Posted on 02/03/2025 3:17:51 AM PST by McGruff
POKROVSK REGION, Ukraine -- A dire shortage of infantry troops and supply routes coming under Russian drone attacks are conspiring against Ukrainian forces in Pokrovsk, where decisive battles in the nearly three-year war are playing out — and time is running short.
Ukrainian troops are losing ground around the crucial supply hub, which lies at the confluence of multiple highways leading to key cities in the eastern Donetsk region as well as an important railway station.
Moscow is set on capturing as much territory as possible as the Trump administration is pushing for negotiations to end the war and recently froze foreign aid to Ukraine, a move that has shocked Ukrainian officials already apprehensive about the intentions of the new U.S. president, their most important ally. Military aid has not stopped, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
So Russia is winning again? I get confused every other day based on the “propaganda”.
All the conspiracy theories are true.
well, bluntly - no one is winning.
Russia lost way back in March 2022 when Putin’s plan to get a headstrike at Kyiv, get Zelenskyy to leave (a la Ashraf Ghani from Kabul) and then create a subservient state like Belarus.
But since then Putin has been trying to get as much as he can get away with and he lost again in September 2022 when his control over Kharkiv was taken away. And then in November 2022 when Russian forces retreated from Kherson.
Since then, this is a bloody slugfest.
There could have been a chance in winter 2022-2022, but Biden didn’t send enough weapons.
Now all we have had for 2 years is lives lost for inches - and Putin isn’t giving in as he doesn’t want to “lose face”
Sarcasm was my point. I don’t give a shxt about Ukraine or Russia. It’s a European problem and they’ve done little if anything, it’s on them and we shouldn’t be involved in any way.
WINNING means Ukraine does NOT get NATO membership.
Not sure what you’re on about
Ukraine deserves to lose and be dissolved.
“… Ukraine — A dire shortage of infantry troops and supply routes coming under Russian drone attacks are conspiring against Ukrainian forces in Pokrovsk, where decisive battles in the nearly three-year war are playing out — and time is running short.…”
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ABC News? I seem to hear tunes changing. The GRIFT MACHINE is being RELENTLESSLY and METHODICALLY DISMANTLED in Washington D.C. The parasites are being systematically dislodged from their sinecure positions draining the life from the American taxpayers and will soon realize why the cost of eggs matters.
We don’t care about Ukraine and its problems with manpower shortages.
A lot has happened since the events of 2-3 years ago. And the intervening time has not gone well for Ukraine. No sense pretending, Ukraine is in a bad way and no sign of it getting better.
well, not quite - it’s not only a European problem.
The situation in Ukraine is a direct parallel to the situation in Czechoslovakia in 1938.
In 1938 the French and British gave Hitler all he wanted and emboldened him to expand the war so that ultimately the UK and France spent billion$, lost many lives and lost their empires.
Ensuring that Putin is cowed and doesn’t try to expand his war ensures that the USA doesn’t end up spending more and losing American lives to a wider conflagration. At the same time it has given Xi pause.
Winning for Putin was making Ukraine a subservient state like Belarus.
You do know that Putin is in the midst of swallowing Belarus into the Russian Federation, right? That was his plan for Ukraine considering his constant statements over the decades that Ukraine is “not a legitimate country” and that it should be brought “back” into Russia.
“NATO membership” is a red herring waved by Putin that dopes fall for.
In 2014 there was no question of Ukraine getting NATO membership or even a pathway - but Putin invaded then.
In 2008 Ukraine (and Georgia) applied for NATO membership but were rejected by Germany and France — you know why? “For fear of provoking Putin”.
did that make him happy? Nope - he invaded Georgia 6 WEEKS later - if Germany and France had agreed to let Georgia and Ukraine into associate membership then neither the Georgian nor the 2 Ukrainian wars would have happened.
But note that Putin invaded despite NATO membership being unequivocally rejected.
On the contrary, considering the fight that Ukraine gave to the 3rd largest military in the world — nearly 3 years — they “deserve” to not lose.
And “dissolve” - what are you on about? They have different ethnic minorities, but, with the exception of Crimea - none of them are in any compact area with a majority to secede.
I wouldn’t say Belarus is totally subservient to Moscow.
But Lukashenko certainly does have to play ball with Putin, much like Franco did with Hitler.
The problem comes if Lukashenko is out of the picture, and that’s when the Russians will move in.
True. They are in a bad way - there are silver linings:
1. they are still alive - and not a vassal state of Muscowy. That could have happened in Feb 2022 (heck most of us thought that was going to happen - as did Putin)
2. their national identity has taken a massive boost - by giving them a common enemy, Putin has solidified Ukraine’s sense of self. THAT concept will survive.
To elaborate on #2 — I’ve known and interacted with Ukrainians since 2010. Here’s my perception of their patriotism
- before 2014 - basically “meh” - they were more “local patriotic” to their city or region. Didn’t really care about Ukrainian (or Russian) nationality or citizenship
- after 2014 - a little bit warmer, more sense of “we are Ukrainian” but lukewarm
- after March 2022 - a robust sense of self - at American levels of “we are who we are”.
I would draw the parallels to 1815 and how Napoleon basically created the German identity by giving a common enemy.
Or in 1919 when the UK provided the common enemy to the various nations of the Indian subcontinent and created the Indian identity.
Or in 1776 when the British provided a common enemy by which the colonies got a sense of “we are who we are”
On in the 1200s when the Hapsburgs did this for Uri, Unterwalds and Schweiz to form Switzerland.
In 2014 there was every likelihood that ukraine would be subsumed into the Rosisski Mir (Russian world) as it was a consumer of Russian soft power and was not developing its own higher culture.
But Putin killed that.
bttt
Nope. It was summer of 2022. While it was still warm in Ukraine. Before the mud season. And before Putin was forced to mobilize troops.
Should have emptied our inventory of humvees, artillery, stinger missiles and drones.
The risk to that is that Putin may have been desperate enough to nuke Kyiv.
Belarus is completely subservient to Moscow.
Lukashenko has no say on whether Moscowite troops walk across Belarus.
in addition the Kremlin seeks to de facto annex Belarus by formalizing the Union State as a Russian-dominated federated government that grants Moscow dominant power over most if not all aspects of Belarusian governance. This includes establishing full operational and administrative control over Belarus’ armed forces during peacetime and permanent Russian military basing in Belarus; a political union with a Kremlin-dominated federated government with a common set of federal laws and institutions for Belarusians and Russians to be governed as a single polity; and a fully integrated economy complete with common markets, free labor flows, unified laws, and a currency union.
Here’s a Belarusski government site — https://president.gov.by/en/belarus/economics/economic-integration/union-state
Lukashenko’s case is less Franco (Spain) and more Kurt Schuschnigg (Austria)
That was never going to happen. He might have nuked Odessa or Kharkiv but not Kyiv
Kyiv and Crimea hold mythological position in Muscowite eyes as it was the seat of the first Rus principality (that is disputed, I kinda think Novgorod was the first)
I don’t really care. Break them up into their ethnic or mutt tribes and never let them organize again after they STOLE over $100 billion in US tax money.
Ukraine was a corrupt pit that enriched Biden, Vindman, etc and still is.
It deserves nothing by contempt.
The citizens, what are left of them, are great people.
But I will never support another Ukrainian gov’t ever again. It is supporting another cartel.
if you say “I don’t really care”, then why did you write in post #7 “Ukraine deserves to lose and be dissolved” - that shows that you care more than a little bit.
They don’t have tribes there.
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