Ukraine

[Spiritwalker]

10 minutes ago, Lionator said:

Is the sensible US/European policy now to basically fund Ukraine enough to ensure they can defend what they have, but not to push onto Crimea/Donbass and create a geopolitical crisis. Make it a total meat grinder for Russia so that it takes them years to remilitarise themselves. Basically a never ending war so that Russia isn't a threat to NATO.

 

Also a wild thing I read on the website formerly known as twitter is that the USA and Russia both took part in navy exercises alongside each other in India. 

Yeah, slowly cooking the frog is a term I heard when this first kicked off.

[MPH]

15 minutes ago, Lionator said:

Is the sensible US/European policy now to basically fund Ukraine enough to ensure they can defend what they have, but not to push onto Crimea/Donbass and create a geopolitical crisis. Make it a total meat grinder for Russia so that it takes them years to remilitarise themselves. Basically a never ending war so that Russia isn't a threat to NATO.

 

Also a wild thing I read on the website formerly known as twitter is that the USA and Russia both took part in navy exercises alongside each other in India. 

 

 

I'm fairly certain that this was the U.S policy all along...

[z-layrex]

 

[worth_the_wait]

Last night on BBC2 ... "Ukraine: Enemy in the Woods"

 

As sobering a watch as I can ever remember.  

[casablancas]

15 hours ago, worth_the_wait said:

Last night on BBC2 ... "Ukraine: Enemy in the Woods"

 

As sobering a watch as I can ever remember.  

I’ve been vying back and forth on this … after 20 days in Mariupol I don’t know how I feel about this now. 

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-68692195

 

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has delivered a blunt warning that Europe has entered a "pre-war era" and if Ukraine is defeated by Russia, nobody in Europe will be able to feel safe.

"I don't want to scare anyone, but war is no longer a concept from the past," he told European media. "It's real and it started over two years ago."

 

More rhetoric designed for more "defence" spending, then. Does get a bit tiresome when the outcome of Russia attacking a NATO country is and remains so patently obvious to everyone involved.

[Dunge]

$61bn aid bill for Ukraine passed by the House in America.

 

Thank f**k for that.

[leicsmac]

5 minutes ago, Dunge said:

$61bn aid bill for Ukraine passed by the House in America.

 

Thank f**k for that.

In spite of the 100 or so Repubs who didn't want it.

[MPH]

3 hours ago, Dunge said:

$61bn aid bill for Ukraine passed by the House in America.

 

Thank f**k for that.

 

just came on to post this! Fantastic stuff!!

Edited 20 April by MPH

[ian__marshall]

This is good news, but I can't help but think that it's rather embarrassing for Europe that Ukraine are so reliant upon this. Surely as a continent we should be able to stand on our own two feet. 

[MarshallForEngland]

Interesting opinion piece from senator JD Vance in the New York Times. 

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/12/opinion/jd-vance-ukraine.html

 

Notable points:

 

Quote

Ukraine’s challenge is not the G.O.P.; it’s math. Ukraine needs more soldiers than it can field, even with draconian conscription policies. 

 

Quote

 

Mr. Biden has failed to articulate even basic facts about what Ukraine needs and how this aid will change the reality on the ground.

The most fundamental question: How much does Ukraine need and how much can we actually provide? Mr. Biden suggests that a $60 billion supplemental means the difference between victory and defeat in a major war between Russia and Ukraine. That is also wrong. This $60 billion is a fraction of what it would take to turn the tide in Ukraine’s favor. But this is not just a matter of dollars. Fundamentally, we lack the capacity to manufacture the amount of weapons Ukraine needs us to supply to win the war.

 

 

Quote

We’ve roughly doubled our capacity and can now produce 360,000 [artillery shells] per year — less than a tenth of what Ukraine says it needs. The administration’s goal is to get this to 1.2 million — 30 percent of what’s needed — by the end of 2025. This would cost the American taxpayers dearly while yielding an unpleasantly familiar result: failure abroad.

 

Quote

...Russia could soon have a 10-to-1 artillery advantage over Ukraine...Russia’s current advantage is at least 5 to 1, even after all the money we have poured into the conflict. Neither of these ratios plausibly leads to Ukrainian victory.

 

Quote

The notion that we should prolong a bloody and gruesome war because it’s been good for American business is grotesque

 

I do wonder what people think this latest handout is going to do that previous ones haven't. Last month it was widely published that Russia is able to produce 3 times more artillery munitions than the US and Europe combined. Ukraine does not have the manpower or equipment to achieve victory on the battlefield, and the sooner that is accepted the sooner the bloodshed will stop. 

[leicsmac]

3 minutes ago, MarshallForEngland said:

Interesting opinion piece from senator JD Vance in the New York Times. 

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/12/opinion/jd-vance-ukraine.html

 

Notable points:

 

 

 

 

 

 

I do wonder what people think this latest handout is going to do that previous ones haven't. Last month it was widely published that Russia is able to produce 3 times more artillery munitions than the US and Europe combined. Ukraine does not have the manpower or equipment to achieve victory on the battlefield, and the sooner that is accepted the sooner the bloodshed will stop. 

So... making the assumption for a second that this is a 100% accurate summary of the strategic situation, what is the optimal way that this all ends?

[MarshallForEngland]

1 minute ago, leicsmac said:

So... making the assumption for a second that this is a 100% accurate summary of the strategic situation, what is the optimal way that this all ends?

Return to the abandoned 2022 Istanbul agreement as a basis for negotiations. I am not sure to be honest whether either side would agree to what ended up in the communiqué back then, given how much the situation has materially changed, but at least the end result there was a cessation of hostilities. As Vance asks in his article, exactly how is this new load of cash actually supposed to make a difference? It may prolong the war and allow Ukraine to lose even more soldiers, but realistically there is no chance that it is going to lead to victory.

[Zear0]

3 minutes ago, MarshallForEngland said:

Return to the abandoned 2022 Istanbul agreement as a basis for negotiations. I am not sure to be honest whether either side would agree to what ended up in the communiqué back then, given how much the situation has materially changed, but at least the end result there was a cessation of hostilities. As Vance asks in his article, exactly how is this new load of cash actually supposed to make a difference? It may prolong the war and allow Ukraine to lose even more soldiers, but realistically there is no chance that it is going to lead to victory.

It won't lead to victory, but more likely to lead to a stalemate that could potentially lead to a negotiated settlement.

 

Russia's objective has always been total conquest and the elimination of the Ukrainian state. I personally had hoped the status quo we found ourselves in last year would lead to a settlement but both sides believed they could achieve their objectives. The withholding of US aid gave Russians the advantage and confidence they could take the home country which would be appalling for Ukrainian people. 

 

I believe stopping the funding would make the war go on longer and be significantly worse for the civilian population that the Russian state believe don't have the right to even exist. 

[Lionator]

38 minutes ago, MarshallForEngland said:

Return to the abandoned 2022 Istanbul agreement as a basis for negotiations. I am not sure to be honest whether either side would agree to what ended up in the communiqué back then, given how much the situation has materially changed, but at least the end result there was a cessation of hostilities. As Vance asks in his article, exactly how is this new load of cash actually supposed to make a difference? It may prolong the war and allow Ukraine to lose even more soldiers, but realistically there is no chance that it is going to lead to victory.

The US know that there’s basically zero chance of a Ukranian victory, they just want to degrade the Russian forces enough so that they become geo-politically irrelevant for the next few decades. 

[MarshallForEngland]

2 minutes ago, Zear0 said:

It won't lead to victory, but more likely to lead to a stalemate that could potentially lead to a negotiated settlement.

 

Russia's objective has always been total conquest and the elimination of the Ukrainian state. I personally had hoped the status quo we found ourselves in last year would lead to a settlement but both sides believed they could achieve their objectives. The withholding of US aid gave Russians the advantage and confidence they could take the home country which would be appalling for Ukrainian people. 

 

I believe stopping the funding would make the war go on longer and be significantly worse for the civilian population that the Russian state believe don't have the right to even exist. 

Interesting idea and you may be right, but I get the feeling that from the Russian point of view a stalemate fits at least one of their objectives which is to grind down the military capability of Ukraine. As far as they're concerned, Ukraine will keep throwing men and equipment into the battlefield and they'll keep firing at it. With Russia's advantages in terms of population and manufacturing capacity, a slow war of attrition suits them more than it does Ukraine. This is why Ukraine's mobilisation efforts are becoming increasingly more desperate and heavy-handed. 

 

As for the elimination of the Ukrainian state, I actually believe you could be right that Russia sees this as the only viable end goal now, but I don't think it's certain that this was always the case. Russia initially went in with less than 200,000 soldiers which nobody seriously believes is enough to take over and occupy a state the size of Ukraine (at least 5 times more than that would be a reasonable starting point based on the 3:1 rule and the size of Ukraine's military at the start of the war). On top of that, the terms of the Istanbul agreement were that Ukraine remained a sovereign but neutral state. Obviously there might be good arguments as to whether Russia really believed and were willing to follow through with what they provisionally agreed to then, but still I'm not sure the evidence suggests that "conquest and elimination of the Ukrainian state" was always the objective.

[MarshallForEngland]

Just now, Lionator said:

The US know that there’s basically zero chance of a Ukranian victory, they just want to degrade the Russian forces enough so that they become geo-politically irrelevant for the next few decades. 

I agree. I don't think it will have that effect though. Only a few days ago it was reported that Russia's economy is growing (faster than the US, UK and Germany). The sanctions have backfired; they have made Russia less reliant on the West and pushed them closer to China. 

[Spiritwalker]

6 hours ago, MarshallForEngland said:

I agree. I don't think it will have that effect though. Only a few days ago it was reported that Russia's economy is growing (faster than the US, UK and Germany). The sanctions have backfired; they have made Russia less reliant on the West and pushed them closer to China. 

The bounce of a war economy is a short term effect, in the longer term the Russian economy will be screwed.

[MarshallForEngland]

2 hours ago, Spiritwalker said:

The bounce of a war economy is a short term effect, in the longer term the Russian economy will be screwed.

Seems more hope than expectation to me. Russia has a lot of resources that other countries (notably China and India) need in vast quantities. That’s not going to stop when the war ends. In fact it’s only going to increase as large parts of Africa continue to industrialise with the help of the Russians and the Chinese.