Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

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Ukraine experiencing severe internet distruption

https://twitter.com/netblocks/status/1497409488403505153
Not a good sign. Hopefully they dont go offline.

If this was caused by the Russians I don't know why they didn't do this upon starting the war on Wednesday. Or, for that matter why they didn't shut down their own internet, or at least start heavily censoring and deleting posts on social media where people filmed their movements.

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While people here are posting memes and Twitter posts about how the glorious Ukrainian army is winning everything and the Russians are burning in their tanks, here's a notice from the Ukrainian Interior Ministry relayed by CNN:

The Ukrainian Interior Ministry has warned civilians in the capital Kyiv that fighting is taking place on the streets.

In a Facebook post Saturday, the ministry said:

    "Active fighting is taking place on the streets of our city. Please stay calm and be as careful as possible!
    If you're in the shelter, don't leave it now.
    If you are at home -- do not go close to the windows, do not go to the balconies. Hide indoors, for example in the bathroom, and cover yourself with something that will prevent injury from bullet fragments.
    If you hear sirens ("Air Alarm" signal) -- go immediately to the nearest shelter!"

So there is street fighting in the capital on the third day of the war. This is what Ukraine winning looks like? Someone compared this to the Winter War earlier, this is not even close to the Winter War.

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Agree. You cannot overstate the morale boost he is providing.

I commend Zelensky's personal courage. He may have done a poor job preparing his nation for war, but there's no doubt he is now raising the morale of his nation and boosting their will to fight. Looks like it was enough for the Ukrainians to hold Kiev for now, but he is still under threat and if he were captured it would crush Ukrainian morale. He either has a highly secret (and likely highly dangerous) plan to evacuate when he is under imminent threat, or it is his intention to become a martyr. Nothing of the former has leaked so I think the latter is a real possibility.

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I don't know, is it just me or does it seem that all dams are breaking in recent hours? All the sanctions, a protest wave across the globe and the boycotts. I really wonder whether Putin expected this as well as the immense and brave resistance of Ukraine?

I'm glad the German government finally came along. Should have done so much earlier. We were delusional about Russia all too long, all political parties from left to right.

The level of foreign support for Ukraine is clearly correlated how the war is going. Today is the first day they can credibly claim to be mounting effective resistance, as they have stopped the Russian advance on Kiev. So now countries are showing support for them, because there is something worthwhile to support. Let's put it this way, would you have favored sending aid to Ashraf Ghani on say August 7, 2021?

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Good profile of the rising strength of civilian volunteers and militia groups in the defense of Kiev.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/26/world/europe/ukraine-russia-civilian-military.html

Here's a good example of an article that is intended as a positive piece towards Ukraine but in reality is not positive at all and shows that they are still in deep trouble. If arming the civilian population were the optimal way for Ukraine to defend itself, why bother having an army at all? Why would Ukraine use its cities as fortifications, giving some credibility towards Russian accusations of "human shields" (that the Americans have also used BTW), if they were capable stopping the Russians before reaching the cities and protecting their population from harm, which is what their army should hope to do? Desperate times call for desperate measures, sure, Ukraine has to try everything at this point, but spinning the desperate measures as some kind of win is the realm of propaganda.

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The Ukrainians are certainly in a much stronger position for these peace talks than when Zelensky was asking for them two days ago. Still, I don't think he will get status quo ante bellum here. Russian forces have fallen short of expectations for sure but they are still winning in the sense that they hold Ukrainian territory, including some important parts in the South near Crimea.

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The Ukrainians are certainly in a much stronger position for these peace talks than when Zelensky was asking for them two days ago. Still, I don't think he will get status quo ante bellum here. Russian forces have fallen short of expectations for sure but they are still winning in the sense that they hold Ukrainian territory, including some important parts in the South near Crimea.

Zelensky gave in on the location of the talks only after the SWIFT and Central bank sanctions.  That way he will go in knowing that Russia knows time is not on their side.  Of course, he has to be realistic on how much he can get away with no concessions.

Very true. However, if the fighting continues, the median result now is probably that Ukraine will lose its major cities (Kiev, Kharkov in particular) in time after some protracted and destructive fighting. They're also in some danger of having their forces in the Donbass encircled. This is not the Winter War where the Finns held the Soviets at the border for months. While Russia will definitely be weakened by the sanctions, Ukraine and particularly the Ukrainian people are still likely to lose most from continued fighting. So if Ukraine is going for an end to the war now they will likely have to give up something, like swearing non-aligned status.

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Berdiansk has also been taken by the Russians, announced by its mayor relayed by CNN. This is the next major town along the Black Sea to the west of Mariupol, which is now in danger of being encircled.

Oleksandr Svidlo, the acting mayor of the town of Berdyansk on Ukraine's southern coast, has said that Russian forces have entered and taken control of the town.

Berdyansk, which has a small naval base, has a population of about 100,000.

Svidlo posted a message to the town's residents on his Facebook page Sunday which said, "A few hours ago, you and I witnessed how heavy military equipment and armed soldiers entered the city and began advancing throughout our hometown. As soon as I learned about that, I tried to inform all the residents of the city so that you have the opportunity to hide in shelters."

Svidlo continued: "Some time ago, armed soldiers entered the executive committee building and introduced themselves as soldiers of the Russian army, they informed us that all administrative buildings were under their control and that they were taking control of the executive committee building."

Svidlo said that officials were asked to continue working, "but under the control of armed men. I consider this proposal unacceptable, so we, as all members of the operational headquarters, left the building of the executive committee."

Svidlo ended his post, saying, "Today Berdyansk was on the line of fire. I don't know what tomorrow will be like, but I think tonight will be very, very hard."

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At this point it's abundantly clear that Russia should have shut off its internet for the duration of the war and that if they had the capacity to knock out Ukraine's internet, they should have done so. How the hell is an army supposed to keep operational security and secrecy if anybody with a smartphone can record troop and vehicle movements and upload it to Twitter/Telegram/etc immediately?

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At this point it's abundantly clear that Russia should have shut off its internet for the duration of the war and that if they had the capacity to knock out Ukraine's internet, they should have done so. How the hell is an army supposed to keep operational security and secrecy if anybody with a smartphone can record troop and vehicle movements and upload it to Twitter/Telegram/etc immediately?

CCP shill very sad that mother Russia being destroyed by Ukraine.

You wouldn't say that if say Afghan civilians were uploading videos of American troop movements on Twitter, you'd call for Twitter to delete the posts immediately and possibly for the army to find and punish said Afghans.

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At this point it's abundantly clear that Russia should have shut off its internet for the duration of the war and that if they had the capacity to knock out Ukraine's internet, they should have done so. How the hell is an army supposed to keep operational security and secrecy if anybody with a smartphone can record troop and vehicle movements and upload it to Twitter/Telegram/etc immediately?

Cope.

I don't need to cope, I'm not Russian. China is not a party to this conflict. However there are surely valuable lessons to be learned, and the PLA should be carefully studying and analyzing this campaign to figure out what worked, what didn't, and what should have been done, and to adjust accordingly.

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At this point it's abundantly clear that Russia should have shut off its internet for the duration of the war and that if they had the capacity to knock out Ukraine's internet, they should have done so. How the hell is an army supposed to keep operational security and secrecy if anybody with a smartphone can record troop and vehicle movements and upload it to Twitter/Telegram/etc immediately?

Cope.

I don't need to cope, I'm not Russian. China is not a party to this conflict. However there are surely valuable lessons to be learned, and the PLA should be carefully studying and analyzing this campaign to figure out what worked, what didn't, and what should have been done, and to adjust accordingly.

If you had to guess, what lessons do you think there are to be learned from this in general?

It's still early, I'm no expert, and obviously I don't have all the information, but a few things I've noticed:

-Russia may have assumed that Ukrainian resistance would collapse quickly and/or there were supporters in Ukraine like in 2014. Neither of these materialized and should not have been counted on.
-The "lightning strike", paratrooper drop, and amphibious landing attempts to take cities have generally failed. But there have been successes taking cities in the south which seem to come from a more conventional land attack from the Crimea. Maybe Russia's strategy should not have centered on the former.
-Aforementioned point on operational secrecy. Also cut off enemy's internet if at all possible, Zelensky has used it to great effect to boost morale and will to fight.
-The Ukrainian air force should have been destroyed on the ground on day 1. The fact that it still flies is incredible. The Russians should have learned this the hard way when the Germans destroyed 2000+ airplanes on day 1 of Barbarossa and it basically let them run wild for 6 months.
-The attack may have generated the public will in the West for sanctions that will affect their daily lives and direct intervention is even creeping into the conversation. As of last week it was conventional wisdom that Europe wouldn't risk seeing surges in energy prices but now it seems like they are willing to endure it. This is also too early to call as the sanctions haven't been felt on either side, but Chinese in particular may have discounted this kind of reaction from the West given that to them wearing masks is an intolerable burden to curb COVID.

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I refuse to believe the Russian military is so incompetent that they are allowing this "40 mile convoy" that is on the front page of CNN to remain as it is. Either it's been moved already or it's a trap to draw out Ukraine's air force and the Russians have AA guns/missiles and fighters ready to cut down the air attack.

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Also, it's clear that China got it right when it decided to ring-fence its internet, bar Western internet and social media companies that wouldn't meet its requirements, which turned out to be all of them, and develop domestic alternatives. Facebook and Twitter are turning out to be huge national security nightmares for Russia as they are clearly intervening on behalf of the Ukrainians and banning them now could cause backlash as there may not be an alternative (maybe Telegram?) and Russians are used to using them. China would not face this issue at all. Yes it's annoying to use the internet in China particularly to browse foreign websites but national security is more important than my convenience.

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Also, it's clear that China got it right when it decided to ring-fence its internet, bar Western internet and social media companies that wouldn't meet its requirements, which turned out to be all of them, and develop domestic alternatives. Facebook and Twitter are turning out to be huge national security nightmares for Russia as they are clearly intervening on behalf of the Ukrainians and banning them now could cause backlash as there may not be an alternative (maybe Telegram?) and Russians are used to using them. China would not face this issue at all. Yes it's annoying to use the internet in China particularly to browse foreign websites but national security is more important than my convenience.

Why are you on an election discussion website when you clearly don't think elections should exist?

It's not an issue of censorship versus freedom. Besides, this forum is not averse to censorship in concept, after all it cheered feverishly when Trump was banned from Twitter and Facebook which may have been a more effective act of censorship than many  governments are capable. It's an issue of national security and not allowing critical media of communication to be controlled by foreign companies that may turn hostile. Facebook and Twitter are clearly enemies of Russia right now, that's their right as a private company but then Russia shouldn't be tolerating an enemy operating in their country during wartime, or anytime for that matter.

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Also, it's clear that China got it right when it decided to ring-fence its internet, bar Western internet and social media companies that wouldn't meet its requirements, which turned out to be all of them, and develop domestic alternatives. Facebook and Twitter are turning out to be huge national security nightmares for Russia as they are clearly intervening on behalf of the Ukrainians and banning them now could cause backlash as there may not be an alternative (maybe Telegram?) and Russians are used to using them. China would not face this issue at all. Yes it's annoying to use the internet in China particularly to browse foreign websites but national security is more important than my convenience.

COPE

Again, this makes no sense. I'm not Russian. I'm basically watching a football game here. I may have picked a side to support but I have no skin in the game. For some reason the vast majority of the forum, minus a few Ukrainians, thinks they do even though they are in the same situation as me.

There is an obvious difference between private censorship and state censorship. For instance, I might think that you should be permanently banned from this site because you are a fascist useful idiot, an authoritarian stooge, a Wumao 50 cent shill, a gutless bloodthirsty keyboard warrior, and worst of all a Jerseyite. Nevertheless, I would still think you should be free to say what you want in the public sphere though. Hypothetically.

These days Twitter, Facebook, and other social media/internet services function practically as extensions of the public sphere even if they are regulated as private companies and have wide powers to deny service. They have clearly picked a side in this conflict and the situation is clearly asymmetric; if Ukrainian troop movements were filmed and posted, they would likely be quickly deleted, and Russian "fake news" is banned while Ukrainian reports that are likely just as fake are promulgated as news. I mean who really believes the 20:1 casualty ratio reported? Imagine how you would feel if Weibo were the dominant service in the US, Twitter were a fringe service like Parler or whatever the hell Trump is launching, and after the war started all you saw were pro-Russian posts and the pro-Ukrainian ones were suppressed?

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Again, this makes no sense. I'm not Russian. I'm basically watching a football game here. I may have picked a side to support but I have no skin in the game. For some reason the vast majority of the forum, minus a few Ukrainians, thinks they do even though they are in the same situation as me.

In human cultures, the loss of life is generally considered lamentable. Hope this helps!

Yet wearing a mask is an intolerable burden to slow down COVID? While the effect of the sanctions will have a far greater impact on daily life, particularly in Europe where energy costs could surge?

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Again, this makes no sense. I'm not Russian. I'm basically watching a football game here. I may have picked a side to support but I have no skin in the game. For some reason the vast majority of the forum, minus a few Ukrainians, thinks they do even though they are in the same situation as me.

In human cultures, the loss of life is generally considered lamentable. Hope this helps!

Yet wearing a mask is an intolerable burden to slow down COVID? While the effect of the sanctions will have a far greater impact on daily life, particularly in Europe where energy costs could surge?

Maybe, just maybe, they should get the f**k out of Ukraine if they want those sanctions lifted.

You misread my post. Westerners will feel the effects of their own sanctions, particularly in Europe with energy prices. They seem to be willing to accept this disruption and cost on their daily lives, even though they have no skin in the game. But they refuse to accept the minimal disruption and cost of wearing masks to slow down COVID, even though there's no doubt they have skin in that game. There's a huge logical contradiction here.

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Again, this makes no sense. I'm not Russian. I'm basically watching a football game here. I may have picked a side to support but I have no skin in the game. For some reason the vast majority of the forum, minus a few Ukrainians, thinks they do even though they are in the same situation as me.

In human cultures, the loss of life is generally considered lamentable. Hope this helps!

Yet wearing a mask is an intolerable burden to slow down COVID? While the effect of the sanctions will have a far greater impact on daily life, particularly in Europe where energy costs could surge?

Maybe, just maybe, they should get the f**k out of Ukraine if they want those sanctions lifted.

You misread my post. Westerners will feel the effects of their own sanctions, particularly in Europe with energy prices. They seem to be willing to accept this disruption and cost on their daily lives, even though they have no skin in the game. But they refuse to accept the minimal disruption and cost of wearing masks to slow down COVID, even though there's no doubt they have skin in that game. There's a huge logical contradiction here.

Dude, dimwits in America throwing a temper tantrum (before the vaccines) over wearing a mask is not representative of all Westerners FFS.

Did you miss out on USGD in December when half of it was whining about phantom "lockdowns", restaurants closing voluntarily and holiday parties being cancelled, and mask mandates?

Anyway, why this is relevant here:

1. It's a huge logical contradiction.
2. Given that people shouldn't be that contradictory, and we've seen sustained resistance to mask mandates in the West, I have doubts as to whether the sanctions can be kept in place in the medium or long term. Maybe they will continue to tolerate the costs in the name of Ukraine and freedom but maybe they'll come to their senses and realize they are suffering directly for something that doesn't affect them directly, and push for the sanctions to be lifted. Too early to call.

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Ugh, what an embarrassing climbdown. It looked like it was finally time to stand up to the West and challenge them but didn't even last a week. It pains me to admit it but the Americans pushed us around on this. Now this is something I need to cope over.

China ready to ‘play a role’ in Ukraine ceasefire

China signalled it was ready to play a role in finding a ceasefire in Ukraine as it “deplored” the outbreak of conflict in its strongest comments yet on the war.

Beijing said it was “extremely concerned about the harm to civilians” in comments that came after a phone call between Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi and his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba.

“Ukraine is willing to strengthen communications with China and looks forward to China playing a role in realising a ceasefire,” the Chinese statement said on Tuesday.

It added that it respected “the territorial integrity of all countries”, without indicating whether Beijing accepted Russia’s claim to the Crimean peninsula or shared its recognition of separatists in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

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Ugh, what an embarrassing climbdown. It looked like it was finally time to stand up to the West and challenge them but didn't even last a week. It pains me to admit it but the Americans pushed us around on this. Now this is something I need to cope over.

China ready to ‘play a role’ in Ukraine ceasefire

China signalled it was ready to play a role in finding a ceasefire in Ukraine as it “deplored” the outbreak of conflict in its strongest comments yet on the war.

Beijing said it was “extremely concerned about the harm to civilians” in comments that came after a phone call between Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi and his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba.

“Ukraine is willing to strengthen communications with China and looks forward to China playing a role in realising a ceasefire,” the Chinese statement said on Tuesday.

It added that it respected “the territorial integrity of all countries”, without indicating whether Beijing accepted Russia’s claim to the Crimean peninsula or shared its recognition of separatists in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

Needing to cope about this is mutually exclusive with insisting you don't have a dog in the actual fight, bootlicker.

I definitely have skin in the part of the game where China is involved. The people at the Foreign Ministry know more than me, they're the experts, so I defer to them, but damn it looks a lot like we took an L here and let the Americans push us around.

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Good analysis in this Twitter thread.

https://mobile.twitter.com/NickForVA/status/1498702036363210754

Between analysis like this showing how Russian victory isn't a done deal, analysis showing how Russian victory is a done deal, analysis showing how it might take a month for Kiev to fall, the halting & logistical problems of the Kiev convoy, Belarus troops seemingly entering Ukraine + the destruction of Kharkiv & the Russian economy, I have no clue what to make of the trajectory of the conflict.

I think it is pretty clear that absent a coup in Moscow (or a stunning reversal by Putin), Russia will win conventionally in the short term. With that said, if the Ukrainian people's morale remains high and the entire country remains mobilized for an insurgency, then they will win they long run because Russia will not be able to afford hold the entire country.

While that's certainly possible, after what we've seen I don't think it's guaranteed. I'm not so naive as to believe the logistics of Putin's invasion are a complete disaster, but it seems plausible that they're insufficient to support what he's trying to do. In which case, the Russian invasion is going to run out of steam at some point. How soon that might happen, I have no idea. But if they reach insufficient levels of supply to keep advancing soon, while Russian economically falls apart, that will not be a win for Russia in any real sense.

Depends on what "winning" is. If that's taking the whole country, I agree that is questionable. But Russia could take Kiev and Kharkov, take Mariupol and encircle the Ukrainian forces facing Donetsk, and then call a ceasefire and negotiate from there. It's not a certainty but I think Russia is still more likely than not to succeed at this limited goal. In this hypothetical Russia will have taken Ukraine's largest city and capital, second largest city, most of their Black Sea coast, and neutralized their fortifications in the east, which is still quite a bit that could be given back to Ukraine in exchange for the neutrality guarantees they are looking for.

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O_O

https://mobile.twitter.com/PalmerReport/status/1498805592068136960

The Americans bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in 1999 and there were no consequences. I guess it's good to be on top of the world pecking order, huh?

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https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/02/us/politics/russia-ukraine-china.html

I personally believe this to be true. What's the problem? Effectively China gave Ukraine several more weeks to prepare for the invasion. It's not China's fault Ukraine didn't do enough with the time to prepare for war and instead spent most of it denying that war would even happen.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/02/us/politics/russia-ukraine-china.html

I personally believe this to be true. What's the problem? Effectively China gave Ukraine several more weeks to prepare for the invasion. It's not China's fault Ukraine didn't do enough with the time to prepare for war and instead spent most of it denying that war would even happen.

E       E       E
   P    P     P
     O O O
E P O C O P E
     O O O
   P    P     P
E       E       E

This is nonsensical, what exactly is there to cope about here? You type illogical things yet get approval because "hurr durr China bad"?