It's been posted for weeks now that Mariupol is about to fall and it never did. Unfortunately now though, barring an intervention they are now giving themselves days if not hours.
and if you're female.....
"Honestly from senior Russian official" = ex Russian official.
Germany (or indeed any of the other EU states) didn't "break" the EU arms embargo, perfectly legit under the EU rules at the time.
Not being mean but I think Russia will get by fine with the EU. We on the other hand are bunched gas,oil, fertilizer, food.... or maybe I'm wrong? That's just what I've been reading.
As regards the Russian Embassy in Ireland. To function they only need a handful of the diplomats to be present. Allegedly there are at least 31 "diplomats" onsite probably with support staff. 4 have been expelled. We should expel the majority and leave 2 diplomats and a couple of support staff to allow the embassy to carry out its functions for Russian citizens in Ireland. If the Russians kick all our staff out in Moscow so be it but we need to show that we are disgusted at the illegal invasion and the subsequent war crimes that have been carried out by the Russians.
If [without the EU] by fine you mean Russia okay being back in the 70s/80s, fine. The EU can still trade with the rest of the world.
I am very surprised this hasn't happened already to be honest.
Sigh, not great to browse and see your comments lied about and twisted, but why expect better.
As per other post, I'm done defending Germany/Germans from all the hyperbolic comments posted (that stuff is really complete nonsense) so you're a bit late taking a cut now @cnocbui. However embarrassed & critical about poor/slow efforts of ther govt. they are + also over failure and coming home to roost of past policies, I don't think those Germans would agree with the more, well, extreme end of the comments about Germany posted on this thread. That would be some impressive level of masochism + self hate and flaggelation.
I was for real. I walk that back as maybe Ukraine did not "lose perspective" there but had their own perspective on it. A case of ask for everything, because we may be about to lose our country and our lives tomorrow. I'd never call people "childish" or "muddle headed" in such circumstances + didn't. edit: Asking for Germany to do more as regards weapons for Ukraine is certainly not such. I really don't know enough to know the full impact (on both Germany and the EU) of a full Russian oil/gas trade embargo imposed by Germany immediately to judge whether that is too big an ask...opinions seem to vary. Be surprised if anyone posting here does.
I think (?) you believe there should be/should have been a full NATO humanitarian intervention (basically what that earlier "close the sky" request from Zelensky was - I haven't heard it asked recently) i.e. US/NATO roll the dice with Russia, it ends the war in Ukraine quickly or it escalates it all. The fact that it has not happened after 2 months or so including Russia committing war crimes and crimes against humanity (though some intervention could still happen I think - just not "no fly zones" etc.) suggests my belief that the request, right or wrong, was very unlikely to happen was correct rather than nonsense. There's been so many nasty rows about all that here (could have been involving you I think?? edit: or maybe not - sorry) here and really no point going into it again (and again).
Russia is an export economy, which means they rely, very heavily, on export revenue. They've entered an expensive war and as a result are losing key export partners. Some of their largest exports, e.g. gas, will take years to switch to other customers (due to required infrastructure changes). This is a country with an economy smaller than California, and is under heavy global sanctions and controls. They'll get by, but in the medium and long term things are going to get difficult for them.
We'll also feel some pain from this, but in comparison it should be significantly lower, e.g. if Germany were to cut all imports of gas/oil from Russia tomorrow, it's estimated it's economy would only contract 1% to 2% as a result. Russia's economy is forecasted to contract 11% this year.
Some idea of the scale of the Azovstal plant in Mariupol. According to the mayor of Mariupol the Russians are hitting it with very heavy ordinance now, likely they are using bunker busters.
Someone said that Germany was caught with its pants down which is not entirely true. On the energy independence front the pants were continuously pulled down for the past 30 years with actions ranging from sponsoring green activism to straight out buying politicians. The ban on fracking is the result of these actions and also the bad attitude towards nuclear. So instead of being energy independent by using fracking Europe was pushed to prop up Russia.
Russians: (Forced to subsist on a thin grey soup made from the ashes and bones of those who died at Stalingrad) "Yeah, this fine. We love misery."
Ukrainian Air Forces confirmed receiving spare parts for existing planes, but not new planes as reported by media
spare parts for planes spirited into Ukraine, full planes spirited in too by any chance?
Russia supplies very little food to the EU. Gas and fertilizer yes, but we have options to pivot away on both fronts and being quite honest we're only cutting our own throats with the amounts of fertilizer we splash about willy nilly so we need to move away from that soon or we'll have a real food crisis on our hands as the land can't keep being pushed the way it is. In Britain they reckon there's about 30 harvests left before a lot of the yields start falling off a cliff from over farming.
Russia has an economy the same size as Spain or around €1.65tn. The EU gives them about €110bn per annum for Gas alone. I somehow doubt that they'll muddle along just fine when 10% of their economy disappears overnight on top of the billions lost in other trades that cannot happen either.
It won't bring down the government. I live in Germany, most people aren't even talking about the war any more, they're more concerned about rising commodity prices and I know as many people opposed to Germany delivering weapons as in favour, don't underestimate German pacifism, it still runs pretty deep
The only country to use nuclear weapons in anger was the USA, although apparently the fire bombing of Tokyo was worse. Yet you have omitted them despite over a century of murder around the world in the name of democracy.
e.g. the USA invasion of the Philippines?
There are various degrees of bunched
"Our" lives, children, families, shelter, utilities, comfort, etc. are not more important than those of Ukrainians
Or shot at for no reason or fed ‘ flavoured food’ that you did not like or ‘ rumbled up’ because something you said - in private- that was reported up the line, etc, etc, etc, etc.
Pacifism surely the wrong word to use for the world's fourth largest weapons exporter.
I'm probably way of the mark here but I wonder if this is a way to supply actual planes to Ukraine covertly, some which would have been maintained with US parts in them.
So now if Russia shoots down said planes and finds the US parts in them, then they can just say yeah sure didn't we supply the parts to the Ukrainians as we already reported.
U.S. to Provide Poland with F-16s to Replace MiG-29 Squadron Being Sent to Ukraine
Headline doesn't match the content, and dated 17th of April - not sure how accurate it is.
You may want to double-check that link @Hobgoblin11 The headline may talk about MiGs but the article discusses the OH-58 Kiowa helicopter.
Yeah I think California would be in g7 if it declared independence tomorrow. The us economy is monstrous.
Correction California has a higher GDP than Germany, it would have the 4th largest economy in the world.
Texas and New York would also be in the top 10.
The poles have been looking at bringing I. More f16s for a number of years now ,it's hardly breaking news ,they don't seem to be in a big rush to buy said f16s though
US imperialism thread is leaking again I see
Looks like the Kremlin has given up any pretence, arrest their own proxies, rule the place directly
Usually when someone mentions the wests 4th gen jets vs Russias someone usually starts bringing up but they thrust vectoring and the cobra manoeuvre ,they will hit the breaks and the Americans or others will just fly by ,
All great in slow and steady preforming in an airshow but not so great when your flying against multiple ship formations with wingmen who cover their leads if you get close enough for an actual dog fight but as you pointed out there's been a shift to bvr engagements when it comes to air combat, where advanced radar and target acquisition is king
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://we.vanillicon.com/v2/e050b53be62f0ae2404c620976170938.svg)
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://we.vanillicon.com/v2/eedacf599b4135dfd56d6fdbddcbd867.svg)
