

ETA: I'd settle for a Russian federation where revanchism is no longer state policy, and where ethnic minorities and LGBT people have equality.

Which would be f.cking crazy military objectives. So it's a good job you're just an internet warrior sat at home and nowhere near the helm of US/Nato policy making.

It didn't say they were military objectives, I'm just talking about what a desirable end result would be, in response to the idea that we could make Russia into a friend and ally - because we tried that after the cold war, turning a blind eye to things like Russia ongoing occupation of eastern Moldova, and it did not go well.

To be utterly clear for the idiots in the room (ie you) this is not something that should be a military objective. The military objectives right now should be twofold; getting Russia out of Ukraine and stopping Russia from repeating this sort of thing in the future.

Long term geopolitical objectives should inform short term military objectives.

In 1943-45 there were those conferences, with Stalin and Roosevelt meeting in Tehran to work out how the post war map would look, drawing the borders of Poland etc. That then led to military objectives, most importantly of course being D-Day. It became clear in 1945 that the USSR would race ahead, with the Battle of the Bulge stalling the USA in the west, and again that led to military decisions, including the nukes on Japan when the USSR was turning its attention to that sphere after VE day.

In this instance we don't want another cold war for 45 years. This could easily happen with Russia isolated and hunkered down, but waving nuclear missiles and continually threatening Finland or Moldova or Poland. We need to think about the post-Putin age.

Surely what we want in 2050 is a westward leaning Russia, with McDonalds and air travel and banks integrated into the whole. That goal doesn't line up with the other goal of getting the Russians out of Ukraine as fast as possible. But it does line up with the goal of stopping Russia from repeating this sort of thing in the future.

Awful to say it, but a long bleeding of Russian soldiers and arms in Ukraine makes other neighbours safer for longer, while avoiding direct humiliation of Putin or a patriotic cause for Russians to unite behind. Your enemy getting trapped in a stalemate is better than your enemy losing in a short sharp shock and then swiftly rebuilding to get vengeance.

This isn't going to end fast anyway. Best case is that only eastern cities like Kharkiv get razed and not other cities further west.

[WFJ]

It didn't say they were military objectives, I'm just talking about what a desirable end result would be, in response to the idea that we could make Russia into a friend and ally - because we tried that after the cold war, turning a blind eye to things like Russia ongoing occupation of eastern Moldova, and it did not go well.

To be utterly clear for the idiots in the room (ie you) this is not something that should be a military objective. The military objectives right now should be twofold; getting Russia out of Ukraine and stopping Russia from repeating this sort of thing in the future.

Strong-arm tactics against Russia can only fail. Putin is not a one-man megalomaniac dictator. He has strong popular support in Russia. Expansion of the Russian sphere of influence, and the treatment of minorities are not ideals imposed top-down. The defeat of Russia in Ukraine does nothing do stop these policies and the more Nato can be framed as an aggressor the worse things will be long term.

[EACLucifer]

It didn't say they were military objectives, I'm just talking about what a desirable end result would be, in response to the idea that we could make Russia into a friend and ally - because we tried that after the cold war, turning a blind eye to things like Russia ongoing occupation of eastern Moldova, and it did not go well.

To be utterly clear for the idiots in the room (ie you) this is not something that should be a military objective. The military objectives right now should be twofold; getting Russia out of Ukraine and stopping Russia from repeating this sort of thing in the future.

Strong-arm tactics against Russia can only fail. Putin is not a one-man megalomaniac dictator. He has strong popular support in Russia. Expansion of the Russian sphere of influence, and the treatment of minorities are not ideals imposed top-down. The defeat of Russia in Ukraine does nothing do stop these policies and the more Nato can be framed as an aggressor the worse things will be long term.

Putin's strength comes from the "at least he saved us from the nineties" belief - that's not something that will last under the kind of sanctions Russia is under. As for "strong arm tactics", I was talking about supplying Ukraine with a few dozen surplus jet fighters, so that they can win this war themselves, or is arming the people of Ukraine to defend themselves against this invasion too "strong-arm" to be applied to Putin?

Dictators don't always do very well at holding power when they lose wars. As for the endemic nature of Russian imperialism and revanchism, I agree - but one reason such views are held and tolerated is because they don't understand the cost of them. When the Soviet Union finally imploded, there was a surge of enthusiasm for independence from Russia, and I'm not just talking about those countries that succeeded in leaving. For example, the Tatarstan referendum of 1992 saw 82% turnout and an almost 25 point margin for independence. The west tolerated Yeltsin's denial of Tatarstani freedom, just as they accepted his violence towards Moldova and Georgia.

We are in the position we are in because for decades people appeased Moscow's revanchism, under Yeltsin as well as under Putin. The west tacitly rewarded Russian belligerence and imperialism with diplomatic reset buttons and new gas pipelines, enabling the kleptocracy.

[WFJ]

Putin's strength comes from the "at least he saved us from the nineties" belief - that's not something that will last under the kind of sanctions Russia is under. As for "strong arm tactics", I was talking about supplying Ukraine with a few dozen surplus jet fighters, so that they can win this war themselves, or is arming the people of Ukraine to defend themselves against this invasion too "strong-arm" to be applied to Putin?

It was your call for Nato involvement, comparisons to 30s appeasement and aims for breaking up the Russian federation that I was questioning. Giving the planes to Ukraine makes sense. Although it would be better if not done via the US, I can understand Poland's reluctance to send them directly.

A rapid loss in Ukraine will do nothing to affect Putin's popularity. And if Nato is more directly involved in it, it can only have the opposite effect.

[EACLucifer]

Putin's strength comes from the "at least he saved us from the nineties" belief - that's not something that will last under the kind of sanctions Russia is under. As for "strong arm tactics", I was talking about supplying Ukraine with a few dozen surplus jet fighters, so that they can win this war themselves, or is arming the people of Ukraine to defend themselves against this invasion too "strong-arm" to be applied to Putin?

It was your call for Nato involvement, comparisons to 30s appeasement and aims for breaking up the Russian federation that I was questioning. Giving the planes to Ukraine makes sense. Although it would be better if not done via the US, I can understand Poland's reluctance to send them directly.

I wasn't calling for NATO involvement, I was explaining that NATO's ability to win a conventional war with Russia would be a deterrent to Russia using conventional arms to retaliate against NATO countries providing fighter jets to Ukraine.

There are arguments for some level of direct NATO involvement, but I was not making them.

A rapid loss in Ukraine will do nothing to affect Putin's popularity. And if Nato is more directly involved in it, it can only have the opposite effect.

This is where I profoundly disagree. Strongmen look awfully weak when they lose, and civil unrest often follows defeats - eg Galtieri's fall after his Falklands misadventure, and the Russian revolutions of 1905 and 1917 both followed military catastrophe.

[jimbob]

Putin's strength comes from the "at least he saved us from the nineties" belief - that's not something that will last under the kind of sanctions Russia is under. As for "strong arm tactics", I was talking about supplying Ukraine with a few dozen surplus jet fighters, so that they can win this war themselves, or is arming the people of Ukraine to defend themselves against this invasion too "strong-arm" to be applied to Putin?

It was your call for Nato involvement, comparisons to 30s appeasement and aims for breaking up the Russian federation that I was questioning. Giving the planes to Ukraine makes sense. Although it would be better if not done via the US, I can understand Poland's reluctance to send them directly.

A rapid loss in Ukraine will do nothing to affect Putin's popularity. And if Nato is more directly involved in it, it can only have the opposite effect.

It is too late now to give Ukrainian pilots aircraft they're unfamiliar with. Polish ex-Soviet aircraft would be familiar.

And Poland would need to not deplete its own aircraft as these would (obviously) no longer be available to Poland, which, if not replaced, would be a defence cut.

[EACLucifer]

Putin's strength comes from the "at least he saved us from the nineties" belief - that's not something that will last under the kind of sanctions Russia is under. As for "strong arm tactics", I was talking about supplying Ukraine with a few dozen surplus jet fighters, so that they can win this war themselves, or is arming the people of Ukraine to defend themselves against this invasion too "strong-arm" to be applied to Putin?

It was your call for Nato involvement, comparisons to 30s appeasement and aims for breaking up the Russian federation that I was questioning. Giving the planes to Ukraine makes sense. Although it would be better if not done via the US, I can understand Poland's reluctance to send them directly.

A rapid loss in Ukraine will do nothing to affect Putin's popularity. And if Nato is more directly involved in it, it can only have the opposite effect.

It is too late now to give Ukrainian pilots aircraft they're unfamiliar with. Polish ex-Soviet aircraft would be familiar.

And Poland would need to not deplete its own aircraft as these would (obviously) no longer be available to Poland, which, if not replaced, would be a defence cut.

Poland operates F16s, which the US can supply to make up for Mig-29s, and Mig-29s are already in service in Ukraine. There's also a few other countries with former Warsaw Pact jets, including Su-25 ground attack jets as well.

ETA: On re-reading, I'm pretty sure I just restated what you said.

[WFJ]

A rapid loss in Ukraine will do nothing to affect Putin's popularity. And if Nato is more directly involved in it, it can only have the opposite effect.

This is where I profoundly disagree. Strongmen look awfully weak when they lose, and civil unrest often follows defeats - eg Galtieri's fall after his Falklands misadventure, and the Russian revolutions of 1905 and 1917 both followed military catastrophe.

Then you fundamentally misunderstand Putin's popularity in Russia. He is neither a monarch nor the head of a military junta. Trump/Johnson/Modi/Bolsanaro would be a better comparisons. Only a much more popular version with almost total control of the press and judiciary. A loss that can be framed as being blamed on malign outside influences only strengthens him.