- Ukraine destroyed columns of waiting Russian soldiers with HIMARS, a Ukrainian commander said.
- He said Ukraine targeted them as soon as it got permission to use allied weapons across the border.
- Military experts say Ukraine’s ability to use Western-supplied weapons in Russia is aiding its fightback.
I wish they didn’t have to wait for things like this. It sucks that Ukraine is at the whims of other countries while it’s trying to fight to maintain its sovereignty.
It makes me so depressed thinking about how many thousands of Ukrainian lives could’ve been saved by just giving Ukraine full and enthusiastic support immediately instead of dragging it out this long.
This was done on purpose so the crisis didn’t escalate. There’s no world police to prevent Russia from nuking everyone. It’s better for outside actors to focus on de-escalation anyway.
Also, Putin is not doing this because of Ukraine. I mean that’s part of it, but he is doing it for domestic appeal. He wants to appear tough to Russian citizens. Two situations allow that: beating Ukraine easily, and losing to NATO forces. He knows NATO will not risk invading Russia, so he’s in no real danger from the second one.
NATO is intentionally not intervening because it makes Putin look weak domestically. Russia has created their own problem and the war will not end until the people of Russia demand it.
The only thing that modern diplomacy teaches nation states today is that they need to get nukes as quickly as possible
Nukes are good, but in fact full arsenal, from home-produced small mortars to MRBMs, and a standing military. Actually, if possible, all the means of power projection the big guys have. Including even proxy militants. Because the big guys back up their words with the blood of the small guys anyway.
You’re speaking about the means of which to project military power on the ground with direct action, I’m talking about the nature of nuclear weapons as a deterrent and how that changes the way soft and hard power is applied.
Nukes make it so that no direct combat need ever take place, look at NK or the inverse where we are applying sanctions against Iran for a current parallel.
It requires very rigid discipline to threaten your enemy with MAD. The more tasks you can solve without testing your own faction’s discipline, the better. If every parking place argument gets to threats of nuking the opponent, because you can’t threaten anything else, either eventually you’ll have to use MAD for such a small cause, or you’ll step back on that and then there’ll be something a bit more important over which you’ll threaten MAD.
And so on, until MAD is in practice useless for you.
The language you are using reads like you’re discussing an RTS.
There’s no requirement for any rigid posture except maintaining control over said nuclear arms. Most of NK saber rattling is done to aquire aid and material. Merely having Nuclear arms and demonstrating that control and willingness to use them as a defensive measure is all that’s needed. Other countries and powers on the global stage will modify or attenuate their position based on the demonstration of said control
I suggest reading these to better understand my position.
No it doesn’t. The US especially has spent a ton of money building up countries it has defeated in war.
The prime minister decides that their only course of action is to declare war on the United States. Expecting a quick and total defeat (since their standing army is tiny and equipped with bows and arrows), the country confidently expects to rebuild itself through the largesse that the United States bestows on all its vanquished enemies
Yes it does, in direct reply to what you said
There’s no world police to prevent Russia from nuking everyone.
The only reason we’re slow rolling Ukraine is because Russia has nukes. Here’s a great study on it. https://assets.cambridge.org/97811071/06949/frontmatter/9781107106949_frontmatter.pdf
Except the Duchy won the war against the US and brought back a hydrogen bomb. They then used that threat to make the league of micro nations. The bomb didn’t work, but the threat of it allowed a tiny nation to gain leverage on the geopolitical stage.
After killing the people in charge and destroying the country.
That’s Putin’s doing. His bluff was strong and he had a big pile of material, so the West is using a Russia technique known as the salami slice method, by slowly escalating and gauging the reaction from Putin. It means no world war 3 scenario, no allies that have to come to his defense and also not letting Putin taking whatever he wants with just bluff and threatening speeches. It is costly in lives and material though.
Can’t make salami without grinding meat I guess. As dark as that sounds. I thank every soul who’s been fighting against that thugtatorship.
And we (the US) have so much support that we could be giving to them but we’re not. We’d rather enable genocide elsewhere.
The US has too many bases to defend simultaneously to engage with Russia directly. It would be the 18th Anglo-French Wars all over again but with the possibility of a spicy nuclear conclusion at any given moment.
Keeping the conflict contained to the Ukrainian theater means western states get to “bleed” Russia in a protracted conflict without drawing the rest of their assets into a firefight. But we’re already seeing the US/Russia conflict leak into the central African states, the Korean border, and recently the coast of Florida.
Americans don’t actually want this to become a full blown World War. That drives up our defensive costs significantly and skews the “Stupid Russians Lose Again” headlines with a bunch of “Brave NATO Soldiers Fucked By Insidious Russian Treachery” articles.
This is patently untrue, look to Syria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Khasham or Africa https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/us-extra-troops-east-africa-sudan-evacuation-rcna80678 for examples of this. The US is able to project power globally in a way that Russia has tried to and simply cannot counter. https://www.usip.org/publications/2021/02/what-russias-endgame-syria or https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/5/24/how-russia-tried-to-colonise-africa-and-failed
Even Ukraine is projecting power in Sudan and Syria as a direct belligerent in opposition to Russian interest. https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-sudan-syria-cnn-russians-1907835
The United States spends in a year, what the rest of the world spends in 1.2 years. https://www.pgpf.org/chart-archive/0053_defense-comparison There is no historical analogue to the power of the United States military. Unfortunately, this is what we spend our money on instead of Universal Healthcare or our infrastructure, or our schools etc. etc.
This is patently untrue, look to Syria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Khashamor
Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. Please search for Battle of Khashamor in Wikipedia to check for alternative titles or spellings.
shrug
The US is able to project power globally in a way that Russia has tried to and simply cannot counter.
Who can forget their famously successful efforts to project power into Afghanistan, Iraq, and Yemen.
Even Ukraine is projecting power in Sudan and Syria
In a report on Monday, the English-language Kyiv Post said it had obtained video from Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate (GUR) filmed in March
Listen, I know we’re all “Rah Rah Ukraine! Can’t wait till they’ve got boots on the ground in Moscow!” But you can’t seriously link to a fucking press briefing by the GUR as unbiased news.
The United States spends in a year, what the rest of the world spends in 1.2 years.
Yes, yes. This is why we can’t afford health care. Ye-haw.
But we spend all this money on an endless parade of Wall Street executive compensation packages. Nobody in Russia is getting paid a Boeing CEO’s salary to make aerospace equipment that strands folks on the IIS. And while Lockhead and Raytheon have made a mint selling the Pentagon loot boxes, the physical hardware we’ve produced still doesn’t seem capable of winning the fucking war.
There is no historical analogue to the power of the United States military.
There are numerous analogs. But none of them are particularly flattering.
LOVE what you cherry picked to respond to and completely ignored any direct response to my points. Those Boeing Billionaires are making it soooooo hard for the Russians to project their will against the world at large.
lol here’s the corrected article you couldn’t find https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Khasham
I’ve edited my first post.
keep on trollin’
Good. Make Russian civilians see the horrors of the war they support personally.
Saw this video on my feed which uhhhhh NSFL (Death) https://x.com/Megatron_ron/status/1805588024803074447
Also lmao at everyone condemning Hamas but Russian civilians being targeted gets them cheering.
Russian civilians weren’t targeted, the missile was intercepted by russian air defense on its way to a military target. The shrapnel happened to fall on that beach.
Edit: If you’re thinking of holidaying in an active warzone, perhaps reconsider.
That was an ATACM missile with a cluster bomb warhead. Not “shrapnel”.
Edit: If you’re thinking of holidaying in an active warzone, perhaps reconsider.
So you’re saying israelis holding a rave next to a concentration camp should have reconsidered their location on Oct7?
That was an ATACM missile with a cluster bomb warhead. Not “shrapnel”.
It was an “ATACM missile with a cluster bomb warhead” until russian air defence turned it into shrapnel
So you’re saying israelis holding a rave next to a concentration camp should have reconsidered their location on Oct7?
Yup.
Although not sure why we’re talking about Israel now, this conversation was about Russia blaming ukraine for bombing intentionally civilians when they were actually attempting to bomb legitimate military targets, likely in sevastapol bay.
The Oct7 attack isn’t even comperable, civilians were actively targeted there, not so here
“Targeted”. (Likely just an intercepted missile)
They’re on a fucking beach, on illegally occupied land, during an active war. I’m pretty sure they knew the risk.
Play stupid games, grow 🌻
So you’re saying Hamas has the full right to target any israeli because they are illegally occupying Palestinian land and putting the Palestinians in a concentration camp?
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Are you calling Ukraine a terrorist organization? They’re an independent country from Russia.
Obvious troll is obvious. Grow up
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Last thing I remember yesterday many condemned Israel for announcing it’s land development program that is gossiped as planned on occupied territories. Today there were news of a shitbag minister who voiced a plan to take the West Bank under a military rule (and to convert it into profits?), and I don’t see many support to him there as well. Would it be too cynical to ask wtf these settlers would be doing there?
Condemning israel is like condemning Russia when they kill civilians. Rather easy. Of course people were praising israel initially but we’re past that.
The fun part is now the Ukrainan resistance is doing what the Palestinian resistance was doing and asking why people react so differently.
Where’s the fun part? I oversimplified this comparison because I felt you did so too.
The fun part is watching people do mental gymnastics to condemn Hamas but praise Ukraine. Both have committed war crimes while resisting occupation, but we seemingly only care when one of them does so.
Wait, what side you care about? It seems I’ve lost you.
Does it matter? A discussion is not about signalling that you support the correct side even though social media seems to think so.
I’m sorry that this is the best job you can find right now. It can’t be a very fun job. But you are also kind of bad at it, you should at least try to make the post sound like a real human could possibly think the things that are said.
How close to the port is that beach?
Proximity doesn’t matter, the beach is in the flight path so it could be anywhere between the launching point of the missile and the target
How close to the military bases were those Kibbutzes?
Wuh-wuh-wuhddabout… Get a new tactic. That one is completely worn out at this point.
For our other readers, those missiles were intended for the military facilities nearby and were shot down by Russian AA and debris fell on the beach (hence the lack of explosions)
If the comment said “I hope israeli civilians see the horrors or war” I’m sure you would be just as generous with your thought process. Oh wait you’d be calling him straight up Genocidal.
There is no whataboutism cluster munitions are illegal and this is a war crime. This is not debris this is the ATACKMS filled with m74 bomblets.
Just be consistent in your morals. This is like someone defending Hamas gunning down non combatants.
cluster munitions are illegal
Well, depends on the country. For example, if you are in Ukraine or russia (and surprisingly, Finland) they are legal.
Hamas and israel said they killed no innocents so therefore it’s legal.
Assad uses nerve gas? That’s legal in Syria. Aint a crime if it’s legal! case closed everyone!
Fun fact, there are only two major countries that employ cluster munitions the United States and Russia. Everybody else has banned them. Since Ukraine is using almost exclusively Russian and American stocks of munitions for this war…
Also China, Korea (Both), Israel, India, Brasil. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_on_Cluster_Munitions
But apart from that ALL the major countries
What does the proximity of the kibbutzes to Israeli military bases have to do with anything? Did Hamas accidentally murder civilians in their homes while trying to go after legit targets?
“Oops, we missed the military base and accidentally cut this old guys head off with a garden hoe and machine gunned some families hiding in their homes! Honest mistake!”
The guy said “I hope Russian civilians see the horrors of war”
And using cluster munitions is banned. Did Ukraine oopsie a wrong rocket? Honest mistake!
And using cluster munitions is banned.
TFW you don’t know how treaties work
So if israel kills Palestinian civilians… first does Hamas get the right to kill israelis indiscriminately?
You don’t know how international law works. Cluster munitions are banned. But sure keep on defending civilians being killed. Just a very reasonable person on Lemmy defending the killing of Russian civilians after someone wishes they see the horrors of war.
Civilians weren’t intentionally targeted by Ukraine, unlike Hamas, who happily murders children.
Less than 3% of the israelis killed by Hamas on October7 were children.
40% of the people killed by this “unintentional cluster bombing” were children
Mhhh
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I mean those are some stupid russians to be chilling on the beach at the edge of an active war zone
It’s funny because you are still allowed to post these shit takes, but if you switched Hamas and Russia you’d be banned from .ml at light speed.
Did you notice the guy above me wishing bad things to happen to civilians or you just wanna keep ignoring that.
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Ukraine is fighting to survive.
Yes that’s what Hamas is doing. They are in a far more precarious spot than Ukraine too. Israel was committing Genocide in Gaza far before Oct7. Which makes the comparison wrong.
Russia is comparable to israel. Invading and annexing land by killing people. Hamas is the party resisting occupation just like Ukraine.
If we put the double standards away everyone would start condemning Ukraine right now like they were/are condemning Hamas. Using cluster munitions on civilians is not a great look. What’s different? How the media sells the story?
Who’s using cluster munitions on civilians? The missile was intercepted on the way to it’s actual target. They weren’t targeting that beach
That might be what happened. But as we see the cluster bombs did not explode during interception. Instead they landed all over a beach of people on annexation vacation. There’s a reason why cluster bombs are banned.
But in any case. These are the “horrors of war” which the original commenter was hoping Russian civilians would be seeing no?
There’s a reason why cluster bombs are banned.
By whom?
https://disarmament.unoda.org/convention-on-cluster-munitions/
The Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM) prohibits under any circumstances the use, development, production, acquisition, stockpiling and transfer of cluster munitions, as well as the assistance or encouragement of anyone to engage in prohibited activities. The text of the Convention is available for download in the six official UN languages: عربي, 中文, English, français, русский, español.
Pretty sure the kremlin is a legitimate military target
Wonder if they could make an explosive filled Cessna stealthy enough for that…
They don’t need stealth apparently. They have gotten drones into that airspace.
It’s a joke about a guy landing a Cessna in Red Square.
OHAIMARS
“So sad that the Ukrainian government cares so little about it’s people it is giving Russia an excuse to demolish Ukraine.”
- Some Israel Supporter, probably
I’m waiting for these wars to finally come full circle and for Israel to start selling Russia weapons it got from the United States on the cheap.
Military experts say Ukraine’s ability to use Western-supplied weapons in Russia is aiding its fightback.
Wow, thank God for that expert analysis.
“Destroyed"? Don’t you mean “killed” columns of Russian soldiers? Even if they are in the wrong, these are still lives that are lost, not some equipment.
In the military it’s common to talk about groups of soldiers the same way you talk about equipment. Because the crucial information isn’t their humanity, it’s their utility to the war effort. “Destroyed” is usually used to mean a unit is so broken it must be combined with other units and different militaries have different definitions of exactly how many casualties that takes.
Not sure, I heard they’re actually orcs
Fuck russia. Kill the blyats.
Striking those Russian oil and gas facilities really seemed like the thing that made actual impact. But that damaged global trade which America wasn’t a fan of.
Ukraine has both tactical and strategic plans for striking Russian oil and gas facilities. Strategically it’s important to hit these facilities as reducing output results in a long term slowdown in Russia’s ability to wage war on its neighbours. Tactically it’s a way of both boosting Ukrainian morale and also (most interestingly) forcing the US to help resupply Ukraine.
By reducing Russian production, Ukraine is pushing up oil and gas prices which affects the World and, more importantly, the US economy. Due to the US election cycle, inflation is a hot button topic in the US ATM and the Biden administration will do just about anything it can to reduce its impact on the upcoming Presidential election.
It’s entirely valid to conclude that the Ukrainian’s can bring pressure on the US to provide military aid by attaching Russian oil and gas assets.
Let me be clear: I’m on the side of the Ukrainians.
I’m not following. The first part makes sense, but wouldn’t driving gas up make Ukraine less popular and less likely to get US aid?
That’s a good question. The answer lies not so much about the general popularity and sympathy for Ukraine but rather the amount of pressure Ukraine can exert on the the present US administration to leverage more military aid.
The Ukrainians are aware of the level of sympathy they have in the US as the plucky underdog in this conflict. Striking oil and gas targets deep inside Russia doesn’t diminish this but rather underlines and reinforces the situation. However, reducing the supply of oil and gas impacts the price of oil and gas and has a knock on effect on inflation.
The majority of Americans don’t consciously make that connection, they just feel the pinch in their hip pocket. For better or worse inflation is commonly viewed as domestic issue and this is reinforced by the retoric of those on the right of US politics. So, for many inflation is Joe Biden’s fault.
Therefore, by attacking these targets or threatening to, the Ukrainians can bring the very real pressure on the Biden administration. The President has to continue to show support to the Ukrainians (both moral and materiel) while attempting to rein in the Ukrainians ability and desire to strike deeply at oil and gas targets in Russia.
It appears that this delicate balancing game is ongoing with the US administration pressuring their opponents in the Congress to back down on defunding the Ukrainians while at the same time convincing the Ukrainians to back off a little and focus more on military targets.
I support Ukraine too but throwing Ukrainian soldiers into the meat grinder is a lost cause.
What Russia does care about (and needs to keep their invasion going) is money. Which Russia mostly makes from their oil and gas.
So America not allowing Ukraine to hit Russia where it actually hurts means Putin has no reason to agree to a ceasefire. His money keeps flowing and he can keep his war economy going.
Sounds like a win/win then.
