Russia and its “Special Operation” in Ukraine

[Mozzavfc]

Are there any estimates on what % of GDP Russia spends on defense?

I'd assume like 10-15%

[Genie]

It sounds like Russia have made a fairly significant gain over the last week or so.

[chrisp65]

Can’t be true, they’ll be completely out of money, fuel, personnel, and bombs by the middle of 2023.

I find it genuinely fascinating how ‘we’ refuse to use history as any sort of metric on how stuff could potentially play out There was an opportunity to really give that regime a proper bloody nose. Of the calibre that could potentially have lead to regime change. It was blundered. If another opportunity was to come up, I don’t doubt for a second it’s worse than fifty fifty on whether it would be blundered again.

The only thing that has come out of this is some long term Ukrainian debt to the west, an enlarged NATO, and some fat long term increased military spending promises to private companies.

Knowledge of what has happened will now be used to predict future war as if the military hawks are **** psychic gurus. But hey, at least when the next thing happens we’ll be moderately well prepared for what happened in Ukraine in 2023.

 

 

 

[Panto_Villan]

32 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Can’t be true, they’ll be completely out of money, fuel, personnel, and bombs by the middle of 2023.

I find it genuinely fascinating how ‘we’ refuse to use history as any sort of metric on how stuff could potentially play out There was an opportunity to really give that regime a proper bloody nose. Of the calibre that could potentially have lead to regime change. It was blundered. If another opportunity was to come up, I don’t doubt for a second it’s worse than fifty fifty on whether it would be blundered again.

The only thing that has come out of this is some long term Ukrainian debt to the west, an enlarged NATO, and some fat long term increased military spending promises to private companies.

Knowledge of what has happened will now be used to predict future war as if the military hawks are **** psychic gurus. But hey, at least when the next thing happens we’ll be moderately well prepared for what happened in Ukraine in 2023.

There's also the minor matter of ~80% of Ukraine remaining free of Russian occupation, no? If the West hadn't bothered getting involved then the whole country would have fallen.

[chrisp65]

3 minutes ago, Panto_Villan said:

There's also the minor matter of ~80% of Ukraine remaining free of Russian occupation, no? If the West hadn't bothered getting involved then the whole country would have fallen.

80%

That’s kind of my point.

 

[Panto_Villan]

7 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

80%

That’s kind of my point.

I'm aware of that - but it still seems bizarre to claim that protecting 80% of Ukraine is "nothing".

I think almost every pro-Ukrainian person would have snapped your arm off for the current situation if offered it before the war, even if the West has since missed an opportunity to do even better.

[sidcow]

18 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

80%

That’s kind of my point.

 

It's true 80% is basically the exact same as 0%

[chrisp65]

3 minutes ago, Panto_Villan said:

I'm aware of that - but it still seems bizarre to claim that protecting 80% of Ukraine is "nothing".

I think almost every pro-Ukrainian person would have snapped your arm off for the current situation if offered it before the war, even if the West has since missed an opportunity to do even better.

When you say before the war, do you mean before 2014, or after they lost Crimea and we had 8 years before they had another go?

[chrisp65]

4 minutes ago, sidcow said:

It's true 80% is basically the exact same as 0%

You’ve lost me there, what are you trying to say? It’s better to lose 20% of your country once every 8 years? Well, yes I guess it is, if the only other scenario was losing everything. If you want to chalk that up as a success, you go for it. I’d suggest there was another scenario, an opportunity not to settle for 80% on an 8 year cycle. 

I’m sure China will have seen that and realised we are not to be messed with. Not if they want more than 20% of Taiwan. Although I suppose if they only took 20% the first time, then 20% the second time, looking at it more positively, we’d be winning.

 

[Panto_Villan]

9 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

When you say before the war, do you mean before 2014, or after they lost Crimea and we had 8 years before they had another go?

Are you seriously suggesting we should have flooded 2014-era Ukraine with Western weapons or troops?

[chrisp65]

1 minute ago, Panto_Villan said:

Are you seriously suggesting we should have flooded 2014-era Ukraine with Western weapons or troops?

I’m asking at what point you think Russia became a threat worthy of action, but not so much of a threat as to permanently push them back to their own border, and whether that border is the 2014 one, the 2022 one, the 2024 one...

There is a significant chance Trump could be President in 6 months time. From there, it wouldn’t be wild to suggest he might stop supporting Ukraine. If those two scenarios play out, and I don’t think the odds are outlandish, where do you think our benefit has been? What have we gained? 

 

 

[magnkarl]

55 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

I’m asking at what point you think Russia became a threat worthy of action, but not so much of a threat as to permanently push them back to their own border, and whether that border is the 2014 one, the 2022 one, the 2024 one...

There is a significant chance Trump could be President in 6 months time. From there, it wouldn’t be wild to suggest he might stop supporting Ukraine. If those two scenarios play out, and I don’t think the odds are outlandish, where do you think our benefit has been? What have we gained? 

 

 

On what basis are you arguing here? That we shouldn't have supported Ukraine, or that we didn't do it soon enough?

The massive ground you think they've taken over the last few weeks is all of around 100square kms, it's not a massive amount of land in a country who's main fighting asset is to trade land for soldiers\kit. It would make absolutely no sense to hold on to the first of four lines for a nation fighting Russia when they'rel obbing 1500kg bombs at them along with 10.000 men meat-waves.

As per ISW the Russians have only secured minimal gains in previous grey zones and pretty much already been stopped.

Edited May 16 by magnkarl

[blandy]

1 hour ago, chrisp65 said:

Can’t be true, they’ll be completely out of money, fuel, personnel, and bombs by the middle of 2023.

I find it genuinely fascinating how ‘we’ refuse to use history as any sort of metric on how stuff could potentially play out There was an opportunity to really give that regime a proper bloody nose. Of the calibre that could potentially have lead to regime change. It was blundered. If another opportunity was to come up, I don’t doubt for a second it’s worse than fifty fifty on whether it would be blundered again.

The only thing that has come out of this is some long term Ukrainian debt to the west, an enlarged NATO, and some fat long term increased military spending promises to private companies.

Knowledge of what has happened will now be used to predict future war as if the military hawks are **** psychic gurus. But hey, at least when the next thing happens we’ll be moderately well prepared for what happened in Ukraine in 2023.

Hmmm. I don't share all of that take, or perspective.

"There was an opportunity to really give that regime a proper bloody nose". No, there wasn't, at least not without starting world war 3. As for regime change, there is a lesson from history - how have recent ventures into regime changing gone? It's pretty much a dreadful idea to try and replace a nation's leaders, however much we disapprove of them. Russia is a **** mafia state, in effect. various competing warlords and gangsters kept in their places and played off against each other by Putin. Remove him, and who knows what happens in a state with a eff-ton of weapons, including Nukes, and a load of people ready to sell them on to terrorists and criminals.

The long term things coming out of this also include a move away from oil and gas, efforts to repair the neglected and dilapidated state of Europe's military and defence capabilities and a move away (though not as far as we should) from London being a centre for Russian money laundering and wotnot.

[blandy]

26 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

If those two scenarios play out, and I don’t think the odds are outlandish, where do you think our benefit has been? What have we gained? 

There is nothing to gain. There never has been. Not for Russia, for Ukraine, or for "us" (whoever you thing "we" are - the west, the UK, Yurp?). 

[Panto_Villan]

8 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

I’m asking at what point you think Russia became a threat worthy of action, but not so much of a threat as to permanently push them back to their own border, and whether that border is the 2014 one, the 2022 one, the 2024 one...

There is a significant chance Trump could be President in 6 months time. From there, it wouldn’t be wild to suggest he might stop supporting Ukraine. If those two scenarios play out, and I don’t think the odds are outlandish, where do you think our benefit has been? What have we gained? 

Firstly, I don't think Ukraine will fall completely even if Trump gets elected and stops aid to Ukraine. At this point I genuinely think European forces would intervene to stop the Russians taking Odessa or Kyiv. So I think even the worst case scenario for the war as it stands now is a lot better than even the most optimistic commentators were hoping for when things kicked off for real back in 2022. Obviously this isn't an ideal outcome, but you still can't describe it as "nothing", which is what I took issue with. 

As for what it would take to push Russia back to the 2014 or 2022 border - realistically I think we've missed the boat there. The missed opportunity was shortly after the war began, when it became obvious that the Russian army was a shambles and Ukraine wasn't about to collapse. Who knows what would have happened if we'd sent them the best gear right from the start? It's possible the Ukrainians could have driven the Russians from their territory entirely. I don't think you'll find many people in this thread that disagree with that.

Using Western troops to fight Russia back to its borders isn't on the table yet. It'd be on the table if Russia attacked a NATO or EU state, or if the West sent troops to secure the western part of Ukraine and Russia attacked those troops. At present I don't think there's any political appetite for that level of bloodshed (which is probably fair). But Ukraine will be in either NATO or the EU within a year or two of the war ending, so there's not going to be a repeating cycle of Russia attacking every 8 years like you're making out.

It's also worth remembering that the Ukraine of 2014 was a totally different animal to the Ukraine of 2022. If Putin had wanted the entire country in 2014 he could easily have taken it, but he stupidly gave the Ukrainians 8 years to tool up to resist him. One of the reasons there was reluctance to send aid in 2022 was because the Ukrainians were heavily defeated in 2014, so it's difficult to look back and say we should have acted earlier - but equally, nobody is going to make that mistake again if Putin comes back for a third go, which is another reason why the war won't be a repeating cycle.

[villa89]

14 minutes ago, blandy said:

No, there wasn't, at least not without starting world war 3.

I've said this multiple times on this thread but there was never going to be a world war 3. Russia can't even take Ukraine. Had NATO entered the war on the Ukraine side Russia would have abandoned the war instantly. Nobody picks a fight they know they are going to lose, Putin isn't stupid. His threats about nuclear weapons, world war 3 blah blah blah were idle threats to stop the west supporting Ukraine properly. And its worked perfectly. The west won't even let Ukraine fire its missiles at Military targets inside Russia. What a laughable farce. 

You can talk about risking WW3 or nuclear weapons but it was never a gamble, never on the table. It would have been leadership to show that we've learned from two previous world wars to end a war before it begins. It would have shown that the combined forces of the west can put a pretend super power like Russia back in their place any time they want. However that would have taken some leadership, unity and brains, both of which are sorely lacking in modern democracies. 

Now we have China realising they can trot around the world doing whatever the hell they want and there won't be much resistance. 

Edited May 16 by villa89

[magnkarl]

As far as I gather the Baltic countries are seriously considering putting rapid reaction forces into Western Ukraine already. Essentially to secure infrastructure, hospitals and population areas and be a repellent to Russia firing missiles at those targets.

The national security advisor to the Estonian president is the latest NATO nation official to weigh into the debate over the wisdom of foreign forces in Ukraine, while a senior British officer said it's still "not a path that the [UK] Prime Minister wants to go down."

Quote

“Discussions are ongoing,” he said on May 10 at the presidential palace here. “We should be looking at all the possibilities. We shouldn’t have our minds restricted as to what we can do.” He also emphasized that it’s “not unthinkable” that NATO nations opposed to such a move would change their minds “as time goes on.”

Free up resources that Ukraine uses to block Belarussia and guard the West and that's a lot of divisions that can be used in the East.

What's sad is that it appears that it's always the smallest nations that would risk this and not the countries that would tie Russia's hands easily (US, Germany, UK). Macron has also hinted that we shouldn't put it off the table.

Edited May 16 by magnkarl

[Genie]

43 minutes ago, villa89 said:

I've said this multiple times on this thread but there was never going to be a world war 3. Russia can't even take Ukraine. Had NATO entered the war on the Ukraine side Russia would have abandoned the war instantly.

At this point it would have been all on eyes China. Fresh from signing a “no limits” pact with Russia, would they get involved, or be happy to be called bottlers deciding instead to allow some worldwide stability (with their economy the motivation)? 

I hope we don’t get to that point.

[chrisp65]

I’ll be back! Having to do some bloody work. Bloody nuisance.

[villa89]

59 minutes ago, Genie said:

At this point it would have been all on eyes China. Fresh from signing a “no limits” pact with Russia, would they get involved, 

China would have seen Russia make a hasty and embarrassing retreat. Might have kept Xi in line for a few years. There's zero chance they would have joined the war on Russia's side. You don't back a three legged horse against a field of thoroughbreds.