Comments by "duncan smith" (@duncansmith7562) on "Why gains in Ukraine's counteroffensive are slow in coming | DW News" video.

with no air superiority it will be halted and then reversed
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NATO said Ukraine received 98% of what was promised, so, you choose, who is lying? Zelensky or NATO?
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for Russia, it was never about and is not about taking territory.
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so why was the offensive launched?
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@warbrain1053 surrounding Kiev was the means to get Ukraine to the negotiating table. which worked. incorporating 4 oblasts happened with no opposition, such were NATO and Ukraine focused on Kiev. Since then it has been a war of attrition. As long as the kill rate is in Russia's favor, which it is, gaining territory has little meaning.
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@SallyanneXxx exactly! NATO has built up Ukraine for 9 years for this moment. now we see what happens when you under-estimate the enemy.
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@mysticmarble94 truth hurts, eh?
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@Memovox yep, that's right. After 21 "game changers" we have demoralized, badly equipped Russians, poorly led, halting in its track the grand NATO counter offensive!
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@soil-play of course. the huge tactical blunder was believing NATO assurances that it could deliver a victory over Russia.
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just so funny watching DW and its "experts" explain away the total catastrophe that is the Ukrainian offensive. We are in WEEK SIX and slow progress has been replaced by NO progress. Hundreds of ukronazian cannon fodder get massacred every day, NATO training and weaponry has failed to enable one single Ukrainian get anywhere near the FIRST line of Russian defences. The Ukronazians are getting massacred in the security zone! Cut to the chase...NATO under-estimated Russia's ability to counter Western weapons and Zelensky was fool enough to believe NATO's promise that NATO would be able to deliver victory.
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@srambrero it's a really easy choice, if you are a realist and not a deluded dreamer. Zelensky picks up the phone and says to Putin "I totally misjudged Russia's capacity to fight a war of attrition AND NATO's ability to help me. Let's talk a peace deal to end this".
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@Memovox truth hurts, eh?
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really? but we keep hearing how NATO is united and will do whatever is needed for as long as it takes!
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SLOW? no advances were made over the last week! None! Based on the advances made by Ukraine in its most "successful" two weeks, Ukraine will reach the Sea of Azov and cut the land bridge in SIXTEEN YEARS! Just in time for Ukrainian babies conceived today to join the cannon fodder and get massacred! Only a total fool would take Russia on in a protracted ground war. The counter offensive has been stopped. it's over.
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remember the days of "send more javelins"? now NATO is down to cluster bombs. Give it 2 more months and the latest panic cry will be "send Kiev some nukes".
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keep in mind folks, that NATO never anticipated nor planned for being in this position. But Russia did. remember senile Biden boasting how the ruble would become rubble and the Russian economy would collapse and Putin would become a pariah? Von der Leyen saying "the Russian economy is in tatters, in tatters, I tell you" reality check: it's Germany in recession, not Russia. it's NATO incapable of providing Ukraine's troops with what it needs, not Russia incapable of supplying Russian troops with what they need. it's Ukraine forcing teenagers and pensioners to enlist, not Russia.
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@hornstein12 there was never a plan to "take Kiev". 40,000 troops to battle it out street by street in a city of 3 million? Makes no sense. Russians create cauldrons. Kiev was never going to be assaulted. Learn how Russia fights instead of repeating Western media blabber.
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@thegreatdane3627 and now the truth..the Russians don't have to capture anywhere. the Russians just need to wait until the last Ukrainian has been killed, or the last Ukrainian missile fired, or the last US military aid package is voted down by Congress. And if you doubt Russia's patience to wait it out, re read the history of Russia.
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@jiminverness Jim, which word in the statement did you not understand? Putin's plan was to resolve all issues at the negotiating table once the land bridge to Crimea was secured, which it was pretty early on. And Putin succeeded. In Istanbul we saw Ukraine just about to sign an agreement on outstanding issues. NATO then told puppet Zelensky not to sign (remember, as Lloyd Austin said, "the aim is to weaken Russia") and NATO promised it would support Ukraine all the way to victory, "as long as it takes". now then, what do you not understand?
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@MSDGroup-ez6zk yep, this is the best USA can do. cluster bombs because USA is incapable of supplying regular shells. we now understand why USA was kicked out of Kabul so easily by the sandal wearing Taliban. The US military is pathetic and its commander in chief useless.
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@jiminverness and to think, Jim, all this because Kiev and Washington just could not stand the idea of the Donbass ethnic Russians separating from Kiev! How much easier all of this would have been had Poroshenko said "fine, be independent or join Russia, we are fine without you".
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@jiminverness No one in Ukraine has ever voted to leave the Russian Federation because no one in Ukraine has ever lived in the Russian Federation! Oh dear, looks like you are confused between the difference between the USSR and the Russian Federation!
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@jiminverness let me introduce you to the notion of democracy. at the time of the coup in Kiev in 2014, the Crimean Parliament in Simferopol voted 78-0 to separate from Kiev. The vast majority of Crimeans are Russians and pro Russians. Ever been there, have you? Crimea was only part of Ukraine since Krushchov's days because he decided to transfer it from the RSFSR to Ukraine, though it was all USSR back then and it made no political difference.
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@jiminverness now then, Putin has been in power for decades. If capturing all of Ukraine is some Putin imperial dream, why has he done NOTHING to bring that dream to fruition for all the years he was in power before 2022? Why wait so long? And if recreating some sort of Imperialist Russia is a Putin objective, why reclaim ONLY South Ossetia and Abkhazia in Georgia, and not the whole of Georgia? Why only have Russian troops in Transnistria and NOT take over all of Moldova? At some point you will understand that Putin's desire is to protect the rights of Russian speakers and ethnic Russians, not to recreate any empire, but it is so cute you parrot the baseless nonsense the western press shove down your throat every day!
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@jiminverness just curious. would you say to French speaking Canadians that if they are unhappy with things in Quebec, they should just move to France? Or to French speaking Belgians, if they feel unhappy, just get out of Belgium and go to France? and to Catalans, if you don't like how Madrid treats you, screw your independence, just get out and go to the French side of Cataluna? try expressing those sentiments in Barcelona and see if you survive the day.
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@jiminverness hey, Jim, when do you expect the ruble to become rubble and for Russia to be incapable of waging war in Ukraine? Biden first mentioned the imminent demise of Russian a year and a half ago! when will it actually happen?:)
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@bonnie7898 exactly so. when you talk to students about their fears of being forced into the Azov battalion and dispatched to the front in a war they don't support, it changes your perspective. spouting your ignorance from Down Under about who the Allies were, and getting it so horribly wrong, shows you know nothing. You're probably the fascist type that insists Aborigines, when they form the majority of a school community, must never use their native language in the classroom.
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@thorn6809 the "nobody" is someone who is destroying Ukraine and massacring hundreds, sometimes thousands, of Ukrainian citizens every day. if that isn't a good reason to start negotiating, it just means the lives of Ukrainians mean nothing to Zelensky.
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@niburu1508 truth hurts, eh?
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@niburu1508 A rose is a rose by any other name
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@bonnie7898 truth hurts, eh? the great counter offensive has failed and NATO is so low on weapons it must send cluster bombs. Nice little surprise gift for future generations of Ukrainian kids playing in the woods. no wonder the Taliban kicked NATO a*s so easily in Kabul, NATO has no bloody clue what it's doing.
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@braxxian what is really nice for Russia is that the absurdly small amounts of weaponry sent to Ukraine is sent in intervals so that plenty of time and attention can be fixed on destroying the latest weaponry arrivals and Russia is never overwhelmed by a wave of new supplies arriving.
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@anderssigeklint8739 it's a totally unrealistic dream. Ukraine needs to get real and accept it can survive as a state, much reduced, but survive as a state if it talks peace with Russia. otherwise, Russia's plan to "demilitarize" really will be eliminate every fighting age man in Ukraine. those are the two realistic choices. survival but reduced status as a nation, or complete annihilation. only a fool would engage Russia in a protracted land war. fools must pay the price.
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@crumcon makes you wonder when these "experts" will stop extolling the virtues of NATO's failed weapons and start analyzing what it is that the Russians have (beyond shovels) that seems to be working. Know thine enemy....but too late for NATO to evaluate why Russia is coming out on top.
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@vlhc4642 exactly! am beginning to think it is "as long as it takes to ensure the last Ukrainian is dead and buried"
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@SmilingNinja I am a logical thinker with a radar that detects bs from a mile away, hence I can see that Ukraine, Zelensky and NATO are in massive trouble.
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@jean-marcsalotti999 just hesitant to consider these recent Russian gains as big reversals. when Avdiivka or Siversk or Liman or Kupinsk fall, I''ll be on board with you!
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