Politics

[Vashper]

I truly appreciate your participation. If for no other reason old soldiers need to dialogue. But you are stretching the limits of your own credibility in trying to square this circle.

Whether you wish to admit it or not, your leader is a dictator. Whether you wish to admit or not, he has made your great nation a pariah among the vast majority of the nations of the world. Whether you wish to admit it or not, he has attempted to make strategic alliance with a nation that could care less if you devolve into the middle ages. Whether you wish to admit it or not, you are attempting to rationalize the murder of the very people you claim an uniquely enlightened Russian government is trying to rescue from fascism.

I honestly feel badly for you. Loyal men and women who love their country, and have served in its armed forces, should not be put in the position to deny what their own eyes and common sense may be telling them. It just sickens me that more and more women and children, who simply wish to live under their own flag and chart their own future, will have to die at the hands of a man vainly attempting to turn back the hands of time. If those 40 million people refuse to submit, Russia will eventually lose this contest. What then becomes of your country?

Indeed, all nations have done bad things. All have made miscalculations that have cost treasure and blood. None of those mistakes justify what everyone outside of Russia is seeing on their screens every minute of every day.

Dear Red Leg, I sincerely respect you and the other participants, but let's not turn the discussion into a moral area, especially since, as a rule, it turns into a discussion on which of the participants is more immoral and who is less.
This war is not being waged out of the "whim of a mad dictator", it is a war for national interests, whether someone likes it or not. Perhaps it could have been prevented if the request for security guarantees had not been rejected from the doorstep.

Therefore, it may be interesting to you, such an episode from the past:
Recently, I accidentally stumbled upon a story relating to the summer of 1945, when the United States was deciding whether to inform the USSR (an ally) about the appearance of an atomic bomb. And at the final meeting, General Marshall spoke, and this is what he said in particular: "Marshall supported the disgraced concept of a "proactive initiative", primarily referring to personal experience. He stated that the history of claims and counter-claims, typical of Soviet-American relations, was based on accusations that, as a rule, turned out to be unfounded. What appeared to be a lack of Russian cooperation in purely military matters stemmed from their (Russian) understanding of the need to ensure their security. He, Marshall, always accepted this as a kind of reality and acted accordingly. ".

In general, Marshall suggested inviting the Russians to test the bomb, but the Truman government did not agree with this. This decision had many consequences. But I will only note that General Marshall was, it turns out, an astute and realistic person. I saw a monument to him near the base in Garmisch (I was passing by on a bicycle) and I hope that he will not suffer in the future, as monuments in different places of the world are suffering now.

 

[rdog]

I'm not sure I understand your question @rdog

Air strike ? Artillery? what destroyed the Russian artillery unit?

 

[Ray B]

USSR was the only ally I know of that imprisoned members of their allied armed forces that happened to fall into Soviet hands. Possibly why the USA didn't particularly trust USSR- with the exception of VP Wallace- who FDR had the good sense to drop.

 

[Vashper]

In an interview with Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda in 2005, former KGB Chief Vladimir Kryuchkov claimed that "the murder of Stepan Bandera was one of the last cases when the KGB disposed of undesired people by means of violence."

I have read this and several other versions, but is it possible to believe everything that a professional intelligence officer tells journalists? There is only the fact that Bandera was killed, as it was recorded by the meticulous German police, and everything else is actually covered in darkness. Moreover, was there a murder? I personally would like it to be the merit of the KGB liquidators.
Recently there was an incident in Kiev: a journalist Babchenko was killed in his house. The photos were in the press. And then it turned out that it was a dramatization of the security service, which caught the customer of the murder. So everything happens in this world.

 

[Vashper]

As for this artillery division, it is difficult to understand what it was doing there and what happened to it. Where are the corpses, why are there a lot of howitzers, but few support vehicles? Of course, in an extreme situation, these howitzers can be deployed even on the road, but there was something incomprehensible. It is unclear who they belonged to. They can be Russian. Although there are such in service with the 79th airmobile brigade, which is based in Nikolaev.

 

[Red Leg]

@Vashper The problem is - in a small world connected digitally in nearly every way - this situation has indeed become moral rather than merely power politics. That is a dangerous thing that I am not sure your president has fully appreciated in his calculus. NATO and United States may be forced to take very dangerous actions because of moral pressure exerted by the member nations' populations. These are actual "democracies" of one form or the other, and the governments of each are susceptible to the perceived will of those electorates. No citizen in any of those democracies is comfortable with what he is seeing.

I believe that your president concluded that he could cause the collapse of the Ukrainian government in the first 72 to 96 hours of this "special operation." If I am correct in that assessment, then everything that has followed has been the result of contingency planning and hasty decisions. Both democratic pressure on one side and a flailing search for operational solutions on the other can lead to very badly vetted decision making. Indeed, I wonder if any senior advisor to your President has the courage to give him an honest operational assessment.

Based on the Ukraine's rather violent rejection of Russian "salvation," I assume we can set aside Russia's claim it is acting in the interest of Ukrainians. The fact that as of this evening 1.5 million women, children, and elderly Ukrainians have fled the country rather than subject themselves to Russian liberation speaks far louder than Russian claims to the contrary. Whatever Russia believes its legitimate security concerns may be, those concerns will go unheard if Ukraine continues to resist and NATO perceives itself forced to take an ever more active role. And nothing - neither history - nor the collapse of the Soviet Union - nor the cynical protestations of your President will change that particular calculus.

What is equally worrisome but very apparent to me over the last two weeks is that the Russian armed forces can not withstand a conventional conflict with the West. Our 5th generation aircraft really are exactly that and the depth of modernization, training, and combat experience of our ground forces is far deeper than that of the Russian Army. That means your President will be forced to consider first use of nuclear weapons in the first hours of any such a conflict. Based on what we have seen so far, neither I nor you should have much confidence that he and his advisors have fully understood that outcome or fully considered the contingency plans to address that battlefield reality.

And with sincerest respect, if you or he believes that a tactical exchange can be contained or anything worthwhile will truly survive a strategic nuclear exchange, then that is truly madness.

 

[steve white]

I have been made to understand that what the Crimean, Georgian and Ukranian invasions have in common is the rise of oil prices to $100 a barrel. The spike in revenue, paid for by the west and caused at least in part by the green new deal and closing of Keystone pipeline resulting in increased gas prices is what funded the aggression in the first place. Actions to bring the price down, thus starving Russia of a lot of discretional cash would seem the best simplest route to curtailing aggression in the future. We should have learned what happens in such cases when "cash on the tarmac" to Iran resulted in funding ISIS. As long as we vote for liberal idiots and geriatrics, what better can we hope for?

 

[steve white]

@Vashper The problem is - in a small world connected digitally in nearly every way - this situation has indeed become moral rather than merely power politics. That is a dangerous thing that I am not sure your president has fully appreciated in his calculus. NATO and United States may be forced to take very dangerous actions because of moral pressure exerted by the member nations' populations. These are actual "democracies" of one form or the other, and the governments of each are susceptible to the perceived will of those electorates. No citizen in any of those democracies is comfortable with what he is seeing.

I believe that your president concluded that he could cause the collapse of the Ukrainian government in the first 72 to 96 hours of this "special operation." If I am correct in that assessment, then everything that has followed has been the result of contingency planning and hasty decisions. Both democratic pressure on one side and a flailing search for operational solutions on the other can lead to very badly vetted decision making. Indeed, I wonder if any senior advisor to your President has the courage to give him an honest operational assessment.

Based on the Ukraine's rather violent rejection of Russian "salvation," I assume we can set aside Russia's claim it is acting in the interest of Ukrainians. The fact that as of this evening 1.5 million women, children, and elderly Ukrainians have fled the country rather than subject themselves to Russian liberation speaks far louder than Russian claims to the contrary. Whatever Russia believes its legitimate security concerns may be, those concerns will go unheard if Ukraine continues to resist and NATO perceives itself forced to take an ever more active role. And nothing - neither history - nor the collapse of the Soviet Union - nor the cynical protestations of your President will change that particular calculus.

What is equally worrisome but very apparent to me over the last two weeks is that the Russian armed forces can not withstand a conventional conflict with the West. Our 5th generation aircraft really are exactly that and the depth of modernization, training, and combat experience of our ground forces is far deeper than that of the Russian Army. That means your President will be forced to consider first use of nuclear weapons in the first hours of any such a conflict. Based on what we have seen so far, neither I nor you should have much confidence that he and his advisors have fully understood that outcome or fully considered the contingency plans to address that battlefield reality.

And with sincerest respect, if you or he believes that a tactical exchange can be contained or anything worthwhile will truly survive a strategic nuclear exchange, then that is truly madness.

And yet Putin was quoted as saying, "I am not interested in a world which does not include a Russia."

 

[steve white]

I truly appreciate your participation. If for no other reason old soldiers need to dialogue. But you are stretching the limits of your own credibility in trying to square this circle.

Whether you wish to admit it or not, your leader is a dictator. Whether you wish to admit or not, he has made your great nation a pariah among the vast majority of the nations of the world. Whether you wish to admit it or not, he has attempted to make strategic alliance with a nation that could care less if you devolve into the middle ages. Whether you wish to admit it or not, you are attempting to rationalize the murder of the very people you claim an uniquely enlightened Russian government is trying to rescue from fascism.

I honestly feel badly for you. Loyal men and women who love their country, and have served in its armed forces, should not be put in the position to deny what their own eyes and common sense may be telling them. It just sickens me that more and more women and children, who simply wish to live under their own flag and chart their own future, will have to die at the hands of a man vainly attempting to turn back the hands of time. If those 40 million people refuse to submit, Russia will eventually lose this contest. What then becomes of your country?

Indeed, all nations have done bad things. All have made miscalculations that have cost treasure and blood. None of those mistakes justify what everyone outside of Russia is seeing on their screens every minute of every day.

One can hardly blame Ukranians fleeing the country--was it really that long ago that Stalin eliminated 30 million Ukrainians who did not make good communists. I don't think I would be in a hurry to forget that any time soon if I were them...

 

[spike.t]

If this is correct atrocities will get even worse ....

 

[Sabattiboy]

In an interview with Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda in 2005, former KGB Chief Vladimir Kryuchkov claimed that "the murder of Stepan Bandera was one of the last cases when the KGB disposed of undesired people by means of violence."

Who poisoned the guy in the UK with radioactive material?

 

[spike.t]

From my understanding the USA can be self sufficient in energy production, and an exporter....that was until Biden the muppet turned off the taps...so instead of what he is now reportedly planning...surely even he must realise that turning them back on is better than going cap in hand to Saudi Arabia....and Venezuela of all places.....

 

[spike.t]

Who poisoned the guy in the UK with radioactive material?

The Skripal poisonings: the bungled assassination with the Kremlin’s fingerprints all over it

The attempt to kill former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal in Salisbury ended in an accidental death and the unmasking of two members of Russia’s GRU as the suspects

www.theguardian.com

 

[Scott CWO]

Press reports are circulating that Putin is recruiting Syrian urban street fighters to go cities in Ukraine. Just goes to show that birds of a feather stick together. Two barbaric leaders.

 

[DieJager]

@Vashper you mean like this guy.
Dmitry Utkin. Military commander of the Wagner group. Putin's mercenaries.

Read this article lots of Russian nazi wannabes in it.

The Wagner Group Files

“Mercenaries,” he replied. “They commit crimes for money.” A tablet recovered from the battlefield in Libya offers detailed insights into the murky world of Russian mercenaries fighting abroad.

newlinesmag.com

Seems like you are reffering to a small bunch of right wing extremists in Ukraine paramilitary units but every countries has is share of nutjobs. But in this case it is just projection.

 

[Pondoro]

Gentlemen...the million dollar question is this:

Will the war spread into NATO territory..? Will Putin at some point consider arms help to Ukraine hostile enough to take military action against NATO states..? I think that will happen..sooner or later..

 

[hyipl]

Bad News World

Se Bad News World på Snapchat

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[CoElkHunter]

Gentlemen...the million dollar question is this:

Will the war spread into NATO territory..? Will Putin at some point consider arms help to Ukraine hostile enough to take military action against NATO states..? I think that will happen..sooner or later..

The longer Putin’s nightmare in Ukraine drags on, I believe he will become more irrational and mentally unstable and then anything can happen. I saw an interview with Ukraine’s former President Poroshenko, who was their president when Russia invaded Crimea. He stated that the Putin now is not the same person he dealt with in 2014. He claims the current Putin is mentally unstable and a War Criminal for his actions now in Ukraine.

 

[CoElkHunter]

Bad News World

Se Bad News World på Snapchat

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Finders keepers!

 

[Ray B]

Bad News World

Se Bad News World på Snapchat

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They have arms control to keep guns out of citizens hands, but now you can have a tank?

How long can it be until they get laws like that in New York City? There must be some surpluses M60 or even M48s laying around. I wonder how "stop and frisk" would work.