Comments by "Tx240" (@Texas240) on "Jake Broe"
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@DeMan59 The problem with saying, "it's not our war," is THAT is exactly what the US said at the outset of WWII as Hitler said the EXACT SAME things when they invaded Poland as Putin said when his Russia invaded Ukraine.
Putin isn't just trying to subjugate Ukraine. He's trying to rebuild the second Russian Empire (aka Soviet Union). He's openly stated that the fall of (really the implosion of, though) the Soviet Union is the worst thing to happen to Russia.
Putin's goal is to reclaim ALL former Soviet republics and territory that Putin views as part of Russian sphere of influence.
Many of those countries are now NATO members. If we, the USA, don't help Ukraine make it untenable for Russia to be in Ukraine and force Russia to withdraw from Ukraine, it will be the same as us giving Putin the green light to invade the Baltics (Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia), small countries that Putin views as part of the Russian Empire.
At THAT point, NATO Article 5 requires us to defend those countries directly, not just send aid.
So, if we don't help Ukraine because "it's not our war", we will have a much more expensive fight that includes American casualties and possibly nuclear armageddon as we send men and equipment to the Baltics to directly fight Russia. At that point, it's much, MUCH more expensive than simply sending materiel to Ukraine and letting them do the fighting to prevent further Russian aggression in Europe.
As the old oil change ad pointed out when a car repair shop said, "you can pay me now (for the oil change) or you can pay me later (for a new engine)".
We're spending money to update the American arsenal and create American jobs (90% of "aid to Ukraine" is spent in the USA).
So, there's even an added immediate benefit of economic stimulus in the US while we work to enjoy the future benefits of not having to send troops to fight Russia in European NATO countries and prevent nuclear war.
If you want to know how "not our war" goes when wars start in Europe, I really recommend looking at what happened during the outset of WWII.
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I'm not a fan of Trump. However, any real Republicans know that Russia isn't a friend.
There's a few key points on the Ukraine war.
First, Ukraine is fighting the exact same war that the American Colonies were fighting in 1775. In our effort to gain independence from England, we had help from the French and that help was not trivial or insignificant. If France hadn't helped the colonists, America might not be a thing.
Second, related to the above point, Ukraine is more different than Russia in terms of language and culture than the American Colonies were different from England!
I have a Russian speaking friend living in Ukraine, one of the people who Putin was allegedly "helping". She had to flee a city in the Donbas during the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine. Since February 2022, she's denounced her Russian heritage and says she can't understand what's wrong with Russians in Russia that they allow or support Putin in the bombardment of Russian speaking areas of Ukraine.
I had learned Russian and was surprised how different Ukrainian is from Russian when she started learning Ukrainian. I can't understand any of it.
My point here is that Ukraine is not "part of Russia", not culturally or linguistically or historically. Kyiv existed as a city long before Moscow or Russia.
Third, the war in Ukraine is actually a fight to PREVENT WWIII. Our inaction and failure to fulfill our obligation under the Budapest Memorandum to guarantee Ukraine's territorial integrity in exchange for giving up its nuclear deterrent. Our inaction in 2014 was the exact same thing as giving Putin a green light to continue his invasion and ultimately his efforts to rebuild the Russian Empire.
After listening to julia ioffe interview on PBS (available on YouTube), it's clear that Putin really thinks it's Russia's right to re-acquire territory that Putin thinks should be within the Russian sphere of influence. This territory includes Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Poland. All are NATO members. Not stopping Russia in Ukraine and aiding Ukraine until Russia withdraws from all areas of Ukraine would lead to invasion of NATO countries that were formerly Soviet states.
Ukraine is spending blood to prevent WWIII in addition to fighting for their own independence.
Any real Republican remembers or knows of Ronald Reagan. In his words:
"Simple-minded appeasement or wishful thinking about our adversaries is folly."
And
"There is no safety, no security in the appeasement of evil."
Evil and bullies don't need provocation to do evil deeds. Inaction never stopped a bully's next beating. He needs to be stopped, just as Putin does.
Finally, as regards cost, allowing Ukraine to spend the blood to stop a US and NATO adversary is a bargain. In a more direct sense, money spent helping Ukraine is also a bargain compared to what it would cost when Putin invades a NATO country that he views as "Russian territory".
And, if Putin isn't stopped in Ukraine it is guaranteed that he will enter other former Soviet states that are now NATO members.
Incidentally, in the ioffe interview, she pointed out how Putin thinks every American president, including Trump, was a rube and not his equal. Putin specifically brought young, attractive translators to meetings with Trump to distract Trump.
Most Russians look down on blacks and Putin thought Obama was just a stupid black. So, Putin was anti America, regardless of who was in the White House.
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@JakeBroe - Perun did a really good presentation on the politics and risks of escalation.
Russia is the first nuclear power to start a war and then threaten nuclear weapons once they realized their plan was woefully insufficient.
Yes, I've seen your vid on why Russia won't use nuclear weapons, however the fact remains that if Russia was crazy enough to attack a near-peer European neighbor, the possibility exists that Putin, delusional as he is, might do something crazier.
Then, there's the suspicion that the West is drawing it out to keep Russia hooked long enough to more fully demolish Russia's military capacity than if overwhelming aid had been immediately given to Ukraine and Russia was forced to withdraw earlier.
Ironically, while horrible for Ukraine in the short term (and I have a friend there, now), this provides greater security for Ukraine and Europe in the longer term.
If there is any truth to this, then Europe and NATO absolutely owe Ukraine everything thrust need to fight and rebuild, since they are spending the blood to fight for the security of all of Europe.
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Russia doesn't control the skies. Both sides have proliferated ground based air defenses (GBAD) that prevent the other side from safely operating aircraft.
Russian air superiority jets stay over Russian controlled territory, protected by their GBAD and lob R37 long range missiles at Ukranian aircraft when they are detected by Russian AWACS over the black sea or Russian territory or ground based radar. These long range attacks are mainly to make the Ukrainians evade and stop trying to do whatever they're trying to do. The R37 was designed to hit B52 stratofortress bombers, not fighters and while very fast, isn't maneuverable.
Unfortunately, the F-16 offers no safe counter to either the Russian GBAD or the Russian R37 vollies.
The R37 has a range of up to 200 km. The US AIM 120 AMRAAM that the F-16 will carry has a range of about 60km. The F-16s will never get in range to attack Russian aircraft. The Russians will simply fly away from the F-16s and encourage the F-16s to fly over Russian GBAD to snack on a few missiles. The F-16s will decline the offer and the Russian jets will turn around and pop off a couple more R 37s. That's modern air combat. Air to air battles aren't "dogfights" and the F-16 brings nothing valuable to the Ukrainian air superiority situation.
Where the F-16 could be effective and where it will have to be effective if air superiority is the goal is SEAD or suppression of enemy defenses. The Ukrainians have already dabbled in firing Western HARM anti radiation (anti radar) missiles from Mig 29s. The F-16 will offer better integration of these missiles as well as other guided missiles like the AGM 65 maverick and various unguided munitions (bombs and rockets) which can all be valuable for elimination of Russian GBAD.
The problem is that Ukraine will lose jets and pilots doing this, hunting the things designed to shoot them down. The Russian PANTSIR system can integrate multiple launchers into each other's radar so that "dark" launchers can still fire at Ukrainians hunting the units with active radar.
Think Iraq 1, where the US blitzed Saddam's GBAD and where we (the US) lost aircraft and had pilots paraded on Iraqi TV. Then turn that up to 11 and you have what Ukraine is facing in trying to deal with Russian GBAD.
The F-16 will be similar to the Leopard, except even less significant. Ukraine operates the Mig 29. It's the functional equivalent of the F-16 in flight performance, munitions carrying ability, and mission profiles. The F-16 doesn't bring much to Ukraine that the Mig 29 doesn't already give them... Except more airframes that can be sacrificed in Ukraine's fight for independence, ultimately, from Russia.
What Ukraine REALLY needs is the Swedish Gripen. First, this jet can use the British Meteor, which the F-16 currently doesn't. This is a longe range air to air missile that would give rough parody to Russia's R37. It's a little shorter but designed to hit fighters and so, more of a threat than the R37.
The Gripen can also carry the Storm Shadow missile which the F-16 doesn't. Ukraine is currently using aging and few Su 24 aircraft to carry and launch the Storm Shadow. Having Gripen would ease the burden on the Su24s and allow Ukraine to continue using such long range missiles as the Soviet era jets wear out.
Gripen for long range air to air and Storm Shadow missions with F-16 for SEAD, close air support and locking down the Black Sea with AGM 84 Harpoon missiles in addition to combined use of ATACMS, decoys, S200s, etc would be an ideal combination to enable Ukraine to blitz Russian GBAD.
The problem arises as Ukraine closes distance to Russia. The ground launched anti air missiles can be inside Russian territory which means they're safe from Western or US weapons and free to shoot down F-16s over Ukraine.
The F-16 alone will be less of a game changer than Leopard tanks were. It's ironic that one of the best dog fighters ever built will see it's most significant use in the ground attack role in Ukraine and virtually no air to air combat (unless helicopters count).
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Actually, it's worse than that. If the US quits supporting Ukraine, Ukraine will be forced to start attacking targets inside Russia, especially civilian targets like heat and electricity, that they so far have been avoiding because it would cause a loss of Western support.
Perun channel recently did a presentation that indicates a large part of Putin being able to continue is the lack of effect or cost of the war on most Russian's everyday lives. If Ukraine was able to place a cost on the war for ordinary Russians (say, not having heat or electricity during winter) then the tacit support for Putin's war could dry up and leave Putin with larger concerns at home.
Remember, if Western aid stops, Ukraine ends up in a desperate fight for survival alone and means they'll have lost the reason to take the high road and will need to take whatever action they see necessary to ensure their survival.
Ironically, the US halting military aid to Ukraine could actually cause the as yet merely threatened nuclear escalation.
Putin and his upper echelon already believe this is a war between Russia and the United States or NATO and that we are (somehow) forcing Ukraine to fight when Ukraine really just wants to give up and be part of Russia.
If US aid dries up and Ukraine is forced to start attacking infrastructure inside Russia in order to place a cost on the war for average Russians and try to cause backlash against Putin inside Russia, Russia will view these attacks as COMING FROM (or at the instruction of THE UNITED STATES.
Juila ioffe, an expert on Russia has suggested that it would be better if Russians were purple. As it is they look like us, European (most Americans are of European descent) but they absolutely don't think like us. Because they look similar, it's easy to forget that they very much aren't similar.
So, with that in mind, our purple Russians will interpret the consequences of US halting aid to Ukraine as escalation by the United States and an attack by the United States directly on Russia proper.
So, by halting aid to Ukraine, the United States will both lose any influence over Ukraine's war activities AND be escalating the war in the mind of Russia's leaders.
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This is similar to what happened in Texas a couple years ago when a strong winter cold period increased electricity consumption (as people turned up heating) beyond what power company had prepared for. There was so much draw on the equipment that power had to be cut in order to avoid damaging the power generation equipment.
Once the emergency blackouts (followed layer by rolling blackouts) began to save the power equipment, water pumping stations lost power. At that point, with water not flowing and hard freeze temperatures, the pipes bursts as water began to freeze. So, people were without electricity for heat and without water.
Here, we don't wave radiator heating systems, but they're radiators bursting is the same as our water mains bursting.
Except, it's very rarely thst cold in Texas. Our problem was due to the electricity company not planning enough fuel supply at the generating stations. Then, once the storm hit, more fuel couldn't be transported in.
Whatever Russia's current electricity generating issues are, all those complaining Russians should be tried for treason. If they are not building military equipment in a factory or fighting on the front "to save Russia from invasion", then they are not a necessary part of the society because they aren't doing their patriotic duty to support their "benevolent" czar.
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4:35 re, why we keep making the same mistakes (burying our head in the sand during WWI and WWII until action was unavoidable instead of acting earlier and being able to prevent the situation from worsening...
Even if history is recorded, society only has the memory of about 60 to 80 years or 1 generation. After that history and lessons learned from it are forgotten.
This is true both ways. Putin forgot how things worked out for the last fascist dictator who invaded European neighbors.
The West, especially the United States, has forgotten what happened when nothing was done as that dictator began invading Europe. We kept hearing, "we don't want to give too much aid as it might cause Russia to escalate."
Utter nonsense. Russia had no room escalate because they were 100% in at day 3 of the 2022 invasion. Yet, the West, completely forgetting how appeasement and diplomacy don't work with an aggressive dictator bent on building an empire.
Worse, Trump aka "Mr Win at Any Cost" is so desperate for personal power that he's willing to throw America under the bus to get it and do things that align with the goals of an enemy the USA and the democratic, free world.
Because society doesn't remember how trying to avoid a world crisis didn't work, people begin parroting the nonsense coming out of Trump led Republican Party. And, Trump isn't even an elected official! It's nuts.
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11:19 PLEASE, anyone who hears a friend or relative mention aid "given" to Ukraine, correct them by reminding them that everything we're "giving" to Ukraine is a loan, just as aid to Britain was during WWII.
The United States isn't "giving" Ukraine anything anymore than a bank "gives" a mortgage or car loan. Most people don't refer to a mortgage or car loan as a "gift".
The "gift" is that a person has been afforded the opportunity to purchase a home or car with future repayment. Ukraine is being afforded the opportunity to purchase their independence from a neighbor who continually tries to move into their house.
As a bonus, Ukraine, not the United States, is spending BLOOD to defeat an enemy of the United States. Like it or not, Russia has remained an enemy of the United States since the Soviet Union lost the Cold War.
US aid to Ukraine, if nothing else, is buying the military and economical weakening of an enemy of the United States, NATO, and Europe with ZERO cost in American lives while actively increasing growth in the US defense industry jobs program.
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@sstratford123 - for a moment, I thought the findings you listed were about the United States. I had to scroll back up.
Independent judiciary? What about the federal judge who threw out an armored car company's request to issue a pre - trial injunction against a California sheriff's department that has been "legally" hijacking its armored cars and the proceeds mostly go to the US government, with a kick back to the sheriff department, through asset forfeiture laws?
Abuse of Detainees? Ask former police officer Derek Chauvin why he was imprisoned (and subsequently stabbed 22 times). It sure wasn't for upholding detainee rights and guaranteeing proper care.
Etc, etc.
You're trying to say Ukraine isn't perfect. Glass houses and stones, my friend.
The important question is whether Ukraine has been improving. Remember, you're talking about a former Soviet state that has been burdened with the mindset of some people that corruption is normal (it's well documented how Russia corruption compromised its military). All of the former Soviet states and Warsaw Pact countries that are now EU or NATO members would've had similar reports prior to them having a path to join those organizations. Hungary and Slovakia probably still do have such reports based on their Soviet-esque governments.
Israel, beacon of the Western civilized world in the Middle East, is also pretty bad on the issues you chastise Ukraine for and that's part of the current cause of their troubles.
To answer your question, yes I supported Ukraine in 2014 because I have a friend living there who had to flee the Donetsk area in 2014, despite being one of the Russian speakers that Putin's Russian proxies were "liberating". Putin's anarchists and criminals that Russia transported to eastern Ukraine and referred to as "separatists" were responsible for the death of my friend's grandmother (who raised her) when they began shelling the town with artillery prior to attacking (the same method Russia has used in Ukraine since 2022 which has turned many towns to rubble). The grandmother wouldn't leave her home when other people were evacuating and, ironically, had fond memories of the "good old days" during Stalin. No joke. That's how "Russian" my friend was raised inside Ukraine and who has proudly declared herself Ukrainian, not Russian, since February 2022.
Since 2014, I've also been pointing out how the US and UK didn't fulfill our obligations under the Budapest Memorandum to protect Ukraine's territorial integrity in exchange for Ukraine giving up its Soviet era nuclear deterrent.
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@fyr7343 Correction. Donetsk and Luhansk both voted for independence from Russia at the fall of the Soviet Union. They were both (as was Crimea) semi autonomous regions within Ukraine. People there didn't really care much what Ukraine OR Russia was doing. The status quo was fine.
There was no discrimination or persecution against Russian speakers until AFTER the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine.
And it was a Russian invasion of eastern Ukraine, not a separatist uprising. The original "separatists" were foreign criminals and anarchists which Russia transported to Ukraine and then supported with Russian special forces who trained them in basic tactics, use of captured equipment, and called in helicopter gunship support when Ukraine tried to respond.
I have a friend who lived in Donetsk. She fled to a city farther west and called the "separatists" (aka foreign Russian proxy fighters) t*rrorists. She was one of the Russian speakers you suggest wanted independence from Ukraine. Prior to 2022, she would tell you she was Russian. After February 2022, she was Ukranian and hates Russia for what they've done to her country, to her home, to her grandmother (killed by "separatist" artillery fire as they moved into town, similar to the current Russian tactic), to her friends who lived in Kharkiv, and for stealing her heritage by making it bad to be Russian.
THAT is the person you're suggesting wanted independence from Russia. People who didn't leave weren't "fighting for independence from Ukraine", they just didn't have resources to leave or believed the Russian propaganda on the TV saying "we're coming to help you!" (which was followed by artillery and then armed criminals and anarchists ranging through town).
As a bonus the first president of the DPR wasn't Russian OR Ukrainian. As I said, foreigners hoping to be the next Kadyrov or wanting an outlet for their criminal tendencies.
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Trump didn't just surrender. Trump bent over and grabbed his ankles in front of Putin. Trump is evil. Lieutenant Hegseth is a naive idiot.
Trump thinks he's a Master Negotiator much as Putin fancies himself a Master Strategist. In Putin's eyes, Trump is weak and confirming Western weakness.
Edit 6:46 Hegseth, Trump, and President Elon didn't think this through. Europe needs to guarantee Ukraine's security with their troops, but the US is against Ukraine joining NATO and the US will not send troops to guarantee security.
First, if Ukraine is going to give mineral rights to anyone, it's going to be countries that help with security. Second, when Putin inevitably breaks the peace, NATO troops will be casualties and the US will be sending troops... Either to secure Ukraine or to fight Russia as Russia, emboldened by American weakness and disinterest in Europe, moves into European NATO countries.
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21:07 sadly, Ukraine tried the same thing, to join NATO because they knew one day Russia would be back. Ukraine was told, "someday" while the west was also, unofficially, telling Russia that Ukraine wouldn't be allowed into NATO as an appeasement to Russian fears of a European invasion of Russia.
Because of their history of being invaded, Russia has a built in paranoia even if it's unfounded in this age.
And, here we are today. The Ukrainians paying the price for the West trying to appease evil. And, STILL there is the appeasement mindset "don't want to upset Russia" (Biden with ATACMS, Scholz with Taurus). We learn slow.
Send Ukraine everything they need, and then some, so they can defeat Russia on the battlefield and the US and Europe don't have to risk our soldiers lives fighting inevitable Russian invasion of the Baltics should Russia prevail in Ukraine.
Get the war over with as quickly as possible saves the most lives, prevents the most destruction, and gets the world back to "normal" sooner.
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4:42 re, RF Kennedy claims Russia invaded Ukraine in good faith
Even Prigozhin, in his "truth propaganda" just pointed out that all of Russia's reasoning for invading Ukraine was nonsense, made up, lies or just wrong.
Also, for people who think Ukranian lives would be saved if Ukraine didn't have the resources and equipment to fight against Russia's invasion, realize that if Ukraine capitulated, surrendered, that every fighting age man would be executed (or castrated) and every woman of child bearing age would be either raped or married off to a Russian soldier as a war prize.
Russia would employ these measures both to punish the Ukranian people for resisting and embarrassing Russia as well as to mitigate the demographic crisis in Russia.
Russia's missile campaign against civilians and the destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam are designed to punish the Ukrainian civilians for resisting as is Russian soldiers castrating Ukrainian POWs.
So, this "punishment campaign" and mindset of the Russians is already evidenced.
Withdrawing military aid to Ukraine and preventing them from defending themselves from unwarranted Russian aggression would be much, MUCH worse for Ukrainian people than allowing Ukraine to beat the Russians back out of Ukraine.
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43:06 re, Ukrainian feelings toward Russians
Jake, the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine and its impact on average Ukrainians was minor compared to the current war situation.
I have a friend who is Russian speaking that fled Donetsk during the 2014 invasion to a more western part of Ukraine (and lost her grandmother to artillery fired by the Russian proxy fighters because grandma wouldn't leave her home).
Even that most Ukrainians were unaffected by the 2014 invasion, my friend said that her and her elementary school aged daughter faced discrimination because they were Russian.
(Up until February 2022, my friend would say she was Russian, not Ukrainian, because of family heritage and she didn't really start learning Ukrainian until the 2022 invasion when speaking Russian, BEING Russian, became a no-no. Since February, she describes herself as Ukrainian, not because of discrimination but because she, like most Ukrainians, became incensed or pissed off by Russia's barbaric behavior and especially the destruction of cities through artillery bombardment...primarily Russian speaking cities where she still had friends and family.)
My point being that there was an unwelcome feeling from Ukrainians towards Russians in 2014. Now, it's more like hatred. Unless the Russian immigrants would already speak Ukrainian or English and have work skills, particularly construction or something else immediately valuable to Ukraine, I don't see Ukrainians welcoming Russians for quite a while.
In my Russian, now Ukrainian, friend's own words, "there's just something wrong with them (the Russians)".
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22:26 ask those people if they were supportive of our efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. Our actions in Iraq led to a Civil War and Iraq becoming friendly with Iran (instead of a staunch enemy under Saddam).
We spent 20 years training, supplying, and equipping the Afghani military so that it could...surrender immediately when the Taliban came down from the mountains.
We were in those 2 ungrateful countries, jamming our fingers in their pies, without invitation, to give them freedom and democracy whether they wanted it or not.
We did that to help ensure US security by eliminating the Taliban and the supposed WMD of Iraq that could find their way into the hands of "terrorizers".
Sending aid to Ukraine is the same as the intent of our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan EXCEPT we're not risking American lives, the Ukrainians are fighting a civil war among themselves for control of their country, the Ukrainians are fighting Russia, which is also an enemy of the United States (with Russian TV presenters calling for Jihad against the US, among other more subtle activities). Further, unlike Iraq and Afghanistan, Ukraine is a European country and aspires to join the EU and NATO and become an actual ally.
Aid to Ukraine is important because they are fighting the same fight we did in 1776. We had significant help from France. How great would it be if we were still paying the tea tax because France didn't think it was important to help us.
Then, you can tell them the things Jake pointed out about Russia stealing Ukrainian children, trying to commit genocide, using rape as a war weapon, executing civilians both as the Russians enter an area and as they're forced back out, etc.
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Orcs, barbarians, zombies aren't simply wartime slurs to de-humanize the enemy, in the case of Russians, they're apt descriptions.
Orcs and barbarians are brutal, unthinking, and leave a wake of chaos behind them. While they can be strong in battle, they rely heavily on numbers to create fear and reduce morale of their enemies. Barbarians also rely on speed and continuous movement and suffer rapid atrophy if sitting still in a trench too long.
While potentially being strong in battle, they're not necessarily capable of organizing themselves into an effective group to accomplish specific objectives that require more than brute force. Both orcs and barbarians are also weak to sorcery and magic from the school of HIMARS.
Zombies are the unthinking, unfeeling remains of something that was once human (or in this case, something that was once orc or barbarian). They may be able to endure pain and harsh conditions but without any thing more than a primal drive to survive (and steal washing machines), they are a very disorganized and ineffective enemy when they don't have a large advantage of sheer numbers of bodies.
Zombies have, in smaller groups, have also been found to be almost tameable if offered sustenance (and /or cash payment). Ongoing experiments have yet to determine if the blind, unthinking zombie state can be reversed and the subject returned to humanity.
So, yeah. It's terrible that the Ukrainians' borders have been overrun by these orcs, barbarians, and zombies but the brave, resilient, and flexible Ukrainians are doing an excellent job of pushing the vile hordes back.
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@crogeny - Speaking of timetables, in 2008, Dubya was still sparring with Putin over who was actually head of a world power. Putin warned, told, Dubya not to invade Iraq for Iraq 2. Putin never got over the fact that the American cowboy considered Russia so toothless that America wouldn't heed Putin's warning.
So, of course Dubya would urge NATO to do things, like talk up admitting Ukraine, that would follow the same grain of sidelining Putin's Russia.
In 2009 Obama came to the White House and began the "Russian Reset". At that point, anything offensive to Russia ceased, including the US honoring its commitments under the Budapest Memorandum to protect the territorial integrity of Ukraine.
So, again, you would be correct to argue that since the fall of the Soviet Union, Ukraine WAS being considered for NATO membership, "someday"....someday.
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1:09 Jake, make no mistake, mass indiscriminate killing of civilians is also Israel's policy towards Palestinians.
Except, Isreal has tanks, jets, and helicopter gunships. So, Israel is much better at it than HAMAS. The Israeli policy is to eliminate women before 30 can have more children and eliminate the children before they can grow up to be HAMAS.
Israel is the Russia of the Middle East.
Israel bombs the only authorized exit from Gaza and THEN advises Palestinian civilians to exit Gaza due to imminent Israeli attack.
This is EXACTLY the same as Russia bombarding humanitarian civilian evacuation corridors with artillery, thereby preventing civilians from fleeing areas that were facing attack.
Israeli regional policy and leadership behavior mimic that of Russia: bullying neighbors with the SAME excuse Putin uses (we've been invaded in the past), occupying territory illegally, desiring genocide against people who live in territory that Israel desires.
It's sadly ironic that Netanyahu, and many Israelis would eliminate the Palestinians altogether with a snap of their fingers if it was possible.
Take care that when hunting monsters, you yourself don't become a monster.
Again, It's similar to Putin and his Nazis. The only reason Israel doesn't outright obliterate the Palestinians is that if they did what they desire, they'd lose the moral high ground and possibly Western support. Although, America so enjoys slobbering and choking on Israeli peen that it might be too far down our throats to remove.
As with Putin, Israeli leadership enjoys having the Palestinians and HAMAS as an "existential threat to security". That one of Putin's reasons for invading Ukraine. HAMAS is a creation of bad Israeli regional policies. Israeli leadership benefits more from HAMAS than the Palestinians do because having that threat allows Israeli politicians to be the strongman and continue the cycle. That's a cycle which keeps them in power.
Israel doesn't want peace with the Palestinians. Israeli politicians are perfectly OK with Israeli civilians being killed or wounded in terrorist attacks every so often as long as this maintains status quo and enables the Israeli politicians to stay in power and propagate cycle.
There won't be peace in that region until Israel eliminates all Palestinians or the civilized world starts treating Israel like the barbaric state sponsor of terrorism that it is. Israel is both directly responsible for the killing of Palestinian women and children as well as the Israeli governments de facto support for HAMAS as described above.
As an American, it sickens me that so many people go full on Russian Sheep mode and refuse to think critically and look at the causality of the current situation and how Israeli policy is the catalyst.
Edit, more similarity with Russia
1:24 Pictures and videos online show Israel pretending they're Russia and that Gaza is Mariupol.
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I said it before, but Kherson wasn't a misinformation campaign or feint. The technical term for the Kherson operations is "dilemma".
Basically, the Kherson operation would leave Russia with 2 bad choices. 1st, Russia could divert troops to Kherson region and leave the east and northeast weaker. Or, Russia could not divert troops to Kherson, continuing its eastern attacks and northeast probing attacks, but leaving Kherson weaker.
Due to the lack of logistics due to the HIMARS removing Russian supply depots, Russia was no longer able to maintain its troops and hold on both south and east regions.
If Russia hadn't reinforced Kherson area, Ukraine simply would have pushed the Russians back to the Dnipr River and re-taken Kherson.
So, it wasn't a successful misinformation campaign, it was a successful dilemma that was going to result a huge map change either in the east, northeast, or south
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@lewisdoherty7621 - are you suggesting that Ukraine has a bunch of unaccounted for equipment at its national guard bases?
If that's what your suggesting, it's doubtful. First, Ukraine is a poor country and was never a military threat to Russia, as Russia claimed. Ukraine's military would've already been transferring that equipment or munitions to the east where there was a need to defend against regular probing attacks from the DNR and LNR forces occupying the east of Ukraine. That stagnant battle line existed for 8 years prior to the invasion in 2022. Even if it was low intensity, there was shooting.
Third, since the mobilization of Ukraine on a war footing, the only way stuff is sitting unused and unaccounted for in a national guard base is through corruption, which is a possibility. Remember, those units had troops. Those troops are going to want to take equipment and ammunition with them when they need to go fight.
4th, an accounting that you suggest probably took place when the various military units were organized into a national defense. Bean counters exist everywhere.
If you were talking about US state national guard inventories, I don't see how that's relevant other than they do have lots of old equipment that Ukraine could benefit from and would probably like to replace it with new equipment if the old stuff could be sent to Ukraine.
Second,
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Regarding F-16 and it's "meh" impact on the Ukraine theater (snipped from a sub comment reply)
Russia doesn't control the skies. Both sides have proliferated ground based air defenses (GBAD) that prevent the other side from safely operating aircraft.
Russian air superiority jets stay over Russian controlled territory, protected by their GBAD and lob R37 long range missiles at Ukranian aircraft when they are detected by Russian AWACS over the black sea or Russian territory or ground based radar. These long range attacks are mainly to make the Ukrainians evade and stop trying to do whatever they're trying to do. The R37 was designed to hit B52 stratofortress bombers, not fighters and while very fast, isn't maneuverable.
Unfortunately, the F-16 offers no safe counter to either the Russian GBAD or the Russian R37 vollies.
The R37 has a range of up to 200 km. The US AIM 120 AMRAAM that the F-16 will carry has a range of about 60km. The F-16s will never get in range to attack Russian aircraft. The Russians will simply fly away from the F-16s and encourage the F-16s to fly over Russian GBAD to snack on a few missiles. The F-16s will decline the offer and the Russian jets will turn around and pop off a couple more R 37s. That's modern air combat. Air to air battles aren't "dogfights" and the F-16 brings nothing valuable to the Ukrainian air superiority situation.
Where the F-16 could be effective and where it will have to be effective if air superiority is the goal is SEAD or suppression of enemy defenses. The Ukrainians have already dabbled in firing Western HARM anti radiation (anti radar) missiles from Mig 29s. The F-16 will offer better integration of these missiles as well as other guided missiles like the AGM 65 maverick and various unguided munitions (bombs and rockets) which can all be valuable for elimination of Russian GBAD.
The problem is that Ukraine will lose jets and pilots doing this, hunting the things designed to shoot them down. The Russian PANTSIR system can integrate multiple launchers into each other's radar so that "dark" launchers can still fire at Ukrainians hunting the units with active radar.
Think Iraq 1, where the US blitzed Saddam's GBAD and where we (the US) lost aircraft and had pilots paraded on Iraqi TV. Then turn that up to 11 and you have what Ukraine is facing in trying to deal with Russian GBAD.
The F-16 will be similar to the Leopard, except even less significant. Ukraine operates the Mig 29. It's the functional equivalent of the F-16 in flight performance, munitions carrying ability, and mission profiles. The F-16 doesn't bring much to Ukraine that the Mig 29 doesn't already give them... Except more airframes that can be sacrificed in Ukraine's fight for independence, ultimately, from Russia.
What Ukraine REALLY needs is the Swedish Gripen. First, this jet can use the British Meteor, which the F-16 currently doesn't. This is a longe range air to air missile that would give rough parody to Russia's R37. It's a little shorter but designed to hit fighters and so, more of a threat than the R37.
The Gripen can also carry the Storm Shadow missile which the F-16 doesn't. Ukraine is currently using aging and few Su 24 aircraft to carry and launch the Storm Shadow. Having Gripen would ease the burden on the Su24s and allow Ukraine to continue using such long range missiles as the Soviet era jets wear out.
Gripen for long range air to air and Storm Shadow missions with F-16 for SEAD, close air support and locking down the Black Sea with AGM 84 Harpoon missiles in addition to combined use of ATACMS, decoys, S200s, etc would be an ideal combination to enable Ukraine to blitz Russian GBAD.
The problem arises as Ukraine closes distance to Russia. The ground launched anti air missiles can be inside Russian territory which means they're safe from Western or US weapons and free to shoot down F-16s over Ukraine.
The F-16 alone will be less of a game changer than Leopard tanks were. It's ironic that one of the best dog fighters ever built will see it's most significant use in the ground attack role in Ukraine and virtually no air to air combat (unless helicopters count).
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32:35 re, Ukraine and NATO
At the point where Russia is pushed out of Crimea and eastern Ukraine, Russia will have ZERO reason to sign a "peace" treaty with Ukraine, and certainly won't with Putin in power.
Russia may agree to a cease fire or an armistice, but the situation will look like North and South Korea, still technically at war.
A country at war can't join NATO. For Ukraine to join NATO, Russia would somehow have to be convinced to a war ending treaty or the NATO Charter would have to be amended.
The former won't happen with Putin in control of Russia, even if "Russia" devolves into a country of just St Petersburg and Moscow. The latter wouldn't happen while Article 5 requires all members to assist a member that is attacked, which Ukraine has been.
So, Putin may actually be successful in ONE of his special operation goals, preventing Ukraine from joining NATO (by not agreeing to a war status ending peace).
It's anyone's guess if Putin's eventual successor would sign such a peace.
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@figleaf8948 no problem. It's Russia that currently controls or occupies Crimea.
However, there is a similar principle in Ukraine controlled areas. I have a friend living closer than I'd like to the Zaporizhia area. When there was the fear that Russia was going to sabotage the nuclear power plant, I told her she needed to get away from that area and sent her bus ticket money. When she got to Lviv, near Poland, she said it looked more like Poland than the Ukraine she was used to. I asked for pictures. She explained that she'd try but it wasn't a good idea to take pictures because people become suspicious that she's a spotter relaying target information back to Russia.
You might recall that there was a pizza restaurant that Russia hit with 2 missiles. It was frequented by Ukrainian military officers and their families.
Whether anyone actually is sending pictures of this or that restaurant or apartment building or if Russia is flinging darts randomly at map, I can't say. However, the Russian missile and drone terror attacks are very real and really stressful since the Shaheed drones are loud and can be heard flying around and the distant booms from missile and drone explosions make sleep difficult (according to my friend who's back in her city closer to the front).
So, while Ukraine doesn't mind images of the aftermath getting out so the world can see what Russia is doing, people are wary of anyone taking pictures because of the concern, real or imagined, that it's a Russian spotter and the stress from living with it for 2 years.
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@dfloper actually Russia's "booming" economy is entirely due to the Russian government spending money it doesn't have on war related expenses. All that expenditure, which Russia has no way to afford and can't sustain, is figured into the GDP or economic output figures.
It's because of this that it's been said that Putin actually can't afford to win the war, which would cause that "booming" economy to instantly crash as war related spending (which is propping up the economy) would cease.
As for the private sector, in order to have access to foreign currency to prop up the value of the Ruble during 2022 and 2023 by buying up Rubles with foreign currency reserves, Russia implemented policies that have hurt non government and non war related industries by such things as forcing profit repatriation. In other words, if a Russian business earned profit outside of Russia, they must buy Rubles from the government with that foreign currency profit.
If you look into real economic news that reports more than the basic GDP, you'll learn this sort of detail about WHY the Russian economy, based GDP is "booming".
You could also look at the current value of the Ruble, which Putin instructed his central bank to maintain at least a 100 Ruble to 1 USD ratio prior to his "reelection", and how the Ruble fallen below that threshold (currently 105 Ruble are required to buy 1 USD or the Ruble is worth $0.0095 instead of $0.0100 as required by Putin) as Russian foreign currency reserves dwindle and it's petroleum exports are further hampered by tougher sanctions further reducing the access to any foreign currency to prop up the Ruble (as well as generally, the government having less revenue whilst spending more on boosting that "booming" GDP).
Cheers.
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@vanettevanhuyssteen5548 to answer your question, I suppose it's because we have 2 oceans and a mighty military and nuclear deterrent protecting us. We feel safe. Unfortunately, perception doesn't equal actual safety.
And, we're really too busy trying to make our car or SUV and credit card payments and fueling the wealth gap by helping executives and shareholders take an ever increasing share of the wealth to worry about what's going on "over there".
Interestingly, this isn't just an American issue. In late 2013, during the Maidan protests in Ukraine, I was talking to a Ukranian friend who lived near Donetsk. When I asked her about the subject, she flippantly changed the subject stating that the protests were far away and had nothing to do with her.
Within the year, she and her daughter had fled to a city outside of the Donbas area, her grandmother was eliminated by Russian proxy artillery fire as they approached her town (she refused to leave her home), and Russian special forces had secured the government buildings in the "polite" takeover of Crimea.
THAT is the lesson that other Ukranians, other Europeans, and Americans need to understand. "That's far away and not my concern," can get real close and real personal unexpectedly quick. It's the same thing that happened in the outset WWII.
Anyway, yes... Frustrating that so many people want to believe if we ignore it, the Russians will begin behaving.
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Jake, could you do a piece on how a vote for RFK Jr is actually, functionally a vote FOR Trump. (RFK's campaign was made viable by republican donors).
Any vote for RFK Jr in the general election is actually a vote for Trump.
The reason is that with our 2 party system and not having a consensus government, any vote for the 3rd party candidate that takes votes away from the main party candidate of similar affiliation, is a vote for the candidate of the opposite affiliation by removing the vote from the viable 2 party candidate and putting it towards the 3rd party candidate that CANNOT WIN the election.
In this case, we have RFK Jr, who tried but failed to earn the Democratic Party presidential nomination, being supported by REPUBLICAN donors to sabotage the chances of the actual Democratic presidential nominee, Biden, getting more votes.
Make no mistake, as pointed out in the video, a vote for RFK Jr in the general election is actually, functionally a vote for Trump.
This is why 3rd party candidates are, counterintuitively, TERRIBLE for democracy in our 2 party system. They aren't actually adding choice in the general election.
People who vote for the 3rd party are actually really voting for the candidate that's farthest from their positions or beliefs by stealing votes from the main party candidate that is closer to their position on issues.
For a recent example, in the 2016 election cycle of Hillary Clinton vs Donald Trump, 3rd party candidate Jill Stein helped Trump clinch key battleground states (states where the electorate was evenly split between democrat and republican voters) by pulling votes away from Clinton.
People who voted for Stein were probably definitely not supportive of Trump, but that's what their vote for Stein ensured.
Because of the electoral college system, your vote isn't for the president. Your voting for who ALL the electors of your state will vote for. The people don't elect the president, the electoral college does.
Voting for RFK Jr is a vote for Trump.
Choose wisely.
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36:35 re, combined arms
Remember that in Ukraine "combined arms" means armor, infantry, and artillery. Air power is noticeably absent from the equation due to proliferation of ground based air defenses on both sides.
F-16 won't change that because it can't engage the Russian Su 34 and Mig 31 that are lobbing R37 air to air missiles at Ukrainian aircraft, from 150 km away, whenever Ukraine's jets are detected by ground radar or the AWACS flying over the Black Sea.
Gripen, Typhoon, or Rafale (with the Meteor missile, that the F-16 isn't equipped for) would be required to discourage the Russian long range attacks.
Even then, any significant air operations would require simultaneous strategic missile spam (Storm Shadow, ATACMS, GLSDB, decoys, etc) to saturate Russian radar and confuse threat priority assessment.
So, combined arms in Ukraine is armor infantry, and artillery working together.
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8:26 re, internet off
You can't call Russia foolish, odd, or evil for turning off the internet at night unless you say the same things about Ukraine.
I support Ukraine because I have a friend there (one of the Russian speakers Putin was supposedly trying to save, who has since abandoned her Russian heritage and says Russians are evil).
She's said that Ukraine will cut internet and electricity when the air raid warnings go off (at least in her city)
This is usually at night. So, the Russians are just copying Ukraine.
Cutting the electricity turns off the lights. That's an air raid staple since WWII to make finding targets harder in the dark.
Besides any possible long range guidance (say, from Russia), cutting the internet will stop any local hand-off guidance that may occur if there are Russian infiltrators, loyalists, or sympathizers helping with drone attacks.
Likewise, cutting the internet prevents such people from doing real time spotting or bomb damage assessment.
Remember the Lira guy you just did a recent story on? While probably not many, including agents or infiltrators, there are people working for Russia inside Ukraine.
We know that there are also Ukrainian operatives and partisans deep inside Russia. So, this apparently odd action of turning off the internet probably has some value and the only thing odd about it is that Russia seems to be learning and adapting.
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@freemanreed5228 - there are a lot of "Republicans" who are actually just "anti-Democrats" and corrupting the party. Marjorie Greene is a lunatic and people like her are holding the weak Republican leaders, like Kevin Mccarthy hostage, driving the agenda from the backseat.
Mccarthy wants to be in power, so he won't actually lead. The same is true as you go up the ladder. Trump wasn't a leader. He was treating the presidency like a game show and playing the people against each other in hopes of staying in power.
Barrack Obama, bless his naive heart, was so focused on the "Russian reset" and dealing with the foreign mess Dubya left him that he didn't realize that Putin thought he was a "stupid black" (according to Julia ioffe's research on Putin and Russia) and just buying time to shape his bigger plans for what we now see him doing.
I think Biden is an anti-Constitutionalist, every bit as much as Trump was, in different ways, and out of touch. However, to his credit, he does have a good team of people who understand Russia as an enemy and the bigger picture of needing to stop Russia in Ukraine so that Putin isn't encouraged to try his luck in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, or Poland.
A bully has to be stopped. Rolling over never stopped the next beating. When the US and UK failed to uphold their responsibility under the Budapest Memorandum at the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Putin viewed that as a green light to continue.
If he's not stopped in Ukraine and kicked out, he will definitely try again. If Ukraine were to be allowed to fall to Russia, Putin would absolutely try other former Soviet, now NATO countries that he sees as "Russian territory".
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@carolwilliams8511 - You're right, the actions of HAMAS are not condoneable.
I wish Russian civilians could understand the barbarity they are visiting upon Ukranian civilians by their tacit and complicit support for Putin, his war in Ukraine, and the barbaric actions of the Russians in Ukraine.
However, I wouldn't support Ukraine behaving like the Russians or like HAMAS. They'd lose the moral high ground, for one thing and have to live with themselves afterwards for another which would be difficult if they aren't the barbarians that the Russians are.
The situation in Isreal is that at the tactical level, BOTH Israel and HAMAS act like barbaric Russians. At the strategic or regional level, Isreal is very similar to Russia.
When HAMAS has, in the past, basically flung fireworks at Isreal and Isreal responded by indiscriminately killing women and children with tanks and helicopter gunships, Isreal wasn't preventing future HAMAS attacks, Isreal was creating the next generation of HAMAS fighters and guaranteeing future attacks, like the one we saw yesterday.
Israel's policies regarding occupying Palestinian territory, which is internationally recognized as illegally, limiting access to mutual holy sites, oppression and discrimination against Palestinians, and general bullying of its neighbors guarantees two things: there will ALWAYS be armed conflict OR Isreal will murder every last Palestinian.
Obviously, if Netanyahu could snap his fingers and eliminate every Palestinian, he'd certainly choose option B, above.
*Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself don't become a monster.
It's sadly ironic that this is yet another similarity between Isreal and Russia. Putin, delusionally proud of his Soviet heritage, hates Nazis (while also enjoying the excuse they give him) because they put the USSR in great pain in WWII. Putin has been acting very much like Hitler, both in his propaganda, operation of the state, and militarily to include micromanaging the war to the detriment of the war effort.
Jewish people have been persecuted throughout history and had a genocide attempted against them in WWII. Now, with Isreal and the Jewish people under no existential threat (other than that of their own creation through bad regional policies), Isreal is persecuting its neighboring people and trying to enact a virtual genocide on the Palestinians.
The behavior of HAMAS isn't acceptable in the civilized world. Neither is Israel's behavior and the civilized world should stop enabling Isreal simply because Western countries want a non Muslim, non Arab ally in the region.
Putin is a monster. Netanyahu is a monster. The barbaric Russian soldiers in Ukraine are monsters. The barbaric HAMAS fighters are monsters. The complicit, enabling Russian sheep of a citizenry are monsters. The complicit, enabling ignorant Isreali citizenry are monsters.
There won't be peace for Isreal until Isreal quits provoking or eliminates Palestinians. Isreal is absolutely, ultimately, to blame for the HAMAS attacks.
But, this is part of the cycle of a dictatorial government maintaining power. As Russia does, create an existential threat so that a strong, unquestionable government is required to "defend its people."
It's a vicious cycle and requires an ignorant and lazy populace, which both the Russian and Isreali people have been trained to be over the past several decades.
Isreal really is the Russia of the Middle East and should be treated like such by the civilized world.
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Sure, allow Russia to keep territory they've claimed and sign a peace agreement, with the stipulation that since Ukraine is at peace and none of its territory is occupied, Ukraine will be immediately allowed in to NATO.
First, we'd see if Putin is REALLY interested in that cease fire. Second, if Russia keeps any Ukrainian territory in a peace settlement, Ukraine immediately joining NATO is the only way Russia won't just rebuild, learn from their mistakes, and continue the invasion later. The precedent has already been set by Russia doing exactly that after the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine.
If you reward a dog for pooping the rug, it's guaranteed to poop the rug again. Obama, during the "apology era" did virtually nothing when Russia invaded Ukraine via proxy forces, despite the fact that it was the USA that led the effort to trick Ukraine into giving up its Soviet era nuclear deterrent under Clinton.
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9:15 man, it makes me feel old having to say:
These stupid, lazy kids don't realize that most people, including Biden and the Ukrainians fighting it, want to end the war
The question then isn't do we want to end this war. The question is HOW can the war be ended in a way that assures Ukraine's territorial integrity and security.
I bet if I barge into her house and tell her that I live there now, she's going fight to get me out, calling the police, getting a restraining order, macing me, etc.
She damn sure won't be interested in sitting down and discussing a settlement where I continue living her home as long as I agree to not attack her.
Lazy idiots aren't thinking about the right question or how to answer it or bothering to research the issue.
That's why it's important that people watching channels like this continue trying to educate people about the fact that Ukraine is not part of Russia, Biden isn't making Ukraine fight, and Russia is entirely responsible for the loss of life on both sides and could end end the war tomorrow by recalling its forces back to Russia.
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9:50 "Russia" wasn't "The USSR". Putin would need to send his lawyers to either the UN or the Supreme Court of the USSR to try and get something legal regarding the illegality of the breakup of the USSR.
Russia was just a Republic, like any of the other republics, within the USSR. If Putin is trying to assert that Russia WAS the USSR, then he's also saying that he is in fact trying to forcibly rebuild the Russian Empire and rebuild it out of independent nations that either the USSR or previous Russian Empire had unlawfully subjugated.
This is also the reason it's imperative to stop Russia in Ukraine, remove Russian political and military forces from all of Ukraine, and unequivocally tell Russia "No, you can't invade former Soviet states."
Otherwise such sham legal rulings inside Russia would give Putin "legal" standing to invade Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Hungary (we should probably just give Hungary back to Russia tbh), etc.
If Putin uses his "legal" standing to invade any of those countries, because we failed to tell him "No", that would result in direct Russia and NATO confrontation.
The fight to get Russia out of Ukraine is the fight to prevent WWIII.
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The lack of a framework or timeline for NATO membership for Ukraine is disappointing. It's doubly so when the NATO chief stands up tries to sell Ukraine some BS sprayed with rose perfume.
The only reason we're having this discussion is because in 1992, Ukraine was told, "someday".
The Russians arrived before "someday". Now, as Ukraine is spending the blood to fight a NATO enemy, NATO is telling Ukraine the same thing, "someday".
Still worse, the only reason Ukraine wasn't offered NATO membership was as an unofficial appeasement to Russia, an appeasement that we foolishly thought would "avoid provoking" Russia and prevent an invasion of Ukraine.
NATO was and is genuinely thinking with #RussianLogic
That said, the NATO charter would have to be modified or some technicality made to allow Ukraine to join NATO before the war is over and Ukraine liberated its territory.
The latter is actually the easier objective. Putin's Russia could simply refuse to ever sign a peace treaty, the way North and South Korea are still at war with merely an armistice cease fire.
Of course, NATO could use the same "pretend with words" that Putin does. Ukraine simply declare the war over, hostilities ceased, once their territory is liberated.
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"There is no safety and no security in the appeasement of evil... He counted on America to be passive. He counted wrong."
-President Ronald Reagan (Republican), USA. 1986
Modern "Republicans" in the US have lost their way and suffer from weak and timid leadership who care more about politicking and weaponizing political divisiveness for their own personal benefit than doing the right thing.
Ronald Reagan, a two term Republican president, defeated the Soviet Union without firing a single shot or placing a single American in harm's way.
He defeated the Soviet Union by spending money.
After the breakup of the Soviet Union, most former Soviet states or Warsaw Pact countries voted to be independent of Russia. Ukraine, including Crimea and the Donbas regions voted overwhelmingly for independence from Russia.
Unlike other countries that were afforded NATO protection from the inevitable return of Russia looking to rebuild its empire, Ukraine (and Georgia) were told "someday" and not offered NATO protection as an appeasement to Russia (who, ironically, is a signatory of the Budapest Memorandum that guarantees Ukraine's territorial integrity in exchange for giving up its nuclear deterrent).
The United States, and NATO, waved a red flag in front of an angry, wounded bull when he we left Ukraine to fend for itself after we defeated their oppressor and turned our backs on their future security in the early 90s.
I applaud Democratic president Biden for carrying on Republican presidential tradition, doing the right thing in the face of evil, and picking up the ball that previous presidents had dropped.
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@mrtoonami1782 You're right, not fighting and avoiding violence or danger might be the safe and sane choice. However, it's also not an option in some situations.
Ukraine is currently in that situation where safety, not fighting, isn't a choice.
Unfortunately JustTooHonest, in a comment below, points out the truth of the matter for Ukrainians and their situation.
They actually ARE in a genuine life and death situation and still THEY have people unhappy with the new mobilization or draft (I'm not sure of the details).
People in Ukraine don't have a choice, even if they want to choose not to fight. They are either going to choose to fight for Ukraine against Russia or, if they choose not to fight and Russia prevails, they will be FORCED by Russia to fight in Russia's inevitable next campaign (likely against Maldova or Estonia).
This is important to realize, both that most people don't have an interest in war or fighting in a war, and that it's not always a choice.
This is important to realize because if Russia is victorious in Ukraine, people in other European countries are going to lose the choice when Russia comes rolling in.
Again, it's not a matter of, "if we don't fight, we'll just be living under Russian rule." It's that Russia will force conscript or press gang every able bodied Ukrainian male to fight in their next campaign. This already happened in Luhansk and Donetsk. It's not something I'm speculating about. It's a certainty.
So, the same thing happens to the next European country. Except, once Russia gets to the Baltics or Poland, it's a NATO issue and NATO countries lose the choice of whether to fight.
Sure, people in those countries or the alliance members can choose not to fight. However, if enough make that choice, they'll end up conscripted into the Russian war machine and forced to fight the next county in line.
The United States has the luxury of being insulated by 2 oceans. Europe doesn't and every European will either choose to fight or choose to be forced to fight.
It's something that we've read in history books and are all aware of. Germany forced conquered people to fight or die as slave labor, starved.
We read it in a history book and our minds can't fathom that history coming to life again. That's the same thing that people thought in the runup to WWII, we had WWI as history so it can't be happening again.
That led to appeasement. Appeasement led to Germany getting a bigger head start.
Putin had begun a Russian invasion of Europe. Everyone in Europe will lose the choice of whether they will fight...if Ukraine loses its fight for freedom from Russian oppression.
This is why its critical that the free world, West, NATO, whatever we want to call ourselves, wake up and send every bit of equipment to Ukraine that they need. Otherwise war will eventually come for all of us.
It may take longer because of distance, but war will even come to America, eventually, if Russia is able to secure the resources and slave labor and conscript army of Europe.
If 90% of the population doesn't want to fight, at least 90% of the population should demand military aid be sent to Ukraine in mass quantities.
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12:35 the Spanish example is interesting because there was a Spanish Empire.
However, according to #RussianLogic, Spain actually belongs to and is rightfully a part of Italy because Spain was once a part of the Roman Empire.
Ukraine and Russia might be neighbors, but they are every bit as different as Spain and Italy with different languages and cultures and national history.
I have a friend in Ukraine who is Russian speaking and fled Donetsk during the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine. She moved to another area Ina more western city where she was able to continue speaking Russian.
Once February 24th, 2022 happened, she denounced her Russian heritage, calling them barbarians and began referring to herself as a proud Ukrainian.
What was a surprise to me was that as she had to now start learning Ukrainian, that Ukrainian is a very different language than Russian. They use a similar alphabet, but it's like English and French. You may recognize the alphabet but the words are different.
Ukraine was never culturally or linguistically a part of Russia. Ukraine had been twice subjugated by Russian imperialism.
Which brings us back to Spain being a part of Italy, if we're using #RussianLogic and saying that if a place had been conquered by an empire, it was forever part of that empire.
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@ramonpen2592 there's a couple issues. People LIVE ON THAT LAND. Russia would have to agree to allow anyone who wants to leave would be able and that would require international observers. Plus, Russia claims territory that is fully under control of Ukraine. If someone broke into your home and claimed your living room is there's, despite the fact that they only broke into your garage and couldn't get into the living room, would you give up your living room?
Russia is demanding that Ukraine "leave the Russian oblasts of Zaporizhia, Kherson, Donetsk, and Luhansk. Russia doesn't fully control any of those oblasts, was chased out of most of Kherson, and hasn't ever reached Zaporizhia.
Then, there's the tens of thousands of children Russia kidnapped and hasn't returned. This is the primary war crime Putin is wanted for by The Hague.
Also consider, if you reward a puppy for pooping the rug, it's guaranteed that he'll poop it again. Russia keeping any Ukrainian territory is rewarding Russia and encouraging them to invade again, except this time they already have a toe hold in the new territory.
Finally, only way to prevent that inevitable future Russian 3rd invasion of Ukraine is to have Ukraine join NATO with the remaining territory Ukraine controls. Russia won't ever agree to this. Russia has broken every agreement it's made related to Ukraine since 1992. There is no peace agreement that will provide for an actual peace without Russia entirely leaving all Ukranian territory or Ukraine joining NATO.
What you are advocating is actually a cease fire that will allow Russia to reaarm and reconstitute its military while the Western world forgets about Ukraine and ceases military support in light of the cease fire, aka "peace". In the short term this will stop the eliminations. In the long run, it's encouraging Russia to not only invade Ukraine again but to also invade the Baltics which are NATO members.
Russia just doesn't respond to weakness and appeasement. It's viewed as something to be taken advantage of.
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@OrangeDaddy47 That's not true. The original "separatists" were foreign criminals and anarchists which Russia transported to Ukraine and then supported with Russian special forces who trained them in basic tactics, how to operate captured equipment, and called in helicopter gunship support when Ukraine would try to move troops into the area in response. Internally, Russia referred to these proxy fighters as "asymmetrical fighters" while calling them separatists publicly.
It's similar to the Russian campaign of dumping foreigners near the EU border and giving them bicycles to ride into the EU looking for asylum or refugee status from wherever they were actually from.
A friend who lived in the Donetsk area during the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine called them terrorists and fled to a city father west. She's one of the "Russian speakers" that were supposedly wanting independence and whom Putin was invading Ukraine to "save". She now hates Russia both for what they've done to Ukraine and for stealing her heritage since being Russian is now bad.
These "separatists" used the typical Russian tactics of bombarding an area before moving in, not caring about casualties of the people who lived there. Once they were in an area, local criminals looking for a legal outlet and people who had bought into the propaganda would join the Russian proxy invaders.
Most people in the "area seeking independence" consumed Russian media, TV mainly. And they didn't realize they were being invaded until artillery shells started landing. My friend's Russian grandmother (moved to the territory of Ukraine under Stalin) was killed by artillery from the "separatists" because she refused to leave her home and bought into the propaganda that Russia was coming to "make things great again."
Prior to the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine Donetsk, Luhansk, and Crimea were already semi autonomous regions in Ukraine. People mostly didn't pay attention to what either Ukraine OR Russia was doing and went on about their daily lives. There wasn't any discrimination against Russian speaking people until AFTER the 2014 invasion where some Ukrainians blamed ANY Russian of causing the problem. That said, other than feeling like a refugee from leaving her childhood home and starting new in an unknown city, my friend didn't experience any discrimination other than people saying her young daughter spoke strangely. Even that stopped as the girl acclimated and began learning Ukrainian from interaction with the other children.
As an added bonus, the first president of the DPR was neither Ukranian OR Russian. How's that for home grown "separatists"??
So, no. Prior to the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine, there were not separatists active, especially militarily, in Luhansk, Donetsk, or Crimea, let alone Zaporizhia or Kherson (which Putin also claims, despite not occupying and having only the tiniest amount of support from any Russian sympathizers).
And, EVERY oblast in Ukraine voted for separation from Russia in 1991 after independence FROM RUSSIA was an option.
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@scotthenry3401 either comments are bugged again or the YouTube thought police removed my comment where I pointed out that Ukraine was never being considered for NATO membership. It's ironically unfortunate, too, because had Ukraine joined NATO as other former Soviet states were allowed to, Russia wouldn't have invaded.
NATO had been, unofficially, telling Ukraine "someday". Meanwhile, NATO had been telling Russia, unofficially, that Ukraine wouldn't join NATO as a wrong minded appeasement attempt at the belligerent and imperialistic Russia.
It's asinine to think or try to argue that the largest country on Earth needs just this little bit more land to feel safe from an alliance that exists solely to protect its members against Russian aggression. Further, Russia can't currently defend its own legitimate airspace or borders. More territory isn't going fix that, it makes it worse.
Finally, the logic that Russia can't be safe if it borders NATO means that all of Europe ought to capitulate and join Russia. Again, ludicrous.
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21:10 Uhhh... hopefully, those provinces weren't paying attention to what happened when Ukraine gave up its Soviet era nukes in exchange for reassurances by the US and UK (and Russia, insert Dr Evil pinky smile) that their territorial integrity would be protected.
You know if say, the caucuses withdraw from the Russian Federation that eventually Russia will be back, looking to assert dominance over them as it did with Belarus, Georgia, and Ukraine.
I'm sure if Putin had it to do over again, he would've absorbed Belarus before attacking Ukraine as the 2 poisonings against Belarus' leader indicate strong displeasure in the lack of military involvement.
Regardless, what deal could be struck with breakaway Russian states to get their nukes? Lord knows the Islamic fundamentalist enemies of the West are probably already trying to work deals on religious grounds why Islamic people in those governments should give nuclear material or warheads to say, Taliban, for example.
Besides that religious angle in some areas of the Russian Federation, nobody is going to believe that the West will intervene when Russia inevitably comes calling.
China will probably invade Outer Manchuria to take it back adding a whole other layer of chaos.
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4:09 re, the phony debate.
The terrible and ironic thing is that Putin is shelling the very Russians, in Ukraine, that he says he wants to liberate. Mariupol, Kharkiv, Izium, these are towns with ethnic Russian populations.
I have an ethnic Russian friend who fled Donetsk during the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine. She's still in Ukraine and prior to the 2022 invasion always referred to herself as a "Russian". She speaks primarily Russian and has learned Ukrainian and English after moving to a more westward city.
When I spoke to her a few days ago, she told me that she is no longer Russian. Now she's Ukrainian and so proud to be Ukrainian. She also said she's angry. She watches updates and sees the destruction of eastern cities where she still has friends or family and is just angry.
Again, she is one of the ethnic Russians that Putin was allegedly liberating.
Now, after making camo nets and molotovs, she's learning how to shoot and operate a manpad surface to air missile system and has renounced her Russian heritage.
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@damarcusowens5511 Hi, thanks for the question. First, I'd like to point out that saying, "Ukraine should've taken their defense seriously," is like saying "Mexico should've taken their defense seriously," if the United States were to invade Mexico.
Mexico simply doesn't have the resources to fund the buildup and maintenance of a military force great enough to prevent the US from invading.
You're seriously trying to argue that since Ukraine couldn't defend themselves from a much larger neighbor (Russia is the largest country in the world) with a much larger military without foreign assistance that Russia should be able to take over Ukraine.
Hitler could've used more people like you on his side. Maybe you could've convinced the Americans that since Britain (indeed all of Europe) wasn't taking their defense seriously that Germany should've been able to assimilate the entire world, eventually.
Secondly, Ukraine is literally (Ukraine being derived from the Polish word for frontier or borderland) the frontier between Europe and Russia.
Russia has begun an invasion of Europe. Putin never intended to stop at Ukraine. Putin's motivation to invade Ukraine began back at least as far as 2003 when he told Bush not to invade Iraq looking for imaginary WMD and Bush promptly brushed Putin's concerns aside and invaded Iraq. Putin sees the fall of the Soviet Union as the greatest tragedy of the 21st century.
The fact that Western nations no longer needed to heed the word of a Russian Czar, as they did in the Soviet era, set Putin on a course to "Make Russia Great Again" by rebuilding the Russian Empire.
The reason sending aid to Ukraine, in sufficient type and quantity, is preventing WWIII is because it tells Putin that the West won't stand back and let him forcibly rebuild the Russian Empire by invading and subjugating nations that he feels are part of the Russian sphere of influence or that he feels are "rightfully part of Russia".
Yes, Putin could absolutely send Russian forces into Estonia tomorrow. In fact, I'd argue that this is actually more likely than people would like to recognize.
Because Europe is only half heartedly helping Ukraine and the US (leading global exporter of Freedom and Democracy) took 7 months off, Putin views this much as he viewed the almost non response to the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine, as a green light to continue.
Not helping Ukraine sufficiently to defeat Russia on the battlefield or make keeping Russian forces in Ukraine untenable is telling Putin that Europe and NATO won't actually fight Russia for the little actually-Russian (in Putin's mind) countries like Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. That encourages him to think about conquering these countries (after or in addition to Ukraine) in order to gain their resources and population to forcibly add to the Russian war machine before advancing on Poland, Finland, Sweden, and even parts of Germany.
So, just sending aid to Ukraine isn't preventing anything. You're right about that. Sending ENOUGH aid of the right types to Ukraine to make staying in Ukraine untenable for Russia is what will prevent Russia, Putin specifically from trying to invade the Baltics (which are now NATO members).
With the current half hearted assistance to Ukraine, a Russian invasion of Estonia would be a amazing distraction for the West from Ukraine. That would be a huge benefit to Russia in its conquest of Ukraine even if every Russian that went to Estonia was eventually un-alived and the Russian invasion of Estonia eventually thwarted.
Not being able to succeed at such a thing hadn't stopped Russia from trying (1 unsuccessful invasion followed by 1 semi successful invasion of Georgia and 1 semi successful invasion of Ukraine followed by the currently stymied 2nd invasion of Ukraine).
Basically, stopping Russia in Ukraine with significant enough Western support will send the message to Russia that "No, you can't invade your neighbors" and it will also decimate Russia's capacity for a conventional war.
Even the current half hearted assistance to Ukraine combined with sanctions on Russian individuals and the Ukrainian strategic bombing campaign of Russian oil refining and fuels production is beginning to push Russia past the tipping point of the elite becoming fed up with Putin and wanting to do something about it before a window finds them.
The recent arrest of Defense Minister Shoigu's assistant Defense Minister is showing this infighting of the various factions had shifted from them fighting over the scraps Putin gives them to fighting over who will shape post-Putin Russia (and therefore who will be in the best position to benefit financially).
Shoigu is in charge of the military not because he's proficient. Rather he's Defense Minister because Putin views him as completely loyal. A dictator's greatest fear is the military, via a military coup, and having a loyal man at the top of it is essential.
The fact that Shoigu's right hand man was made vulnerable to punishment for his corruption is actually a shot at Shoigu which, even though Putin ordered the arrest is actually an attack on Putin by the people who made the corruption public in a way that couldn't be ignored.
So, this may have been a bit more than you were asking for, but if your question was genuine or another person might genuinely have the same question, hopefully this has given some perspective.
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By halting aid to Ukraine, the United States will both lose any influence over Ukraine's war activities AND be escalating the war in the mind of Russia's leaders.
Borrowed from my reply to another comment:
Actually, it's worse than that. If the US quits supporting Ukraine, Ukraine will be forced to start attacking targets inside Russia (especially civilian targets like heat and electricity) that they so far have been avoiding because it would cause a loss of Western support.
Perun channel recently did a presentation that indicates a large part of Putin being able to continue is the lack of effect or cost of the war on most Russian's everyday lives. If Ukraine was able to place a cost on the war for ordinary Russians (say, not having heat or electricity during winter) then the tacit support for Putin's war could dry up and leave Putin with larger concerns at home. Maybe not but it's a possibility Ukraine would have to explore if they lose US aid.
Remember, if Western aid stops, Ukraine ends up in a desperate fight for survival alone and means they'll have lost the reason to take the high road and will need to take whatever action they see necessary to ensure their survival.
Ironically, the US halting military aid to Ukraine could actually cause the as yet merely threatened nuclear escalation. With the current global situation, this could happen by Russia helping Iran attack overseas US assets, if Russia doesn't act directly.
Putin and his upper echelon already believe this is a war between Russia and the United States or NATO and that we are (somehow) forcing Ukraine to fight when Ukraine really just wants to give up and be part of Russia.
If US aid dries up and Ukraine is forced to start attacking infrastructure inside Russia in order to place a cost on the war for average Russians and try to cause backlash against Putin inside Russia, Russia will view these attacks as COMING FROM (or at the instruction of) THE UNITED STATES.
Juila ioffe, an expert on Russia, has suggested that it would be better if Russians were purple. As it is they look like us, European (most Americans are of European descent) but they absolutely don't think like us. Because they look similar, it's easy to forget that they very much aren't similar.
So, with that in mind, our purple Russians will interpret the consequences of US halting aid to Ukraine as escalation by the United States and an attack by the United States directly on Russia proper.
By halting aid to Ukraine, the United States will both lose any influence over Ukraine's war activities AND be escalating the war in the mind of Russia's leaders.
The US has so far spent merely 5% of the defense budget (JUST of the defense budget, NOT 5% of the WHOLE budget!) aiding Ukraine and MOST of that has been spent paying American defense contractors to replace old equipment and munitions sent to Ukraine (there would've been some cost, regardless, to decommission some of this materiel had it not been sent).
Further, aid to Ukraine is a LOAN, like aid to Britain was during WWII, and isn't any more of a "gift" than a mortgage or car loan is a "gift" from the bank. The gift is that you can buy a house or car. The gift to Ukraine is that they can fight for their ultimate freedom from Russia and demolish the military power of a rival of the US in the process.
The correct answer is to "give" Ukraine what they need to end the war as quickly as possible so that we can all get back to a more normal pre-war situation where Russia is inside Russian borders and isn't screwing up the world economy and encouraging unrest in the Middle East.
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Trump's "peace" plan won't work. We ALREADY tried it!
For 7 months Trump blocked aid to Ukraine by ordering his lap dog, House Speaker Mike Johnson, to block the democratic process and PREVENT A VOTE on aid to Ukraine.
Further, "freeze the front line" was also already tried after the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine and Russia broke that agreement, surprise, after using the time to regroup and resupply its "asymmetric fighters" (publicly referred to as "separatists" despite having been transported to Ukraine by Russia).
Finally, we ALREADY tried giving Ukraine "assurances" that their sovereignty and territorial integrity would be secure. That was in the Budapest Memorandum of 1994, in which the US, UK, and Russia guaranteed Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. Obviously, Russia violated this agreement in 2014 and again in 2022.
All key parts of the Trump peace plan have already been tried and found to not do anything to promote or facilitate peace.
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@johnnykotletti4614 - You're absolutely right that Germany has sent some valuable aid, including its retired Gepard AA vehicles, Patriot air defense systems, humanitarian, and financial aid.
However, there's amount and there's type.
If Zimbabwe sends Ukraine 100 C17 cargo planes, they'd probably be right up there at the top of the list of countries that sent aid. It would also be mostly useless.
Ukraine's offensive failed because they didn't have the long range fires in sufficient number to target Russian ground based air defenses and command and communications centers.
That is required before trying to clear the minefields because the minefields are protected by artillery that is protected by the air defenses and coordinated by the C3.
Ukraine says they need long range weapons, and they absolutely DO need them. Germany says, "no" while France the UK and the US say "yes".
Germany and Scholz isn't giving the type of aid required to end the war. They are giving aid to allow Ukraine to defend itself from Russian attacks that won't end until either Ukraine or Russia is defeated.
Therefore, regardless of dollar value it has, the ACTUAL value of German aid to Ukraine is less because Germany isn't interested in ending the war.
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@cynthiagarnham1157 - A10 would have the same problem as every other aircraft trying to operate in Ukraine, ground based air defenses.
The A10 is a tough aircraft, including titanium armored pilot seat, dual engines, and actual mechanical backup controls incase of electronic or hydraulic failure.
However, the A10 has never had to operate in a theater where either significant GBAD was present OR where enemy aircraft were a threat.
Trying to use an A10 would get them shot down because their mission profile, low level close air support, puts a target on them from several places (the long range R37 AA missile, the S300 or S400 long range ground based missiles, the PANTSIR close range system, and finally man portable SAMs).
The sidewinder missile system is very short range and wouldn't serve much purpose. Russia was only able to operate helicopters in the southern front at the beginning of Ukraine's counter offensive because they didn't have enough mobile ground based anti aircraft systems.
Trying to use an expensive jet to shoot down a helicopter is silly when a cheaper SAM vehicle can do the same job. (And, the helicopters can potentially shoot back with missiles at close range, still a bad trade, expensive jet for a helicopter.)
Since The A10 hasn't been produced in decades and we haven't yet retired it, there's no way we'd give them to anyone. But, as mentioned, it would even less useful in Ukraine than the F-16 which can be used in several roles that the A10 can't. Also, getting an F-16 to where it's needed, if it's farther away, just requires more fuel and flying faster. That seems to be the name of the game when either side does use aircraft, as low and fast as possible.
Oh, recently the Russians have lost a couple Su25, near Avdiivka in there push for that town. It's similar to the A10 in survivability. Russia has lost several since the start of the war to ground based missiles.
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@martinedwards2004 - OK. You might be right. If so, answer this: if air targets are out of weapons range (meaning that neither F-16 nor Mig 29 can SHOOT at a Russian jet, regardless of radar range because neither aircraft has a long enough ranged air to air missile to reach Russian aircraft that are hiding behind Russian GBAD over Russian controlled territory), what more good is a longer range radar?
While you're trying to figure out a way to answer that, I'll provide some extra facts.
The Ukrainian Mig 29s have a max radar range of about 120 km and the R27 missile with a range of about 60 km.
The F-16 has a radar range of 300 km and the AIM 120B missile with a range of...wait for it...about 60km.
The Russian Mig 31 and Su 34 are lobbing the R37 missiles from up to 200km away, while comfortably cruising over Russian controlled territory and protected by Russian GBAD.
Ok, so you probably came up with answer to the question of how that extra radar range helps if the F-16 still can't shoot at the Russian aircraft.
In light of the facts or weapons range and the air situation in the Ukraine theater, you might need to reassess whatever answer you came up with. Take a moment.
Incidentally, there's evidence that Ukraine has already used the AIM 120, jury rigged, on the Mig 29, as it has used the AGM 88 HARM missile on the Mig 29. However, it appears that trying to actually engage Russian aircraft has gotten at least a few Migs shot down by...take a guess, Russian GBAD (ground based air defenses) as the Ukrainian jets must fly into Russian GBAD range to try. Meanwhile, the Russian jets just fly away from the Ukranians. #ModernAirCombat
Now, there IS a missile in the US inventory that would help the Ukrainians. The AIM 120D. This variant has an estimated range of around 160 km and went into production around 2021. (Note the AIM 120 C is similar to the B except optimized to fit inside the F35 weapons bay.) The newest version of the D model has an estimated max range of between 160 km and "classified". These models are completing testing and aren't in full production yet.
The AIM 120D (entered service in 2021) with its longer range is on par with the British Meteor missile (in service 2016), which has slightly longer range but requires a Gripen or Typhoon (the 2 most likely candidates for Ukraine).
I don't have production numbers of the D model that just recently entered service in 2021 (compared to the B in 1994), but it has not fully replaced the B model in US service among the aircraft that use it (notably, F-16, F/A-18, F-15).
So, the D model would be perfect and actually allow Ukraine to engage at nearly the range the Russians can.
How that relates to the maximum radar range... The F-16 could fire the missile 35 km or so sooner or farther away than the Mig 29. This is hardly the "better in all roles" you're going for. And, those 35 km are actually closer to zero actual km because Ukrainian F-16 won't be able to shoot at Russian jets inside recognized Russian airspace and can't get within range of ground missiles.
As an added bonus, it's longer ranged ground radar that are spotting and tracking the Russian jets anyways.
My point in explaining all this is that the F-16 is a great jet that's going to be less game changing than the great Western tanks. The Mig 29 is on par with capability in the Ukrainian theater with how Ukraine can actually use them. An F-16 is going to perform no better than the Mig 29, despite double the radar range.
Getting back to the AIM 120 D. It would be perfect for Ukraine...except they probably won't get them. The pentagon might surprise us and want real world tests, essentially. However, we have a history of withholding longer range weapons. Even now as Ukraine makes use of ATACMS, which are longer ranged than HIMARS, they didn't get the longer ranged ATACMS.
Why? There's two main reasons.
First, some people are still scared or intimidated by Putin's "I'll nuke you if.." threats. We're afraid to escalate, as if Russia isn't already 100% committed with its conventional forces.
Second, the Pentagon isn't big about passing out weapon systems that we don't have an oversupply of. AIM 120 B, Abrams, Bradley...that stuff is sitting unused in warehouses.
Related to "enough for us" even if nobody is going to attack mainland USA, Ukraine won't get the A-10 because it hasn't been built in decades and can't be replaced in our inventory (and the pentagon or Air Force hasn't been able to convince Congress to retire it). Ukraine initially didn't get ATACMS because they aren't in production and the successor isn't in production yet. We've started sending Ukraine the oldest of the bunch.
Again, the Pentagon may surprise us by sending the D model of the AIM120 to Ukraine for real world "testing". Ukraine seems to think so as they someone recently say how the 160 km range will be very helpful when the F-16 arrives. Raytheon has recently won a contract for more AIM120 production.
So, based on our history of denying Ukraine useful long range systems, I'd not wager on the D model going until Raytheon has producion spun up and Pentagon is comfortable with having an oversupply.
The F-16 is an awesome aircraft. It's the ultimate dogfighter and has grown into a capable ground attack or multi role fighter.
It's just that the F-16, especially without the D model Amraam, doesn't offer Ukraine much more practical capability than the Mig 29, except that F-16 is properly integrated with the AGM 88 anti radar missile and can carry the anti ship AGM 84 missile, along with various other munitions that will be more numerous in Western stockpiles.
Is F-16 good? Yes, of course.
Will F-16 make much difference in Ukraine? Not unless they come up with a combined weapons blitz and sufficient intel to decimate Russian GBAD (which would equally benefit the Mig 29).
With ground based radar doing most spotting and tracking of Russian aircraft, radar range is a minor benefit, if at all, considering that without the AIM 120 D, the F-16 will primarily be used for hunting Russian ground based air defenses, general close air support, and possibly anti shipping work (if we actually even give them the anti ship missiles).
Thanks for the enjoyable thought exercise. Modern air combat, weapon systems, strategic realities, and how very different the modern air war is compared to Vietnam and earlier conflicts is very interesting.
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Drones aren't difficult to counter. It's simply a lack of acknowledgement of the amount of jamming systems and shotguns needed to do the job.
In 2014, when Russia invaded eastern Ukraine with civilian proxies (criminals and anarchists transported to Ukraine by Russia and called "separatists") supported by Russian special forces, Ukraine TRIED to respond with columns of troop transports (BTRs) and those columns were decimated by Russian helicopter gunships called in by the special forces supporting the proxy fighters.
For whatever reason, Ukraine didn't send anti aircraft assets, either mobile vehicles or man portable missiles.
At THAT point, those helicopters filled the role of drones. They were fairly easily countered in 2022 when Ukraine was chock full of anti aircraft systems and on alert.
Non "wire guided" FPV drones can be jammed fairly easily IF EVERY VEHICLE AND UNIT HAS A JAMMER.
Shotguns have been used for decades in skeet shooting. It's a simple and effective concept with the drone playing the role of the clay skeet.
Obviously, from a moving vehicle, the shotgun solution would be more difficult but on the flip side, the jammer, with vehicle for power would be better.
The problem is that each small unit needs a couple shotguns and ammo. That's another 10 lbs on top of everything else they need to carry, including anti air and anti armor weapons and if the unit isn't grouped up coverage is limited.
The problem is that while the drone is an ever present threat, it's out of sight and out of mind. The guy with the rifle shooting at you is still more immediate at that point of contact and what's likely more focused on.
While it's a simple item it's unlikely Ukraine has sufficient shotguns and troops willing to carry the extra weapon. That's a supply and mindset issue (at command level) that needs to change.
Now, a jammer and shotgun is as essential as the rifle or carbine and manpad anti air and armor weapons.
The US and China are probably working on EMP systems. For something like a long range drone swarm (think 6th generation "fighters" working as drone carriers and directors), a low yield atmospheric nuclear detonation is an extremely easy way to create an EMP to knock out the drones.
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@AAWT - Right, thanks for clarifying. We weren't saying taking pictures will get you sent to jail. However, it will draw looks and suspicion from people who have seen the results of missiles and drones destroying apartment buildings, hospitals, schools, museums, etc and don't want to be the victim of such an attack.
SOMEONE will end up reporting you to authorities who will investigate and, as you point out, if they find you sending those pictures to Russia, you go to jail for attempted murder, treason, etc.
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@br0k3nman - Whether I realizes a shark has sharp teeth before I stick my hand in it's mouth is irrelevant to the fact that it does.
Whether Russia considered Ukraine a neer-peer enemy is irrelevant to the fact and irrelevant to the West, except that, obviously, the West is stuck funneling aid into Ukraine to help alleviate Putin's miscalculation.
But, none of all that changes the fact that Ukraine, and foreigners who've volunteered, are the only people spending blood to fight an enemy of Europe.
It's no secret that Putin intended to continue on to the Baltics after Ukraine and expected the same response from the West as when he originally invaded Ukraine in 2014, mostly nothing. He was emboldened by the fact that neither the US or UK honored the commitment to defend Ukraine's territorial integrity under the Budapest Memorandum. Putin probably figured Article 5 from NATO would get a similar non-response to him moving into Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania.
If he really thought he could push into Poland, he's just nuts. Maybe he thought he wouldn't get any real fight until then.
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30:12 If the US is screwing around, which it appears we are, European countries would do well to start off loading their military equipment to Ukraine, in lieu of future backfill from the US when a more reasonable political situation manifests, otherwise Europe is likely to be using that equipment with their own troops dying instead of Ukraine spending the blood to keep Europe safe from an imperialistic Russia.
Decades ago, in elementary through High school, I always thought it was a funny and sad justification that history teachers would use, "We need to study history so that we don't repeat mistakes of the past!"
Europe and the United States are currently repeating the mistakes that a few people are still alive remember without having to reach for a history book.
"Wait and see, appeasement, they'll stop once they conquer that country because it's part of their natural territory, all that is an ocean away and doesn't affect me."
All of these ideas on why NOT to help allowed, actually empowered, Hitler during WWII.
Showing weakness, not being willing to join the fight when only equipment is required and no lives are at risk shows Russia that the United States and most of Europe is unlikely to aid the smaller nations that are first in line for Russian ambition.
Those countries especially ought to be petitioning the US and larger European political leaders to not only keep aid flowing to Ukraine but to increase the amount and quality lest Europe fall apart and America have our precious economy further impacted by worse global trade conditions.
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Uh, fact check. The mistake that led to Saddam Hussein's death was 100% American. After Iraq 1, all Saddam wanted was to keep being the big fish in his little pond. His aspirations of dominance over his smaller neighbors was gone. Also, being that he was the only big fish in his pond, he didn't allow Al Qaeda to operate or train in Iraq, which actually made him an erstwhile ally of the US in that regard.
If Saddam had been killed in the first Iraq war, after invading a smaller, weaker country that had Western support, then I'd agree with your statement.
As it is, Dubya (Real. American. Genius), demanded to see raw, unvetted intel that showed Saddam had WMD. The intel agencies gave him what he wanted. The Genius Level Thinker and leader of the free world then started a war which led to civil war and 20 year occupation and resulted in Iraq becoming more allied with Iran than with the US, all on bad, raw, unverified intelligence.
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