So, what's your plan. Do you think you'll still get paid once Putin is deposed?
Couple of known posters working hard to validate Russian attacks on civilians. Have watched a lot of nasty footage in the past days, have no time for that kind of behavior
Pure war crime - no ambiguity - appalling
Tbf the US have been meddling with the governments of probably half the countries in central and southern America for the last 50 years. They've never fully invaded but a lot of those governments have been the CIAs playground. Us War on Drugs has been a pretty good way to feck Mexico in the last 30/40 years too.
omg - i can never forget that footage of the elderly couple in a car. Utter disgrace and war crime
Germans investigating war crimes
Defeat for Russia is a failure to achieve thier goals. All of the options above are defeats for Russia except for the one you see as the most attractive
Russian armor is moving into civilian areas. As we've seen they have zero problem targeting and killing civilians, nuclear reactors, humanitarian columns.
How many Anti Armour rounds have the Ukrainians got versus how much armour have the Russkies got?
Now wonder they're mostly just bombarding from a distance
The obtuse was in reference to apparently not understanding the persons questions about "refugees" to Europe being, in the majority, male.
Where refugees are actually fleeing somewhere, the ratio would be expected to be 50:50. If, somewhere along the route, the women are taking a pitstop, then people might ask for more information on the actual reality of the situation. That would be natural thing to do.
Doh! Welcome to day one!
Disgusting flippant comment to make!
The Russians are the attacking force here, Ukraine is just trying to defend their country.
This car was just driving along the road posing no threat.
The Russian still opened fire from the safety of their tanks.. cowardly scum!
And the same cranks taking up the contrarian/conspiracy theorist position every time because they are special.
We've all seen the drive by molotoving by civilians in a normal car, I doubt it was plastered with markings clearly identifying it.
Same for the APC getting hit with the RPG while telling a crowd of civilians to disperse.
Anyone getting near the Russians is either a direct threat or a distraction for one.
Ok, so I'm not sure what point you are disputing or where you think I am being obtuse.
Sadly every thread descends into madness.
But what annoys me most is people try to come off as experts. Remember the Japanese earthquakes a decade ago? So many coming off as nuclear scientists. More recently with the covid forum - so many were 'experts'.
I never said the refugees from Syria were overwhelmingly male. In fact I explicitly pointed them out as legitimate refugees.
Just to get this straight, in one sentence, you are blaming the US for supplying the Ukrainian army with anti-tank weapons, and you've justified Russian military units in Ukraine blowing up an elderly couple in a car. Okay.
These vehicles have optics and range findings, at that range they can easily see the occupants in the car, it's straight up murder, and will probably be referred to the Hague
@[Deleted User]
Iv read a few of your posts. And with all that is going on, its difficult to keep up with posts. I want to say that i have sympathy for your position. We all feel impotent at this point. Because we are impotent, at least, militarily.
how many in the west are willing to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian: It can seem this way, i admit that. And there are very sad, frankly disturbing precedents.
The above all refers to Hard Power - and i admit, there is a HUGE IMBALANCE in this that favors the Russians.
SOFT POWER - on the other hand (Economics, Public Relations, Public perceptions, Diplomacy) - There is an imbalance on this too, but it is ENTIRELY the reverse of the Military situation. Now you may ask, what does it matter? I would answer, believe me; It matters. If it DID NOT MATTER, the Russians would not be
All of the above matters. And so, frankly, does everything that Western Populations say and do. And our multinational companies are now Voluntarily leaving Russia. They are no longer WAITING for sanctions. And this is BECAUSE of the General Populations REVULSION for what Russia is doing.
All of this matters. We can't fight Russia militarily (i cannot see this ever happening) - but we can continue to make our voices loud and united, against Russia, and her Allies
Im not going to call you a 'Chamberlain' or a 'Defeatist' - nonsense to do so. And i am happy to debate (a fellow trekkie if im not mistaken) at any time
Slava Ukraini
Aggresively, like the way elderly people drive small Korean sedans around the village?
He has a point though DJ. While arming a civilian militia increases your force in a big way and adds some serious advantages, it also means the opposing forces become significantly less conscious of targeting civilians, because they can use the excuse that they were carrying arms. And it's not such an excuse if you're the one in the firing line no matter what uniform you're wearing. In urban enviroments where threats can come from anywhere this really ramps up and can be seen in every single conflict where civilians become militias. The "civilians let them pass" leeway often gets thrown away. We've seen it in this war. At first the Russians on the ground were pretty 'tolerant' of Ukrainian civilians, even when they came towards them en masse in peaceful protest, or taking video of them. That's changed. I'd be very very worried if ordinary Ukrainians tried the flag waving peaceful protests of last week today.
Volunteers are getting uniforms.
As far as I can see there are only 5 possible outcomes to this.
1) Ukraine defeat Russia - possibility almost zero.
2) Russia Defeat Ukraine, install puppet Government and put up with years/decades of internal strife, terrorism and sanctions.
3) Conflict expands into neighboring Nato member countries - escalation leading to possible nuclear war
4) Putin get taken out by an internal coup and replaced, Russia pull out - ideal but not guaranteed
5) Negotiated settlement with Russia - Putin gets assurances regarding Nato's future expansions, Ukraine sign up to certain stipulations and Putin pulls out.
Of the above options, other than 4, option 5 is by far the most attractive and one hopes there are back-channel discussions on-going at present. What isn't helpful in the hysterical media (traditional and social) coverage which have portrayed Putin as a mentally unstable psychopathic cross between Hitler and Stalin. It's quite likely that the West will need to do a deal with this guy, a deal than involves giving him certain assurances and ramping back the sanctions. Even Option 4 will likely require the same deal but with a different leader.
What Putin has done is despicable but it's not necessarily illogical. Time people wised up to the realpolitik of what's going on.
There were posters saying that nuclear war isn't a big deal. Boggles the mind.
Ultimately there's no need to escalate things anywhere near that so the suggestions that things should go in that direction are ill informed at best.
Can you please cite any evidence whereby the refugees from Syria are overwhelmingly male?
I'm honestly not sure what part of my posts you are disputing here.
More foreign sourced equipment arriving
Not really, the yanks have shipped out hundreds of light anti armour weapons to the Uks, this is one result, anything approaching Russian armour aggressively will be taken out.
No the reporter said they Russian saboteurs who have been operating inside Ukraine and the press team were specifically warned about them
Big Russian Kyiv assault finally seems to be almost ready - https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-russia-war-news-putin-zelenskyy-latest-live-updates-12541713?postid=3498774#liveblog-body
Analysis from a leading US military thinktank suggests Russian forces are preparing for an assault on Kyiv in the coming days - and as soon as tonight.
The Institute for the Study of War says Russian forces are concentrating in the eastern, northwestern, and western outskirts of the capital.
And released at 8pm last night UK time, the assessment suggested the assault would take place "in the coming 24-96 hours".
"The Russians are bringing up supplies and reinforcements as well as conducting artillery, air, and missile attacks to weaken defenses and intimidate defenders in advance of such an assault," it says.
The analysis indicates that the operation could signal a pivotal moment in Putin's invasion, given the lack of certainty around whether or not any attempt to take control of the city would be successful.
"It is too soon to gauge the likely effectiveness of any Russian attempt to complete the encirclement of Kyiv or to seize the city at this time," it says.
"If Russian troops have been able to resupply, reorganize, and plan deliberate and coordinated simultaneous operations along the several axes of advance around and into the capital, they may be more successful in this operation than they have in previous undertakings."
To be fair, we have only the Ukrainian's story to go on there. Now I'm personally 90% sure it was a Russian hit squad. If for no other reason than the Ukrainians know that they're getting huge support because of western media and naturally want to protect them to get their story out. However, if it turned out to be trigger happy Ukrainian civilians with newly minted guns in the fog of war I'd not be too shocked. Why? The TV crew went through a few Ukrainian checkpoints until they got to one and were turned around and told it was too hot to continue. They then go back the same road with the same Ukrainian checkpoints and are ambushed in what should have been more Ukrainian held territory. The other thing that's odd is that the vehicle was hit repeatedly(by what to me looked like one shooter), but the shooters a 100 metres away would have seen the crew get out and run down to an embankment and they didn't finish the job when the crew were lined up in a near perfect fire trap, when all they had to do was move ten metres to the left to do that?
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