What next? Ukraine's allies divided over Russia endgame

Reuters via Yahoo ^ | June 13th, 2022 | John Irish, Andreas Rinke and Humeyra Pamuk

[PIF]

Biden is deliberately using negative economics, ostensibly to crush Russia, but is really deliberately creating conditions for a near to full-on depression - it began with the ending of the Keystone XL pipeline and continues with financially discouraging oil exploration and also halting grain and fertilizer railroad shipments in the US.

[cowboyusa]

They cleaned up on the east, lost in central Ukraine. Stalemate

[cowboyusa]

It’s stalemate.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Zhang Fei.

[Zhang Fei]

Ukraine ping

MercyFlush: [Just to let you know there are several items in the news today showing the Ukrainians advancing and making some unexpected river crossings to attack Soviet positions.

The Soviet offensive is failing and the Ukrainians are retaking territory.]

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Given Ukrainian losses (~200 KIA daily) and Russian firepower superiority combined with Russian manpower problems, my impression is that they should give ground so the Russians get overextended geographically, then hit the Russian flanks and logistics.

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From WaPo:
https://archive.ph/VbM1V
[Ukraine has now almost completely run out of ammunition for the Soviet-era weapons systems that were the mainstay of its arsenal, and the Eastern European countries that maintained the same systems have run out of surplus supplies to donate, Danylyuk said. Ukraine urgently needs to shift to longer-range and more sophisticated Western systems, but those have only recently been committed, and in insufficient quantities to match Russia’s immense firepower, he said.

Russia is firing as many as 50,000 artillery rounds a day into Ukrainian positions, and the Ukrainians can only hit back with around 5,000 to 6,000 rounds a day, he said. The United States has committed to deliver 220,000 rounds of ammunition — enough to match Russian firepower for around four days.]

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IMHO, the pointless meat grinder battles are a waste of good Ukrainian men.

When Ukraine said it needed fighter jets, it wasn’t exaggerating. Without the 130-odd fighter aircraft USAF pilots flew to Israel during the Yom Kippur War, it’s likely Israel would have fallen to the Egyptians and Syrians. Ukraine isn’t fighting Arabs. Golda Meir was said to be contemplating the Samson option - the nuclear destruction of Egypt’s and Syria’s capitals, when Nixon overrode Kissinger and sent aid.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Nickel_Grass
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/us-jews-shouldnt-honor-kissinger-594780

[dfwgator]

Soviet?

[Berlin_Freeper]

If ever there was the need for nuclear artillery shells this would be it.

[Zhang Fei]

[If ever there was the need for nuclear artillery shells this would be it.]

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Nukes against a nuclear-armed opponent are a one-way ticket to Götterdämmerung. No amount of territorial loss is worth national suicide, unless your adversary views your population as insects to be exterminated, as the Nazis did the Slavs.

[Berlin_Freeper]

unless your adversary views your population as insects to be exterminated,

[MercyFlush]

“Soviet?”

Pardon the cut and paste but I posted this yesterday and it answers your question:

“Putin brought back Soviet Russia as is illustrated by the Red Army being called the ‘Red Army’ again, the Red Army using the Soviet Red Banner as their battle flag, the use of Soviet iconography on government buildings, military uniforms, military medals, and etc.

Oleg Mikhailov, current member of the 8th Duma, introduced legislation this year to make the Red Banner the national flag of Soviet Russia and to replace the State Anthem of the Russian Federation with the State Anthem of the Soviet Union.

Soviet Russia never went away, it just took a break.”

[Zhang Fei]

[unless your adversary views your population as insects to be exterminated,]

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Massacres happen in every war. Going back to Alexander’s time, the men were butchered, and the women and children sold into slavery:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Thebes#Destruction_of_Thebes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Persian_Gate#Aftermath

Heck, even William of Normandy went after the local civilians when his retainers in newly-conquered England were ambushed and killed. His depredations resulted in a 75% reduction* in the population of the lands upon which he chose to inflict exemplary violence (to deter other challengers to his rule).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrying_of_the_North

The deliberate root and branch extermination of the entire population is another matter. That’s a fairly unusual approach to empire, and the likely cause of Hitler’s downfall. Whether Alexander or Genghis, successful conquerors tended to incorporate the armies of the conquered into their formations, to replace their losses, keep newly-acquired combat-age men busy and to balance out internal rivals/courtiers in their own high command. That Hitler chose to starve to death millions of able-bodied Russian POW’s he captured, whose fate at Stalin’s hands if repatriated to Russia was death (for surrendering instead of fighting to the end) or a long stint as a guest of Russia’s many gulags is evidence that he had serious hangups about ethnicity.

* Some of these people are said to have ended up in Crimea, of all places.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England_(medieval)

[Jim Noble]

“Our western partners have given us about 10% of what they have.”

We’re not your partners.