Russia invades Ukraine

[Firebot]

Originally Posted by Itse

Yeah, and you seem to making comments that I see as only vaguely related and arguing against something no one said.

The basic issue with drones is fairly simple: if you need to constantly use million dollar AMRAAMs to shoot down 20k drones, that's going to become a problem over time, because you're going to run out of money or missiles before the other side is going to stop sending more drones. It's not an insurmountable problem, but it's still a real issue currently.

So you choose to no longer shoot down 20K drones because its too expensive to do so, and they bomb an extra theatre, a school, a hospital.

How does that change anything for the war? They've already been doing that. Meanwhile there is a large Ukrainian army decimating the remaining Russian troops and steadily losing occupied ground.

You are missing the point.

[Agamemnon]

Originally Posted by Itse

Yeah, and you seem to making comments that I see as only vaguely related and arguing against something no one said.

The basic issue with drones is fairly simple: if you need to constantly use million dollar AMRAAMs to shoot down 20k drones, that's going to become a problem over time, because you're going to run out of money or missiles before the other side is going to stop sending more drones. It's not an insurmountable problem, but it's still a real issue currently.

What you're saying is true, but you don't seem to be drawing a conclusion to this, what does 'a problem over time' mean? Yes shooting down drones is expensive... so... pretty soon Ukraine won't be able to afford to do it? What is the natural conclusion from this $1m vs $20k fact? The war itself is costing Ukraine and its allies billions. Some millions of that is going into air-defence, this is true. Hundreds of millions more are going into equipment procurement... so... what? Say it.

edit: Going back and reading more posts... Yes, Russia's strategy is to inflict infrastructure and cost damage. Ukraine's strategy is to defeat Russia's army on the battlefield. I like Ukraine's chances of winning this conflict through their strategy.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by Firebot

So you choose to no longer shoot down 20K drones because its too expensive to do so, and they bomb an extra theatre, a school, a hospital.

How does that change anything for the war? They've already been doing that. Meanwhile there is a large Ukrainian army decimating the remaining Russian troops and steadily losing occupied ground.

You are missing the point.

You just decided to make a completely different point than the one the video was talking about or the one I was talking about.

[calumniate]

I agree with firebot that these drones won't win the war, which I think was his initial point. But they're certainly an issue. Man this conflict just gets darker and darker

[Kasi]

“While I don't want to be overly pessimistic, this video just reminds that it's very premature to suggest that the Russian military is all but beaten in Ukraine, and that a Ukrainian victory in the battlefield is all but inevitable.”

You said this and then backtracked when the point was made that them bombing Kyiv with Drones has very little to do with the actual war. The point is that these bombings have as much effect on the war as the V1/2s did in WW2. Sure it is horrible and all but it doesn’t affect the military balance at all. If anything one can argue it’s a help since they’re using imported hardware to hit civilian targets while their army is losing ground. It’s not like bombing Kyiv is going to make Ukraine surrender. Or make Ukraines allies abandon them. If anything it will harden support on both fronts.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by Agamemnon

What you're saying is true, but you don't seem to be drawing a conclusion to this, what does 'a problem over time' mean? Yes shooting down drones is expensive... so... pretty soon Ukraine won't be able to afford to do it? What is the natural conclusion from this $1m vs $20k fact? The war itself is costing Ukraine and its allies billions. Some millions of that is going into air-defence, this is true. Hundreds of millions more are going into equipment procurement... so... what? Say it.

You're imagining arguments

That's the whole point, there's nothing I'm not saying about that.

No one is saying it's some major war defining issue on it's own, and how that issue plays out depends on a ton of things. That's all I'm saying about drones, there's an issue there. Just an issue.

One overall point the video was making was that it's possible air defense does become a problem for Ukraine at some point, that they've lost a bigger portion of their air defense than Russia, that stockpiles of surface to air missiles aren't unlimited etc. But that's it. It doesn't say it will define the war, it's just a thing.

Sorry for breaking internet rules and not hyping every issue into some gamechangning world defining thing.

Overall I was just commenting that I think people have been getting carried away by recent Ukrainian successes and ignoring the numbers game of it all, assuming that a victory is all but guaranteed when Russia still mostly has the numbers on their side.

If there's a thing I'm saying it's that I think people should make less sweeping declarations about what's going to happen.

[Kasi]

https://mobile.twitter.com/TrentTele...95443211776001

Not sure if this was posted here before. But basically bearings for Russian trains used exported parts that Russia doesn’t produce. Sanctions have cut those off so they’re having to take train cars out of service. It’s somewhat crazy that a country the size of Russia has so little in manufacturing capability. They can make conventional munitions by the ton but anything overly technical seems to be beyond their capabilities.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by Kasi

https://mobile.twitter.com/TrentTele...95443211776001

Not sure if this was posted here before. But basically bearings for Russian trains used exported parts that Russia doesn’t produce. Sanctions have cut those off so they’re having to take train cars out of service. It’s somewhat crazy that a country the size of Russia has so little in manufacturing capability. They can make conventional munitions by the ton but anything overly technical seems to be beyond their capabilities.

They became lazy and relied too much on exporting low refined natural resources. Canada does the same thing. While we unlikely to face sanctions like that, we would still be screwed if we got cutoff for some reason.

[White Out 403]

https://www.politico.eu/article/zele...-leaders-meet/

Russia threatens hundreds of thousands of people by mining dam, Zelenskyy warns
Ukrainian leader says 80 settlements — including Kherson — could be hit by rapid flooding because of Russia’s planned ‘terrorist attack’

[Kasi]

It’s still a really dumb move if Russia does that because the bank most likely to heavily flood is the south bank where Russia is. And secondly a big part of this here is securing water supply for Crimea, and doing that screws Crimea over.

[kn]

One of my biggest concerns is a transition in American leadership to the Republicans and ultimately to Trump. The US has played a pivotal role and I don’t see Ukraine lasting otherwise. There was a graph posted somewhere (probably Reddit) showing the contributions of each country and the US dwarfs all other countries combined. That’s a combination of military, financial, and humanitarian assistance.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Mr.Coffee]

Originally Posted by Firebot

And let's understand. Russia has nukes. If it decided to, it can unleash thousands of nukes on Ukraine today.

But that in itself would not get Russia a win. There is no winning scenario here anymore for Russia. Their Iranian kamikaze drones isn't going to do it even if they are effective at bombing a house.

The idea that you even want to occupy territory that you have nuked to oblivion is suspect at best. What’s the goal?

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

The idea that you even want to occupy territory that you have nuked to oblivion is suspect at best. What’s the goal?

The narrative in Russia has changed from benevolently liberating Ukraine, to aggressively protecting Russia from Nazi and NATO invasion. Wiping Ukraine from the map would now satisfy the objective

Having said that, I don't think even Putin is dumb enough because of all of the consequences of using strategic Nukes, especially so close to home

[eddly]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

The narrative in Russia has changed from benevolently liberating Ukraine, to aggressively protecting Russia from Nazi and NATO invasion. Wiping Ukraine from the map would now satisfy the objective

Having said that, I don't think even Putin is dumb enough because of all of the consequences of using strategic Nukes, especially so close to home

On day 1 of the invasion they called it a peace keeping mission…

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by eddly

On day 1 of the invasion they called it a peace keeping mission…

It looked eerily like the Balkans.......

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by kn

One of my biggest concerns is a transition in American leadership to the Republicans and ultimately to Trump. The US has played a pivotal role and I don’t see Ukraine lasting otherwise. There was a graph posted somewhere (probably Reddit) showing the contributions of each country and the US dwarfs all other countries combined. That’s a combination of military, financial, and humanitarian assistance.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I was in the US this week and talked with a life-long republican and patriot. He argued that it was AMERICA's fault that Russia invaded and that Putin had EVERY RIGHT to invade Ukraine to defend himself from America's aggression.

A republican victory might be exactly what Putin is holding out for.

[blankall]

Originally Posted by CroFlames

I was in the US this week and talked with a life-long republican and patriot. He argued that it was AMERICA's fault that Russia invaded and that Putin had EVERY RIGHT to invade Ukraine to defend himself from America's aggression.

A republican victory might be exactly what Putin is holding out for.

Their narrative is that the USA manufactured the overthrow of Yanukovych and everything that's happened between Russia and Ukraine since then is the result of that coup.

Obviously the USA is going to support the overthrow of Yanukovych, given the circumstances, but the theories about USA responsibility ignore the millions of Ukrainians protesting over the fact Yanukovych did a 180 on his foreign policy following a massive payoff from Putin.

[Envitro]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

It looked eerily like the Balkans.......

Yup, we had the same #### happen in the early 90's with Serbia.

They had to "invade" Bosnia to "protect" Serbs living there, when nobody was threatening them in any way whatsoever before the JNA rolled in and started murdering Bosnians with the help of the local Serb militias.

"Greater Serbia" was always their goal, the just dressed it up nice in talking points. The same thing happened in Eastern Ukraine.

So basically the logic would be "Don't ever let any Russian speakers live in your country since Russia might want to invade it to 'protect them'"

[burn_this_city]

RFK’s grandson fought in the foreign legion.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1583407231566942208

[burn_this_city]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1584202556124774400