Latest Ukraine/Russia Thread

[BlueOak]

Possible false flag attack exposed - as people keep telling me 'how could this start' - 'Russia would never do that' and I keep saying any one of a 1000 ways, the method is largely irrelevant as tensions are that high. Russia being backed by BRICS means it can do that, it'll get Belarus levelled and Russia heavily damaged, but Putin doesn't care as the people are that suppressed. 

Also ballistic missile sources for the last post. - With the interactive map on their site as always.

I also agree that India and China need to be sanctioned heavily at this point, and their efforts to support this proxy war for them halted as much as possible. 
 

Edited 5 hours ago by BlueOak

[Hatfort]

I haven't commented in this thread for a while.

Trump's administration chose to continue fueling Ukraine in this war. I thought he wouldn't do it, he had a chance to score a goal as the peacemaker he sold himself to be. Ukraine would have to sit and accept the loss of four territories and sign neutrality, but the war would have ended there. Nothing is easy, but there was a route. Instead, Trump chose the Biden path, and even now has threatened with nuclear submarines. Remember NATO is not officially fighting this war, it's between Russia and Ukraine, so that's crazy. But it's probably for show, kind of what he did in Iran. It's irresponsible and stupid behaviour, but that's who Americans put in the White House. For their defense, Biden wasn't better on that, and we don't have any sign to say Kamala was either. 

The war continues, so the battlefield will be where the maps are drawn. Russia keeps advancing, and Ukrainians have to retreat or die at the front. After recapturing Kursk, Russia has entered Sumy. Now they have also started to put feet in Dnipropetrovsk. The longer it goes, the less has Ukraine in its hand to negotiate for a less bad outcome, and the weaker their army gets, which is a further risk. 

[BlueOak]

1 hour ago, Hatfort said:

I haven't commented in this thread for a while.

Trump's administration chose to continue fueling Ukraine in this war. I thought he wouldn't do it, he had a chance to score a goal as the peacemaker he sold himself to be. Ukraine would have to sit and accept the loss of four territories and sign neutrality, but the war would have ended there. Nothing is easy, but there was a route. Instead, Trump chose the Biden path, and even now has threatened with nuclear submarines. Remember NATO is not officially fighting this war, it's between Russia and Ukraine, so that's crazy. But it's probably for show, kind of what he did in Iran. It's irresponsible and stupid behaviour, but that's who Americans put in the White House. For their defense, Biden wasn't better on that, and we don't have any sign to say Kamala was either. 

The war continues, so the battlefield will be where the maps are drawn. Russia keeps advancing, and Ukrainians have to retreat or die at the front. After recapturing Kursk, Russia has entered Sumy. Now they have also started to put feet in Dnipropetrovsk. The longer it goes, the less has Ukraine in its hand to negotiate for a less bad outcome, and the weaker their army gets, which is a further risk. 

Russia's economic situation continues to get worse. 
Russia's population demographics get worse.
Their stockpiles are gone.
It takes very little land, in Sumy it was just repelled almost to the border again.
Their casualty rates now with so little armor left to use are ridiculously high vs Ukraine. They use human wave tactics, its why they've had to reach out to places like North Korea for manpower.

Russia vs Ukraine yes, that will always be true. (Thank you for acknowledging it most people just gloss over it)
But this is now BRICS vs NATO to a much larger extent than you are acknowledging. China and NATO are using this as a proxy also, and that's the only reason its continuing.

As to why nobody would do as you suggest, i'll requote myself below as it covers most of it. But you can add to the fact that obviously, people are calculating and watching that this is going to hurt Russia (and BRICS) more than help it. You cite some land gains, i'll cite that its falling into being a satellite state of China. Its economy bought up, Kamaz just failed, I mean the country is buckling, and although the citizens might well just put up with it, it'll never project real power again.

Whatever you think of the above statement, that's the calculus: keeping Russia from puppeting Ukraine is better than allowing it to, else this war would not be continuing. Russia has repeatedly stated it wants control over all of Ukraine, like it had previously, it wants to project its power into eastern Europe and its not strong enough to do so anymore. - This is why this situation exists. Not because I dislike X or you dislike Y - because the practical reality is Russia is overreaching. 
 

2 hours ago, BlueOak said:

@zazen

You keep talking like Russia is just asking for space and being ignored. That’s not what’s happening. Russia’s entire approach is to project fear, and that doesn’t earn respect from stronger countries, it gets pushback. If you focused on the countries that joined, and why, you'd come to that conclusion.

Chat GPT examples from the last decade:

Feb 2022 – Putin warns of consequences “you have never experienced in your history” and puts nukes on alert.

May 2022 – State TV says the UK and Ireland could be turned into a “radioactive wasteland.”

Jan 2024 – Medvedev threatens nuclear strikes if Ukraine hits Russian launch sites.

May 2024 – Medvedev talks “fully fledged nuclear war” if NATO keeps supplying Ukraine.

July 2025 – Medvedev brings up the “Dead Hand” doomsday system at Trump.

End Quote

This is Russian foreign policy mask off.

Then they've got hypersonic missiles in Belarus,  ditching the INF moratorium, and rewriting nuclear doctrine so even conventional threats matter. Intimidation is baked into their security policy.

You frame NATO expansion like it was some arrogant Western move. When Russia’s spent centuries threatening Eastern Europe. NATO was created to stop exactly that. Countries lined up to join because they remember Moscow’s behavior, not because America forced them. Regional powers don’t get to veto who their neighbours ally with,  that’s not security its trying to control other countries. By your logic Turkey could tell Armenia who it can talk to, I highlight that with the Azerbaijan-Russia relations deteriorating to show you directly Russia's regional power slipping.

On Multipolarity, sure great theory. Russia’s 'multipolarity' is just an authoritarian bloc with China, Iran, and others keeping each other’s wars or expansion going. Russia believes it allows them to act like they used to. BRICS support isn’t neutral, it’s keeping the Ukraine war alive. Real multipolarity means sovereign equality. Russia’s version is 'we get our sphere' and everyone else accepts it. That’s not balance its replacing one unipolar arrogance with another. - Cue you saying how bad the west is right? Then I just point you to the mirror they are.

If Russia wants space, it needs to learn how to live in that space without trying to dominate everyone in it. Right now it’s doing the opposite, and that, (and their weakening geo-political position) are why the neighbors you think should be neutral are running straight to NATO or China for that matter. 

For transparency. I told chat GPT to critique my own position. It told me that because you use statecraft, and I use debate imagery, I needed to bring more real-world examples and argue more along those lines to provide solid examples.
 

Edited 3 hours ago by BlueOak

[Ajay0]

23 hours ago, zazen said:

The negative response to Russia is mostly Western - which makes up at most 15-20% of the world. Most of the world is either neutral or friendly with Russia - much of Africa, Latin America, Middle East and Asia. Much of the world is reacting to the Western led uni-polar order as it exists -which is a imperial order that needs extricating from via a parallel order that doesn't insist on ordering others around or being sanctioned because it doesn't pick sides which is childish school yard politics.

The problem is that the West doesn't take Russia seriously, or any countries legitimate interests for that matter. Because in a uni-polar order the hegemonic empires interests supersede everyone else. That doesn't mean caving in to other countries injustices or aggression, but when a country articulates again and again its own legitimate security concerns and asks for neutrality on its periphery to prevent feeling cornered - that should be respected.

Post WW2 Japan and Germany were re-built and integrated into the system despite being imperially expansionist - they got some level of respect, but Russia was denied this post collapse of the USSR. This is largely because Germany and Japan subordinated themselves to the US empire via conceding to a US security architecture.  

Their sovereignty is strategically limited and they don't have red lines in the real sense because they are client states of the US empire - patrons rather than partners. Russia doesn’t want to concede this level of autonomy. They floated becoming part of NATO and worked with the US in counter terrorism post 9/11 - but working alongside the US isn't enough because they empire demand others working under them.

The imperial mindset is the key issue here - and its most of the world that is reacting to imperialism, some aggressively (Russia) that is then gaslit and flipped on its head to be portrayed as imperialism itself.

This articulates the present situation very well.