Russia and its “Special Operation” in Ukraine

[tinker]

On 04/04/2024 at 12:48, magnkarl said:

I don't disagree. It just brings us back to the UN being broken. Too many 'big' powers have a veto, and if the US, China or Russia wants to they'll invade whoever they please and veto anything in the UN. The only thing stopping that is deterrence.

The only thing that made the cold war the most peaceful period in history is the fact that both sides knew that they'd wipe each other out if they tried. It's time to get back the mentality of showing Russia\China\Iran\North Korea that we'll whoop their asses purely due to our democratic industrial output and technology. When Russia hopefully loses this war there might be a chance to reconfigure the UN, because as it is now it's used by blocks of countries to vote for at times quite bonkers ideas, you know like Russia or China accusing Ukraine of attacking civilians when one has invaded a sovereign nation for no reason and the other is essentially genociding a whole minority (Uighurs).

That may work with Russia and North Korea but it won't work with China,  they are at least the USA's match with industrial output and not far behind with tech. Plus they have a huge population that are willing to run into a burning building if told to, not much political dissent to a war from them. 

The UN stops the nuclear armed nations from fighting and that's its undoubted benefit, any weapons race with nukes at its centre is a very dangerous world to live in as anyone who lived in the 80's will testify, it was dreadful. 

[magnkarl]

13 hours ago, tinker said:

That may work with Russia and North Korea but it won't work with China,  they are at least the USA's match with industrial output and not far behind with tech. Plus they have a huge population that are willing to run into a burning building if told to, not much political dissent to a war from them. 

The UN stops the nuclear armed nations from fighting and that's its undoubted benefit, any weapons race with nukes at its centre is a very dangerous world to live in as anyone who lived in the 80's will testify, it was dreadful. 

China really doesn’t match NATO and the US though, and they’ve got several demographic crises on their hands. They’re also extremely dependent on trade with US/Western allies.

Compared to Russia, China’s economy is extremely brittle.

[tinker]

3 hours ago, magnkarl said:

China really doesn’t match NATO and the US though, and they’ve got several demographic crises on their hands. They’re also extremely dependent on trade with US/Western allies.

Compared to Russia, China’s economy is extremely brittle.

Surprised about China being more brittle than Russia but I guess that's down to Russia's raw materials,  oil, gas etc. 

[villa89]

4 hours ago, tinker said:

Surprised about China being more brittle than Russia but I guess that's down to Russia's raw materials,  oil, gas etc. 

Isn't 25% of the Chinese economy their construction sector? Also the one child policy will lead to disaster. 

[LondonLax]

12 hours ago, villa89 said:

Isn't 25% of the Chinese economy their construction sector? Also the one child policy will lead to disaster. 

They got rid of the one child policy a decade ago but it hasn’t really changed anything. Just like South Korea or Japan (or indeed many western countries) birth rates are below replacement levels. 

[Panto_Villan]

Yes, China's economy is more brittle than Russia's in the sense it's a very resource-poor country and is an advanced globalised economy that is more hooked into external supply chains. They've also got serious demographic problems; a very low birth rate and an aging population, and while the West has been able to deal with the same issues through immigration, China haven't - they're very hostile to immigration. They're arguably at the peak of their powers right now and will start to fall back in coming decades.

However, it's important not to exaggerate their weaknesses too much. Their population is more than ten times greater than Russia (roughly four times that of the EU or US), and their economy is seven times the size. They've got the largest army and navy in the world, and probably got more raw manufacturing capacity than the entire West combined. While they don't have many raw materials to fuel that, they do share a land border with resource-rich Russia who do. You can hardly call them weak.

A completely unified NATO and allies could likely take on a China / Russia / North Korea alliance and win, provided they fully mobilised their economies for war and were prepared to suffer the sort of casualties countries expect to suffer when fighting major world wars. But I'm not at all convinced the whole of NATO would be up for spending that amount of blood and treasure; they can't even unify enough to defeat a declining power on Europe's doorstep.

Edited April 7 by Panto_Villan

[magnkarl]

Another night, another airport hit. Ukraine is going after Russia's glide bomb fleet.

Ukraine also claiming to have sunk a ship in Kaliningrad by setting a fire in the engine room. Could be fake news, but if it's true the war is moving to Russia's other fleets too.

Edited April 9 by magnkarl

[bickster]

New Russian cope cage upgrade  

[Genie]

2 minutes ago, bickster said:

New Russian cope cage upgrade  

because seeing around you is over rated.

[bickster]

2 minutes ago, Genie said:

because seeing around you is over rated.

Well that turret isn't going to turn much is it?  

I also can't imagine what the upturned bathtub is achieving

[bickster]

Also has @sidcowbeen giving them design tips  

[Genie]

That void between the cover and the tank looks like a lovely place to fire a grenade or RPG into.

[sidcow]

14 minutes ago, bickster said:

Also has @sidcowbeen giving them design tips  

A shed on wheels?

 

[tinker]

Looks like Max and Paddy had some input. 

[magnkarl]

3 hours ago, Genie said:

because seeing around you is over rated.

There's a video of this tank's assault squad doing the rounds on reddit, it's trying to turn a sharp left at some point and has to go back and forth like it's got epilepsy to get the angle right, all the while Ukraine takes out 3 of the 5 vehicles waiting behind it to get through.

At least that one tank survived - which for Russian armoured assault standards is a 100% improvement. 

[BleedClaretAndBlue]

 

[magnkarl]

If only we had a pre-Iraq Blair to go to the Yanks and get them to wake up like he did with Bosnia. 

It's up to EU\UK\Norway to keep Ukraine in this until the U.S election. The US will be forever stained for this.

From listening to various podcasts on this people in the DOD in US predicted this war years ago, and have been trying to get US politicians to arm Ukraine ever since to no avail. Must be the most depressing job in the world.

Edited April 17 by magnkarl

[Mandy Lifeboats]

Unfortunately the USA has shown that it cannot be relied upon.  Unless support returns soon its possible that Ukraine will lose more than if they had negotiated peace 1 year ago.  

The US politicians have disgraced themselves and the country.     

Edited April 17 by Mandy Lifeboats
Spelling mishsteaks

[magnkarl]

12 minutes ago, Mandy Lifeboats said:

Unfortunately the USA has shown that it cannot be relied upon.  Unless support returns soon its possible that Ukraine will lose more than if they had negotiated peace 1 year ago.  

The US politicians have disgraced themselves and the country.     

It appears like Mike Johnson has caved. He's going to split the aid bill into 4 different bits to try to allow his loonies to show their 'conscience' when voting on aid for Ukraine, Taiwan and Israel separately, and then he's somehow linking banning TikTok with the border bill. I don't see how most republicans won't vote yes for the aid for Ukraine unless Trump has a bigger hold than I thought. It would only need 4 republican votes to pass. It would  then need to go back to the Senate where it'll pass too. At least there's a glimmer.

The guy is off his nuts.

Edited April 17 by magnkarl

[chrisp65]

But why would a dozen of the richest most industrialised nations on the planet, faced with an enemy that is walking distance away, have got themselves so reliant on the U.S. for their defence?