Russian invasion of Ukraine | Fewer tweets, more discussion

Ragnar123 said:
If someone still had any doubts:


A pretty clear message from Xi and surely no coincidence so soon after Biden's visit in Kiev. They will continue to support Putin, no matter how many humans russia murder in Ukraine. They need Russia as a counterweight to western democracy and for economic reasons (cheap energy and a big market to offload their products).
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Joe Biden needs to do a Bush and outright call those two out as the new Axis of Evil. There is simply no other way to put it when Xi already made his bed.
 
pierrethesnack said:
I don't think that's a great call while trying to strengthen and possibly entice neutral states to join your coalition.
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Also, it's never a good idea to ever "do a Bush".....like ever..... unless the murder of 100's of thousands and the decimation of multiple countries is your bag.
 
RedDevilQuebecois said:
Joe Biden needs to do a Bush and outright call those two out as the new Axis of Evil. There is simply no other way to put it when Xi already made his bed.
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Good idea, but I doubt he has the would be willing to do it. The fact that Dubya once did also makes it harder to do in the present.
 
RedDevilQuebecois said:
Joe Biden needs to do a Bush and outright call those two out as the new Axis of Evil. There is simply no other way to put it when Xi already made his bed.
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A bit offtopic here (maybe not, because pressure on China leads to a weak Putin):

Biden needs to gather Europe's leaders and together they need to discuss how they can pressure China. Xi feels invulnerable right now. He took full control of China recently with a demonstration of power. He also knows the west is dependent on China, so he feels like he can do whatever he wants with no consequences.

But the western industry made China rich in the first place and what's stopping us to outsource all our production to other south asian countries?
Why don't we start building new factories in India for example? They have the same population as China, are poor as feck and would love european factories to boost their economy. China has entire cities dedicated to a certain production line because of the western market. I saw a documentary of a town that makes only shoes. You can imagine what happens to that town if western countries stop ordering their shoes.
I don't understand why we don't play that card. We have more leverage on China than the other way around. If we start to outsource and stop ordering from China, they will crash harder than a meteorite.

The only way to keep China in line is threatening their current status. In my opinion, Xi is even more dangerous than Putin in the long run.
 
Ragnar123 said:
A bit offtopic here (maybe not, because pressure on China leads to a weak Putin):

Biden needs to gather Europe's leaders and together they need to discuss how they can pressure China. Xi feels invulnerable right now. He took full control of China recently with a demonstration of power. He also knows the west is dependent on China, so he feels like he can do whatever he wants with no consequences.

But the western industry made China rich in the first place and what's stopping us to outsource all our production to other south asian countries?
Why don't we start building new factories in India for example? They have the same population as China, are poor as feck and would love european factories to boost their economy. China has entire cities dedicated to a certain production line because of the western market. I saw a documentary of a town that makes only shoes. You can imagine what happens to that town if western countries stop ordering their shoes.
I don't understand why we don't play that card. We have more leverage on China than the other way around. If we start to outsource and stop ordering from China, they will crash harder than a meteorite.

The only way to keep China in line is threatening their current status. In my opinion, Xi is even more dangerous than Putin in the long run.
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Modi is just as much of a despot as Xi. He's just not as powerful. If industry moves it needs to go to places that won't try to take over the world and, even better, to countries that are actually well run and respect the rights of their people.
 
TwoSheds said:
Modi is just as much of a despot as Xi. He's just not as powerful. If industry moves it needs to go to places that won't try to take over the world and, even better, to countries that are actually well run and respect the rights of their people.
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Yeah, I didn't mean to make India the new China of course. Just spread the industry on many countries. This way you are not dependent on any country and there is none strong enough to blackmail you. It was one of the biggest mistakes ever to outsource nearly everything to China. But that's a topic for another thread.


By the way, it looks like another open window suicide season for a bunch of oligarchs in Russia again. Looking a current gas and oil prices, Putin will need their money to keep financing his war.



edit: Someone is tired of life it seems.

 
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OK, so many things to go over here. I'll do my best and hope that it will close down the offtopic part.

Ragnar123 said:
A bit offtopic here (maybe not, because pressure on China leads to a weak Putin):

Biden needs to gather Europe's leaders and together they need to discuss how they can pressure China. Xi feels invulnerable right now. He took full control of China recently with a demonstration of power. He also knows the west is dependent on China, so he feels like he can do whatever he wants with no consequences.

But the western industry made China rich in the first place and what's stopping us to outsource all our production to other south asian countries?
Why don't we start building new factories in India for example? They have the same population as China, are poor as feck and would love european factories to boost their economy. China has entire cities dedicated to a certain production line because of the western market. I saw a documentary of a town that makes only shoes. You can imagine what happens to that town if western countries stop ordering their shoes.
I don't understand why we don't play that card. We have more leverage on China than the other way around. If we start to outsource and stop ordering from China, they will crash harder than a meteorite.
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For sure Biden needs to take action and is already taking action with a number of European partners to keep their eyes peeled on China. Among some of the signs that Europe is increasingly turning their backs to China, you have the AUKUS alliance, you have the Czech president is set to visit Taiwan soon, you have all 3 Baltic States opening channels with Taiwan as well, a greater number of European politicians have holding a stronger stance against China, Huawai getting banned in a numebr of European countries, TikTok under scrutiny everywhere, etc. As usual, the same obstacles against a cohesive response come from France and Germany. However, recent events of Xi showing up alongside Putin could precipitate further decoupling away from China.

As for India, I ask myself the same question. However, I also feel that question could be extended to both other Asian countries and Central America. I often feel that offering jobs in Central America would 1) allow people to have jobs closer to North America, 2) cut transportation costs of goods to NA if produced in Central America, and 3) cut mass immigration from Central America to the US by a very significant margin because people would enjoy having a job in their home country. In short, there are plenty of countries who can provide manpower and, eventually with time, new customer bases.

The Japanese have moved further away from China since the Senkaku Islands dispute took an uglier turn a decade ago. Despite the occasional talks between Japan and China, the Japanese have not stopped the decoupling at all as more factories went to Southeast Asia. It's up to Western companies to do the same and faster.

The only way to keep China in line is threatening their current status. In my opinion, Xi is even more dangerous than Putin in the long run.
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Agree. I have seen worrying parallels between Xi Jinping and Wilhelm II regarding their personalities and how they deal with power. I will not elaborate on that here for the sake of closing the offtopic part, but I will say this though: what I saw yesterday of Xi and Putin reminds me of Germany and a decaying Austria-Hungary in the lead-up to 1914. I didn't think I would have said this a year ago, but Russia is now in Austria-Hungary's shoes.
 
Ragnar123 said:
Yeah, I didn't mean to make India the new China of course. Just spread the industry on many countries. This way you are not dependent on any country and there is none strong enough to blackmail you. It was one of the biggest mistakes ever to outsource nearly everything to China. But that's a topic for another thread.


By the way, it looks like another open window suicide season for a bunch of oligarchs in Russia again. Looking a current gas and oil prices, Putin will need their money to keep financing his war.



edit: Someone is tired of life it seems.

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Girken’s descent from once lauded operative to frustrated vlogger is pretty remarkable. At some point he will say something that gets him mysteriously killed in a freak accident, probably involving a tall building
 
Ragnar123 said:
The source is probably the daily update by Ukraine's general staff.

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I don’t think they’re going to lie, but they wouldn’t be incentivized to make conservative approximations either. Still a pretty remarkable number and if remotely true, would suggest the Russians are losing people at an unsustainable level that could actually see them collapse and lose a lot of territory should they ever fail to consistently replenish the dead.
 
RedDevilQuebecois said:
OK, so many things to go over here. I'll do my best and hope that it will close down the offtopic part.



For sure Biden needs to take action and is already taking action with a number of European partners to keep their eyes peeled on China. Among some of the signs that Europe is increasingly turning their backs to China, you have the AUKUS alliance, you have the Czech president is set to visit Taiwan soon, you have all 3 Baltic States opening channels with Taiwan as well, a greater number of European politicians have holding a stronger stance against China, Huawai getting banned in a numebr of European countries, TikTok under scrutiny everywhere, etc. As usual, the same obstacles against a cohesive response come from France and Germany. However, recent events of Xi showing up alongside Putin could precipitate further decoupling away from China.

As for India, I ask myself the same question. However, I also feel that question could be extended to both other Asian countries and Central America. I often feel that offering jobs in Central America would 1) allow people to have jobs closer to North America, 2) cut transportation costs of goods to NA if produced in Central America, and 3) cut mass immigration from Central America to the US by a very significant margin because people would enjoy having a job in their home country. In short, there are plenty of countries who can provide manpower and, eventually with time, new customer bases.

The Japanese have moved further away from China since the Senkaku Islands dispute took an uglier turn a decade ago. Despite the occasional talks between Japan and China, the Japanese have not stopped the decoupling at all as more factories went to Southeast Asia. It's up to Western companies to do the same and faster.



Agree. I have seen worrying parallels between Xi Jinping and Wilhelm II regarding their personalities and how they deal with power. I will not elaborate on that here for the sake of closing the offtopic part, but I will say this though: what I saw yesterday of Xi and Putin reminds me of Germany and a decaying Austria-Hungary in the lead-up to 1914. I didn't think I would have said this a year ago, but Russia is now in Austria-Hungary's shoes.
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I think China needs Europe too much to estrange them into not doing business with them. Therefore Xi is walking a tightrope between authoritarian solidarity with his public support for Putin, and the realization China’s economic prowess is interdependent on western cooperation.
 
Raoul said:
I don’t think they’re going to lie, but they wouldn’t be incentivized to make conservative approximations either. Still a pretty remarkable number and if remotely true, would suggest the Russians are losing people at an unsustainable level that could actually see them collapse and lose a lot of territory should they ever fail to consistently replenish the dead.
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I also think they make favorable approximations. If they destroy an APC, they will count a full crew probably, not knowing the exact number of men sitting inside. But they won't be far off, especially if you also count the wounded men who will never fight again.
Russia's losses since the start of their winter offensive are unsustainable indeed. They also started to lose a two-digit number of tanks daily. At this rate, they need a new mobilization wave pretty soon I'd expect.
 
Real Name said:
Any talk about a possible UA offensive somewhere?
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It's likely to begin in April, after a lot of heavy Western equipment arrived, much of it like the Leopard 2 is scheduled for delivery end of this month.
 
stefan92 said:
It's likely to begin in April, after a lot of heavy Western equipment arrived, much of it like the Leopard 2 is scheduled for delivery end of this month.
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Wonder where will they want to hit first. Maybe Mariupol area while Russians are still occupied with Bakhmut or will be in the future.
 
Ragnar123 said:
A bit offtopic here (maybe not, because pressure on China leads to a weak Putin):

Biden needs to gather Europe's leaders and together they need to discuss how they can pressure China. Xi feels invulnerable right now. He took full control of China recently with a demonstration of power. He also knows the west is dependent on China, so he feels like he can do whatever he wants with no consequences.

But the western industry made China rich in the first place and what's stopping us to outsource all our production to other south asian countries?
Why don't we start building new factories in India for example? They have the same population as China, are poor as feck and would love european factories to boost their economy. China has entire cities dedicated to a certain production line because of the western market. I saw a documentary of a town that makes only shoes. You can imagine what happens to that town if western countries stop ordering their shoes.
I don't understand why we don't play that card. We have more leverage on China than the other way around. If we start to outsource and stop ordering from China, they will crash harder than a meteorite.

The only way to keep China in line is threatening their current status. In my opinion, Xi is even more dangerous than Putin in the long run.
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Exactly, but that also makes him susceptible to becoming too bold. Putting sanctions on China is difficult since there is mutualy dependenacy there between them and the west, but cozying up to Putin of all people seems like an odd thing to do.
 
Real Name said:
Any talk about a possible UA offensive somewhere?
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Its talked about now by all parties as if its pretty much a certainty. I still have a worry in the back of my mind that they might not have the ammo or whatever to pull it off, but things do seem to be gearing up this way.

I also wonder if attrition rates really are so favourable to Ukraine, it may be a preferred option to just carry things on as they are, rather than take the risk of an offensive. Depends on how much they think time is on their side, and a million other factors I guess. We shall see.
 
Simbo said:
Its talked about now by all parties as if its pretty much a certainty. I still have a worry in the back of my mind that they might not have the ammo or whatever to pull it off, but things do seem to be gearing up this way.

I also wonder if attrition rates really are so favourable to Ukraine, it may be a preferred option to just carry things on as they are, rather than take the risk of an offensive. Depends on how much they think time is on their side, and a million other factors I guess. We shall see.
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Yeah, of course offensive shouldn't be rushed at any cost cause if they go into in unprepared it might backfire big time.
 


Emperor Palpatine invites a dear friend...So surreal that their people are okay with this. Don't they have any selfrespect to court them like tsars?
 
RedDevilQuebecois said:
Joe Biden needs to do a Bush and outright call those two out as the new Axis of Evil. There is simply no other way to put it when Xi already made his bed.
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On the 20th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq mate? You've learned feck all?
 
Real Name said:
Wonder where will they want to hit first. Maybe Mariupol area while Russians are still occupied with Bakhmut or will be in the future.
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I would think they'd like to cut through to the black sea to be able to get back the rest of Kherson and access to Crimea without having to cross the Dnipro river at Kherson.
 
Maagge said:
I would think they'd like to cut through to the black sea to be able to get back the rest of Kherson and access to Crimea without having to cross the Dnipro river at Kherson.
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This is the most obvious and Russia expects this according to this map. The fortifications are strongest in Zaporizhzhia area.
 
Raoul said:
I don’t think they’re going to lie, but they wouldn’t be incentivized to make conservative approximations either. Still a pretty remarkable number and if remotely true, would suggest the Russians are losing people at an unsustainable level that could actually see them collapse and lose a lot of territory should they ever fail to consistently replenish the dead.
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With some of the images I've seen today, seems fairly believable!
 
Ragnar123 said:
This is the most obvious and Russia expects this according to this map. The fortifications are strongest in Zaporizhzhia area.
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Looking at that map, wouldn't it make sense to push through Luhansk, mine/entrench/fortify the frontier to block any reinforcements coming that way, and then go from East to West facing an enemy with an increasingly stressed supply line and the constant risk of being surrounded? I imagine is easier said than done but it looks like a good strategy from the outside, especially as russian deffense have been weaker there recently.
 
Real Name said:
Wonder where will they want to hit first. Maybe Mariupol area while Russians are still occupied with Bakhmut or will be in the future.
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Without considering the strenghts of the Russian defensive forces in various sectors Melitopol would seem like an obvious choise, it's fairly close to the front lines and taking it back would cut off all logistic routes between Crimea/Kherson oblast and Donbas.

But the reality is that US and EU support will probably peak this spring for the forseeable future and it will probably take 12-18 months before the ammunition production has caught up and we will be able to provide them with similar offensive capabilities again. Because of this Ukraine know they can't afford a failure, they need to attack where they have a good chanse of succes and a break through will yield some strategic advantages. A failure will probably mean at least another year of the same trench warfare we have seen this winter and that will be very costly for Ukraine. Whatever happens in the coming months it will have very long lasting consequences on the war.
 
Real Name said:
Wonder where will they want to hit first. Maybe Mariupol area while Russians are still occupied with Bakhmut or will be in the future.
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The Ukrainians will want to cut off Crimea first, which would seem the most logical since its a fairly narrow sliver or land between Crimea and Kherson Oblast. That would at least partially deprive Putin of being able to resupply his troops in Kherson, which will allow the Ukrainians to reclaim it with less resistance (that's if they're successful in cutting Crimea off). In terms of the east, it will be much harder since there hasn't been much progress in months.
 
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Russia is a fascist state that does not want to know its real history. Lies upon lies about its own past and present. I don't know if there is a way back, with or without Putin. Too many people are involved.


https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65024254

Memorial raids: Russia targets leaders of banned Nobel Prize-winning group

Nine leaders of one of Russia's oldest human rights groups, Memorial, have been targeted in raids on their homes, 15 months after their organisation was shut down by the courts.

Among them was Memorial's co-chair, Oleg Orlov, who is facing a criminal case for "discrediting" the military.

Founded in 1989, Memorial aimed to remember millions of innocent people persecuted by Soviet repression.

But it was liquidated ahead of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
 
frostbite said:
Russia is a fascist state that does not want to know its real history. Lies upon lies about its own past and present. I don't know if there is a way back, with or without Putin. Too many people are involved.
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It reminds me of a tweet that Mark Hertling wrote only 2 days ago.



While Germany and Japan managed to rise up from the ashes of WW2 to become a new breed of superpowers through economy, Russia are in a much deeper hole compared to the other 2 countries because of longstanding kleptocracy and corruption. You could have Jason and the Argonauts with you, and yet it would not be enough to clean up the house in Russia.
 
RedDevilQuebecois said:
It reminds me of a tweet that Mark Hertling wrote only 2 days ago.



While Germany and Japan managed to rise up from the ashes of WW2 to become a new breed of superpowers through economy, Russia are in a much deeper hole compared to the other 2 countries because of longstanding kleptocracy and corruption. You could have Jason and the Argonauts with you, and yet it would not be enough to clean up the house in Russia.
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Yes. Also, both Germany and Japan transformed into modern, stable democracies (while neither of them had any deep democratic traditions in the past). And the truth is that occupation by the United States helped them to establish and nurture their democracies, especially at the beginning.

Russia does have this and doesn't show any deep desire for democracy... actually, I really don't see how they can transform themselves into a democracy. Watching videos with interviews of everyday Russians on youtube, I get the impression that Putin is not an anomaly, if it wasn't Putin it would be someone else. And if the autocrat cannot depend on an economic ideology like Communism to justify their power and their excesses, then they need some other ideology, and usually this is either God or Nationalism or both.
 
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