Russia Invades Ukraine. Again
POSTED BY: captaincrunch
UPDATED: Sunday, September 6, 2026 21:09
VIEWED: 562266
PAGE 576 of 1104
Quote:You have repeated Putin's tired old stories many times. When Putin dies, storytime ends and Russia goes back to being like North Korea threatening its neighbors with nukes, but not crossing into neighboring countries.
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
If Ukraine committed to not being in NATO, if NATO committed to not creating a "security agreement" with Ukraine, if Ukraine were to be a neutral nation likee Austria, the war would end tomorrow.
But NATO (i.e. the USA) can't agree to let Russia alone.
I was reminded what set this all off.
Deputy Chairperson of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev continued his nuclear saber-rattling rhetoric likely aimed in part at deterring Western aid to Ukraine. Medvedev claimed on February 7 that Russia has repeatedly “underscored” that it’s “plans” do not include any conflict “with NATO and EU member states.”[12] Kremlin officials, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, however, have recently and consistently rhetorically threatened NATO member states, and Kremlin-affiliated actors appear to be attempting to sow instability and set information conditions for possible future Russian aggressive actions against various European states.[13]
Medvedev stated that NATO’s military budget and population are significantly larger than Russia’s, so that if a war were to break out between Russia and NATO, Russia would have to respond “asymmetrically” by using “ballistic and cruise missiles carrying special warheads” — referring to nuclear warheads — resulting in an “apocalypse.” Medvedev posted these claims on his English language X (formerly Twitter) channel and Russian language Telegram channel, suggesting that his statements are meant for both an international and domestic audience.
Kremlin officials and pundits have consistently threatened to use nuclear weapons against NATO members, and ISW continues to assess that this nuclear rhetoric is aimed at deterring Western aid to Ukraine.[14] Medvedev‘s statements about NATO’s larger size and military budget relative to Russia are likely aimed at domestically promoting Kremlin narratives that NATO — and the West generally — poses an existential threat to Russia — a claim the Kremlin has used to try to justify its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.[15]
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-february-7-2024
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Quote:You have written that almost as frequently as Trump will be President. I can see why you flunked out of college, lost your girlfriend, live on $7,000 per year, and obsessively work on repairing your house, seldom leaving its protection from reality. You are a gopher in a hole in the ground, but with internet to connect you to Trump.
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Fuck Ukraine.
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Political correctness is just tyranny, with a smiley face.
Russia simply can’t win a war against Europe. The mathematics are inexorable
Even if the US pulls out, Putin would be crazy to start something
By Andrew Lilico | 6 February 2024 • 1:36pm
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/02/06/russia-war-europe-nato-eu-
ukraine-economics/
Consider two opposed countries. One has a larger population; the other has higher GDP. To create matching militaries, in terms of personnel and equipment, the country with the larger population need only devote a smaller percentage of its population to the military, but must devote a higher share of its GDP.
Suppose, instead, that the two countries devoted equal shares of personnel and GDP, and thus the more populous country had more personnel but they were less well-equipped, so each soldier is less effective – eg in killing opponents. In that case we can gain insight from an ingenious piece of military mathematics worked out during World War I: the “square law”. https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA225484.pdf (. . . “presents the results of the statistical analysis and suggests that an exponential law is more appropriate” than square law.)
This tells us that, in pure attrition terms, if one military force is more numerous than another but less effective, then in order to win, the ratio of the smaller military’s effectiveness advantages needs to be greater than the square of the ratio of its numerical disadvantage. So, for example, that means that if you have 10 percent fewer troops, your troops need to be more than 21 percent more effective to win an attrition-based war.
The proportion of the population that different countries can mobilise to fight might differ. An authoritarian state might be able to conscript more of its population to fight. But an authoritarian state might also have what we might term a “morale” disadvantage – its forces might become unable or unwilling to fight at a lower loss rate than would be the case for forces fighting for what they regard as a more noble cause. On the other side there are those that would argue that some democratic liberal countries have become sufficiently self-hating or decadent that they do not regard their own cause as noble enough to fight for.
Let’s apply some of these insights to a consideration of Russia’s medium-term threat to the EU. The Russian economy is about 10 percent of the size of the EU’s. The EU spends about 1.3 percent of GDP on its military and the Russians have recently raised their spending to about 6 percent. So EU military spending will be about twice that of Russia. If we assume spending more produces greater troop effectiveness, then by the square law, to compensate for spending half as much, Russia would need to mobilise more than 40 percent more troops than the EU that it was able to devote to battle, if Russian forces continued to be able to fight at the same loss percentages that EU troops were. The EU’s combined militaries have about 1.4 million troops. So Russia would need to have around 2 million troops available in an attrition war. If we assume Russia would be attacking, and apply the classical rule of thumb that attacking forces need a 1.5:1 advantage across a theatre, Russia would need about three million. Russia has around 1.2 million troops at present, but notionally around 2 million reservists.
If the above analysis is correct, then, in the medium term, even setting aside any “morale” differences, in order to have a chance against a combined EU (and thus be in any position to threaten Britain) Russia would need either to dou
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It is time for the Ukrainian army to pull out of the ruins of Avdiivka.
Ukraine’s Fortress City Held For A Decade. But Russia Was Willing To Trade Tens Of Thousands Of Lives For It.
By David Axe | Feb 7, 2024, 05:15pm EST
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2024/02/07/ukraines-fortress-cit
y-held-for-a-decade-but-russia-was-willing-to-trade-tens-of-thousands-of-lives-for-it/?sh=941335a54bfa
For 10 years since Russia first attacked Ukraine, Ukrainian troops held out in Avdiivka, a city with a pre-war population of 30,000 that lies just five miles northwest of Russian-occupied Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.
But now it’s time for the Ukrainians to pull back, according to one Ukrainian analysis group. “The fall of Avdiivka is not a matter of if, but when,” Frontelligence Insight explained in a new report.
There are very few civilians left in Avdiivka’s ruins, and rescuers are working to get them and their pets out of the city. Which is not to say Ukraine stands to lose nothing by pulling the army’s 110th Mechanized Brigade—which has garrisoned Avdiivka since Russia widened its war on Ukraine 23 months ago—from the city.
There’s propaganda value for both sides in either holding or taking Avdiivka. Russian president Vladimir Putin surely would enjoy the ruins as a gift ahead of his sham re-election next month.
But Avdiivka has actual military value, too. It’s one of Russia’s main objectives to fully control Donetsk Oblast—and to prevent Ukraine from ever liberating the oblast. That means eliminating pockets of resistance such as Avdiivka while also digging in and firming up local logistics.
From Avdiivka, Ukrainian troops can threaten the railways in Donetsk, forcing the Russians to find alternate—and less efficient—ways to ship people and materiel around eastern Ukraine.
If the survivors of the 110th Brigade’s 2,000 troops quit Avdiivka and retreat to prepared positions several miles to the west, it becomes much harder for them and adjacent forces to hold at threat Russian supply lines threading through Donetsk. That in turn firms up Russia’s occupation in the east.
All the same, it may be time. The 110th’s troops have fought a valiant defense for four months straight, without a break, bleeding a 40,000-person Russian force for every yard the Russians gained. The Ukrainian army’s 47th and 53rd Brigades have helped, by defending Avdiivka’s flanks with drones, mines, artillery and—in the 47th’s case—American-made M-2 fighting vehicles.
Since launching their latest campaign against Avdiikva back in October, the Russians likely have lost tens of thousands of troops, killed or maimed, as well as many hundreds of tanks and fighting vehicles. At times, it was possible the loss ratio—Russian casualties to Ukrainian ones—was seven-to-one or even 10-to-one in the Ukrainians’ favor.
But that was earlier in the campaign, when the Ukrainians’ supply lines into Avdiivka weren’t threatened by incremental Russian advances along the city’s flanks and, as of late January, Russian incursions directly into the city from the north and south.
Now the Russians are just a few hundred yards from the main roads into Avdiivka, and can strike Ukrainian supply trucks with handheld weapons.
It’s a turning point. One Ukrainians veterans have observed before. In May last year, in a grinding battle not dissimilar to that in Avdiivka, a Ukrainian garrison held out for months in the ruins of Bakhmut. They killed as many as 10 Russians for ever person they lost—until the Russians traded blood for ground and pinched the city’s supply lines.
Running low on ammunition, the Ukrainians in Bakhmut lost their advantage. “Once Russian forces managed to seize Ukrainian flanks and disrupt supply routes, the casualty rates almost equaled,” Frontelligence recalled.
Waiting too long to retreat from Bakhmut, Ukrainian commanders partially surrendered their attrition advantage and—in the process—lost credibility with the Ukrainian public.
The lives the generals wasted at the end of the Bakhmut campaign
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Trump’s already back and America has ditched Ukraine
February 8, 2024 4:01 am CET
https://www.politico.eu/article/olaf-scholz-joe-biden-united-states-su
pport-ukraine-trump-return/
BERLIN — During a visit to Washington this week, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is likely to find that Donald Trump has already returned — at least in terms of U.S. policy toward Europe's worst strategic nightmare in Ukraine.
Scholz arrives just as Republicans in Congress, acting at Trump’s behest, are blocking military aid for Kyiv, imperiling the fate of the embattled country.
The Washington setback comes as Ukraine's frontline troops complain of ammunition shortages, and as Russian forces make a major push to capture the shattered ruins of the city of Avdiivka.
It's a particularly grim scenario for the Germans, who fear they will now be on the hook as Kyiv's main champion — a role they never wanted, preferring the part of Washington's sidekick.
“The discussions between the House of Representatives and the Senate on funding support for Ukraine is of course a topic that we are following particularly closely,” a senior German government official said ahead of Scholz’s trip.
That, to put it mildly, is an understatement. Since Russia invaded Ukraine nearly two years ago, the U.S. has been the largest provider of military aid to Kyiv by a wide margin. With that support now on hold, and little assurance it will resume soon, the world has been upended for Ukraine's European allies.
Germany and Europe have a lot more riding on Ukraine’s survival than the U.S. does.
European leaders fear that if Putin wins in Ukraine and Trump returns to the presidency, countries like Latvia or Moldova might be next.
Discussing that prospect, a senior European diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, recently told POLITICO and other media outlets: “These are the things that keep me up at night.” (Why the anonymity? All European cheese-eating surrender monkeys will do no more than overeat cheese to make themselves feel better about Ukraine's downfall.)
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Quote:
Originally posted by second:Quote:You have written that almost as frequently as Trump will be President.
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Fuck Ukraine.
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Political correctness is just tyranny, with a smiley face.
Yes. I have.
Quote:
I can see why you flunked out of college,
Dropped out of college and did better than most Americans will ever do.
Quote:
lost your girlfriend,
Everybody's lost girlfriends.
Quote:
live on $7,000 per year,
Zero shame. This is a source of great pride.
Quote:
and obsessively work on repairing your house,
It comes and goes. If I obsessively worked on it, it only would have taken me a few years instead of going on 13.
Quote:
seldom leaving its protection from reality.
Reality is overrated when you own your own castle free and clear.
Quote:
You are a gopher in a hole in the ground, but with internet to connect you to Trump.
And yet I have very little knowledge of anything Trump is doing or saying on any given day because I'm not the one here who obsesses over Trump and his daily goings on.
That would be you, buddy.
Fuck Russia.
Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.
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Political correctness is just tyranny, with a smiley face.
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Quote:You are like every Trumptard, bragging about your nothingness. The first Trumptard I knew was Joe Duncan in 1962, before Trump was out of high school. Joe was around 45 years old, a pilot for Eastern Airlines, red-faced, and never sober when home. A big blowhard like you about his "successful" life. Joe was the most unpleasant asshole I knew as a 10-year-old. His greediness and bad temper caused his marriages to end and his children to avoid him. But he didn't get fired from Eastern. In 1965 he choked on a chicken bone and died. Good riddance. I have seen thousands of Trumptards since then. They are all screwed up in the head. When I follow their stories, the ending is stupid and early in life, just like Joe Duncan's, possibly because they cannot believe they are the cause of their problems, not their wives' fault or their employers' or their children's or the government's fault.
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:Quote:
I can see why you flunked out of college,
Dropped out of college and did better than most Americans will ever do.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Quote:
Originally posted by second:Quote:You are like every Trumptard, bragging about your nothingness.
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:Quote:
I can see why you flunked out of college,
Dropped out of college and did better than most Americans will ever do.
It ain't bragging if it's true.
If you don't want me to talk about how awesome I am, you should probably start sticking to the political topics at hand and stop bringing my personal life into everything because you can't ever win an argument with facts.
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Political correctness is just tyranny, with a smiley face.
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Quote:Trumptards don't realize they screwed up, but it is inevitable because the same brain makes their political and personal choices. I knew all about Trumptard Joe Duncan's political opinions and his drunken life. Joe is the reason I never drink and continue despising his political beliefs which live on without him. 6ix, too bad you didn't have a Joe Duncan's poor example teaching you about alcohol and politics. You've had to learn very slowly over many years what was immediately obvious to 10-year-old me about alcohol and people who vote Republican.
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
It ain't bragging if it's true.
If you don't want me to talk about how awesome I am, you should probably start sticking to the political topics at hand and stop bringing my personal life into everything because you can't ever win an argument with facts.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Quote:
Originally posted by second:Quote:Trumptards don't realize they screwed up, but it is inevitable because the same brain makes their political and personal choices. I knew all about Trumptard Joe Duncan's political opinions and his drunken life. Joe is the reason I never drink and continue despising his political beliefs which live on without him. 6ix, too bad you didn't have a Joe Duncan's poor example teaching you about alcohol and politics. You've had to learn very slowly over many years what was immediately obvious to 10-year-old me about alcohol and people who vote Republican.
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
It ain't bragging if it's true.
If you don't want me to talk about how awesome I am, you should probably start sticking to the political topics at hand and stop bringing my personal life into everything because you can't ever win an argument with facts.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
You don't see me crying over spilled milk.
You should worry about yourself. Nobody else is going to do it because you're the only person who cares about you. You are unlovable. You are miserable. You are a waste of carbon.
Have a nice day. I've no more time to waste on you this morning.
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Political correctness is just tyranny, with a smiley face.
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SECOND doesn't obsess over what Putin says, or what Trump says, or what "Trumptards" say or do.
He obsesses over his DELUSIONS, polishing those turds to a brilliant shine.
Hey, SECOND, how did you get Ukraine so wrong? Russia is winning. Ukraine will be destroyed and NATO will be reduced to fomenting terrorist actions in Russia, just like we armed and funded terrorists in Syria, Chechnya, Afghanistan, Libya ... El Salvador (except there we called them "death squads")... we have been reduced to destroying nations like Yugoslavia and Iraq because we don't have the capacity to protect and build.
And you, SECOND, are an epitome of that hate and destruction. That's all you know, and that's all you advocate, 24/7/365.
How about putting some "real world" into that brain of yours? Yanno, stop obsessively posting hate, emerge from your dark inner world and get out in the sunshine once in a while? Do something useful for a change?
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"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger
Loving America is like loving an addicted spouse - SIGNYM
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