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Posted on 09/12/2022 8:58:48 PM PDT by Cronos
...The initial assault toward Kherson in the south wasn’t a feint. It was a major strategic thrust that might yet push Russian troops back from the western bank of the Dnieper River. But deftly, the Ukrainians also moved in the Kharkiv region in the northeast while the Russians were asleep there. They didn’t rush the advance; they softened up Russian lines and then, last week, burst through in a devastating assault that put Russia in pell-mell retreat and regained more than 1,100 square miles of territory.
..Vladimir Putin. He is the loser in this latest round, but he is also the man who cannot be seen to lose
...Putin’s problem now is that all those television watchers in Moscow and St. Petersburg can see that the Russian leader’s non-war is a total mess. His strongest backers on the Telegram channel, and even some commentators on state television, are saying that Russian forces have suffered a severe defeat. The finger-pointing has begun in earnest, and the daggers are out for Gen. Valery Gerasimov, Russia’s chief of staff, and Sergei Shoigu, the defense minister.
But not yet for Putin, and probably not ever. That’s the beauty of the system he has created. There is no one to succeed him, almost literally. If he keeled over tomorrow, Russia’s interim leader would be Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, a former head of the Russian Taxation Service. Have you ever heard of him? Of course not. That’s the point.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
The war was started in 2014 with the US led coup of the then Ukraine pro-Russian government and went on for 8 years against the Russian speaking Ukrainian citizens in the Southern and South-East regions of Ukraine via incessant shelling, etc. of them till the Russians were asked to intervene, which they did.
a NATO army manned by Ukrainians
Remembering that you're a dumbass is not stalking you. I know it's easy for you to get confused though, since you're retarded, so I won't be offended at the accusation.
Your record doesn't exactly show you to be much of an expert on anything.True considering he is a paranoid Putin Stooge in House Atreides. 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Russia wants to steal Ukraine for military and economic strategic reasons including natural resources, land routes, additional sea ports and human resources. To the Russians, Ukraine would be another gateway to conquer Europe as a next step.
Besides other important natural resources, Ukraine has good land for very large grain crops. Russia desires to control and eventually own all of Europe, but that desire would not stop with Europe.
1973 United States–Soviet Union wheat deal
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_United_States%E2%80%93Soviet_Union_wheat_deal
Governments like the government of Russia tend to control their populations by vilifying and invading other nations, and they don’t willingly stop expanding. Only other nations can hold such compulsive bully nations at bay, and eventually running out of room to compromise, stop them.
I’m not convinced “Russia” wants to steal Ukraine.
The average Russian person doesn’t want Ukraine - they think they should be “reunited” but not forcibly.
The Russian governmental establishment wants Ukraine for historical reasons.
Russia - or to be more specific Muscowy - has a historical “concept” of itself as
1. The uniter of all the East Slavs
2. Inheritors of the Constantinople empire
With #1 they expanded it to pan-Slavicism in the 1800s, which failed.
With #2 they expanded it to pan-Orthodoxy in the 1800s, which also failed.
I try to refer to it as Muscowy rather than Russia.
Masterful example of sarcasm in your post :)
Wrong putinista.
you got that from the Kremlin propaganda mills.
Anyone with any braincell would realize that if Ukraine had lost 50% of their military as your post falsely alleges, they would not have been able to sustain ONE front - leave alone win on TWO fronts...
ha ha ha -- is that the latest lie from the Kremlin mill?
The Russian media itself is saying "regrouping", while we see the Ukrainians making gains in Kherson
Face facts tovarisch - you guys lost in the north-east
"Russia" if we consider Kievan Rus (which is incorrect) lost to the Mongols and was under Tatr thumb for centuries
If we consider "Russia" as the point since Ivan the Terrible declared the Tsardom of all the Russias in the late 1400s, then they have been invaded thrice (in 1610, in 1812 and in 1941) and lost once (1610)
Exactly - straight out of Sun-Tzus' playbook --> give the enemy a chance to escape without their weaponry and they will be routed.
Dedbeforehonor --> you should tell that to the Kremlin that they can withdraw from Ukrainian territory
From Moscow secret dispatch radio??
or create a new Tsardom.
The interesting part is that the USSR was explicitly not a continuation of the Tsardom of Muscowy — Lenin said it was a new state and didn’t inherit the debts etc. of the Romanov empire.
yeltin’s Russian federation was a continuation of the USSR officially in the sense that it inherited the UN seat, debts, other international memberships etc. And the same for Putin’s Russia.
However Ukraine was a separate entity from Russia even under Lenin.
“Russia” didn’t do that — it was Putin’s regime that invaded.
Also, if Putin had just stuck to the Donbas and conquered THAT, there would be some noise, but that’s about it - nothing more.
Jeez… Jennifer Griffin is STILL spouting her MASSIVE INVASION is imminent spiel. -- posted on 21st February
Ukraine requested to join NATO in 2008 but Germany and France said "no, this will antagonize Putin" -- and Putin understood that as a greenlight to invade
Russia has a paranoia about the Ukraine region. Operation barbarossa, heck, even Napoleon came through there. They have not been invaded through Finland, at least to my knowledge. Then add that since 2014 the west has been arming up Ukraine, and of course war in the Donbas. To cut to the chase, I am hoping for for at least a measure of success for Russia in this conflict, but yeah, they gotta step it up, that’s for sure. Last week has been rough for my cheer squad.
Amazing that David Ignatius suddenly has credibility on Free Republic.
Ignatius was one of the main “Russian Collusion Hoax” MSM conduits for false DOJ/FBI leaks designed to destroy the Trump presidency.
He’s still on “Morning Joe” (and other Leftist outlets) as a regular, spewing anti-conservative, anti-GOP, anti Trump and anti-MAGA garbage.
Now, there is reverence for his honesty and integrity, here, on conservative Free Republic. Amazing.
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📂☑️
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