Ken wrote: ↑Sun Apr 24, 2022 2:06 pm
Sure, let's talk about history. When was the last time a military power successfully waged a war of territorial expansion against a neighboring foreign nation? Which is what Russia is doing right now. You probably have to go back to the Franco-Prussian War in which Germany successfully annexed Alsace–Lorraine, although they only managed to keep it for 48 years. Or maybe 1939 when the USSR annexed Karelia during the Winter War with Finland at the cost of 350,000 casualties. And that was when the USSR was twice the size of modern Russia and Finland was 1/10th the size of modern Ukraine. On the other hand, history is littered with examples of countries who have tried to do so and failed.
So is history actually on the side of Russia or Ukraine in this conflict?
Is Ukraine right around the corner from warding off Russia? We've been told this for a few months now, but it seems like the largest offensive to date is about to take place.
I don't have any secret knowledge of what is happening in Ukraine. From this distance it looks like Russia is slowly feeding its troops into a meatgrinder with limited or lack of success. They may well manage to both capture and keep parts of Ukraine. The former does not guarantee the latter. But at what cost? The US with double the population and 15x the economy of Russia could afford to wage endless wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan and eventually gave up on all three of those. How long can Russia sustain an endless war in Ukraine in which western economies equal to 20-30x the economy of Russia continually pour weapons and support into Ukraine and wage economic war against Russia's economy?
Iraq was Bush's folly.
I suspect Ukraine will be Putin's folly.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
US combat planes are way over budget, designed to be multirole which gives flexibility but repeatedly its been shown its not a dogfighter and fails if the enemy has better ESW the range closes to dogfights and US can't out turn the enemy planes. EU fighter is better by trials, the SU-57 supposedly is better for turn rates.
Josh wrote: ↑Sun Apr 24, 2022 2:45 pm
Here's somewhere where the U.S. has fallen behind:
- Hypersonic missiles
And here's another:
- Ballistic missile defence
We should be glad Russia has decided to go to war with America, because those two weaknesses are rather big, gaping weaknesses.
Pretty much every ballistic missile in the US arsenal is "hypersonic" Certainly all the large ones are. The fastest missiles on the planet are the US Minuteman missiles developed in the 1950s which travel at Mach 23 and the Trident Submarine missiles are about as fast.
And no country on the planet has an effective ballistic missile defense system. The US and Russia can both vaporize the other with both old and new missiles despite whatever limited ballistic missile defense systems are in place.
You sound just like the American war hawks in Congress and the US defense industry establishment who want to continually throw billions and billions of more dollars of our tax dollars into more military technology. If the US and Russia ever get into direct total war against each other then the planet is doomed. So what we are really taking about is proxy wars in places like Ukraine, Iraq, Syria, etc. And in those kinds of wars, ballistic missiles and missile defense systems have very limited applicability.
US doctrine doesn't require multi-million dollar hypersonic missiles. It is about achieving air supremacy and then dropping 100-times cheaper precision guided munitions wherever they want to drop them.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Mr. Zelensky said he would halt all negotiations with Russian officials if Moscow follows through on alleged plans to conduct a referendum next month on establishing a “Kherson People’s Republic” along the lines of the Donetsk and Luhansk statelets in the east.
I fear we are moving further and further from a negotiated peace for now. A lot hangs on what happens in eastern Ukraine over the next few weeks and months.
Sounds like Macron is cruising to an easy victory.
This election was cast to some extent as a referendum on European policy towards Russia and Ukraine. The thought being that a Le Pen victory would signal a rollback of support for Ukraine and rollback of sanctions against Russia.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Ken wrote: ↑Sun Apr 24, 2022 2:06 pm
Sure, let's talk about history. When was the last time a military power successfully waged a war of territorial expansion against a neighboring foreign nation? Which is what Russia is doing right now. You probably have to go back to the Franco-Prussian War in which Germany successfully annexed Alsace–Lorraine, although they only managed to keep it for 48 years. Or maybe 1939 when the USSR annexed Karelia during the Winter War with Finland at the cost of 350,000 casualties. And that was when the USSR was twice the size of modern Russia and Finland was 1/10th the size of modern Ukraine. On the other hand, history is littered with examples of countries who have tried to do so and failed.
So is history actually on the side of Russia or Ukraine in this conflict?
Is Ukraine right around the corner from warding off Russia? We've been told this for a few months now, but it seems like the largest offensive to date is about to take place.
I don't have any secret knowledge of what is happening in Ukraine. From this distance it looks like Russia is slowly feeding its troops into a meatgrinder with limited or lack of success. They may well manage to both capture and keep parts of Ukraine. The former does not guarantee the latter. But at what cost? The US with double the population and 15x the economy of Russia could afford to wage endless wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan and eventually gave up on all three of those. How long can Russia sustain an endless war in Ukraine in which western economies equal to 20-30x the economy of Russia continually pour weapons and support into Ukraine and wage economic war against Russia's economy?
Iraq was Bush's folly.
I suspect Ukraine will be Putin's folly.
Is Ukraine right around the corner from warding off Russia? We've been told this for a few months now, but it seems like the largest offensive to date is about to take place.
I don't have any secret knowledge of what is happening in Ukraine. From this distance it looks like Russia is slowly feeding its troops into a meatgrinder with limited or lack of success. They may well manage to both capture and keep parts of Ukraine. The former does not guarantee the latter. But at what cost? The US with double the population and 15x the economy of Russia could afford to wage endless wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan and eventually gave up on all three of those. How long can Russia sustain an endless war in Ukraine in which western economies equal to 20-30x the economy of Russia continually pour weapons and support into Ukraine and wage economic war against Russia's economy?
Iraq was Bush's folly.
I suspect Ukraine will be Putin's folly.
hmm, the narrative is shifting fast eh?
What narrative? I think this war is going to be a profound disaster for Putin on multiple levels. Nothing I've seen so far has made me change that position. They may wind up more or less where they were prior to February with a hold over Crimea and the eastern 1/2 of the Donbass. In other words with no gains. But at the expense of ruining their economy for a decade and galvanizing the west against them including an expansion of NATO to include Finland, Sweden and much more forward-leaning posture within NATO. The war is already hugely accelerating the modernization of NATO as a dozen+ countries are shipping all their older gear to Ukraine to replace it with more modern NATO-spec stuff from tanks to artillery to airplanes. And the war is accelerating western efforts to rid themselves of Russian oil and gas. By any rational measure, Russia will wind up in a far worse strategic position as a result of this war.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
