Russia-Ukraine War

Thats great news. The Ukrainians had to rush all their best troops to stop the Kharkiv offensive. Thats bad. But then they successfully stopped it. Thats good. And their absence from Donesk did not result in significant gains for Russia. Thats also good.

So cheer up, that Blogger is just trying to be neutral and he only wants a ceasefire and to prevent the loss of human life, much like yourself.

I suppose it can be a bit depressing that Ukraine have such a well oiled and responsive war machine that they are countering everything that Russia throw at them. Since we only want peace, its depressing that Ukraine is being so unreasonable that they wont let Russia win on the battlefield.

However, I think we can take some solace from the fact that Russia has made some peace gestures by scuttling one of its most advanced submarines and then setting fire to its oil reserves and munitions dumps around its forward airbases. Hopefully those Barnderrites will accept this gesture of goodwill and stop fighting so hard to prevent Russia winning and creating more peace than existed before the invasion began.

Do you mean that if the war ended a well trained Russian army would set its sights on Europe? Or are you asking whether Ukraine, if forced into peace and ceding territory, would turn on Europe?

In relation the first possibility, it is certainly an advantage that large portions of the Russian military that survives the war will have actual combat experience. How many of those soldiers will remain in the army or will be interested in a round 2 in a few years time is hard to say.

Generally, Im not convinced by the argument that the Russian armed forces are stronger now than before the war. They have lost massive amounts of equipment, expended considerable reserves and have a populace who, while not demoralised yet, would generally be happier if the war was over and a new war didnt start.

Russia will continue to pose a military threat to Europe for the foreseeable future and Europe needs to be prepared for same. But they need to prepare to deter the Russians, not prepare for an inevitable war against a strong opponent. They wont have the capacity for another large scale war for some time.

On the second interpretation, I dont see it but then again Im not Ukrainian. I think Ukranians are for the most part thankful to the Western countries who helped them and are not going to turn against them because the West couldve done more etc.

For the same reasons as with Russia, they will not be capable of fighting a high intensity war for several years afterwards, and in any event the hatred of Russia in Ukraine is likely to last for generations similar to Ireland and the British.

So overall the threat to Europe will be low over the next few years. However, that doesnt mean that the threat should be ignored and its far better to invest in military capacity now rather than spend multiples of that in a war later.

Sorry if Ive taken your question up wrong. One thing I will state though is that while there seems to be an increasing view that the West has given Ukraine enough to not lose but not enough to win etc, I think this ignores the substantial amounts of aid already committed/given, from a backdrop of the Western countries indicating in early 2022 that they didnt want to get involved at all and in the current context of budget/deficit concerns, cost of living politics and the need to rearm themselves, I think the Western motivation has been to give the most they reasonably can without seriously impeding their own budgets.

Perhaps, but realistically Russia can at best take a level of territory similar to what he has now plus Kharkiv and the remainder of donetsk. They will have to deal with insurgency in these places (which requires leaving occupational forces) and they will have to pay to rebuild or else face an even unhappier populace.

So I dont see Russia taking over all of Ukraine and I dont think that the portion that they might, but also might not, be able to successfully annex long term is worth the cost to their military and budget.