There are also parallels with Ukraine and the Lend Lease approach adopted when Britain & Commonwealth were fighting on and before the US had entered the war.
I did qualify it by saying «Churchill during the war». For Churchill’s crimes (and there were many, I’m under no illusions there), the one thing I can say in his credit, is that he did help inspire the British people to continue fighting against seemingly impossible odds. He did an excellent job at selling the concept of keeping the fight going and to not give up on the idea of winning.
This does not excuse any of what he did before of course, but my comparison with Zelenski boils down to being a voice that unified a people to resist. It’s that one act that injected enough hope to keep going, that I wanted to highlight.
Talk about Karma......and so much for the Comrade bit, looked more like everyman for himself.
They held the show in the wrong place, the front line in Ukraine is where all the Russian men are!!!
Not a good time to be a russian solider. They can be liquidated at any time. The west really decided to slowly destroy russian capabilities by drip feeding the Ukraine the weapons needed to defend themselves. I wonder where things will stand next year. You would think that these losses are unsustainable but this is russia…. this is what they do…
Exactly!! 100% agree, and to see the slime being thrown at him from the Kremlin Factory of lies..and from some other quarters too.
We've been talking about it for several years now,
Disgusting to compare zelensky to that low life churchill
https://medium.com/@write_12958/the-crimes-of-winston-churchill-c5e3ecb229b3
You can't help but look at how that history will be written, and marvel at it somewhat. With any luck that history will also include how Ukraine fought the Russians out of their lands and forever destroyed the concept of Russian Hegemony over the old Soviet Empire.
Zelenski will likely become one of those instersting figures in our history books who I would bandy together with the likes of Chuchhill during the war, or even Lincoln. Leaders who stepped up during their nation's darkest hour, when defeat seemed certain, and became a voice to rally around & continue to fight. The video of Zelenski and his ministers hanging around of the streets of Kiev to prove to their people that they were staying put, combined with the Snake Island troops telling the Russian warship to have relations with itself, was a clear and galvansiing statement. They would not give up, they would not run away, and that they would fight.
It's somewhat amazing that a comedian, who played a pariody president on TV, and who even did a dance & song routine on Russia's New Years TV Special a few years ago, could become a potentially fatal thorn in the side of Putin's Russia.
….
Having been a few hundred km to the west of that checkpoint this time of year which is above the arctic circle, best of luck to anyone participating in Putin’s ironman games
Its good to see that states bordering russia are on the ball and quickly react to Putin’s bullshit, it shows growing immunity to the Russian neo fascist virus
It's a long way on a bike. especially in the wintertime.
Yes, and when a crime is committed now in Russia, criminals face an indirect death penalty ie: end up in Ukraine, so I'd say some criminals are thinking twice. But corruption being what it is in Russia, its a way of life, so only in time will statistics' show the side effects of Putins war.
LOL
Hes smiling in photo, so I think its the number 4 - Banketny
Ukrainian Arty superiority will only expand as time goes on which strikes right into the heart of russian military doctrine. No amount of meat waves can even hold a stalemate with no arty to support them.
"The pressure of worn-out barrels is a particularly big issue, Stupak said." I mentioned this a few weeks ago too, they can't replace them at any meaning rate.
Yeah I saw some of those cases but I say for them still it's a win as a lot more of them will die in Ukraine then survive to come home and commit these crimes. I suppose down the line they will have massive issues with soldiers returning with trauma so I say eventually you will see a good few of them in prison and committing crimes in Russia. I actually wonder has the crime rate on some things gone down in Russia since the Ukraine invasion, if a lot of criminals who asked to go to Ukraine who were in prison to be pardoned die then they can't reoffend.
Yes, when it works out like that, and statistics favor it, none the less, several have survived the war, and returned home, and in some cases, reverted to form and killed again.
Anyway, on a slightly different note, for anyone doubting the effectiveness of the sanctions have a look at this link.
Anton Gerashchenko on X: "Russian civil aviation is on the verge of collapse: The Defence Intelligence of Ukraine conducted a cyber operation against Rosaviation and obtained classified documents of the Russian Ministry of Transport. The intelligence managed to find out that: ▪️ In January 2023, 185 air… https://t.co/yyy46aEmU5" / X (twitter.com)
I say putin is delighted to get rid of people like this in Ukraine if they die. Kills off the scum of Russia and you don't have to worry about some of them been released and commit violent crimes again as there dead. Makes room in jail cells for anyone who protests back in Russia, evil but smart at same way.
Cometh the hour, cometh the man. Describes Zelensky to a "T". he held the whole show together in Ukraine's darkest hour.
“they know the Ukrainian front lines are at a breaking point.”
Can you provide evidence of this claim? You casually drop that in as if it is an accepted, established fact.
It’s an interesting take to frame the Avdiivka/Bakhmut tactics as an effective strategy given that we have seen no evidence of that in this conflict. As has been noted already in this thread Russia has not shown it has the capacity to make any significant or consequential territorial advances beyond the initial phase of their invasion. There is a large discrepancy between your speculative assessment of the future course of the conflict and what we have been seeing transpire.
I don't think anyone is buying your pearl clutching about poor russia/NATO contrarianism schtick by the way.
Fact is Furze99, as far as you are concerned, all Russians are guilty of what Putin has done, and they are all accountable. My view is the polar opposite, I do not believe that all Russians are responsible for what Putin is doing. For sure, the estimated 330'000 dead and double (at least) maimed and disabled, their relatives and friends are not supportive of Putin's war. Neither are the 300'000 due to be called up after the Election. And the next 300'000. Putin's friends (Oligarchs and Siloviki) are calling for a million strong army. You think that all these are supportive of Putin? But for you every single Russian is responsible. You are unable to even row back and admit that, well maybe not all of them support Putin. Because Putin's support is very far from his claimed 80% (Kremlin figures) support, very far from it indeed, and for sure most Russians do not want this war, but as I've tried to explain to you, they arec powerless to do anything about it, you saw what happened to the woman in the video I posted, when she refused to sign the way they wanted. This happens thousands of times each day in different parts of Russia.
WTF!!!😧
Before the end of WWII, there were discussions and agreements on what the post war world would look like. That agreement sucked if you lived in eastern Europe, it worked out well for countries aligned under pax-Americana.
China is both Irans and Saudi Arabias biggest customer, China is also in the midst of an internal economic crisis, they really don't want disruption. If the Persian gulf gets disrupted then it adds to Chinese governments domestic problems, which may lead to an upsurge in patriotic nationalism. I expect that given its business interests China will become the moderating influence in the region and take a pragmatic approach to diplomacy, instead of all the wolf warrior diplomacy crap they have been pushing in recent years, this will require agreement with the USA which may be underway.
Since 2000, the neocons dominate foreign policy in the United States, their ideas have been the primary driver of US foreign intervention, they are not likely to come to agreement with China. Here is senator John McCain from 2014.
Historically, British diplomats are quite good at getting international agreements stitched together, bringing David Cameron back into the cabinet may bring some normalcy to their diplomatic relations after the Brexit fiasco.
The United States is dominant economically and culturally and still has an outsized military, however, the countrys military adventures since 2000 have not been translated into the success they had in post World war II Germany, Japan and South Korea.
As can be seen from WWII the West is not above making deals with dictators, the EU tried to make a deal with president Putin and that failed officially in February 2022. A military victory to the Russia/Ukraine war is likely to mean NATO boots on the ground, which could happen in one of two scenarios, a Ukrainian army collapse east of the Dnipro river to halt the Russians outside Kiev, or a final push to clear out an exhausted but entrenched Russian army (e.g. Americans entry in WW I).
Half of the soldiers in the trenches are already "home". It's the other half that need to leave.
President Putin, can indeed turn around, declare victory and end the war today and he must. His fate and those of the siloviki protecting him are tied to the outcome of the war and defeat does not look like Khrushchev style retirement to a luxury dacha in the Valdai hills. Too many Russian men dead and a demographic crisis, defeat means a power vacuum with a lot of angry combat veterans in the country, available to hire.
Realistically, Putin and his allies will likely see 2024 as make or break, they know the Ukrainian front lines are at breaking point, they know the West is in an election cycle. The aim for this Winter will be to break the Ukrainian front lines and wreck the countries infrastructure, then move to take the remaining parts of the oblasts they hold and dictate terms to Ukraine.
Ukraine does not have the men to sacrifice, holding out against constant meat-wave attacks which are making incremental gains. The Russian leadership are counting on taking Avdiivka this Winter, likely after the mud freezes, the Russian command has to report victories before the March "election".
To get back to scenario 1: Iran's game is likely to try split the Abraham accords agreement and get its nuclear program complete. Instability in the Middle East has a higher rank in the politics of USA, China and Europe than Ukraine does. The United States is moving into an election cycle, where providing support to Ukraine is a contentious issue. Historically there always has been political opposition in the USA to foreign intervention, for context pre-1941 (Pearl Harbour), most Americans did not want their country involved in the war. American government debt has reached levels that primary dealers cannot process and China is offloading American debt facing and economic crisis of it's own. The US election voting and counting must also be seen as fair and accountable, both sides like to game the system, if this does not happen political disruption is guaranteed. The 2024 US presidential is likely to be a 3 horse race + house elections as well. 2024 also sees European parliament elections, while these don't carry the same weight as the US elections, they will likely precipitate change in the political organisation of the member countries. Should the Middle East conflict expand and Avdiivka fall, combined with the expected Winter infrastructure attacks from the Russians, the Ukrainian government and army will face a crisis of confidence.
I'm not trying to absolve Russians of their responsibilities, for sure Putin does have a certain nr (and not an inconsequential Nr either) but to tar all Russians as being supporters of Putin's madness, is simply not true.
Peaceful outcome in a war? That's definitely an oxymoron.
Also, the "West" doesn't tolerate Russia any more - things changed a bit in 2022 when they launched a full-scale war. That's always where the tankie rhetoric fails.. it's not what about Afghanistan, what about Iraq, what about gas, what about Crimea, what about NATO expansion - it's what about Putin's invasion.
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