Posted on 02/26/2022 6:40:56 AM PST by shotgun
Just a thought, but the Russian economy and GDP is smaller than California. So how long can they sustain their current battle operations?
They are burning through supplies, hardware, and personnel. That stuff is not just “replaced.”
Those are the things that drain an economy. Stuff breaks and has to be fixed. But if you cannot get the materials to fix them…they stay broken.
And you don’t just “replace” choppers and transport planes. During a war, that capacity is lost for the duration.
Well, four plus years in WWII - for a much bigger effort.
That is by design. Putin killed, or sent off to the gulag, those with opinions different from his.
Most of us have had bosses that thought like Putin. Thankfully, I had a battalion commander in Germany that demanded imagination and intelligence from his officers. Under his leadership, we went from a C-3 to a C-1 (combat ready) in about a year.
OTOH, there was a job I quit before my first day was over. When I saw the employment reports that showed 200% annually, I knew it wouldn't work out.
Well, four plus years in WWII - for a much bigger effort.
Agree!
Traditionally Russians out up with a lot.
I had a blizzard thought: If the tic-tac aircraft are US craft, they could knock out planes and they would appear out of nowhere, and disappear.
It’s a fun thought.
How far will Putin go to save face? Will he use chemical weapons if conventional means fail?
Most of the reserves are in gold. While that has value, it is not easy to convert on a huge scale. Their hard currency reserves are much lower.
Does anybody see an opportunity here? They lost 15k troops in Afghanistan. All those stationed in Ukraine are big-time targets of opportunity. Every smart phone should take pics of dead soldiers so the Russian mamas can see what happened to their sons.
Our material support is modern and up to date. Then there’s the sanctions. Anything less than 100% would be Vichyesque.
Ukraine is not like faraway Afghanistan. A minimum 15k dead Russians will bring the message closer to home. We’ll see.
Pelosi, Hillary, and others will try to spin it that way, but it won't work with the general population. Biden's narrative of incompetency has already been established from the day he was elected. It started with shutting down the Keystone Pipeline, and was cemented by the debacle in Afghanistan.
My worry isn't over Russia, it's China, and what Xi has up his sleeve.
Well, if the reports of the Russians running out of fuel and stealing food from the Ukrainians, because they don’t have any, are true then it would appear not for very long.
Multiple videos on social media of Russian military out of fuel, food and stuck on highways
Major expense is military personnel.
They get paid whether sitting in Russia in a camp or
fighting in Ukraine.
Ukraine has been bombed extensively, buildings destroyed and damaged. Their replacement cost will be enormous. But no worries, American tax payers will come to the rescue.
As for military hardware lost in combat, it was all manufactured in Russia. You think all those manufacturing facilities are shut down? No! There are people employed there and getting paid every day. Russia will not need to hire new people to re-manufacture lost military hardware. As for raw materials for that hardware, Russia probably has more mineral wealth than any country.
You gotta understand military-industrial complex. It keeps on trucking, war or no war. Expenses are ever going.
The population of Hitler’s Germany was 70 million. The USSR alone had over 200 million people. The GDP of the allies was at least double Germany’s. The Nazis still caused a bit of trouble.
“..the DemoKKKrat Party is seriously wounded. ...”
They need to be declared a domestic terrorist communist organization and run out of the country on a rail and outlawed from the boundaries of the USA under the threat of public hanging.
And then, with a depleted military, they have to watch their backs vs. the Chinese. I’m talking about Siberia.
I suspect Putin’s adventure is being subsidized by China, who want us occupied in Europe while they snatch Taiwan.
“Well, four plus years in WWII - for a much bigger effort.”
In WW2 the Soviet uniforms were made in the US.
The trucks were made by Studebaker
The rations were grown and packaged in the US
The Soviets used Bell P-39 and Curtis P-40 fighters
Almost 10,000 Sherman tanks were sent to the USSR
About 50% of all material used by the Red Army in WW2 was from the US or Britain
You are applying the MIC Model in the US. Russia doesn’t have the capacity we have. They cannot afford to buy more than a dozen of their 5gen fighters. How soon are they going to replace two of their large transports that were destroyed? They cannot make them that fast.
Your theory makes sense, but their economy and workforce is pretty small. And obviously we know nothing of their inventory.
And remember, it was reported that 50-60% of their military capacity was on the borders. That seems like quite a deployment to be concentrated.
Their missile attacks have been pretty tame. The US would have fired thousands in the first few hours; Russia has fired a few hundred. They haven’t deployed their heavy stuff. Why?
The US remembers when a chopper full of operators was shot down in Afghanistan. That’s happened at least four or five times in two days for the Spetnaz. How is that being received in Moscow?
These guys haven’t been able to secure a small airport.
None of this bodes well for a country that is demographically weak, and financially hobbled.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.