Posted on 11/12/2022 7:22:39 AM PST by lump in the melting pot
There are three reasons why Putin is losing this war. Two of them cannot be fixed. That’s why Putin doubles down on solving the third.
First: Motivation. Russian army has no business in Ukraine. No number of draftees will solve this problem. In fact, it will only make things worse, because every next batch is less motivated that the previous one. Russia is simply running out of idiots.
The Kremlin has just started severe ideologization and militarization of Russian education to get the young committed to fight. Most probably, it is too late. Russian young are skeptical about this war, and will be increasingly opposed to it.
Second: Russian army is too hierarchical and corrupt. Replacing one butcher with another in military command will change nothing.
Russian military is built on despise of soldiers’ lives and suppression of their initiative because Putin’s state is founded on the same principles. It will take changing the state to repair the army.
Third: Russia faces a coalition with practically unlimited resources. Ukraine will never stop fighting because Putin frames it as a genocidal war. The question is whether Ukraine will have resources for that.
This is Putin’s only hope at this point. Nuclear, energy, or grain blackmail, creating divisions in Europe and in the US – all of this is meant to break the coalition.
Those who say that Putin cannot be defeated, or that he should be offered a chunk of sovereign Ukraine as an off-ramp, or that he should be kept in power to avert the worst – these people are the only ones who can help him snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.
Putin is not invincible. He will be soundly defeated, and rather soon. If only some useful idiots don’t step in to save him.
“Putin is about to start the most senseless war in history”
Umm no.
The most senseless war was one that lasted nearly 20 years and just recently ended in utter failure, like leaving Saigon level of failure....
WWI is a very good one.
You Called?
The senselessness of wars is metered in loss of life and destruction of infrastructure, rather than a calendar. By that measure, russia’s war in Ukraine surpassed the USA’s invasion of Afghanistan probably within the first 2 weeks.
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Did the “Clot Shots” kill the Russian soldiers?
Serbia has not and the 78 days straight of bombing of Serbian infrastructure, etc.
Nor has Iraq and the ‘shock and awe’ air campaign waged against Iraqi infrastructure, etc.
Shall I go on?
This is News/Activism not some Drudge-like Twitter posting of BS.
“...entire Reich ...”
I did not miss that.
lulz.
Russia is simply running out of idiots.
The moron balding dwarf that started the whole thing, Vlad the Imploder, needs to be run out.
Well, a silly thread.
Doesn’t discuss the actual reasons of the conflict.
Doesn’t discuss the west will tire of it just like every other one.
Doesn’t discuss that there is actual a large percentage of the Ukraine that doesn’t want to be a part of this corrupt country. And voted to peacefully leave it. But the Kosovo method doesn’t work here
Doesn’t discuss the absolute calamity of winter in the EU. Freezing in the dark doesn’t even begin to describe what is coming.
Doesn’t discuss the absolute corrupt tyrant Zelensky is.
The war is going to come down to outlast and attrition war.
The west is like “Oh look...a squirrel!”
Over a totally avoidable war.
even if this war ended tomorrow, the damage to Russia is permanent
loss of trust, loss of military reputation, loss of international standing, loss of European energy markets, losses to the economy ... Russia has lost a lot already, and will lose more if this continues (which it will)
I don’t like Putin.
I don’t like Zelensky.
I don’t like this war.
I don’t like the Democrats sending billions of dollars to ‘Ukraine when they can’t tell us why they are doing that.
Facts?
We don’t need no stinking facts.
Orange Russian Bad.
That’s all that matters.
So once they started taking heavy losses in that equipment - and the artillery tubes began to fail because of the number of rounds fired through them - they could not be replaced other than in dribs and drabs.
You can't win a modern mechanized war without good logistical and maintenance systems unless you win it fast. And the Russians didn't do that.
Mobilized men without proper equipment are simply cannon fodder in the modern era. And I would imagine that those are the kind of conversations that they're having inside the Kremlin. They're looking at their supply chains, looking at what equipment they have in reserve, and coming to the conclusion that what they are doing now is not sustainable.
And though Ukraine is suffering some of the same things, they're getting greater logistical support from the West, sending damage equipment to other Eastern European countries to be repaired and refitted, etc..
Also unlike Ukraine, Russia has military border concerns other than just this particular war. Ukraine will use every last tank, every last artillery tube, and every last round of ammunition in its possession in this war because it is a war of survival. But Russia can't afford to do the same. It needs to retain some decent troops and equipment in other parts of the country to protect its other strategic national interests.
This war has been a disaster for Russia.
You speak of Afghanistan.
After a little while, that was not really a war but an occupation. There were Americans killed but the numbers were not great. More died on Iwo in a few days than the entire campaign in Afghanistan. More Russians died failing to capture Kiev than americans died in Afghanistan.
Your effort to equate fails on the face
Very good points. None, however, will make any impact on FR’s vatnik brigade, who continue to whistle past russia’s graveyard while assuring us (or themselves, more likely) that things will turn around for russia in the winter, or next spring, or when Soros dies, or when some other cope fantasy comes true.
Japanese plastic model manufacturer Tamiya introduces 'Russian invader' figurine series
Their job is to make noise, and to "poison" the forum as a place of making sense out of - in this case - world affairs.
It explains why they turn to insults - like calling FReepers with decades of good standing "fans of Soros" or other such garbage every time things don't go their way.
At this point it's obvious that Russia has a whole team dedicated to doing this on FR, and probably other forums. I think it has hurt FR immensely.
One doesn't have to be in the cult of Zelensky (he's an obnoxious brat), or be a fan of corrupt Ukraine culture (I'm not, but Russia is worse), to see that Russia clearly was in the wrong in invading Ukraine, and who's LEADERSHIP acted like their normal brutal selves in their war conduct.
I'm not against discussions of the war and our actions in it at all. I do think outright propagandists should get the boot.
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