Some sort of legal framework that obviated an endless stream of illicit drug purchases might help...
Ukraine is game to you? Part deux.
- Thread starter Slothur the Hasty
- Start date
The problems with the US War on Drugs are clearly a core issue with what's going on with the war in Ukraine.
Unless Ukraine becomes the #1 global exporter of hard drugs, let's keep this thread on topic?
I’m not sure how much it matters in the short term— NATO will intervene if Sweden is attacked.
And guns and ammunition (armor piercing in particular) flowing the other way.
Unverifiable
Could you provide sources?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_reparations nope, there is currently no legal standing for any compensation. That may change in the future, but currently based on the treaties that were signed, all of that is over.
Sources? Germany has a relatively small military compared to its peers, both for historical reasons and because they're under the NATO umbrella.
There are political and cultural differences yes, but there are forums for them to work on those where it matters (UN, EU, NATO, etc.)
It's pretty much the exact opposite of WW1 from any perspective. WW1 had a lot of tensions divided amongst a lot of different countries. This war is simply Russia deciding to invade Ukraine. Ukraine has been receiving increasing amounts of material, training, and humanitarian aid from a huge swath of the globe. Poland, which you frequently bring up, is providing a very large amount of humanitarian aid to Ukrainians, as well as a staging and training area for weapons being sent in. Russia is receiving none of that. There are still only two parties actively fighting in the war. If the US or NATO stepped in, the conflict would look very different.
It's pretty clear that you're either not a student of history, really uninformed about the current state of politics, a propagandist, or simply a troll. I can't tell which.
It's unclear whether psglgdame is a regular Chinese citizen parroting Chinese propaganda or an actual propagandist but s/he has been doing the same stuff in the China Covid thread. Waste of time debating.
+++
Their contribution to this thread is so close to actual Russian propaganda that it rings a lot of "troll bells".
EDIT
Here's an analysis on why Russia repeatedly said that Poland was going to seize Western Ukraine. Here's another interesting link that explains why that's utter BS.
Sweden should just say yeah, join, and then break the agreement. Sweden and Finland are in a convenient location and there’s no way of kicking a country from NATO really. It would be nice for Turkey to be on the receiving end of these kind of annoying facts for once.
Although if Russia manages to his totally self destruct in Ukraine and collapse, I guess we’ll get to re-evaluate how strategically important these locations are.
Sweden and Finland can outlast Erdogan's pettiness without any real danger. Even without full NATO membership, they're already in a safer place than they were.
Not that they were at much risk before, but then Putin decided to get dumb.
Not that they were at much risk before, but then Putin decided to get dumb.
No movement on Finnish or Swedish membership is expected until after the Turkish presidential elections in June from what I’ve read.
My wife is from China and mainly gets news from Chinese sources. Let's just say that the Ukraine War is not a subject we are able to discuss after one attempt. Her sources are basically 100% favorable to Putin and 100% of the blame goes onto "Nazis in Ukraine." Ok, not 100%, some blame goes of course onto America and "The West" because reasons. In other words, they are helping Russia spread the bullshit about this invasion.
China (and their canned news outlets) sees Putin's aggression as a way to ding the so-called West. It's especially shitty because China surely could do more against Russia but they are happy to watch Ukraine get murdered as long as China gains an advantage.
I think you also mentioned many pages back that China goes along with Russia attacking Ukraine as their reasoning is also the exact same as China's position regarding Taiwan. It was part of us at one point and should be part of us again.
While Sweden would indeed most likely be protected in a nightmare scenario against foreign invasion, there are still important elements apart from that which NATO would like to have integrated into the larger NATO ecosystem, like Gotland. Gotland is essentially an unsinkable aircraft carrier perfectly positioned to dominate the Baltic which, with the ascension of Sweden and Finland, becomes a NATO lake with minimal Russian shoreline access. Rather than the Baltic states being almost completely surrounded by hostile or neutral territory, now Kaliningrad (a very important Russian military position) will be, instead. The strategic state of play in the Baltic will change dramatically with Sweden and Finland's ascent, but that hard planning and redeployment cannot start until they actually join. Being able to start integrating these changes into NATO defense plans on an official level is important, and that can't happen until Sweden has officially joined NATO. Finland is similar with their extremely long border with Russia and their proximity to the Kola peninsula. Any NATO contingency plans which include Finland as a member will necessarily include a lot of planning for what to do on that border, as it is the perfect position to easily cut off Russia's sole access road/rail corridor to Kola from the rest of Russia and to their most strategically important naval assets (no, not the Admiral Kuznetsov 
).
Once they are both in, I'm all for putting the screws to Erdogan regarding the PKK. After all, it's not like they're going to turn around and ally themselves with the Russians. Türkiye is going to need to come to terms with their Kurdish population sooner or later. If there is to be a Kurdistan, which seems likely over the long time horizon (to me, at least), it should be done in a controlled way, and a weak Russia would make a potential breakaway Kurdish Syria more likely (or at least less likely to result in another decade of civil war). I'm starting to ramble, so I'll just stop at that.
).Once they are both in, I'm all for putting the screws to Erdogan regarding the PKK. After all, it's not like they're going to turn around and ally themselves with the Russians. Türkiye is going to need to come to terms with their Kurdish population sooner or later. If there is to be a Kurdistan, which seems likely over the long time horizon (to me, at least), it should be done in a controlled way, and a weak Russia would make a potential breakaway Kurdish Syria more likely (or at least less likely to result in another decade of civil war). I'm starting to ramble, so I'll just stop at that.
re: China vs Taiwan, Russia vs Ukraine (two posts up)
I don't recall posting or thinking that, I was in a back and forth for a bit in the China thread where that was one of the topics. Then again my memory is not what it was!
One thing that does get pulled up is the US in Iraq, and that's one reason that damn invasion was so harmful. Besides the death of as much of a million humans of course. It gives shitty regimes a reason to do the same..."See! America invaded a country to protect it's 'security', we will too!" It's all about Security of course. The fallback argument for doing any shitty thing you want...from geopolitics to gun culture.
I don't recall posting or thinking that, I was in a back and forth for a bit in the China thread where that was one of the topics. Then again my memory is not what it was!
One thing that does get pulled up is the US in Iraq, and that's one reason that damn invasion was so harmful. Besides the death of as much of a million humans of course. It gives shitty regimes a reason to do the same..."See! America invaded a country to protect it's 'security', we will too!" It's all about Security of course. The fallback argument for doing any shitty thing you want...from geopolitics to gun culture.
That same exact thought has been running through my mind all year. It's really a shame that American moral high-ground was so dramatically and directly undercut for such stupid and ill-defined reasons. Any of the boys from the PNAC still alive can go take a long walk off a short pier.
One question that comes up, though, is just how relevant all this is anymore. RU has shown definitively that it cannot successfully invade UKR, which has far less nominal conventional military power on tap than NATO members - even small ones like the Baltics. They can still do third-world human wave attacks, but the cream of the RU mechanized military is gone and won't be easily replaced with something better - and it would have to be much better to counter modern anti-armor doctrine.While Sweden would indeed most likely be protected in a nightmare scenario against foreign invasion, there are still important elements apart from that which NATO would like to have integrated into the larger NATO ecosystem, like Gotland. Gotland is essentially an unsinkable aircraft carrier perfectly positioned to dominate the Baltic which, with the ascension of Sweden and Finland, becomes a NATO lake with minimal Russian shoreline access. Rather than the Baltic states being almost completely surrounded by hostile or neutral territory, now Kaliningrad (a very important Russian military position) will be, instead. The strategic state of play in the Baltic will change dramatically with Sweden and Finland's ascent, but that hard planning and redeployment cannot start until they actually join. Being able to start integrating these changes into NATO defense plans on an official level is important, and that can't happen until Sweden has officially joined NATO. Finland is similar with their extremely long border with Russia and their proximity to the Kola peninsula. Any NATO contingency plans which include Finland as a member will necessarily include a lot of planning for what to do on that border, as it is the perfect position to easily cut off Russia's sole access road/rail corridor to Kola from the rest of Russia and to their most strategically important naval assets (no, not the Admiral Kuznetsov
Once they are both in, I'm all for putting the screws to Erdogan regarding the PKK. After all, it's not like they're going to turn around and ally themselves with the Russians. Türkiye is going to need to come to terms with their Kurdish population sooner or later. If there is to be a Kurdistan, which seems likely over the long time horizon (to me, at least), it should be done in a controlled way, and a weak Russia would make a potential breakaway Kurdish Syria more likely (or at least less likely to result in another decade of civil war). I'm starting to ramble, so I'll just stop at that.
Should we care all that much about strategic maneuvers to contain an adversary that doesn't pose a modern conventional threat?
We absolutely still care, because NATO isn't about the conventional threat. Until Russia has been verifiably denuclearized, there will be a role for NATO, and especially for strategic planning in the region of the Baltic. Hell, one huge contingency NATO has to account for is the one where Russia collapses into a rump state centered on Moscow and St. Petersburg, and the rest of the world needs to move in very quickly to secure the Russian nuclear deterrent. Given the importance Kola would have in that scenario, we very much care about the integration of Sweden and Finland into NATO contingency planning.
Last edited:
They still pose a humanitarian and criminal threat, and they do appear to be learning lessons about conventional operations (albeit slowly, and only when forced by death). Assuming that your arrogant, obstinate, incompetent, kleptocratic, rapist neighbor will never get their shit together is not a sound strategic platform - especially when they've still got an enormous wealth of human and mineral resources.
https://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/poland-send-leopard-tanks-ukraine-96365346
Slowly but surely.
When an abuser's former victims stand up for a current victim, I'm of the mind that it's worth listening to them.
I hope this goes through. Challenger 2s do pose the same weight problems as Abrams, but the sheer toughness is hard to beat.
And unlike Abrams, they don't force the AFU to learn how to maintain a wholly different type of engine on which any experience is limited solely to the Ukrainian Air Force, nor do they consume fuel by the Olympic Swimming Pool.
Edited to add: On the other hand, we gave hundreds of Abramses to Iraq, and that turned out swimmingly (or at least, no one seemed to complain when the Iranians and ISIS turned up using them), so I don't see what the big deal is with giving tanks to Ukraine now.
Last edited:
On the other hand, nobody makes shells for them any more.
Though they are good at chucking HE in support of infantry, which is a useful capability for Ukraine right now because they need to do a lot of supported infantry attacks without the benefit of air dominance so they need more ground support. (The reason they stuck with the rifled barrel after everyone else had gone to smoothbore was for the sake of the HE/HESH rounds).
T-80's engines are turbo too, not diesel so that's not a problem.
Honestly I'm not sure moving in very quickly in that scenario is a good idea at all.
A silo or a few may launch against NATO where it wouldn't otherwise, and as scary as "Terrorists with nukes" are, actual maintained nukes being launched in their original launch vehicles is a lot worse.
The crews would be loyal to Moscow, so basically you would want an alliance of convenience with Moscow helping it secure the nukes but with the string that those nukes get decommissioned. They don't want any newly independent nations to have nukes, for the obvious reasons the minor one being a slight risk that a region may nuke Moscow and the major one being that a region would be impossible to re-conquer later if it got nukes.
Of course, now that Ukraine got invaded, having anyone give up the nukes could be an issue.
It is not Ukraine. It's Russia. Russian military is trafficking heroine from Afghanistan to Europe. That's why they are stationed in Tajikistan. Russian embassies in Latin America were trafficking cocaine via diplomatic mail though after the invasion started it dried out for some reason. Cartels joined sanctions?
Will they, though? If someone offers them a few million, I'm pretty sure they'll be loyal to those people.
Boy, there's a cyberpunk dystopian future for you: drug cartels being major global players who accede to international sanctions regimes.
Yet another drummer for Spinal Tap Russian army commander; I'm sure this new guy will turn things around and lead the Russian Army to glorious victory....
Sending in a guy who is apparently best known for his loyalty towards Putin as opposed to any, you know, excellence in strategic thinking or anything like that, seems like good news ...for the Ukrainian people.
That would indeed be great news. Surovikin definitely was one of the better general they had. He was the one who managed the orderly retreat from Kherson and that was not an easy manoeuver to pull off...
One wonders if he made rebellious noises to the wrong ears, like "what the fuck are we doing here at this point". Or, "we can't win this, how about let's stop throwing meat at bullets."
I wonder what happens to a deposed general. Er, wait, I don't really care. Ideally he'd be shot by the conscripts he sent to the grinder.
I wonder what happens to a deposed general. Er, wait, I don't really care. Ideally he'd be shot by the conscripts he sent to the grinder.
Some T-80 engines are turbines. The ones in Ukrainian service are the T-80UD variant which have a diesel engine. They probably have some of the turbine engine ones that have been captured but the engine is apparently quite flaky on top of having very high fuel consumption so I doubt they prioritise them for service.
Reminds me of some stories about Rommel in WW2 - while he pulled off some very difficult retreats in the face of a much larger & better supplied force with far less loss of life & equipment than anticipated, that did not impress the top political class.
Dear Leaders want victories, not well executed retreats that conserve resources & fighting capacity.
There may be something interesting at play here.
Gerasimov: Plans invasion.
Putin: The invasion sucked and we got humiliated.
Gerasimov: But that's because your generals were all terrible and screwed it up!
Putin: OK, wise-guy: you're in charge now.
Gerasimov: Oh no!
Gerasimov: Plans invasion.
Putin: The invasion sucked and we got humiliated.
Gerasimov: But that's because your generals were all terrible and screwed it up!
Putin: OK, wise-guy: you're in charge now.
Gerasimov: Oh no!
I would be tempted to donate all of Canada's Leopards to Ukraine as well, although that would almost certainly result in us not having any tanks for a decade or two, if ever again (read up on how long it takes us to replace anything).
They usually send them to Syria. I doubt he was untrusted given that he's still serving in theater. Since they put a Putin loyalist between him and Putin I'd say they were satisfied with his command but not his more realistic take on the war. Now they can hear what they want to hear with the hard decisions filtered out.
Surovikin was also apparently the guy who had the idea to target Ukrainian civilian power plants with expensive cruise missiles, hoping to create a wave of Ukrainian refugees flooding into the EU. Instead his strategy resulted in Ukraine receiving top of the line missile defenses and (shortly) Western MBTs.
And thus a wave of anti-immigrant resentment percolating up and forcing the governments to cut their aid to Ukraine.
They really do think that everyone else is like them, don't they?
I'm trying to think what it would take for the Poles to abandon support for Ukraine, or more accurately abandon a way of hurting Russia. There's ...a lot of history there.
(old not-really-a-joke: If Poland is attacked by Germany and Russia, who do the Poles shoot first? A: The Germans; business before pleasure)
(old not-really-a-joke: If Poland is attacked by Germany and Russia, who do the Poles shoot first? A: The Germans; business before pleasure)