Russian invasion of Ukraine

[Kaleredar]

When all is said and done though, I'm kinda surprised by the response from the russians. The state propaganda is kinda subdued about it an putin is downplaying it.

I mean they could have used this to try and generate more support instead they claim it is not a huge deal.

I guess it's once again a case of: better to appear incompetent in order to avoid further embarrassment?

Like we've said; it's a matter of "you can't make the Ukrainians appear too competent in their ability to wage war and cause harm in Russia or people will begin to fear that the continuation of a war they know is BS is actually making them less safe, and they become more afraid of the Ukrainians than the Kremlin."

That's been the Russian MO when Ukraine has trounced them in the past. Russia wants the Russian people to fear Russia more than they fear Ukraine.

[YUPPIE]

did minimal damage.

let's not brush off the deaths of very little kids as "minimal damage."

[Joszef Kiprich]

Considering the amount the orcs send, yes this is minimal damage. Sadly the minimal still involves death.

[Azadina]

let's not brush off the deaths of very little kids as "minimal damage."

Never saw that kind of concern for the millions of very little kids you're willing to burn in a nuclear fire of WW3. You know, the thing you actively wish to happen.

There's a word for faking concern.

[Corvus]

Russian freedom lads have gone back into Bilhorod again. Lot of panic from the vatniks. Reports of evacuations, burning of documents.

[Kallisto]

let's not brush off the deaths of very little kids as "minimal damage."

Considering you want billions of dead kids you don't get to cry about 2 being dead.

[YUPPIE]

Russian freedom lads have gone back into Bilhorod again. Lot of panic from the vatniks. Reports of evacuations, burning of documents.

And so what I said yesterday has come to pass. Citing an article

On 1 June 2023, the Russian Volunteer Corps and Freedom of Russia Legion announced that they were conducting another operation on the territory of the Russian Federation.

The fighters recorded a video message and reported they were going toward Shebekino. In particular, a man in a military uniform says in the video that "the neighbourhood of Shebekino will appear very soon."

https://t.me/russvolcorps/561

The fighters claim that they plan to liberate all of Russia from Putin's regime.

The Freedom of Russia Legion also announced a raid on the territory of the Russian Federation: "We, the Freedom of Russia Legion, are now near the border of our homeland, very soon we will advance again on the territory of Russia to bring freedom, peace, and tranquility. Graivoron is only the beginning."

Locals are asked not to leave buildings and to remain calm.
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The consequence of this? The Kremlin has vowed all-out vengeance against Ukraine - the "Armed Forces of Ukraine" as they call the partisians, launching a missile strike on Kyiv that killed 3 people, including yet another child, and injured many more.

[jonnysensible]

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The consequence of this? The Kremlin has vowed all-out vengeance against Ukraine - the "Armed Forces of Ukraine" as they call the partisians, launching a missile strike on Kyiv that killed 3 people, including yet another child, and injured many more.

i mean they are trying to genocide them you can't really go much higher with esculation, also pravada is garbage

[YUPPIE]

You've been saying this from day one; first it was "if Ukraine holds out too long the Kremlin will be even more dangerous", then it was "if the West gives Ukraine aid the Kremlin will be even more dangerous", and then "if the West sanctions Russia the Kremlin will be even more dangerous."

I have a perfect response for you, recently out of Joseph Robinette Biden Jr's mouth and then some. It's quite a read though but informative.

Despite the Russian leader’s apocalyptic warnings, the United States has gradually agreed to expand Ukraine’s arsenal with Javelin and Stinger missiles, HIMARS rocket launchers, advanced missile defense systems, drones, helicopters, M1 Abrams tanks and, soon, fourth-generation fighter jets.

A key reason for brushing aside Putin’s threats, U.S. officials say, is a dynamic that has held since the opening days of the war: Russia’s president has not followed through on promises to punish the West for providing weapons to Ukraine. His bluffing has given U.S. and European leaders some confidence they can continue doing so without severe consequences — but to what extent remains one of the conflict’s most dangerous uncertainties.

“Russia has devalued its red lines so many times by saying certain things would be unacceptable and then doing nothing when they happen,” said Maxim Samorukov, a Russia expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “The problem is that we don’t know the actual red line. It’s in one person’s head, and it can change from one day to the next.”

U.S. officials say managing the risk of escalation remains one of the most difficult aspects of the war for Biden and his foreign policy advisers. When deciding what new weapons systems to provide Ukraine, they focus on four key factors, officials said.

“Do they need it? Can they use it? Do we have it? What is the Russian response going to be?” said a senior State Department official. Like others interviewed for this report, this person spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal deliberations.

The official said Russia’s reluctance to retaliate has influenced the risk calculus of Secretary of State Antony Blinken, a key Biden confidant who has been an influential voice encouraging the administration and U.S. allies to do more to support Ukraine.

“You factor that in your decision-making. We did this — there was no escalation or response — can we do the next thing? We’re constantly weighing those factors, and it becomes the hardest judgment call we have to make,” said the official.

Like Blinken, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan also has viewed the benefits of supplying more lethal weaponry to Ukraine as outweighing the risks of escalation and has worked extensively with European allies on providing F-16s to Ukraine, said a White House official.

The administration has juggled these concerns amid a clamor from Ukrainians and hawks in Congress frustrated by the incremental approach and eager for Biden to move faster in sending more advanced equipment to the battlefield amid Russia’s brutal onslaught.

------------------

At the outset of Russia’s invasion in February last year, Putin warned that any country that tried to “impede” his forces “must know that the Russian response will be immediate and lead to consequences you have never seen in history.”

As the war has dragged on, the warnings from Putin and his subordinates have only become more bombastic, threatening a nuclear holocaust if Russia faced setbacks on the battlefield.

“If Russia feels its territorial integrity is threatened, we will use all defense methods at our disposal, and this is not a bluff,” Putin said last September.

Dmitry Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of Putin’s powerful security council, was more explicit in January. “The defeat of a nuclear power in a conventional war may trigger a nuclear war,” he said.

While Putin has challenged the United States — suspending participation in a critical arms control treaty, imprisoning Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and overseeing a court’s decision to sentence WNBA star Brittney Griner to a nine-year prison term before insisting on a one-for-one trade for a notorious arms merchant — he has not lashed out militarily at Washington or its allies.

But Western officials are cognizant that that doesn’t mean he never will — particularly as the conflict escalates.

On Tuesday, drones struck affluent districts of Moscow in what one Russian politician called the worst attack on the capital since World War II. Ukraine has denied involvement in such strikes within the Russian mainland, and the Biden administration said it neither enables nor encourages Ukrainian attacks inside Russia. But Kyiv appears content with Russian civilians experiencing the fears that Ukrainians have lived with for more than a year as their population centers have come under relentless Russian missile and drone attacks.

A possible explanation for Putin’s reluctance to hit the West is the diminished state of Russia’s military, according to U.S. officials.

“It would not seem to be in their interest to get into a direct confrontation with NATO right now,” said the senior U.S. official. “They are not well positioned to do so.”

Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, estimated in a recent interview with Foreign Affairs that Russia has suffered as many as 250,000 dead and wounded since its full-scale invasion began — staggering losses for any conflict.

Putin has replaced them on the battlefield, Milley said, but with reservists who are “poorly led, not well trained, poorly equipped, not well sustained.”

As Russian fatalities have mounted, Putin has recalibrated his war aims, from seizing control of Kyiv and decapitating the government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to controlling and annexing a swath of territory across eastern and southern Ukraine.

Still, U.S. officials remain wary that Russia, home to the world’s largest nuclear arsenal, could escalate in Ukraine or elsewhere. Last year, amid heightened concerns that Russia was considering deploying a nuclear weapon, senior State Department officials privately warned Moscow about the consequences of doing so — messages that were eventually followed by public warnings.

As the Biden administration has weighed such risks, Ukrainian leaders, including Zelensky, have expressed their consternation publicly. The perceived dithering and delay, they have claimed, has prolonged the bloodshed by inhibiting Ukraine’s ability to overwhelm the Russian military and force an end to the war.

Republican hawks in Congress, meanwhile, have said the threat of Russian escalation should not even be a consideration. Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has called the administration “cowardly” for not sending tactical missile systems known as ATACMS. The weapons, with a range up to about 190 miles, have been high on Ukraine’s wish list for almost the entirety of the war.

“Every time the administration has delayed sending Ukraine a critical weapon system, from Stingers to HIMARS to Bradleys, over fears of Russian escalation, they have been proven completely and utterly wrong,” he said earlier this year.

Britain approved the transfer of weapons with a similar range, air-launched cruise missiles known as Storm Shadows, in early May.

“Certain red lines exist,” said Alexander Gabuev, director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center in Berlin, “… but because we don’t have a way to know for sure what they are, that’s what creates risk.”
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In summary, we do not exactly know when Putin will decide to destroy everything because he hasn't done anything of the like yet. And that's the scariest part, we keep provoking him regardless, almost as if challenging him.

[No Kings Voter]

I have a perfect response for you, recently out of Joseph Robinette Biden Jr's mouth and then some. It's quite a read though but informative.

Zero of the pull quotes from your copypasta are from Biden.

Using red text as a scare tactic is terribly junvenile. You're purpsoely trying to scare people in the dumbest ways. It should be infractable.

[Edge-]

In summary, we do not exactly know when Putin will decide to destroy everything because he hasn't done anything of the like yet. And that's the scariest part, we keep provoking him regardless, almost as if challenging him.

Is your fallout shelter ready?

[LeGin v3]

Is your fallout shelter ready?

I've always wanted to establish whether or not there's an afterlife. If there is I'll pursue him with a pineapple.


Yuppie, I mean, not Putin.

[Azadina]

Is your fallout shelter ready?

I thought he wanted to get drafted, not hide in a bunker? Could be wrong....he has strangely refused, repeatedly even, all the offers of all expenses paid trip to vacation spots in the donbass region.

He can't say there's no opportunity for his fantasies of storming the lines in blaze of glory, or that he can't afford to.

[YUPPIE]

I will say the fact the culminating answer to everything the West has done with Ukraine lies in pure uncertainty and gamble on the whims of a mad dictator makes me deeply anxious.

What I read out of that article over and over is that we can't just sit back and do nothing, so we may as well poke the beast's head and see how far we get with it.

[Edge-]

What I read out of that article over and over is that we can't just sit back and do nothing, so we may as well poke the beast's head and see how far we get with it.

So have you volunteered to join the partisans and fight the righteous fight, yet?

[zealo]

In summary, we do not exactly know when Putin will decide to destroy everything because he hasn't done anything of the like yet. And that's the scariest part, we keep provoking him regardless, almost as if challenging him.

Remember to check under your bed for the scary nooks, Putin might have hid one there just for you.

[postman1782]

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-b2349639.html

Apparently Newsmax is trying to be sued by the City of Davenport, Iowa for lying that the collapsed building is the result of a drone strike in Russia. Even though in the video that Newsmax shows, it CLEARLY SHOWS a fucking sign in ENGLISH.

https://twitter.com/MikeSington/stat...DU2fLz0ZcuAAAA
Tweet with embedded video. And you can clearly see the "tow away zone" in English sign they had.

[Edge-]

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-b2349639.html

Apparently Newsmax is trying to be sued by the City of Davenport, Iowa for lying that the collapsed building is the result of a drone strike in Russia. Even though in the video that Newsmax shows, it CLEARLY SHOWS a fucking sign in ENGLISH.

https://twitter.com/MikeSington/stat...DU2fLz0ZcuAAAA
Tweet with embedded video. And you can clearly see the "tow away zone" in English sign they had.

This is all pretty silly. Using the wrong picture is a mistake and it happens a lot, there have been countless reports where literal videogame footage/screenshots were used to report on real-world events lol.

Now if Newsmax doubles down on that image and spends weeks doing so, then there might be some legal grounds for something. But beyond this it's simply bad/lazy/shoddy reporting, which is very much not illegal.

[Poopymonster]

This is all pretty silly. Using the wrong picture is a mistake and it happens a lot, there have been countless reports where literal videogame footage/screenshots were used to report on real-world events lol.

Now if Newsmax doubles down on that image and spends weeks doing so, then there might be some legal grounds for something. But beyond this it's simply bad/lazy/shoddy reporting, which is very much not illegal.

If they retract it, they lose their formerly-of-faux news viewer base to their competitor Onan.

[beanman12345]

I will say the fact the culminating answer to everything the West has done with Ukraine lies in pure uncertainty and gamble on the whims of a mad dictator makes me deeply anxious.

What I read out of that article over and over is that we can't just sit back and do nothing, so we may as well poke the beast's head and see how far we get with it.

If you stop being paralyzed by fear, the need for adult diapers might lessen.