Dilbert_X
The X stands for
+1,815|6347|eXtreme to the maX
At day four its surprising they're still pursuing this strategy, while weapons and aid are pouring in to the Ukrainians,.

Soldier deaths are not going to help Putin at home, there's no way he doesn't know this. He knows he can't control information any more.

Its possible Putin is blindsided and flailing and the Russian military are doing the minimum to avoid being hanged.
Maybe the whole plan was incompetent and has fallen apart.
Fuck Israel
uziq
Member
+496|3693
how are weapons and aid going to get to the fighters when russia has encircled their main city targets?
Dilbert_X
The X stands for
+1,815|6347|eXtreme to the maX
Up to yesterday they weren't encircled, some places still aren't.
Fuck Israel
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|7013|PNW

uziq wrote:

i’m equally nonplussed.

best suggestion i’ve seen is that they’re using their fodder first in order to encircle the major cities and get set-up for the long haul. combined with saboteurs and people sowing terror/confusion among the population.

idea being the ukrainian morale will collapse in time as the siege mentality kicks in. food is already beginning to run out in the supermarkets in kyiv. with russians encircling the city a massive humanitarian crisis looms. the opening jubilation of shooting 1970s APCs full of clueless 17 year olds who were prodded over a border without their mobile phones will wear off real quick. at that point, it’ll be possible to smash them with the actual hardened units and current-gen tech, when they’re drained of resources and fatigued and disorganised.

i’ve read a lot that russia basically can’t even afford to lose their genuinely nice things. we’ve seen hardly anything of their helicopter gunships, main battle tanks, etc. i’d imagine that stuff could sow terror in a besieged population real quick.
Russia itself has had relatively recent experience with being horribly, hopelessly besieged. It is so disheartening to me that the country would ever want to put others through the same thing at any point in history since.

I have a Russian friend on Steam from whom I get a lot of anecdotal cultural stuff and landmark photographs, and sometimes pronunciation lectures. He hasn't said a whole lot but I can tell he's upset. He has family in Ukraine. I don't press for information or answers though.

uziq wrote:

unnamednewbie13 wrote:

I'm sure the Russians probably don't want to be responsible for Dresden 2.0.
erm they did much worse in grozny and cities all over chechnya in the 1990s. and those very same people who they mercilessly crushed are now … sending their mercenaries to fight for putin in ukraine.

so history is full of neat examples.
Well, yeah. It was more for the expression, 2.0. I'm sure though if they gave zero shits about image they probably wouldn't be showing such "restraint."

Last edited by unnamednewbie13 (2022-02-27 18:26:04)

uziq
Member
+496|3693

Dilbert_X wrote:

Up to yesterday they weren't encircled, some places still aren't.
there’s like a 4 mile long convoy moving on kyiv this evening. the chechens have turned up. the belarusians are on their way. it looks like this is going to move towards increased pressure on the urban centres very soon.
Dilbert_X
The X stands for
+1,815|6347|eXtreme to the maX

uziq wrote:

there’s like a 4 mile long convoy moving on kyiv this evening. the chechens have turned up. the belarusians are on their way. it looks like this is going to move towards increased pressure on the urban centres very soon.
Meanwhile the Germans are whining about their economy.
They should shut down Nord Stream I and take some temporary pain.
Fuck Israel
uziq
Member
+496|3693
the pain in europe from this is already going to be great. made a lot worse by those pandemic lockdowns and shutdowns you keep advocating for. not sure an australian with an insulated economy and a reverse role selling fuel to the asians can really gloat much here.
Dilbert_X
The X stands for
+1,815|6347|eXtreme to the maX
If this goes much further the world will have little choice but a total embargo on trade with Russia, including oil and gas.

Meanwhile Israel is trying to stay friends with Putin for venal self-interest.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/27/worl … ussia.html

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-698739

So far, Israel is managing this situation responsibly, doing what it can to straddle a delicate balancing act between standing for values in the West while guaranteeing its own security interests.
Vladimir Putin controls Syria and has the power to decide if Israeli military strikes against Iranian targets in the country can or cannot continue. If Israel overly criticizes Russia, Putin might just decide to do that.

It is for that reason that Israel is being careful and is watching it’s rhetoric. It is essentially a dilemma between Israeli values and Israeli national security interests.
What a calculation, let Ukrainians die so Israel can kill Syrians and Iranians.

Last edited by Dilbert_X (2022-02-27 19:19:46)

Fuck Israel
Dilbert_X
The X stands for
+1,815|6347|eXtreme to the maX
In a 2018 documentary, President Putin commented that "…if someone decides to annihilate Russia, we have the legal right to respond. Yes, it will be a catastrophe for humanity and for the world. But I'm a citizen of Russia and its head of state. Why do we need a world without Russia in it?"
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60551140
So four years ago Putin had regressed into a teenage deep-think mindset "If I don't exist does the world really exist? then whats the point of anything?"

Now I imagine he's almost an infant again, brilliant.

Looking at his face with its unseeing eyes I'd say he's teetering on the brink of senility. All you can do with these people is try not to annoy them as you wait for them to die.

https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/5cd25f80e1394c8481c170efd9da6c26705f9607/1_0_1278_767/master/1278.jpg?width=1020&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=05733de1b09a0b0a3d2fa8ca9a337f7e
Fuck Israel
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|7013|PNW

I guess Fox is starting to reverse a bit of its Putin-adoration. Meanwhile Newsmax in 2021:

https://i.imgur.com/x5Y7VRp.png

The implication being that Trump was master of earth, or something.

Some of the other headlines at the top, how very Newsmaxy.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+641|3961
Never call someone living 'the great'. Never name a building after someone or make a statue.

They found a video on the cellphone of two bodies that were in a ditch. The Russians in the video kill the father in front of the son who is recording. They then kill the son and dump their bodies into a ditch. I won't link to the videos.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
uziq
Member
+496|3693
very good piece from a russian writer’s POV in the LA review of books.

https://lareviewofbooks.org/short-takes … f-the-war/
Larssen
Member
+99|2129

SuperJail Warden wrote:

Never call someone living 'the great'. Never name a building after someone or make a statue.

They found a video on the cellphone of two bodies that were in a ditch. The Russians in the video kill the father in front of the son who is recording. They then kill the son and dump their bodies into a ditch. I won't link to the videos.
And so the glee with which many were spectating this war turns to hatred. I see it in the political class as well. They were practically falling over one another in ever more calls for support to the war effort, sanctions towards the Putin regime, and so on. All of it justified, of course. But if we're seeing Putin order his nuclear arsenal on 'high alert' and only a few hours later they're already ejected from SWIFT, and a few hours afterwards Borrell is boasting about donating fighter jets to a proxy war, and the next morning we're already reading about new rounds of sanctions all with no patience for a response from the Kremlin..

This might be too much of an insight but decision making in the last few days has been little more than top officials and politicians making emotion-based calls, with little regard for the frameworks that are supposed to guide their actions and with little if any discussion with their supporting staff. You wake up and whatever you did yesterday no longer matters. Who can even keep up with this barrage of sanctions? It's also madness the way in which each of them is openly proclaiming their exact contribution to the Ukrainian war effort. Every 'book' is being thrown out the fucking window.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+641|3961
I assume this is what it felt like after 9/11.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|7013|PNW

I wonder what the feeling would have been if Al Qaeda encircled New York with heavy artillery for a week. Totally wouldn't happen out side of C&C Generals though.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+641|3961
As someone who followed the Syrian and Iraqi Civil Wars closely, the amount of logistical support we are giving the Ukrainians is astounding. ISIS had no international support and required a years long campaign to defeat. And we haven't even defeated them totally. They still rise up from time to time. Meanwhile the Ukrainians have a direct line to essentially limitless advanced weapons. The Ukrainian government is now asking for volunteers and Western nations don't seem bothered by that either.

The cratering of Russia's economy is something else too. So much completely avoidable economic hardship.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+641|3961

unnamednewbie13 wrote:

I wonder what the feeling would have been if Al Qaeda encircled New York with heavy artillery for a week. Totally wouldn't happen out side of C&C Generals though.
Speaking of those guys, maybe we could have a seance and ask them for some tips and tricks to fighting mechanized troops in urban centers. It took us a month a half to get them out of Fallujah. And we weren't against leveling the city to do it.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
uziq
Member
+496|3693

Dilbert_X wrote:

If this goes much further the world will have little choice but a total embargo on trade with Russia, including oil and gas.

Meanwhile Israel is trying to stay friends with Putin for venal self-interest.
wow. it took you less than a week to make ‘the jews’ a talking point in this conflict. why am i not surprised?

isn’t the fact that their heroic president is a JEW a sort of, you know, slap in the face for all the crap you’ve spouted here over the years? i have told you so many times how there’s culturally integrated jews in the west, in the US, in europe, etc, who by no means identify with zionism and so on.

here’s a guy literally upholding the entire democratic order of europe on his shoulders and you’re busy trying to get in cracks about ‘evil israel’.

give it a fucking rest you lunatic. italy have made special pleading in the sanctions over designer fucking fashion for christ’s sake. there’s an entire class of post-FDR germans, like their ex-chancellor, who refuse to condemn putin or step down from their plum roles on their energy companies even now. money talks to the ‘great anglo-saxons’ you always have a homoerotic micro-erection over too.

Last edited by uziq (2022-02-28 15:42:39)

unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|7013|PNW

To be fair to him, he did say Israel. But to also be fair to you, Israel and Jews are often the same topic with Dilbert.

SuperJail Warden wrote:

unnamednewbie13 wrote:

I wonder what the feeling would have been if Al Qaeda encircled New York with heavy artillery for a week. Totally wouldn't happen out side of C&C Generals though.
Speaking of those guys, maybe we could have a seance and ask them for some tips and tricks to fighting mechanized troops in urban centers. It took us a month a half to get them out of Fallujah. And we weren't against leveling the city to do it.
I've read that a lot of high ranking Russian officers are getting killed. Troll thought: I wonder if Putin is using Ukraine to conduct a purge?
uziq
Member
+496|3693
dilbert has seldom distinguished between jews and israel before. hence why i’ve had to tell him so many times that there are ‘secular’ and integrated jewish communities in america or britain or france etc who might be wholly critical of israel. of course dilbert’s type think they’re a fifth column with secret fealties etc etc.

https://twitter.com/kofmanmichael/statu … 40167?s=21

this is a very good thread. for twitter users, that is.
SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+641|3961

uziq wrote:

dilbert has seldom distinguished between jews and israel before. hence why i’ve had to tell him so many times that there are ‘secular’ and integrated jewish communities in america or britain or france etc who might be wholly critical of israel. of course dilbert’s type think they’re a fifth column with secret fealties etc etc.

https://twitter.com/kofmanmichael/statu … 40167?s=21

this is a very good thread. for twitter users, that is.
I just read that one via Reddit. Didn't require logging into Twitter thread the whole thing.
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
uziq
Member
+496|3693
lmao there is no way you’re going to convince me the din of all the mil-sim LARP’ers and upvote whores on reddit are in any way preferable to engaging with twitter.

at least the people posting takes on twitter have established profiles and list their credentials. you can see you’re reading a military analyst because they’ve had an account tweeting on the topic for years prior to this.

reddit user ‘DEagle_alphawOlf’ logging on and claiming to have several years of ‘Spec Ops’ is not a better alternative.

i am sure reddit is awash in combat gore and a bunch of kids all posting the same 2-3 things as if it’s a marvel movie. ‘gooooo ukraine!’

Last edited by uziq (2022-02-28 16:02:47)

SuperJail Warden
Gone Forever
+641|3961
Reddit has an Ukraine War tracker that post tweets.

https://www.reddit.com/live/18hnzysb1elcs
https://i.imgur.com/xsoGn9X.jpg
unnamednewbie13
Moderator
+2,053|7013|PNW

uziq wrote:

https://twitter.com/kofmanmichael/status/1498381975022940167?s=21

this is a very good thread. for twitter users, that is.
I can read all of that up until the "also looking at day 5" comment. It's just when you scroll a just little bit past it does the giant page-locking popup appear, or when I go to click on "show more replies" or something. It remains a very obnoxious method to strongarm signups that will never, ever make me feel very compelled to comply.

Very pinterest of them, anyway, and I feel it breaks some sort of cardinal accessibility sin somewhere in the "web design rulebook." Every popup should have an close button. This one doesn't even have a tiny one. Arresting control of a page should never be a thing. All you can do is refresh. Even if I had an account on all these sites, I'm not always using devices that I want to tie to my social medias.

e: I would add that signing up with even a fake account is just rewarding nasty practice with higher account numbers, but I occasionally buy from Amazon so am not going to sit on that hypocritical high horse.
DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+796|6926|United States of America
I understand why newspapers at least will do the "Sign up to view the whole article", because there is a direct incentive there rather than the line between active users being monetized as part of valuation or some ad revenue thing. If I'm linked to a random twitter thread by someone, I will read until there is a popup, but the go-to response from that isn't "I should make an account", it's "Wellp, I'm done looking at this, I guess". If I wanted to be on Twitter, I'd have one already.

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