quote:

Originally posted by Carpentermaass84:
So much for the whole idea of a weakened Russian military.

https://tass.com/defense/1723781

That invasive shit just set off our malware alarms.

quote:

Originally posted by Augen:
I don't have the source link but read one on my phone about the Russian military about to increase their fodder forces to 1.5 million.

Yeah, watching comments by an on-line acquaintance of mine in Moscow suggests they're calling up more bodies. Possibly a lot more bodies. He had to go down and register or check in or whatever. They turned him back due to age and, apparently, because he's a Muscovite?

quote:

Originally posted by Carpentermaass84:
So much for the whole idea of a weakened Russian military.


"Modern Russian hardware was rigidly tested in conditions of the special operation and displayed supremacy over similar weapons of NATO countries."

Wow, spreading propaganda now?
Russian weapons are decades behind NATO.

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:

quote:

Originally posted by Carpentermaass84:
So much for the whole idea of a weakened Russian military.


"Modern Russian hardware was rigidly tested in conditions of the special operation and displayed supremacy over similar weapons of NATO countries."

Wow, spreading propaganda now?
Russian weapons are decades behind NATO.

But their tanks are capable of launching their turrets 300 ft up into the air! Beat that, inferior Abrams!

quote:

Originally posted by echidna:

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:

quote:

Originally posted by Carpentermaass84:
So much for the whole idea of a weakened Russian military.


"Modern Russian hardware was rigidly tested in conditions of the special operation and displayed supremacy over similar weapons of NATO countries."

Wow, spreading propaganda now?
Russian weapons are decades behind NATO.

But their tanks are capable of launching their turrets 300 ft up into the air! Beat that, inferior Abrams!

. That's the Russian Army Space Program.

quote:

Originally posted by David Lee:

quote:

Originally posted by echidna:

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:

quote:

Originally posted by Carpentermaass84:
So much for the whole idea of a weakened Russian military.

"Modern Russian hardware was rigidly tested in conditions of the special operation and displayed supremacy over similar weapons of NATO countries."

Wow, spreading propaganda now?
Russian weapons are decades behind NATO.

But their tanks are capable of launching their turrets 300 ft up into the air! Beat that, inferior Abrams!

That's the Russian Army Space Program.

Launching tank crews into orbit without even using a rocket! There's progress for ya!

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:
Wow, spreading propaganda now?
Russian weapons are decades behind NATO.

What, are we supposed to only read what the Ukrainian and US government want us to read? We've gotten tons of that shit over the last two years, we can't talk about what the Russians have to say about it? Or do you just not like that it doesn't jibe with your "Russians are getting slaughtered wholesale" fever dreams?

Like it or not, all those NATO weapons given to Ukraine only served to stall the inevitable, and in the meantime, gave Russia lots of current-issue captured stuff to reverse engineer. I know the propaganda says we've only given them our Desert Storm era surplus stuff that we were spending more to keep in storage than to just give away, but the Ukrainians bragging on Reddit say otherwise. There was one who in r/nightvision who was bragging about his whole unit getting PVS31's made in the last few years with pictures to prove it, and then he turned around and scammed a bunch of guys out of thousands of dollars with the promise of selling them Russian captured stuff. Standard Ukrainian. There's lots of pictures of GPNVG18's over there, too. Giant waste of money, and a major mistake on our part which will only serve to accomplish a few things, namely depleting our resources and giving Russia a whole big sample of captured current-gen military tech of ours to look at. It won't be everything, but it'll be enough for them to catch up on multiple fronts.

Agree 100% P220. All the news we have been exposed to on this whole shit pot war is a joke at best. Hard to believe that we are sending tons of hardware and dollars to a known corrupt cesspool and no one is asking questions. Seems odd that Biden and his favorite crack head seemed to be very cozy with the country and its oligarchs. But WTF, lets just join sides with the Ukraine communists so they can kill Russian communists at any cost and most important, don't ask any questions. EVER.

Oh, on top off all that shit, can someone please explain to me the strategic importance of Ukraine to US interests? Seems as though Russia and China are getting a tighter alliance by the week. From my 100,000 foot view, that doesn't seem like a good thing, but hey Ukraine is killing Russians

quote:

Originally posted by Bytes:
Oh, on top off all that shit, can someone please explain to me the strategic importance of Ukraine to US interests?

Democracy, freedom, and we owe the French for the American Revolution or some shit.

quote:

Originally posted by P220 Smudge:

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:
Wow, spreading propaganda now?
Russian weapons are decades behind NATO.

What, are we supposed to only read what the Ukrainian and US government want us to read? We've gotten tons of that shit over the last two years, we can't talk about what the Russians have to say about it? Or do you just not like that it doesn't jibe with your "Russians are getting slaughtered wholesale" fever dreams?

Like it or not, all those NATO weapons given to Ukraine only served to stall the inevitable, and in the meantime, gave Russia lots of current-issue captured stuff to reverse engineer. I know the propaganda says we've only given them our Desert Storm era surplus stuff that we were spending more to keep in storage than to just give away, but the Ukrainians bragging on Reddit say otherwise. There was one who in r/nightvision who was bragging about his whole unit getting PVS31's made in the last few years with pictures to prove it, and then he turned around and scammed a bunch of guys out of thousands of dollars with the promise of selling them Russian captured stuff. Standard Ukrainian. There's lots of pictures of GPNVG18's over there, too. Giant waste of money, and a major mistake on our part which will only serve to accomplish a few things, namely depleting our resources and giving Russia a whole big sample of captured current-gen military tech of ours to look at. It won't be everything, but it'll be enough for them to catch up on multiple fronts.

They can't get chips. They surely cannot make chips. Not for decades.
They need millions of parts to even begin to equip their untrained conscripts with the hopes of even delivering NATO style equipment. But Biden sure game mountains of the stuff to the Taliban.
Russia can't fly their latest planes, nor use their latest joke of a tank.
This war has proved they can't take on a fraction of NATO.

But hey, I'm an isolationist too. Why are we fighting a proxy war with Iran?
Just so people can buy shit cheap?

Russia has captured a minimum of the west's equipments. They will likely get more if we bail out and let putin have Ukraine. This whole war was putins to own and now its about his own survival. NATO and the EU are beginning to contribute more aid as the putin has ideas beyond Ukraine. That said, do we set back and allow him to take NATO Member countries? Ukraine has been fighting with their hands tied due to the putins nukes, well known. Anyone have a better answer than just to bail out?

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:
They can't get chips. They surely cannot make chips. Not for decades.

Russia can get as many chips as they need, any time they want, from processors to memory chips. Remember they have a friend called the CCP. China can manufacture almost any tech equipment to the desired specification. Take a look a Lenovo. Pretty good shit but it aint cheap.

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:
But hey, I'm an isolationist too. Why are we fighting a proxy war with Iran?
Just so people can buy shit cheap?

So you don't want to be in Ukraine? I thought you were cheering Ukraine on for killing Russians. Sorry my bad.

quote:

Originally posted by David Lee:
…snip ….That said, do we set back and allow him to take NATO Member countries? Ukraine has been fighting with their hands tied ….snip?

Ukraine is not a NATO member. Never was.

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:
They can't get chips. They surely cannot make chips. Not for decades.
They need millions of parts to even begin to equip their untrained conscripts with the hopes of even delivering NATO style equipment. But Biden sure game mountains of the stuff to the Taliban.
Russia can't fly their latest planes, nor use their latest joke of a tank.

As noted, Russia is now good friends with China, and they can get all the chips they need. If anything, them combat-testing all their stuff against a combined NATO/UN backed modern near-peer military only helps push them to China, and by extension, puts more pressure on Taiwan.

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:
This war has proved they can't take on a fraction of NATO.

I'm not sure their intent was ever to take any more territory than what they took. It's what they said they were going to do, then they did it, and they've held it. Unless I'm missing something.

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:
But hey, I'm an isolationist too. Why are we fighting a proxy war with Iran?
Just so people can buy shit cheap?

So, first of all, fuck Iran. I mean that in the implicit sense, and also the one where I'm unwilling to pick proxy wars with them.

Second, I am not an isolationist. That term has been used to snub anyone who has been opposed to getting involved in Ukraine, and it's wide of the mark, to put it kindly. I am somewhere between the Monroe Doctrine, and the Theodore Roosevelt approach at foreign policy. We need to stay totally out of other countries' disputes inasmuch as anything military is concerned. Brokering peace, trying to get them to the table to come to agreements is fine. Sending arms and directly aiding unless it directly, and I don't mean the logical contortions so many have gone through to justify this stuff with Ukraine, but directly affects us should not be on the table, period. Russia and China, and their forays into South American countries? Bring the noise, and leave none of them alive to tuck tail and race home, nothing left to bear them if they were alive. I think we should aggressively and violently pursue and protect our interests in our hemisphere, and diplomatically and economically flex on the rest of the world. Russia having a border dispute that turns into them annexing territory that's been on-again-off-again Russian and Ukrainian since either Russia or Ukraine were extant? Not. Our. Problem.

quote:

Originally posted by David Lee:
That said, do we set back and allow him to take NATO Member countries? Ukraine has been fighting with their hands tied due to the putins nukes, well known. Anyone have a better answer than just to bail out?

Ukraine is in neither NATO, nor the UN. If we really gave a shit about protecting fellow NATO countries, we would have given all that stuff we sent to Ukraine to Poland instead. But we're playing checkers instead of chess, here.

Here is the Budapest Memorandum. The important part is just two pages, linked below, starting on page two.

https://www.securitycouncilrep...9%7D/s_1994_1399.pdf

If Putin had, at any point, used, or threatened to use nukes, then this would activate ours, Britain's, and Ireland's obligations to consult with the UN security council. Not once did that happen. It's also worth noting again that nowhere in that agreement is an obligation for us to protect Ukraine's borders, only an agreement that all of us, including Russia, would respect their borders. Russia violated part two of the agreement in 2014 and we did nothing, except turn around and violate part three of the agreement by sanctioning both Russian and Ukrainian officials. The Budapest Memorandum keeps getting cited both directly and obliquely, and even if that wasn't your intent, then I think it's still worth linking the actual document so as to frame what kind of force each country can bring to bear on the other without running afoul of it.

quote:

Originally posted by David Lee:
Russia has captured a minimum of the west's equipments. They will likely get more if we bail out and let putin have Ukraine.

Any realistic scenario ends with that stuff going to Russia. They're going to buy it off the Ukrainians at a premium when this is over, who will be happy to have gotten it for free in the first place and then sold it when it was over. The only way that doesn't happen is if Ukraine not only wins the war, whatever that looks like, but Russia collapses. This is just not going to happen. No, the best way to have kept all our tech out of the hands of Russia, and their new best friends China, was to never have sent it in the first place. But that ship has sailed, and it's not like we're going to ask for it back. We have ITAR restrictions on all kinds of stuff, but we just said "fuck that, let's just give it to them." I remember when it was a big deal about Clinton giving the Chinese our satellites. Biden said "hold my beer" and just needs to get us balls-deep in the Middle East again to pull a hat trick.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: P220 Smudge,

I think the only scenario for Ukraine to win is to keep stalling the Russians until Putin is removed from office by a coup. It's a long shot and no guaranty that the new boss will end the war.

We should be flooding the market with U.S. Oil and Gas and driving the price down to starve Russia of revenue. But we aren't doing that.

The 2024 campaign will probably go about like the 2023 Spring/Summer offensive. Zilch.

Link

Ukraine's Zelenskyy Vows to Wreak 'Wrath' Against Russia in 2024

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy vowed to wreak "wrath" against Russian forces in 2024, hours before Ukraine saw attacks on the first day of the year.

Russia and Ukraine have seen an escalation in strikes in recent days, including an unprecedented assault on the Russian city of Belgorod that killed 24 people Saturday.

The attack came a day after Moscow launched a barrage of missiles and drones at Ukrainian cities, killing 39 people in one of the biggest aerial attacks since the war began.

Jan.1 is a day of mourning in Ukraine's capital Kyiv, where 19 people had been killed, city officials said.

Just hours after midnight on New Year's Day, the Russian-installed head of the occupied Donetsk region said four people had been killed and 13 wounded in "massive shelling" from rockets on its main city.

In Ukraine's southern Odesa region, governor Oleg Kiper said one person died in a Russian drone attack, and three others were wounded.

And in western Ukraine's Lviv region, air defense systems shot down Russian drones in Monday's early hours, according to governor Maksym Kozytskyi.

Zelenskyy's televised New Year's address featured clips of Ukrainian artillery and fighter jets.

"Next year, the enemy will feel the wrath of domestic production," Zelenskyy said.

Ukraine will have at least "a million" additional drones in its arsenal next year, Zelenskyy added, as well as F-16 fighter jets delivered by its Western partners.

"Our pilots are already mastering F-16 jets, and we will definitely see them in our skies," he said.

Despite billions of dollars worth of Western weapons, Ukraine struggled to make a major breakthrough in its 2023 counteroffensive against invading Russian forces.

Moscow has meanwhile ramped up pressure along the frontlines, capturing the eastern town of Marinka earlier in December and pushing for control of Kupiansk in the northeast.

Ukraine is urging Western allies to maintain military support.

Britain announced it would send hundreds more air-defense missiles to Kyiv, after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak declared: "We must continue to stand with Ukraine – for as long as it takes."

Zelenskyy's counterpart President Vladimir Putin did not mention Ukraine in his traditional New Year's Eve address Sunday, but praised Russia's soldiers on the front line and called for unity in the face of "difficult tasks."

"To all those who are on duty, on the front line of the fight for truth and justice," Putin said, "you are our heroes. Our hearts are with you. We are proud of you, we admire your courage."

quote:

Originally posted by Bytes:
Ukraine's Zelenskyy Vows to Wreak 'Wrath' Against Russia in 2024