If the purpose was to prevent countries on his border becoming NATO members, then (as you can see from the map below), with an annexation of Ukraine, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania now border Russia and they are all members of NATO.
If the purpose was to prevent countries on his border becoming NATO members, then (as you can see from the map below), with an annexation of Ukraine, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania now border Russia and they are all members of NATO.
The purpose was to regain the spiritual home of the Russians. Except if Ukraine is the spiritual home where Russia started, wouldn’t that mean that Ukraine should technically be invading Russia to regain their lost territory?
Ukraine seem to be doing alright so far, but that will change rapidly once Russian ground troops can get at their air defence systems. Once that’s sorted they can bomb the rest of the country to bits relatively risk free.
The Klitschko brothers are taking up arms…. Not sure anyone wants to face that
lol wtf? Although might be an easy way of taking a few prisoner
Time for Gorbachev to push Putin out and take the reins for a bit.
Anyone interested in a leftist perspective on the whole history from the Euromaidan protests through would do well to give this article a read. Talks about the very real problem of neonazis in the Ukranian national movement/army while at the same time dousing Putin’s claims. The authors are split on the question of calling for NATO military intervention or opposing it: CrimethInc. : War and Anarchists: Anti-Authoritarian Perspectives in Ukraine
Just opened that one and air-raid sirens started blaring. Then stopped. Heard some explosions at a distance I think.
Saw elsewhere some footage of a jet flying low and letting some rockets loose right next to some houses.
Poor bastards.
So Ukraine’s defence ministry are reporting that the Russians have suffered ~800 casualties in the first day alone. They’re not releasing Ukranian casualties (other than 40+l
) but that 130 Ukranians have died all together.
Now that Russian number is probably fudged a bit, but if true that’s a massive amount of casualties to lose in the first day of a war. I mean, the last time you saw those numbers in the opening day of a conflict would probably be back in WWII (Or Rwanda…). But given how strongly a d passionately the Ukranians have resisted, report of lots of tanks, APVs and aircraft being lost, it could very well be accurate.
So if true, no wonder the Russian military are bringing in mobile crematoriums. They keep that sort of numbers up and you’d need to start sending freight trains back to Russia loaded with bodies.
The opposition among civilians in Russia is heartening. Sounds like Putin’s really misread the room among his own people. And when the families of dead soldiers start getting urns of Ashes instead of remains and coffins with their dead loved ones, anger is really going to mount.
It’s all still Mongolian territory to me.
Agreed. Russians should have thought of that before they left the Ukraine.
If Russia does lose this war, I wonder if they’ll be forced to give up Crimea and the Donbass/Luhansk regions
Fighting in Kiev, Russian tanks with the Soviet flag.
What the fuck hey.
Whispers that the initial wave of ground troops consisted mainly of conscripts barely out of initial training, hence the desertions and relative success of Ukrainian defences.
Fairly decent tactic against an adversary without unlimited supplies.
Where is that info from. As i understood it they have about 80% of their regular paid army hanging out in Ukraine?
Stuff like this https://twitter.com/MarkHertling/status/1497035826139738125?t=nzM9d8nUc8XOYLezkpaVhQ&s=19 And the numerous photos of young kids and overweight men being captured by Ukrainian forces.
Highly trained troops wouldn’t be wasted on a land-grab assault, they would have been the ones who jumped into Kiev directly. You don’t waste your best men and equipment on grunt work.
I think you may have linked to the wrong post but that was an interesting read all the same
