Russian invasion of Ukraine | Fewer tweets, more discussion

VorZakone said:
Well done Lavrov.
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Who would have thought that, on the back of repeating stories about Hitler being Jewish, doubling down by accusing Israel of supporting a neo-nazi regime in Kyiv could have backfired? I always thought that Lavrov was more intelligent than most of the goons over there but the whole regime currently resembles some hopelessly drunk bloke who has soiled himself and is now staggering around the bar challenging all-comers.
 
MoskvaRed said:
Who would have thought that, on the back of repeating stories about Hitler being Jewish, doubling down by accusing Israel of supporting a neo-nazi regime in Kyiv could have backfired? I always thought that Lavrov was more intelligent than most of the goons over there but the whole regime currently resembles some hopelessly drunk bloke who has soiled himself and is now staggering around the bar challenging all-comers.
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Maybe Lavrov gets pressured to say these things. But that's giving him a huge benefit of the doubt.
 
VorZakone said:
Maybe Lavrov gets pressured to say these things. But that's giving him a huge benefit of the doubt.
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Either that or he has realised that it's a lost cause anyway and he just doesn't give a f*** anymore.
 
VorZakone said:
Maybe Lavrov gets pressured to say these things. But that's giving him a huge benefit of the doubt.
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He’s a highly accomplished liar and propagandist, so making things up is pretty routine.
 
Frosty said:
Perhaps we have all been giving him too much credit over the years? Perhaps he really is this stupid.
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Well I've definitely been giving Putin too much credit, thinking he was an evil but highly clever chessplayer in the world of geopolitics. But invading Ukraine has turned out to be a yuge blunder.
 
VorZakone said:
Well I've definitely been giving Putin too much credit, thinking he was an evil but highly clever chessplayer in the world of geopolitics. But invading Ukraine has turned out to be a yuge blunder.
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Remember he’s a judo master. The past 10 weeks, the sinking of the Moskva, it’s all rope-a-dope before he strikes.
 
stefan92 said:
Either that or he has realised that it's a lost cause anyway and he just doesn't give a f*** anymore.
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Surely he’s told exactly what to say. The US certainly scripts everything their diplomats say at a podium.
 
Just imagine if - just before the Russian May 9th victory parade is about to start - several missiles hit the bridge linking Crimea with the mainland and it comes crashing down into the sea. We can only dream.
 
*sigh*


"How to make sure the German chancellor and especially his party gets even less motivated to support my cause" for beginners.
 
VorZakone said:
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He’s quite right. It’s because their military isn’t trained to make those game changing medium and small unit combat decisions the way a truly modern military is trained. They’re not even fighting like it’s the “last war” or the one before that. Small unit tactics and decentralized decision making was being developed in Verdun and the Somme 100+ years ago.
 
stefan92 said:
*sigh*


"How to make sure the German chancellor and especially his party gets even less motivated to support my cause" for beginners.
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The kind of people who would get annoyed by this are the kind of people you don’t want anyway, as they’re patently just paying lip service. Scholz looks pathetic to the entire world.
 
stefan92 said:
*sigh*


"How to make sure the German chancellor and especially his party gets even less motivated to support my cause" for beginners.
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What do you expect? Germany's position has been completely disgraceful so far, that Olaf guy can go feck himself.
 
stefan92 said:
*sigh*


"How to make sure the German chancellor and especially his party gets even less motivated to support my cause" for beginners.
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Greens and Liberals seem to be getting equally annoyed with Scholz as Ukraine has. So who knows what will happen.
 
Carolina Red said:
If only the chancellor helped defend Ukraine as fervently as you’re defending him
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Don't get me explaining his actions wrong as me supporting him.
Rajma said:
Would seem super weird to get offended right after refusing the invitation?
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You try to apply reason and logic to the brain of an SPD member. Being member in that party means you lost all basic reasoning skills.
dove said:
What do you expect? Germany's position has been completely disgraceful so far, that Olaf guy can go feck himself.
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Are you aware of any opposition leader from any other country that got a meeting with Zelensky? I'm not, so I wonder why he makes an exception for Merz?

I'm just wondering what Zelensky hopes to achieve with this, which is essentially election campaign support for a guy who just lost the election twice last year (wasn't chosen as chancellor candidate by his party, which then didn't win the election) and isn't to be elected any time soon?
 
stefan92 said:
Are you aware of any opposition leader from any other country that got a meeting with Zelensky? I'm not, so I wonder why he makes an exception for Merz?

I'm just wondering what Zelensky hopes to achieve with this, which is essentially election campaign support for a guy who just lost the election twice last year (wasn't chosen as chancellor candidate by his party, which then didn't win the election) and isn't to be elected any time soon?
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Well, there aren't many countries whose majority leader is someone who keeps disgracing himself and his country, I am not surprised Zelensky would prefer to meet someone else. Germany is a strong country and having it's support would be a huge boost for Ukraine in this war so if the opposition leader is the one who can push for it to happen then he should be the one Zelensky speaks to.
 
dove said:
Well, there aren't many countries whose majority leader is someone who keeps disgracing himself and his country, I am not surprised Zelensky would prefer to meet someone else. Germany is a strong country and having it's support would be a huge boost for Ukraine in this war so if the opposition leader is the one who can push for it to happen then he should be the one Zelensky speaks to.
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But that's the thing, the opposition leader has no real power here, except there would actually be a change of government. And let's be honest, if that would happen, Germany wouldn't be able to do much while sorting that mess out, so that wouldn't help. So the only thing I can see that this visit really achieves is that especially the SPD, the party of the president (who wasn't welcome) and the chancellor is furious about it. That just doesn't help Ukraine.

But sure, if they want to wait almost four years until the next election to get better support, feel free. The German people voted for the SPD as the strongest party (though I don't get why anyone votes for them, but whatever) and the world has to live with it.
 
Revan said:
Greens and Liberals seem to be getting equally annoyed with Scholz as Ukraine has. So who knows what will happen.
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Nothing is going to happen. People didn't really vote for the SPD I'd say but primarily against the CDU which had various corruption related scandals in the last year. This is just borderline opportunism by Merz. Can't really blame Selensky, but I hate this type of PR by the Union. They are to blame for the dependency on Russian gas first and foremost and now smell the opportunity to blame it all on the SPD. Exploiting such a terrible, terrible situation for that kind of motives is shameful.

Scholz not visiting Kiew despite Selensky's request is equally dumb though.You've been called out for your mistakes, just take it and move on.
 
stefan92 said:
But that's the thing, the opposition leader has no real power here, except there would actually be a change of government. And let's be honest, if that would happen, Germany wouldn't be able to do much while sorting that mess out, so that wouldn't help. So the only thing I can see that this visit really achieves is that especially the SPD, the party of the president (who wasn't welcome) and the chancellor is furious about it. That just doesn't help Ukraine.

But sure, if they want to wait almost four years until the next election to get better support, feel free. The German people voted for the SPD as the strongest party (though I don't get why anyone votes for them, but whatever) and the world has to live with it.
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In my view from outside Germany and Ukraine, Scholz is "Larry Daviding" this thing: he may be right in the strict sense. But the social code indicates that (metaphorically speaking) when a neighbor gets cancer and is hosting a fundraising to pay for the treatment, it doesn't really matter if he had a couple of loud parties lately, or if his little kid is annoying, or if you have stocks in the competitor's cancer treatment clinic. You just go, help and try not to be too nitpicky. When you fail to do that, the moral judgement is going your way. And the most likely output is that you'll end up helping anyway, after losing any goodwill from it. Like Germany is doing.

I don't particularly rate Zelensky and the opposition party's move: he has more urgent things to care about, they just saw an open field PR opportunity and seized it.

Anyway, back to the war: has there been any movement in the front lately? Is it feasible that Ukraine gets Kherson back soon and advances in the southern front? Is the Transinistria issue a real threat?
 
Krakenzero said:
Anyway, back to the war: has there been any movement in the front lately? Is it feasible that Ukraine gets Kherson back soon and advances in the southern front? Is the Transinistria issue a real threat?
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Very little happening overall. Little movement from Russia, only interesting development seems to be Ukraine pushing successfully east of Kharkiv and therefore slowly getting artillery in range of the Belogorod-Donbas supply line. If confirmed and being used, that could develop into a blow to Russian logistics and harm their Donbas offensive, as Belogorod is the most important supply base. But they still could reach Donbas from the East instead of from the North (were Belogorod is), so it would just be a longer distance to cover if they had to drive around the dangerous area, but not yet become impossible.
 
JuriM said:


Unsure if it fits here or the Warcrimes thread or both.
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"But NATO expansion and Russia's security needs!"

Christ. I think we'll see more Bucha-like scenes as more towns get liberated.
 
dove said:
What do you expect? Germany's position has been completely disgraceful so far, that Olaf guy can go feck himself.
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Um, we surely could have acted a bit faster here and there but when you consider everything (money, huminatarian help, weapons) only the US and Poland have done more than Germany according to a report yesterday.

We are dependent on Russian gas. It's a fact. Certainly not a nice one, but it's something that can't be sorted out in a few days.

So I wouldn't expect our stance on that to change. We support coal and oil embargos now at least. But that's also something that needed to be sorted out first. These sanctions have to be maintainable for a long time. It would help nobody if they would need to be lifted after a few weeks.


I think many people, especially those that are always complaining about Germany, don't get the whole picture and the consequences of decisions like this.

For example if we were to just cut off the Russian gas some of our industries would need to heavily reduce their production. No big problem, right?
But if you look at the industries (for example chemical industry, pharmaceutical, defense,...), their products and how many European countries rely on these products, you'll see that it would be a big problem for the whole EU.

I'm really growing tired of all this Germany bashing and stuff like "they're on the wrong side of history again" by people that aren't able to get the whole picture.
 
BayernFan87 said:
Um, we surely could have acted a bit faster here and there but when you consider everything (money, huminatarian help, weapons) only the US and Poland have done more than Germany according to a report yesterday.

We are dependent on Russian gas. It's a fact. Certainly not a nice one, but it's something that can't be sorted out in a few days.

So I wouldn't expect our stance on that to change. We support coal and oil embargos now at least. But that's also something that needed to be sorted out first. These sanctions have to be maintainable for a long time. It would help nobody if they would need to be lifted after a few weeks.


I think many people, especially those that are always complaining about Germany, don't get the whole picture and the consequences of decisions like this.

For example if we were to just cut off the Russian gas some of our industries would need to heavily reduce their production. No big problem, right?
But if you look at the industries (for example chemical industry, pharmaceutical, defense,...), their products and how many European countries rely on these products, you'll see that it would be a big problem for the whole EU.

I'm really growing tired of all this Germany bashing and stuff like "they're on the wrong side of history again" by people that aren't able to get the whole picture.
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Wasn’t there a report from a German economist that stated that this wouldn’t be the case? Can’t find the article at the moment.
 
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