Ukraine Conflict - "The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them."

[kanisatha]

15 hours ago, Mamoulian War said:

Looks like Israel has enough of Lavrov being lovey-dovey with HAMAS leaders

 

Yeah it was utterly surreal listening to Russia's ambassador at the Security Council a few days ago debating the resolution the US vetoed. With a straight face he went on and on about how it is so very important to ensure that civilians are not harmed in Gaza and how "everything" must be done to protect them. And then Lavrov repeated those same talking points.

My real frustration, though, is that neither the press nor Western government leaders are jumping on this and publicly calling out the Russians for their rank hypocricy. Western governments are so atrocious with handling global PR.

[Malcador]

The permanent members are all hypocrites, though, so guess no point in doing that.

[HoonDing]

Time to merge this thread with the Gaza thread

[BruceVC]

3 hours ago, kanisatha said:

Yeah it was utterly surreal listening to Russia's ambassador at the Security Council a few days ago debating the resolution the US vetoed. With a straight face he went on and on about how it is so very important to ensure that civilians are not harmed in Gaza and how "everything" must be done to protect them. And then Lavrov repeated those same talking points.

My real frustration, though, is that neither the press nor Western government leaders are jumping on this and publicly calling out the Russians for their rank hypocricy. Western governments are so atrocious with handling global PR.

I agree, the utter and consistent hypocrisy of Russia pretending to care about "civilians "  goes to new levels of cringe 

[Zoraptor]

There's a very good reason the western governments have shut their pie holes. The deliberate, callous and vicious targeting of civilians from Russia has managed to kill about ~9700 people over ~82 weeks. The surgical, proportion, necessary and humanitarian Israeli bombing has killed 3700 people (with 1000 still buried) in 2. Plus the Israelis are committing absolutely blatant war crimes like cutting off water to civilians. There's no way not to look like a hypocrite when the bombing campaign you've excoriated is killing people at 1/12 the rate as the one you're supporting. And unlike Yemen, it's being done under the eyes of the media.

Worse, anything they say makes Russia look good, by comparison, because now everyone has a direct comparison to what the deliberate targeting of civilians actually looks like, and what the forced transfer of civilians actually looks like, and what collective punishment and cutting off the essentials of life actually looks like, and what systematic targeting of protected entities actually looks like. What are they going to say, What About Mariupol? (1) Holiday resort compared to Gaza, and not even the unrealistic cheerleader for western exceptionalism thinks that Israel will be rebuilding Gaza and (2) WhAtAbOuTiSm. They've got no way to attack Russia over this that isn't a bigger L for them.

(Casualty figures are from OHCHR)

Edited October 20, 2023 by Zoraptor

[BruceVC]

10 hours ago, Zoraptor said:

There's a very good reason the western governments have shut their pie holes. The deliberate, callous and vicious targeting of civilians from Russia has managed to kill about ~9700 people over ~82 weeks. The surgical, proportion, necessary and humanitarian Israeli bombing has killed 3700 people (with 1000 still buried) in 2. Plus the Israelis are committing absolutely blatant war crimes like cutting off water to civilians. There's no way not to look like a hypocrite when the bombing campaign you've excoriated is killing people at 1/12 the rate as the one you're supporting. And unlike Yemen, it's being done under the eyes of the media.

Worse, anything they say makes Russia look good, by comparison, because now everyone has a direct comparison to what the deliberate targeting of civilians actually looks like, and what the forced transfer of civilians actually looks like, and what collective punishment and cutting off the essentials of life actually looks like, and what systematic targeting of protected entities actually looks like. What are they going to say, What About Mariupol? (1) Holiday resort compared to Gaza, and not even the unrealistic cheerleader for western exceptionalism thinks that Israel will be rebuilding Gaza and (2) WhAtAbOuTiSm. They've got no way to attack Russia over this that isn't a bigger L for them.

(Casualty figures are from OHCHR)

I dont understand your point? How would Russia ever look good because of the Israel vs Palestinian conflict 

Russia has committed dozens of war crimes in Ukraine and fights a war of brutality in Ukraine. Israel has done the same like Hamas

But how does this make Russia look good for what they are doing  in Ukraine, its 2 separate conflicts? Im clearly misunderstanding what point you trying to make so some clarification would be appreciated 

[Mamoulian War]

Russia made another record yesterday. At Avdiivka Again, this is the only media, which I have found and could be posted here…

 

[Malcador]

https://www.ft.com/content/d6145249-6589-45dd-bf8f-7ba7f3cb664b

Other than not trending on social media (it's rather funny seeing every pro-UA twitterati being huge IDF fans now), think these concerns are a little overblown

 

[pmp10]

2 hours ago, Malcador said:

https://www.ft.com/content/d6145249-6589-45dd-bf8f-7ba7f3cb664b

Other than not trending on social media (it's rather funny seeing every pro-UA twitterati being huge IDF fans now), think these concerns are a little overblown

US has already diverted to Israel thousands of 155mm shells initially meant for Ukraine.
Any long war with western involvement will be competing for already scant resources. 

[Mamoulian War]

 More details from continuous Avdiyivka human wave attack

UA source:

RU source:

 

[xzar_monty]

On 10/21/2023 at 8:50 AM, BruceVC said:

I dont understand your point? How would Russia ever look good because of the Israel vs Palestinian conflict

Zoraptor wrote that Russia looks good by comparison, which it does, because Israel is far more deadly when it comes to targetting civilians. Just look at the numbers he provided.

I once did a fair amount of work related to Mossad, and it was both extremely interesting and quite shocking to learn what a bad partner Israel can be. They are extraordinarily greedy when it comes to collecting intelligence from their allies, but they absolutely do not hesitate to be stingy and deceptive when it comes to sharing their own, even with the US. This has been well documented and demonstrated. I don't know whether the well-justified ire of the US actually led to any changes in the way Israel behaves, but I doubt it.

My pet peeve with the Israeli government, by the way, is their attachment to the anti-semitism rhetoric: any and all criticism is almost instantly labelled anti-semitic. This would seem to imply that according to the Israeli government, it is incapable of making mistakes or being wrong, which doesn't seem very likely to me, in reality.

[Malcador]

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/finland-retrieves-anchor-seabed-near-broken-gas-pipeline-2023-10-24/

Finnish article - https://yle.fi/a/74-20054483

I guess if you're going to damage a cable intentionally, that might be one way to try it on the sly.

[HoonDing]

Why are we talking about Avdiivka now

What happen to counter offensive

[Keyrock]

2 hours ago, HoonDing said:

What happen to counter offensive

Nothing. The counter offensive achieved nothing.

Edited October 24, 2023 by Keyrock

[Malcador]

3 hours ago, HoonDing said:

Why are we talking about Avdiivka now

What happen to counter offensive

It was just a feint.

[Mamoulian War]

1 hour ago, Keyrock said:

Nothing. The counter offensive achieved nothing.

Yes, the Ukrainians should also do what Russia and throw thousands over thousands of soldiers, run them over with their own BMPs while dropping them of, and hope that at least one percent of the soldiers would not get cluster****ed so they could put thier flag in the middle of a destroyed wasteland. That’s how proper offensive looks like, right? 

[Keyrock]

10 minutes ago, Mamoulian War said:

throw thousands over thousands of soldiers -snip- That’s how proper offensive looks like, right? 

It's not fun to think about, but yes, that's what it would take to achieve the objective of the counter offensive (break through the Russian defensive line and sever the land bridge to Crimea). This isn't like the highly successful 2022 Kharkiv counter offensive which worked because they caught the Russians unprepared. If this counter offensive were to succeed it would take thousands... Tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands (more) of dead Ukrainians to achieve it. The Russians are very heavily fortified. Without significant air superiority, breaking through the defensive line in any meaningful way will require MASSIVE casualties. It's a horrible situation but that's the reality of it.

[Zoraptor]

Sounds pretty much exactly like the 'counter' offensive. Right down to the 'pointless' flag planting. Attacking prepared positions is hard for both sides, more news at ten.

[Gorth]

The only army who ever won a war of attrition against Russia was Russia... when the Red Army defeated the White Army (iirc that is)

[xzar_monty]

8 hours ago, Gorth said:

The only army who ever won a war of attrition against Russia was Russia... when the Red Army defeated the White Army (iirc that is)

Given the numerical discrepancy in personnel, the counter-attack was always a bit of a stretch, and unfortunately, as you say, Russia can keep the current war going a lot longer than Ukraine. I don't know the extent to which it's an accepted wisdom, but I've read several military personnel comment that an attack generally needs approximately three times the amount of personnel the enemy has, and obviously Ukraine never had that, not even close.

It seems very, very unlikely that Ukraine could fall or fail catastrophically[*] anymore (in the war, that is), but it also seems very, very hard to see a good way out of this.

 

[*] Meaning, essentially, in the way that Russia envisioned on day 1.

 

EDIT: I've been working on material concerning this war for months now. It is really something to see how blatant Russia's plans were, and had been for years. Years ago, the bottom line was, "If we can ensure that our men rule Ukraine from their government, there will be no need for us to tear Ukraine apart." Ukraine's recent political development led to the invasion, because Ukraine was not willing to be as subservient as Russia demanded. So Russia has always, or at least for a long time, regarded Ukraine as its legitimate prey / vassal / subordinate / take your pick.

Edited October 25, 2023 by xzar_monty

[pmp10]

15 hours ago, Keyrock said:

Nothing. The counter offensive achieved nothing.

Nothing Ukraine would want perhaps.
With failure of the offensive we now know there will be no forcing of negotiations by threatening Crimea.

[Elerond]

13 hours ago, Gorth said:

The only army who ever won a war of attrition against Russia was Russia... when the Red Army defeated the White Army (iirc that is)

Afghanistan(Mujahideen) won against Soviet Union. After nine years of waring Soviet Union collapsed and war evolved as Afghan civil war, which lead to taliban taking over the country.

[uuuhhii]

golden horde subjugated moscow

then moscow eventually become more successful golden horde

[Mamoulian War]

11 hours ago, xzar_monty said:

Given the numerical discrepancy in personnel, the counter-attack was always a bit of a stretch, and unfortunately, as you say, Russia can keep the current war going a lot longer than Ukraine. I don't know the extent to which it's an accepted wisdom, but I've read several military personnel comment that an attack generally needs approximately three times the amount of personnel the enemy has, and obviously Ukraine never had that, not even close.

Well. I would agree about this assessment of yours, if Russia had unlimited personel. Which is not true. Currently Ukraine has more troops than Russia can possibly raise, as Putin is affraid to call for total mobilization, as it would made much bigger stain on his “election” as few hundred thousand corpses from Russian colonial provinces no one gives a crap about at home The other reason why I cannot fully agree with your assessment is that Russia helps tremendously to Ukrainians with their “brilliant” tactics, all we need to do is look at all the Russian “glorious offensives at Kyiv, Bilohorovka, Vuhledar and currently at Avdiyivka (etc.). All Ukraine needs to do, is to set their artillery at fixed points and load it as fast as possible as Russia is sending one meat battalion after another. And now Ukraine has cluster bombs which makes their job even easier.  

 

As Elerond said, Afghanistan won the war of attrition against Soviet Union, which ended up in collapse of Soviet Union, and Ukraine is playing out for them even worse in that regard. War of attrition is not won i. Two years though… So unfortunatelly for Ukraine, this will be very painful for them as well, but… I recommned you these videos as well for your research on the matter, which analyzes the attrtional warfare:

 

 

[xzar_monty]

16 hours ago, Elerond said:

Afghanistan(Mujahideen) won against Soviet Union.

Fascinating statistic, by the way: Russia lost more troops in Ukraine in the first two weeks than it lost in the whole of the war in Afghanistan. The numbers are, among other sources, from a Kremlin-backed newspaper that quickly removed them, of course. I suppose someone lost more than their job, too.