Ukraine conflict
03-26-2024, 06:48 PM
#2671
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Apr 2011
Posts: 1,479
Originally Posted by Lowslung
It’s an interesting playbook some here are using:
1. Insist our ally is flawed & not worth saving (usually a politically motivated position). State (incorrectly) that they are bound to lose.
2. Actively advocate for policies that will hamstring the ally and make your original assertions magically come “true”.
3. Sit back and say “told you so” to the people you think are dumb enough not to have seen through your ploy.
🤦♂️
1. Insist our ally is flawed & not worth saving (usually a politically motivated position). State (incorrectly) that they are bound to lose.
2. Actively advocate for policies that will hamstring the ally and make your original assertions magically come “true”.
3. Sit back and say “told you so” to the people you think are dumb enough not to have seen through your ploy.
🤦♂️
03-27-2024, 06:49 AM
#2672
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Apr 2011
Posts: 1,479
Originally Posted by Lowslung
1. Insist our ally is flawed & not worth saving (usually a politically motivated position). State (incorrectly) that they are bound to lose.
Originally Posted by Lowslung
2. Actively advocate for policies that will hamstring the ally and make your original assertions magically come “true”.
Ukraine’s border remains blasted west. Likely to stay that way for a while even as reinforcement units burn. Mostly because zealots prepared to pay that price aren’t those summarily roundup & sent. Bus of the dead now departing, all aboard.
Originally Posted by Lowslung
3. Sit back and say “told you so” to the people you think are dumb enough not to have seen through your ploy.
I told you so refrains are poison to any aspirations of joining club star. War machines answer to yes men. Luv or loathe him, ex is a relentless no guy.
03-27-2024, 07:03 AM
#2673
Gets Weekends Off
Thread Starter
Joined APC: Jun 2022
Posts: 1,268
Originally Posted by METO Guido
All people are flawed. Who isn’t worth saving? Assert only this; ends don’t necessarily justify means. A hand with 4 fingers beats a hook.
Ukraine’s border remains blasted west. Likely to stay that way for a while even as reinforcement units burn. Mostly because zealots prepared to pay that price aren’t those summarily roundup & sent. Bus of the dead now departing, all aboard.
I told you so refrains are poison to any aspirations of joining club star. War machines answer to yes men. Luv or loathe him, ex is a relentless no guy.
Ukraine’s border remains blasted west. Likely to stay that way for a while even as reinforcement units burn. Mostly because zealots prepared to pay that price aren’t those summarily roundup & sent. Bus of the dead now departing, all aboard.
I told you so refrains are poison to any aspirations of joining club star. War machines answer to yes men. Luv or loathe him, ex is a relentless no guy.
fact: they were holding
fact: they dont have enough ammo to hold now
blame it on the EU or not, it was our GOP in the drivers seat. I fully believe that if we had stayed the course, russia would be ready to negotiate. Less loss of life, reduced EU turmoil, etc…Now they have the bit between their teeth as the west flounders along.
you have to give props to the RU cyber warfare propaganda folks. They really nailed it preying on our weak folks.
03-27-2024, 07:20 AM
#2674
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Apr 2011
Posts: 1,479
Originally Posted by Hubcapped
in ukraines prime moment of need we pulled the plug because of politics. You explain away lows point as if it didn’t happen, when we all saw it unfold right here via proxy mouthpiece fear porn consumed right wing boomers.
fact: they were holding
fact: they dont have enough ammo to hold now
blame it on the EU or not, it was our GOP in the drivers seat. I fully believe that if we had stayed the course, russia would be ready to negotiate. Less loss of life, reduced EU turmoil, etc…Now they have the bit between their teeth as the west flounders along.
you have to give props to the RU cyber warfare propaganda folks. They really nailed it preying on our weak folks.
fact: they were holding
fact: they dont have enough ammo to hold now
blame it on the EU or not, it was our GOP in the drivers seat. I fully believe that if we had stayed the course, russia would be ready to negotiate. Less loss of life, reduced EU turmoil, etc…Now they have the bit between their teeth as the west flounders along.
you have to give props to the RU cyber warfare propaganda folks. They really nailed it preying on our weak folks.
Is there only one tool in your box?
03-27-2024, 04:48 PM
#2675
Perennial Reserve
Joined APC: Jan 2018
Posts: 11,503
Originally Posted by Hubcapped
in ukraines prime moment of need we pulled the plug because of politics. You explain away lows point as if it didn’t happen, when we all saw it unfold right here via proxy mouthpiece fear porn consumed right wing boomers.
fact: they were holding
fact: they dont have enough ammo to hold now
blame it on the EU or not, it was our GOP in the drivers seat. I fully believe that if we had stayed the course, russia would be ready to negotiate. Less loss of life, reduced EU turmoil, etc…Now they have the bit between their teeth as the west flounders along.
you have to give props to the RU cyber warfare propaganda folks. They really nailed it preying on our weak folks.
fact: they were holding
fact: they dont have enough ammo to hold now
blame it on the EU or not, it was our GOP in the drivers seat. I fully believe that if we had stayed the course, russia would be ready to negotiate. Less loss of life, reduced EU turmoil, etc…Now they have the bit between their teeth as the west flounders along.
you have to give props to the RU cyber warfare propaganda folks. They really nailed it preying on our weak folks.
GMAFB.
Their commander announced three months ago they needed more soldiers.
https://www.aol.com/ukraines-top-gen...143712761.html
They CANNED him - their military commander and most popular General - because he said they needed more personnel conscripted. That was SEVEN WEEKS AGO.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/08/europ...tl/index.html#
The bill to extend their draft all the way down to 25 year olds from the current 27 year minimum age passed first reading SEVEN WEEKS AGO.
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe...f%20the%20bill
The Ukrainian parliament subsequently bogged it down with 4195 amendments.
https://www.kyivpost.com/post/29441
Despite the fact that the average age of Ukraine soldiers is 43, they again are rejecting conscription for those 18-25, and are still working on 700 amendments.
https://ukranews.com/en/news/994810-...-aged-up-to-25
Now soldiers are a long lead time item. Basic Infantry training in the US takes 10 weeks. That just qualifies you to learn to be a soldier. Advanced individual training - depending on the MOS - takes anywhere from 3 weeks to two years. But the process can't even start until the bill is passed, signed into law, and the changes instituted at the induction stations and nobody even seems to know when a vote is going to be held on the bill or what is going to happen to the remaining amendments that have yet to be considered AFTER THEY HAVE ALREADY F@RTED around for three months since their senior general said this was a critical issue and are now two years into the war, ten years if you date it to the loss of the Crimea.
Yet Hub says this all the GOPs fault. Go figure.
03-28-2024, 12:33 PM
#2676
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Oct 2009
Posts: 741
From website for Institute for the Study of War.
A lengthy article from 27 March, 2024 titled:
"Denying Russia's Only Strategy for Success"
by
Nataliya Bugayova and Frederick W. Kagan with Kateryna Stepanenko.
Insightful. It is lengthy and covers a lot of ground. It starts with highlighting Russia's strategy of shaping perceptions and hence conclusions. Every aspect of the success of this Russian strategy is on display on this message board almost everyday.
One of the best reads I have come across in the last few years in explantion and description of Russia's methods of warfare dating from at least 2014.
As I mentioned, it is a lengthy read.
A lengthy article from 27 March, 2024 titled:
"Denying Russia's Only Strategy for Success"
by
Nataliya Bugayova and Frederick W. Kagan with Kateryna Stepanenko.
Insightful. It is lengthy and covers a lot of ground. It starts with highlighting Russia's strategy of shaping perceptions and hence conclusions. Every aspect of the success of this Russian strategy is on display on this message board almost everyday.
One of the best reads I have come across in the last few years in explantion and description of Russia's methods of warfare dating from at least 2014.
As I mentioned, it is a lengthy read.
03-28-2024, 02:23 PM
#2677
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Apr 2011
Posts: 1,479
The West has the advantage, but it must decide to use it. The West is a giant that – at times – behaves like a mouse when it comes to Russia. All it needs to do is stand up. That is why Russia needs to develop offsets and ways to fight asymmetrically. The power dynamic favors the West — and Ukraine, if the West decides to mobilize on behalf of Ukraine. Mobilizing would mean surging its military production, sparing more of its existing military capabilities and economic assets, and accepting a higher threshold for pain and risk now to avoid more cost and pain and risk in the future.
03-28-2024, 06:38 PM
#2678
In a land of unicorns
Joined APC: Apr 2014
Position: Whale FO
Posts: 6,469
From the ISW opinion piece:
Their strategy clearly is working on ExCargo.
Russia cannot defeat Ukraine or the West - and will likely lose - if the West mobilizes its resources to resist the Kremlin. The West’s existing and latent capability dwarfs that of Russia. The combined gross domestic product (GDP) of NATO countries, non-NATO European Union states, and our Asian allies is over $63 trillion.[1] The Russian GDP is on the close order of $1.9 trillion.[2] Iran and North Korea add little in terms of materiel support. China is enabling Russia, but it is not mobilized on behalf of Russia and is unlikely to do so.[3] If we lean in and surge, Russia loses.
The notion that the war is unwinnable because of Russia’s dominance is a Russian information operation, which gives us a glimpse of the Kremlin’s real strategy and only real hope of success. The Kremlin must get the United States to the sidelines, allowing Russia to fight Ukraine in isolation and then proceed to Moscow’s next targets, which Russia will also seek to isolate. The Kremlin needs the United States to choose inaction and embrace the false inevitability that Russia will prevail in Ukraine. Vladimir Putin’s center of gravity is his ability to shape the will and decisions of the West, Ukraine, and Russia itself. The Russian strategy that matters most, therefore, is not Moscow’s warfighting strategy, but rather the Kremlin’s strategy to cause us to see the world as it wishes us to see it and make decisions in that Kremlin-generated alternative reality that will allow Russia to win in the real world.
The notion that the war is unwinnable because of Russia’s dominance is a Russian information operation, which gives us a glimpse of the Kremlin’s real strategy and only real hope of success. The Kremlin must get the United States to the sidelines, allowing Russia to fight Ukraine in isolation and then proceed to Moscow’s next targets, which Russia will also seek to isolate. The Kremlin needs the United States to choose inaction and embrace the false inevitability that Russia will prevail in Ukraine. Vladimir Putin’s center of gravity is his ability to shape the will and decisions of the West, Ukraine, and Russia itself. The Russian strategy that matters most, therefore, is not Moscow’s warfighting strategy, but rather the Kremlin’s strategy to cause us to see the world as it wishes us to see it and make decisions in that Kremlin-generated alternative reality that will allow Russia to win in the real world.
Their strategy clearly is working on ExCargo.
03-28-2024, 07:22 PM
#2679
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Apr 2011
Posts: 1,479
Originally Posted by dera
From the ISW opinion piece:
Their strategy clearly is working on ExCargo.
Their strategy clearly is working on ExCargo.
03-29-2024, 02:28 AM
#2680
In a land of unicorns
Joined APC: Apr 2014
Position: Whale FO
Posts: 6,469
Originally Posted by METO Guido
Ex is a soldier. Or a conduit for some depending on your bias. Focus on the what before the who. Wars are waged for property rights. Principles run up and down with the yard marker like a cheer squad. No one ever heard of ISW much less gas what they think. Does the turf clawed out of Ukraine really matter to some unlucky dude from Honduras working midnights on a bridge in Baltimore? Probably not.
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