Ukraine Conflict - "Only the dead have seen the end of war."

[Lexx]

Afaik if you get drafted, you can't choose where they will deploy you. Sure you can end up in a soup kitchen, or you end up at the front lines in the east without ammo and with russian artillery shells all around you.

[BruceVC]

42 minutes ago, Lexx said:

Afaik if you get drafted, you can't choose where they will deploy you. Sure you can end up in a soup kitchen, or you end up at the front lines in the east without ammo and with russian artillery shells all around you.

When a country is invaded like we seeing with Putins War their is lots of jobs you can be recruited to do that include patrol and information gathering, engineering, repurposing of vehicles, catering, hospital work, salvaging of destroyed cities. I have seen  lots of this on CNN where they interview both men and women who are actively involved in the war effort but they not frontline soldiers and they all volunteers. They dont need to be conscripted and very few of them had any military experience 

I would expect this when your entire country faces an existential threat. How many Ukrainians have been sent to fight the Russians without ammunition, can you provide links because I am not aware of it ?

[Mamoulian War]

• what language do you speak with each other, I assume English? - (Slovak, Ukrainian, Russian, English - Ukrainian is in some way close to Slovak, but she is from Russian speaking family, and me and my wife learned Russian language at secondary school. I use mostly English, my wife mostly Russian)
• did the student have family who stayed in Ukraine or were her family also refugees - (they family stayed almost two month at home in Dobropillia in Donbas, after Russian Army moved away from Kyiv and started Donbas offensive, they moved to Krivyi Rih. Her brother is "available" for mobilization in Kyiv. So in the end, they are refugees, but they are still in Ukraine)
• who paid for the food and other costs and if you paid was it expensive - (We have 7 EUR a day reimbursement for 1 person from government, but the girl started to work 1 about 2 weeks after she moved to us, so we were sharing most of the costs, but more of the costs were of course on the side of me and my wife. I would not say that it was expensive, but I think some Slovakians with worse income than our family might consider it expensive)
• what did she use to do during the day, did she have friends and or other Ukrainians that she associated with - (First two weeks she tried to explore the city, then she started to work, and two weeks, before her leave, we bough her cheap guitar, so she spent a lot of time learning the instrument )
• And then did your family get on with her? I know it sounds weird but what was it like, did she use to talk about the war? - (We tried to not talk with her at all about the war. Only very very occasionally when we were all outside and talking about all the stuff. My wife had pretty good relationship with her, but she did not talked much to me. She said that she does not understand my English, but you never know )

[Mamoulian War]

2 hours ago, BruceVC said:

When a country is invaded like we seeing with Putins War their is lots of jobs you can be recruited to do that include patrol and information gathering, engineering, repurposing of vehicles, catering, hospital work, salvaging of destroyed cities. I have seen  lots of this on CNN where they interview both men and women who are actively involved in the war effort but they not frontline soldiers and they all volunteers. They dont need to be conscripted and very few of them had any military experience 

I would expect this when your entire country faces an existential threat. How many Ukrainians have been sent to fight the Russians without ammunition, can you provide links because I am not aware of it ?

As I said some weeks ago, the logistics is currently less in favour for Ukrainians like around Kyiv, so at some point it possible, that the UA soldiers can be some time without enough weapons/ammunition to fight. But I presume, it is not as catastrophic as Russian propaganda is trying to depict it.

[Mamoulian War]

Also, while Russians are pushing with all of their available force to gain political goals of seizing Luhansk Oblast, while loosing hundreds of soldiers weekly, Ukraine continues to push to achieve tactical goal of liberating west bank of Dnipro in Kherson Oblast.

 

"In the Kherson region from the direction of Dnipropetrovsk region, the Armed Forces have already liberated more than 20 settlements - the head of the Kherson Regional State Administration Gennady Laguta"

 

https://t.me/ukrinform_news/72339

Edited June 1, 2022 by Mamoulian War

[Malcador]

Ukraine taking 60-100 dead and 500 wounded per day, as per Zelenskyy on Newsmax. 

https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/interpol-warns-of-flood-of-illicit-arms-after-ukraine-war

Not all together unexpected, hopefully no MANPADs though.

 

Edited June 1, 2022 by Malcador

[BruceVC]

55 minutes ago, Mamoulian War said:

• what language do you speak with each other, I assume English? - (Slovak, Ukrainian, Russian, English - Ukrainian is in some way close to Slovak, but she is from Russian speaking family, and me and my wife learned Russian language at secondary school. I use mostly English, my wife mostly Russian)
• did the student have family who stayed in Ukraine or were her family also refugees - (they family stayed almost two month at home in Dobropillia in Donbas, after Russian Army moved away from Kyiv and started Donbas offensive, they moved to Krivyi Rih. Her brother is "available" for mobilization in Kyiv. So in the end, they are refugees, but they are still in Ukraine)
• who paid for the food and other costs and if you paid was it expensive - (We have 7 EUR a day reimbursement for 1 person from government, but the girl started to work 1 about 2 weeks after she moved to us, so we were sharing most of the costs, but more of the costs were of course on the side of me and my wife. I would not say that it was expensive, but I think some Slovakians with worse income than our family might consider it expensive)
• what did she use to do during the day, did she have friends and or other Ukrainians that she associated with - (First two weeks she tried to explore the city, then she started to work, and two weeks, before her leave, we bough her cheap guitar, so she spent a lot of time learning the instrument )
• And then did your family get on with her? I know it sounds weird but what was it like, did she use to talk about the war? - (We tried to not talk with her at all about the war. Only very very occasionally when we were all outside and talking about all the stuff. My wife had pretty good relationship with her, but she did not talked much to me. She said that she does not understand my English, but you never know )

Thanks for the detail, I appreciate it and you have answered my questions nicely 

You guys are doing a good thing helping out like this 

[xzar_monty]

15 hours ago, Lexx said:

I really hate that men can't leave Ukraine. The women are already returning, but there's still lots of dudes who'd like to flee the country, because they don't want to be drafted into the military. I know of at least one person who has to visit the draft office every few weeks to tell them that he is still there and "available". If he tries to leave the country "illegally", he faces prison or forced draft.

Kinda sexist, tbh.

Sexism, as a question, ranks way way way down in order of importance in a situation like this. It's irrelevant. I suppose you were being facetious.

[Mamoulian War]

Finally the best youtube channel, I follow, which covers the war for Ukraine, started to cover it in English. It is the channel of Austrian Army, so it is very professional, and neutral channel, which covers successes and failures of both sides equally. A lot of the info I have shared in the past, was based on their assessments.

If you know German language, and want to have more detailed and unbiased look on what is going on, I really recommend to watch some of the past videos, as well.

And another looks at why Russian Army under-performs so much, by another guy, which I find has very good research behind his videos. Beware, it is 1 hour long video

 

Edited June 2, 2022 by Mamoulian War

[Mamoulian War]

12 hours ago, BruceVC said:

Thanks for the detail, I appreciate it and you have answered my questions nicely 

You guys are doing a good thing helping out like this 

Also I forgot to answer one part of the question, she had here for some time some a friend from University, and other girl from the same University. But they moved few weeks ago to UK, because they both were directly for Mariupol, the second girl's father was even killed by Russians, despite they being at some point during this conflict in Crimea , so there was nothing left to return to for them back in Ukraine. Our "kid" wanted to go at first to UK with her as well, but her desire to finish her education won in the end. She sometimes met some other UA "kids" around the city, but she spent most of her time alone, as she was pretty big kind of introvert.

[BruceVC]

12 minutes ago, Mamoulian War said:

Also I forgot to answer one part of the question, she had here for some time some a friend from University, and other girl from the same University. But they moved few weeks ago to UK, because they both were directly for Mariupol, the second girl's father was even killed by Russians, despite they being at some point during this conflict in Crimea , so there was nothing left to return to for them back in Ukraine. Our "kid" wanted to go at first to UK with her as well, but her desire to finish her education won in the end. She sometimes met some other UA "kids" around the city, but she spent most of her time alone, as she was pretty big kind of introvert.

Thats good to know, now that she has gone back to Ukraine where in Ukraine is she  going back to and will she be finishing her education in Ukraine? What is she studying ?

[Lexx]

3 hours ago, xzar_monty said:

Sexism, as a question, ranks way way way down in order of importance in a situation like this. It's irrelevant. I suppose you were being facetious.

It was a joke, yes. Still -- Not everyone wants to die for their country for whatever reasons. (I wouldn't want to die for Germany either)

[BruceVC]

1 hour ago, Lexx said:

It was a joke, yes. Still -- Not everyone wants to die for their country for whatever reasons. (I wouldn't want to die for Germany either)

And if Germany was invaded unprovoked and German cities were being destroyed and thousands of Germans citizens were being killed what would you do?

[xzar_monty]

2 hours ago, Lexx said:

It was a joke, yes. Still -- Not everyone wants to die for their country for whatever reasons. (I wouldn't want to die for Germany either)

It is true that not everyone wants to die for their country.

However, I'd very strongly suggest that you don't feel certain about your stance until push really comes to shove. It is a well-established psychological fact that until something of this caliber really happens and you really have to make a choice, you cannot really know what your choice will be. Perhaps, when really pressed, you will find that you care more about your loved ones than you care about other things, so perhaps Germany won't even be an issue, maybe the issue is your family. Or your sense of personal dignity and the will not to be a coward after all. It cannot be known. (Although training may help! And this is why military training contains so much repetition; in times of extreme stress, people often revert to what they've learned by rote, because they cannot really think.)

Jerry Lewis addressed this problem really well  in an interview with **** Cavett. The link starts from the right place, and the answer only takes like 45 seconds or so.

 

[BruceVC]

14 minutes ago, xzar_monty said:

It is true that not everyone wants to die for their country.

However, I'd very strongly suggest that you don't feel certain about your stance until push really comes to shove. It is a well-established psychological fact that until something of this caliber really happens and you really have to make a choice, you cannot really know what your choice will be. Perhaps, when really pressed, you will find that you care more about your loved ones than you care about other things, so perhaps Germany won't even be an issue, maybe the issue is your family. Or your sense of personal dignity and the will not to be a coward after all. It cannot be known. (Although training may help! And this is why military training contains so much repetition; in times of extreme stress, people often revert to what they've learned by rote, because they cannot really think.)

Jerry Lewis addressed this problem really well  in an interview with **** Cavett. The link starts from the right place, and the answer only takes like 45 seconds or so.

 

Just to clarify something, no one is suggesting we must want to die for our country. Very few people really want to die for any reason

I am asking what would you do if your country was invaded like the Ukrainians are experiencing and this debate started around conscription. Conscription under these circumstances I support because Ukraine literally faces an existential threat. I dont automatically support conscription  because sometimes its unhelpful if you consider Vietnam. So it all depends on the country and the conflict or the history of conflict. For example @Elerond do you support Finnish military service ?

But conscription for Ukrainians  doesn't mean you want to die, it means you stand by your country in these terrible times 

[xzar_monty]

39 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

I am asking what would you do if your country was invaded like the Ukrainians are experiencing and this debate started around conscription.

If you're asking me, then you'll know from my previous comment that my answer is, "I don't know". That's the only honest answer I can give.

Look at Finland and Sweden. They've just ended their neutrality. It wasn't something they were going to do, in fact it was something they almost certainly wanted to avoid. But then push came to shove and they recognized that with such a monster right next to them, pacifism is a pipe dream and neutrality is not a realistic option if you want to, for example, remain alive. So let's effing change our policy right now. That's a good example of two collectives suddenly realizing something new about their priorities.

[Elerond]

1 hour ago, BruceVC said:

For example @Elerond do you support Finnish military service ?

Military service here is constitutional duty. To ensure that there are enough people who know how to use arms and military warfare in case of war.

It is most cost effective way to ensure that Finland can defend itself. 

Military service ensures that in case of crisis there will be much less people drafted to battlefronts who don't have any clue how to use arms given them and how to protect themselves from enemy fire. Because of Finland's size and geopolitical location there really isn't choice for people not to participate if Finland gets invaded by foreign forces.

[BruceVC]

15 minutes ago, Elerond said:

Military service here is constitutional duty. To ensure that there are enough people who know how to use arms and military warfare in case of war.

It is most cost effective way to ensure that Finland can defend itself. 

Military service ensures that in case of crisis there will be much less people drafted to battlefronts who don't have any clue how to use arms given them and how to protect themselves from enemy fire. Because of Finland's size and geopolitical location there really isn't choice for people not to participate if Finland gets invaded by foreign forces.

I agree with everything you mention here, great post and very informative

But do you personally agree with it, I dont mean it from a Constitution perspective because sometimes we all obey the law and Constitution  but that doesnt mean we necessarily agree with it. So do you  personally support  Conscription in Finland?

 

[Malcador]

2 hours ago, BruceVC said:

But conscription for Ukrainians  doesn't mean you want to die, it means you stand by your country in these terrible times 

Well, made to stand by your country, yes.

[Gorth]

Nationalism brought us WWI... nationalism brought us WWII... nationalism brought us the Russian invasion of Ukraine... nationalism is overrated. Why was it again you wanted to take up arms and kill your neighbor because some politician said so?

 

[BruceVC]

14 minutes ago, Malcador said:

Well, made to stand by your country, yes.

Well sometimes in life we are all faced with the acceptance  of our realities that can be profoundly influenced by others ..and  this can sometimes be a negative thing like Putins War for the sovereign country of Ukraine 

Now because this is an existential threat to  the entire country, culture and freedom of Ukraine it is expected if you are a citizen to stand by your country where reasonable. Dont think of it as conscription, think of it like duty and possible sacrifice in support of your way of life ?

[Elerond]

46 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

I agree with everything you mention here, great post and very informative

But do you personally agree with it, I dont mean it from a Constitution perspective because sometimes we all obey the law and Constitution  but that doesnt mean we necessarily agree with it. So do you  personally support  Conscription in Finland?

 

It is best option available

In general I don't have big feelings toward one direction or another, but as long as we see that Finland needs to be defended it is best and realistically only option. As in order to defend country size of Finland we need closer to million soldiers in order to have enough to protect whole country, which would mean in country of 5.5 million people so big professional army that there is no realistic way to maintain it. Which means that we can either prepare our people for case of war so that they have higher change to survive one or just reactively drafting people in army when enemy is attacking in hopes that they do something useful before they die. Of course there is option just give enemy all the land they want and hope that they don't kill all the people.

So question is not do I support conscription in Finland, but do I support Finland's independence and way of life, because if there is realistically only one option to do so then it is meaningless if that option fits or fits not in my personal ideology, as I am not able to offer alternatives. 

[majestic]

6 hours ago, Mamoulian War said:

If you know German language, and want to have more detailed and unbiased look on what is going on, I really recommend to watch some of the past videos, as well.

Some (all?) of them have English subtitles.

[xzar_monty]

1 hour ago, Gorth said:

Nationalism brought us WWI... nationalism brought us WWII... nationalism brought us the Russian invasion of Ukraine... nationalism is overrated. Why was it again you wanted to take up arms and kill your neighbor because some politician said so?

 

This is, in theory, a valid criticism. But the problem is that it only takes one nation to turn nationalism into an insurmountable problem. And not everybody is going to leave nationalism behind, it just won't happen. In a similar way, it only takes one party to ruin all attempts at diplomacy. (The war in Ukraine isn't a diplomatic failing. Russia didn't give a damn about any of the things it had agreed to. It just broke everything.)

I, for one, used to be a pacifist, and I have a history of being a conscientious objector, for precisely the reasons you describe. But this kind of thinking, which I also subscribed to, contains a fatal flaw. If it is not you but your neighbor that takes up arms and comes to kill you, what are you going to do then? Your pacifism and your lofty philosophy is only going to get you killed.

I see that you are in Australia. It was already some time ago that I thought Australia and New Zealand are the most ideal places to leave nationalism behind. Such great places for all-consuming philosophy of peace! Trying it in Poland, for example, is somewhat different, I would say.

Edited June 2, 2022 by xzar_monty

[rjshae]

56 minutes ago, Gorth said:

Nationalism brought us WWI... nationalism brought us WWII... nationalism brought us the Russian invasion of Ukraine... nationalism is overrated. Why was it again you wanted to take up arms and kill your neighbor because some politician said so?

I think it would be more accurate to say that an absence (or failure) of true democracy is what brought us those wars. The nationalism urge was something exploited by the alpha males who wanted to conquer their neighbors. But nationalism also allowed those democracies to defend themselves.