Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

[Former President tack50]

Seems like Ukraine is folding insanely quickly? What even is the plan on the Ukranian side? I understand a war would almost certainly be lost long term but I don't think anyone expected Ukraine to fold this fast?

[Former President tack50]

Putin doesn't want NATO Troops so close to his border, views it as Security Threat!

If Putin dares to do anything against Finland, NATO will attack nonetheless, in my view. Finland is a EU member, thus, if Russia attacks Finland, it's invading the EU and there's a cooperation treaty between NATO and the EU, so a military response to it would most likely happen.

Worth noting that iirc the EU has a NATO-like "call to arms" mechanism (pretty sure France actually activated it in response to terrorism from ISIS in fact). Granted, it's weaker than the NATO equivalent and the EU's combined military is still probably not good, but it's better than nothing. The US would not be forced to join, but at least the EU-28 would be.

[Former President tack50]

Really great strategic move by Putin now that he has gotten NATO to pile up defense capabilities by massive amounts.

Yup. Putin has lost his mind. This will be his death sentence.

Ironically, Vladimir Putin was far more effective in getting the defense budget to 2% than Donald Trump ever was.

I remember back a couple years ago when some were questioning NATO's usefulness in the 21st century and when President Trump pulling the US out of NATO, while unlikely, was not seen as completely impossible.

Thank you Vladimir Putin for giving NATO a newly found purpose for the 21st century

[Former President tack50]

What do you'll think are the odds that Putin ends up being deposed and who are the most likely candidate's to replace him?

The latest betting odds on  Zelensky being Prez of Ukraine as of April 22nd, 2022 is 54/46.  The odds on Putin being Perz of Russia as of Dec 31 2022 is 78/22.

Worth noting that pre-war at least Zelensky was a mild underdog for reelection, while of course Putin does not have to worry about such unimportant things like elections

[Former President tack50]

We have to consider what we mean by "win" here. Take Kiev and impose a set of borders and puppet gov't sure that is possible. But that isn't enough to avoid getting bled dry by resistance, especially in Western and South Western Ukraine.

Also as the US themselves learned in Afghanistan and Irak, it's one thing to invade a country and put in a new government. It's a very different thing to assert effective control of the country.

Admittedly Ukraine's geography is much worse for an insurgency than Afghanistan or even Irak, but even if Russia does take control of all of Ukraine (which is not a guarantee, even if long term it is still the likeliest scenario); they will have tons of problems asserting their control.

[Former President tack50]

The reality is that no state that Russia sets up in the east of Ukraine will be accepted as a state by the vast majority of UN states (see Crimea and the Donbas). A puppet regime in the west/Kyiv will not be accepted by the majority of UN states if there is a functional Ukrainian government in exile and continued resistance within Ukraine itself.

To be fair, wouldn't time (eventually) heal all wounds and what not? Perhaps what might be the absolute best case scenario for Russia is something like the Turkish invasion of Cyprus, where they set up a separatist puppet republic in half of the country with no recognition (except for Turkey itself). And of course, Turkey these days is a relatively standard country (and was even more so before Erdogan went authoritarian)

If you want to keep going with the analogy, the internationally recognized half of Cyprus even went on to eventually join the EU!

Admittedy this is the absolute best case scenario for Russia, which is very unlikely. Also I don't think Eastern Ukranians support Russia anywhere close to the rates that Turkish Cypriots would have supported the Turkish invasion.

[Former President tack50]

I’m very strongly anti-war, but seeing the pictures of civilians shot execution style with hands behind their backs and mass graves makes my blood boil. I can’t even imagine what Mariupol looks like. If they continue to find more and more scenes like this, then I would be in favor of sending NATO troops in to directly fight the Russians.

Would that escalate things immensely? Yes. Would it likely lead to a broader war with Russia? Yes. But I’m sorry, if more scenes like today come out as more towns are liberated, I think we have to acknowledge that Kremlin leadership needs to be eliminated from this earth. In the 21st century, having a nation such as Russia engage in acts of genocide and ethnic cleansing simply cannot be tolerated.

Exactly. If a direct intervention leads to WW3, wouldn’t we be glad that a country like Russia no longer exists?

The issue with that is that the US (and Germany, Spain, France and basically every western country) will no longer exist too. If you want to live in Fallout World, well I guess that's your choice, and tbh if it's ever been justified it's now. But it is not a sacrifice I am willing to make.

I will say that if Russia did not have nukes I would 100% be in favour of an intervention though. But is it worth the high risk of the literal Apocalypse?

[Former President tack50]

Is it more or less near certain Russia is going to further escalate their presence on May 9th?

Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov has firmly denied that Russia will declare war on May 9th.

So it's almost certain it will happen.

If Russia actually formally does declare war, it will be the first "formally declare" war since what, Iran-Irak?

Tbh I think an actual war declaration is incredibly unlikely as that is something that countries these days just don't do even when they actually fight wars; since iirc it comes with a lot of downsides and not many benefits.

[Former President tack50]

https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/19/energy/germany-russia-gas-supplies-winter-intl/index.html

"Germany to fire up coal stations as Russia squeezes gas supply"

The Western Left faces many impossible trinities.  One of them with respect to energy policy is you can have a most 2 of the 3:

a) No Putin/MBS
b) No nuclear power
c) No local hydrocarbon energy

So the Western Left has to pick which one of the 3 to give up.

Well the "Western Left" has never been monolithically anti-nuclear power, and that is a trend I expect to see accelerate following recent events.

The issue is that given how long it takes to build and operate a nuclear power plant, it might just be too late for nuclear anyways. The moment to be pro-nuclear would have been in the mid 1980s, not now.

[Former President tack50]

Ukraine isn’t a dictatorship. This isn’t even a debatable claim. You’re just making sh**t up at this point.

Tbf a very disappointing fact I learned the other day is that Ukraine is not considered by The Economist and other such organizations as a democracy but rather as a "hybrid regime" along the likes of Mexico, Hong Kong or El Salvador.

Still easily beats Russia's "full authoritarianism" though.

[Former President tack50]

Never thought I'd say this, but critical support to Sergey Prigozhin on his quest to destabilize Russia