Ukraine Conflict - "There is no instance of a nation benefitting from prolonged warfare"

[Malcador]

49 minutes ago, Gorth said:

Serbia and Russia have old ties, that has little or nothing to do with "Admiration". They are both ethnic Slavs (even if not the same "brand" of Slavs), same religion (Orthodox), lots of cultural similarities and when **** hit the fan in WWI, Russia was the first one standing up for Serbia against Germany and the Habsburg Empire. Sort of a big brother/little brother kind of relationship. If you feel kinship with someone, you ask less critical questions.

Edit: Serbia and Russia special relationship has its own Wiki page, showing the shared history of the last few centuries (back to 1547)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia–Serbia_relations#18th_century

 

Nah, I think Serbs, like all Bad Slavs are genetically predisposed for totalitarianism.

[xzar_monty]

2 hours ago, Gorth said:

Serbia and Russia have old ties, that has little or nothing to do with "Admiration".

Yeah, and this stuff runs deep. There was an interesting period before WWI when Russia was sort of vacillating between supporting Bulgaria or Serbia, and it might conceivably gone either way. That would probably have changed the relationship a lot. But it did go Serbia's way (and of course this had a lot to do with politics of all three countires, so it was complicated).

[bugarup]

'sides, Serbia to former Yugoslavia seems to be a lite menthol version of what Russia is to former Sovietistan conquests, Ukraine excluded as by now. 

I hope our resident Serb isn't too annoyed by all the Serbsplaining.  

[BruceVC]

3 hours ago, Gorth said:

Serbia and Russia have old ties, that has little or nothing to do with "Admiration". They are both ethnic Slavs (even if not the same "brand" of Slavs), same religion (Orthodox), lots of cultural similarities and when **** hit the fan in WWI, Russia was the first one standing up for Serbia against Germany and the Habsburg Empire. Sort of a big brother/little brother kind of relationship. If you feel kinship with someone, you ask less critical questions.

Edit: Serbia and Russia special relationship has its own Wiki page, showing the shared history of the last few centuries (back to 1547)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia–Serbia_relations#18th_century

 

I have heard that before but I find it hard to take seriously after the Ukrainian invasion and Putins comments like "Ukraine has no identity and is irreverent"  because they decided to not be part of Putins recreation of the old Soviet borders. The whole " Slavic brothers " is about political servitude and how you must accept a Russian view of who you align with 

If most Serbs really still believed that then they have a very different definition of what a brother is for me 

[Sarex]

5 hours ago, Malcador said:

Nah, I think Serbs, like all Bad Slavs are genetically predisposed for totalitarianism.

I would say that we a nasty streak where we don't want to be anyone's vassal, ie. bend the knee and kiss the ring. Sadly that usually leads to leaders who hold all the power, but we also saw that the "democratic" alternative didn't turn out any better for us.

[xzar_monty]

21 minutes ago, Sarex said:

but we also saw that the "democratic" alternative didn't turn out any better for us.

Why was that?

Btw, Oded Galor, in his book The Journey of Humanity, presents many good reasons why "just switching to democracy" often doesn't work -- and why "the west" has been quite naive in this regard. There are so many variables to the issue, so many historical, geographic and other factors to consider. The book is recommended reading.

[Sarex]

2 hours ago, xzar_monty said:

Why was that?

They sold everything that was of worth in the country, destroyed our banking system to appease the eu and destroyed our military. Either way they weren't truly democratic either, because they needed to cheat on the election to beat Milosevic and even before that they relied on western funding and support to even get those elections.

[ShadySands]

Whatever it is, it produces some of the finest basketball players in the world

[pmp10]

G7 plans to cap Russian oil prices.

I wonder how do they hope to enforce it.
They can't even get a condemnation for the war from major prospective customers like India.

[HoonDing]

Isn't Japan, who just signed into Sakhalin II, in the G7

[Malcador]

52 minutes ago, pmp10 said:

G7 plans to cap Russian oil prices.

I wonder how do they hope to enforce it.
They can't even get a condemnation for the war from major prospective customers like India.

Guess they'll have to find some way to threaten or bribe India. 

Edited September 2, 2022 by Malcador

[Sarex]

29 minutes ago, Malcador said:

Guess they'll have to find some way to threaten or bribe India. 

Good luck with that. Maybe offer more support against China, but I doubt they are stupid enough to not know who would be next on the chopping block right after it.

[Malcador]

Will be interesting to see how it works out, anyway. And how broad the "coalition" they are referring to actually is.

[pmp10]

To the surprise of few the Nord Stream 1 emergency maintenance won't be completed to schedule.
No restart date is available ATM.

Energy war is kicking into high gear. 

[Lexx]

Shortly before winter ofc. They are trying maximum pain. It's not like they have much to lose now anyways I guess. I'm more interested in what our government is going to do now. They need to react fast, but will they? Probably not ... the industry is making fat bank right now.

[Mamoulian War]

Russia threatens to completely stop oil export to G7 if it is price capped.

Meanwhile, Ayatollah would now wish that the alcohol would not be prohibited, as he would now be popping champagne bottles all over Iran. Looks like the possibility of Iran Russia cooperation lived shorter than the average Russian conscript in Donbas
 

https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/476308/Iran-s-oil-production-capacity-to-increase-by-200-000-bpd-by

Edited September 2, 2022 by Mamoulian War

[Chilloutman]

too bad we don't have problem with oil but with gas

[Mamoulian War]

AFAIK Iran has also a lot of gas, so I do expect them to use that as a leverage for better nuclear deal. We’ll see how this one will tip the balance…

Also Slovakia opend last week gas transport interconnection between SK and PL. This one should be helpfull for CZ as well.

Edited September 2, 2022 by Mamoulian War

[ComradeYellow]

Russian equipment is proving to be pretty low tech and hasn't really improved much since the Soviet Era (Let's be honest here, USSR collapse was the worst thing that happened to them), but their 'Deep Operations' tactics are slowly but surely working.  The question is how long can they keep it up?

"Deep Operations" was developed in the pre-War USSR (Stalin purged the original architect but eventually allowed his generals to implement it with astonishing success against German Blitzkrieg) that calls for a wide front and using combined arms tactics with constant artillery fire all along the front in an effort to entice the enemy to attack and then "mop them up" with reserves when they inevitably take the bait and launch an offensive.

The Ukrainians are making the same mistakes the Germans did near the end of WW2 and launching petty "counter offenses" as the Russian MoD explains here.

The enemy suffered losses and was pushed back from Olginka, Thorn Ponds and Arkhangelsk. A battalion of the 57th Motorized Infantry Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine was defeated near the settlement of Sukhoi Stavki. Currently, the destruction of its remains is being completed. To unblock the AFU units, 12 tanks supplied to the Kiev regime by Poland were transported across the Ingulets River. Some of the tanks were destroyed by the powerful fire action of the Russian troops. Several tanks were blown up in their minefield during a disorderly withdrawal. Only five Ukrainian tanks were able to break back, deep into the territory controlled by the AFU. During two days of unsuccessful attacks on Mykolaiv-Krivoy Rog and other directions, Ukrainian troops lost four combat aircraft: two Su-25, one Su-24 and one MiG-29. Three Ukrainian Mi-8 helicopters were shot down in the air. Russian troops also destroyed 63 Ukrainian tanks, 59 infantry fighting vehicles, 48 other armored combat vehicles, 14 pickups with heavy machine guns and more than 1,700 Ukrainian servicemen.

Sure, this whole thing seems like an IRL scenario of Hearts of Iron and other WW2 larping on a small scale with both sides using outdated tactics but it looks the Russians will inevitably gain the upper hand here as they now have first hand experience against modern NATO equipment and implement countering these in their doctrine.  China's MoD is also watching closely here.  The West gains nothing because Russia is not doing or using anything new or innovative in their tactics to learn from.

[Mamoulian War]

On 9/1/2022 at 8:06 AM, Mamoulian War said:

Another look into Russian army

 

Second part of the insight has been released today.

 

[Mamoulian War]

19 hours ago, ComradeYellow said:

Russian equipment is proving to be pretty low tech and hasn't really improved much since the Soviet Era (Let's be honest here, USSR collapse was the worst thing that happened to them), but their 'Deep Operations' tactics are slowly but surely working.  The question is how long can they keep it up?

"Deep Operations" was developed in the pre-War USSR (Stalin purged the original architect but eventually allowed his generals to implement it with astonishing success against German Blitzkrieg) that calls for a wide front and using combined arms tactics with constant artillery fire all along the front in an effort to entice the enemy to attack and then "mop them up" with reserves when they inevitably take the bait and launch an offensive.

The Ukrainians are making the same mistakes the Germans did near the end of WW2 and launching petty "counter offenses" as the Russian MoD explains here.

 

 

Sure, this whole thing seems like an IRL scenario of Hearts of Iron and other WW2 larping on a small scale with both sides using outdated tactics but it looks the Russians will inevitably gain the upper hand here as they now have first hand experience against modern NATO equipment and implement countering these in their doctrine.  China's MoD is also watching closely here.  The West gains nothing because Russia is not doing or using anything new or innovative in their tactics to learn from.

Sure sure. It took 4 months to get Luhansk and 7 month to get Pisky, one of the suburbs of Donetsk City, but UA offensive is 100% and definitelly finished off 2 days after it began. Yeah yeah, seems like another wishful thinking and wet dreams for all the vatniks and generals to afraid to tell the truth to Volodya

Edited September 3, 2022 by Mamoulian War

[Mamoulian War]

Little bit of analysis of the few last days of the UA counteroffensive, which speaks about a lot of contrdictions presented by RU MoD, and the possible outcomes. Of course Nothing is 100% sure, until the UA cancels the blackout.

 

[Mamoulian War]

Redeeming article on the German military help to Ukraine (including the full list). The people at Oryx, who run the site for confirmed losses on both sides, are estimating it as the third biggest material help, right after the US and the UK.

https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/09/fact-sheet-on-german-military-aid-to.html

Edited September 4, 2022 by Mamoulian War

[Malcador]

Not sure they need much redemption in the first place.

[pmp10]

Predictably energy prices protests are starting in Europe with the Czech one being surprisingly big.
I guess local politics also played a part.
I doubt Czechs have any extra Russian sympathy not found in Hungary.

 

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

Not sure they need much redemption in the first place.

By which you mean that there is nothing left to redeem?
It's pretty clear for some time that this German government will stall and sabotage weapon transfers as far as it's practical to do so.