Russia-Ukraine War (continuing)

Suddenly, a lot of the supporting logistics and troops have come into missile range today

Fairly sober analysis of the challenges facing the prospect of a European Army.

"Europe on paper has nearly 2 million personnel in uniform and spends roughly $338 billion per year on defense, more than enough to deter Russia and enough to make Europe collectively a military power. But the numbers on paper do not match reality. Europe’s militaries are way less than the sum of their parts. Many of these forces are in militaries that are not ready to fight. For all of the chest thumping about NATO’s strength, its wartime operations in Libya and Afghanistan have all demonstrated the challenges of coordination. Thus, the goal of a common European force is to reduce incessant multilateralism, shrink the number of relevant militaries, and thereby minimize the duplication and waste, and create a more cohesive fighting force."

It doesn't go near the problem of renegade states like Hungary and formerly Poland which might not be trivial.

Maybe the external threat that is the Russian Federation can help to reignite the European project which has been stumbling along since the Euro crisis and later the refugee crisis which lead to Brexit and the rise of the right all over the continent.

As ever, and well Putin knows it, when you want to talk to Europe who do you call.

It's amazing how many Americans have now completely accepted Trump's myopic view of their relationship with Europe.

They just accept verbatim that the relationship is one way, that the US sustains all the costs and that Europe reaps all the benefits. If anything, the reverse is true. The Americans are actually getting a bargain, their role as policeman of the world yields extraordinary benefits.

In exchange for the implicit security guarantee, Europe accepts the Dollar as the reserve currency of the world. We accept much of the worlds trade needs to be conducted in Dollars, that banks must keep significant sums of US treasuries as reserves, we exchange tangible goods and services for printed Dollars, we operate in their Swift payment system because we accept their dominance, we finance the consistent US trade deficits. We allow US tech companies to operate in Europe with only minimal restrictions, we invest vast sums of capital to prop their stock market up (50% of the S&P 500 is held by Europeans), we provide a market for their goods and cheaper educated labour.

After seeing the mess the British made with Brexit, you think the Americans wouldn't be so stupid as to repeat the mistakes of damaging trade, but here we are…

Not being nasty to your supposed allies is free

Edit: like clockwork

By pulling out if Ukraine and Europe and even actively punishing them while supporting Putin one does not “deter” Russia/Iran/N Korea and China (quite the opposite) who are learning from this war unlike the Americans who are too busy politically purging their military Stalin style

The North Koreans and Chinese and Iranians have people and equipment actively fighting in this war

Manic and yourself are welcome to point to concrete examples of US troops being trained by Ukrainians in either Ukraine or outside, because there is examples of the Danish and the Brits for example specifically learning from Ukrainians about drone warfare with training going on in both directions now

The focus in pentagon now is how to survive Trump political purges and DOGE cuts, not how to learn from current wars and fight future wars

Ukraine has massive experience in warfare now, while US spent over two decades hunting goat herders with AK rifles across hills only to be run out of two countries after wasting trillions there

Manic has fallen under the delusion that China, Russia, North Korea and Iran are not an axis that’s interconnected at multiple levels, it be like Americans preparing to fight only Japanese in WW2 while actively aiding the Germans and Italians (hell those countries of the original axis did not even have land connections with each other)

Sooner or later US will find itself in yet another war, but this time it’s “allies” who keep getting shat upon will and their populations will say “nah we good, good luck there”

There is no evidence that now in 2025 Since Trump arrived in whitehouse there has been cooperation and training between Ukrainians and US

The US military is paralysed by cuts and purges and whiplash changes in policy on a daily basis

There is evidence of European NATO countries doing just that however in both directions

I'm sure when Mexico tries to invade America they'll really regret it. And if America pulls another Afghanistan I hope they get their arses kicked. Regardless all western militaries are watching Ukraine and adapting. One thing though if it was the US fighting Russia in a non nuclear war it wouldn't be a stalemate like Ukraine. The US would also go into a military economy if needed and would dramatically increase production of artillery and other weapons systems.

Further advances in Sumy with the capture of Konstantinovka today.

Fighting on the outskirts of Novonikolaevka and Yablunovka and fighting continues inside of Yunakivka currently.

Total captured 140 KM2 of Sumy, twice what Deepstate is now claiming and 5 settlements more.

Do you not think that a stronger Western response to Putin's invasion of Ukraine would have nipped a lot of the threat you're talking about in the bud. The ability was and is there for the West to cripple Russia's ability to grind out advances in the manner it has been doing for at least 2 years now. Had Russia been humiliated like that, the US would be very much freer to turn its focus to the East without having to wonder what sh*tstorm is bubbling away in Europe, and the Europeans would have gained valuable experience from the initial cooperation with the US in pushing the Russians back to their borders. Not to mention the fact that the Ukrainians would be able to provide a lot more of the boots on the ground to reduce the jeopardy of coffins coming back to the US.

Its the dawdling that has allowed Putin to maintain this Emperor's New Clothes image of a strong man, and which has surely caused the Chinese to question whether they've put too much stock in the West's stomach to get involved in a dirty war.

There was no moral ambiguity about what should have been done when Putin rode across the border to start his decimation of Ukraine's civilian infrastructure. On a risk/reward or cost/benefit analysis, it's hard to see what the US (and this isn't on Trump) and the European's didn't just pull their heads out of their arses and do the right thing.

All this talk of "but the Chinese and North Koreans" is to gloss over the fact that the US is in the current predicament due to a large part it's own foreign policy failings and failure to kick the Russians in the balls as soon as it became apparent that the Ukrainians were well up for and up to the fight.

The US don't even recognise Taiwan as an independent sovereign nation so what are they getting so worked up about. It can't be morals, surely?

His leniency towards Putin has not come to an end tho

In last two weeks Trump has

• Promised to hit EU with massive tariffs which he then postponed hurting what are meant to be largest US allies
• Refused yet again to further tighten sanctions on Russia which would have helped US energy producers that are squealing about being killed by OPEC+ (which includes Russia) flooding markets
  

So he is actively yet again hurting allies and Americans while helping enemies

Europe is not to blame for the russian federation being a terrorist state who's leader believes it needs to be at war for him to look good and hold his geriatric deranged grip on power over a weak willed people willing to die trying to kill their neighbours rather than take power away from putin who even Donald Trump can see has gone "crazy".

We have seen before how the armed forces of Ukraine have slowly given up territory in small amounts to allow them eliminate more of putin's terrorists and what you report sounds like more of the same.

Zelensky should have just decked him when he had the chance a few weeks ago.