Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

[jaichind]

https://nypost.com/2023/05/22/ukraine-losing-10000-drones-per-month-to-russia/

"Ukraine losing 10,000 drones per month to Russian electronic warfare: report"

[rc18]

February 2022: "The Russian army is the 2nd best army in the world!"

May 2023: "The Russian army is the 2nd best army in Russia."

[jaichind]

Russia renames the city of Bakhmut to Artemovsk, as it was in 2014, by a decree issued by the President of the Republic of Donetsk.

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/maks_nafo_fella/status/1660962245168209921?s=12

[jaichind]

Sunday Telegraph cartoon on G7 summit

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/maks_nafo_fella/status/1660999611924848640?s=12

[Virginiá]

Making Belgorod the primary thrust for a counter-offensive could have let Ukraine not only seize significant territory to leverage in future negotiations..

So you're suggesting hostage taking then? Because that's what terrorists do.

"Man, why won't NATO let me use their stuff to conquer Russian cities and use their citizens as bargain?"

What do you think happens in war? You're acting like this is something else. Perhaps some game where Ukraine just gets bled out indefinitely by its much larger neighbor, who has no rules or decency? If Ukraine could up its chances of liberating their own people by occupying Russian border areas, and / or using those border areas to bypass hardened defensive lines in Ukraine, why shouldn't they?

Perhaps you would have a different opinion if a foreign enemy was slaughtering your people and showed no signs of leaving. Let's see how long your creative interpretations of war last then.

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/reshetz/status/1660975103566397441?s=12
The Russian partisan group is claiming on telegram that they had another breakthrough in the map area the tweet shows. And there are rumblings apparently on telegram Ukraine might pull a troll job and declare the area a crisis zone and send in the Georgian and Belarusian volunteers legion to support this

[Torie]

Making Belgorod the primary thrust for a counter-offensive could have let Ukraine not only seize significant territory to leverage in future negotiations..

So you're suggesting hostage taking then? Because that's what terrorists do.

"Man, why won't NATO let me use their stuff to conquer Russian cities and use their citizens as bargain?"

What do you think happens in war? You're acting like this is something else. Perhaps some game where Ukraine just gets bled out indefinitely by its much larger neighbor, who has no rules or decency? If Ukraine could up its chances of liberating their own people by occupying Russian border areas, and / or using those border areas to bypass hardened defensive lines in Ukraine, why shouldn't they?

Perhaps you would have a different opinion if a foreign enemy was slaughtering your people and showed no signs of leaving. Let's see how long your creative interpretations of war last then.

When it comes to Ukraine using Russian territory to better defend itself, the problem is not Woody, but Biden unfortunately.

[Logical]

Sending Nazis to die fighting fascists makes Zelensky the greatest anti-fascist.
https://twitter.com/AricToler/status/1660772959621873664
https://twitter.com/EliotHiggins/status/1660980457993822209

[CumbrianLefty]

Making Belgorod the primary thrust for a counter-offensive could have let Ukraine not only seize significant territory to leverage in future negotiations..

So you're suggesting hostage taking then? Because that's what terrorists do.

"Man, why won't NATO let me use their stuff to conquer Russian cities and use their citizens as bargain?"

What do you think happens in war? You're acting like this is something else. Perhaps some game where Ukraine just gets bled out indefinitely by its much larger neighbor, who has no rules or decency? If Ukraine could up its chances of liberating their own people by occupying Russian border areas, and / or using those border areas to bypass hardened defensive lines in Ukraine, why shouldn't they?

Perhaps you would have a different opinion if a foreign enemy was slaughtering your people and showed no signs of leaving. Let's see how long your creative interpretations of war last then.

When it comes to Ukraine using Russian territory to better defend itself, the problem is not Woody, but Biden unfortunately.

Honestly, is it a surprise that Biden is cautious where this is concerned? Though I do still wonder if the US were tipped off in advance about this latest development, and gave it the nod.

[Torie]

Making Belgorod the primary thrust for a counter-offensive could have let Ukraine not only seize significant territory to leverage in future negotiations..

So you're suggesting hostage taking then? Because that's what terrorists do.

"Man, why won't NATO let me use their stuff to conquer Russian cities and use their citizens as bargain?"

What do you think happens in war? You're acting like this is something else. Perhaps some game where Ukraine just gets bled out indefinitely by its much larger neighbor, who has no rules or decency? If Ukraine could up its chances of liberating their own people by occupying Russian border areas, and / or using those border areas to bypass hardened defensive lines in Ukraine, why shouldn't they?

Perhaps you would have a different opinion if a foreign enemy was slaughtering your people and showed no signs of leaving. Let's see how long your creative interpretations of war last then.

When it comes to Ukraine using Russian territory to better defend itself, the problem is not Woody, but Biden unfortunately.

Honestly, is it a surprise that Biden is cautious where this is concerned? Though I do still wonder if the US were tipped off in advance about this latest development, and gave it the nod.

Maybe not surprising, but wrong headed. The red line about no US troops around, and no targeting of non military assets, would make sense, but if ordinance is coming into Ukraine from Russia, why not go after where it is coming from? I am  not giving Biden as pass on this one. He says no, until he says yes, and his incrementalism has cost a lot of Ukrainian lives.

[Hindsight was 2020]

I’m normally one to get annoyed about fear mongering that Putin using nukes but I think you guys are seriously downplaying that likelihood of Putin launching nukes if Ukraine actually invaded Belogord. Retaking Ukrainian land Russia has stolen over the past 9 years in one thing, taking actual Russian land (that could also put Moscow itself in a missile strike range) is a completely different ballgame

[Buffalo Mayor Young Kim]

https://nypost.com/2023/05/22/ukraine-losing-10000-drones-per-month-to-russia/

"Ukraine losing 10,000 drones per month to Russian electronic warfare: report"

I’m pretty sure there aren’t 10,000 UA drones in the first place, but who am I to argue with America’s tabloid of record.
Keep coping bro

ETA: OK this look like a total including Amazon/Alibaba Express civilian market stuff thrown together.
Also the report paints a different picture across the entire front, NYpost and our most fascist cheerleading posters decided to run with one line.

[Stranger in a strange land]

https://nypost.com/2023/05/22/ukraine-losing-10000-drones-per-month-to-russia/

"Ukraine losing 10,000 drones per month to Russian electronic warfare: report"

I’m pretty sure there aren’t 10,000 UA drones in the first place, but who am I to argue with America’s tabloid of record.
Keep coping bro

The drones shown in the article are those little quadcopter hobby drones you can buy off of AliExpress or Temu for 100-200 bucks, which Ukrainians have been using for recon or grenade drops. As Perun said in one of his videos, these are so cheap and disposable that they're more accurately regarded as ordnance rather than UAVs, but the fact that Russia now apparently has EW systems that can take them out is the real and concerning finding here. The 10,000 figure is to grab clicks and eyeballs, and even then I don't find it realistic. 

[Person Man]

Gone from “Kyiv will fall in 3 days” to “Belgorod holds!” In little over a year. Quite the special military operation eh? Lol

Going from conquering a country a third the size of your own in a few days to losing territory a year later is definitely a “special” kind of special operation.

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/avalaina/status/1660890953412927490?s=20

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/JimmySecUK/status/1661017347967299589?s=20

[Woody]

Sending Nazis to die fighting fascists makes Zelensky the greatest anti-fascist.
https://twitter.com/AricToler/status/1660772959621873664
https://twitter.com/EliotHiggins/status/1660980457993822209

"Putin's justification for this war is to de-nazify us, how do we dispel this?"

.."I got it! Let's invade their country with actual Nazis!"

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/lilia_yapparova/status/1660970617556852739?s=20

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1661042414142865416?s=12
https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/1661045018168119298?s=12

[Woody]

Making Belgorod the primary thrust for a counter-offensive could have let Ukraine not only seize significant territory to leverage in future negotiations..

So you're suggesting hostage taking then? Because that's what terrorists do.

"Man, why won't NATO let me use their stuff to conquer Russian cities and use their citizens as bargain?"

What do you think happens in war? You're acting like this is something else. Perhaps some game where Ukraine just gets bled out indefinitely by its much larger neighbor, who has no rules or decency? If Ukraine could up its chances of liberating their own people by occupying Russian border areas, and / or using those border areas to bypass hardened defensive lines in Ukraine, why shouldn't they?

Perhaps you would have a different opinion if a foreign enemy was slaughtering your people and showed no signs of leaving. Let's see how long your creative interpretations of war last then.

I don't know how old you are, but I remember the Chechen wars from the late 90s/early 2000s.

Chechens tried the same: Budyonnovsk, Stavropol, Nazran, Kizlyar, Dagestan, etc. Every time it backfired spectacularly and the Russian public opinion about the wars skyrocketed. Ukrainians also have to station valuable reserves to hostile territory. These 2 villages we are talking about are populated in the dozens right now. Belgorod itself is a city of 400k and 20 miles away from the border. You know this is psychotic right? Because at that point it's not a strategic play, you're looking for hostages.

And again, I don't know what's the deal with subtle Nazi dog-whistles that goes on in some Ukrainian circles, but at the very least you probably shouldn't be sending real fascists to do the invading part. That's not helping your cause, and might make some Russians get flashbacks to you-know-when.

[Hindsight was 2020]

Kinda weird how Bakhmut Bob loves to compare Ukraine to terrorists whenever Russia suffers a pr black eye. Like when he compared the Ukraine military to ISIS when they blew up the Crimea bridge and now invading Belgorod would apparently be the moral equivalent of the Chechen rebels?  

[GoTfan]

https://twitter.com/ForeignPolicy/status/1659763384248676353

If there is one glaring failure on the part of the West, it's the total neglect of a major diplomatic presence in the Global South, particularly Africa.

[Woody]

"Let's invade Russia proper, what could go wrong?"

https://twitter.com/WarMonitors/status/1661029547481899008
https://twitter.com/Spriter99880/status/1661050184648867840?cxt=HHwWgIC-ofSVno0u...