Russian invasion of Ukraine

[Shalcker]

And why should an innocent nation cede anything to an aggressor? Ukraine has done nothing to warrant the purging of their population.

"Innocence" is in the eye of beholder; Russia doesn't see Ukraine that way, and we're long past the point where you could convince it otherwise.

Why do you personally think a bully should be given what they want, or the blame is shifted on the victim for getting hurt?

Because alternative can be bully hitting his target until it dies.

[Iphie]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...st-claims.html

So, what's this all about?

Russian grunts injuring their own officer. Surely for sending him off the battlefield to protect him? All according to the plan?

I can do you one better:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...box=1648223229

Take it with a sufficient amount of salt of course.

[Breccia]

there is another Harry Potter universe movie about to release

From the sounds of things, "Harry Potter and The War You Can End Any Time By Letting Me Kill You"?

Biden announces natural gas deal with EUrope. There are some hurdles to clear, but it's a start.

The deal calls on the United States to send an additional 15 billion cubic meters of liquefied natural gas — roughly 10 to 12 percent of current annual U.S. exports to all countries. But it did not address the lack of port capacity to ship and receive more gas on both sides of the Atlantic. The effort could also struggle because the Biden administration can’t simply order U.S. exporters to sell gas to European buyers or to set prices that are acceptable to sellers and buyers.

I'm also going to quote this entire part verbatim because NYTimes and paywall.

Russian forces no longer have full control of Kherson, the first major Ukrainian city that President Vladimir V. Putin’s forces managed to capture as part of his invasion, a senior Pentagon official said on Friday.

Ukrainian forces are now fighting fiercely in Kherson and pushing back Russian gains there, again making the strategically important port city “contested territory,” the official told reporters during a briefing.

That contradicts a statement released on Friday by Maj. Gen. Sergei Rudskoi, the chief of the Main Operational Directorate of the Russian military’s General Staff, who claimed that the Kherson region was “under full control.”

Ukrainians in Kherson and Ukrainian officials also questioned the Pentagon’s assessment, saying that the city appeared to remain firmly in Russian hands, though Ukrainian forces are fighting across the broader Kherson region.

"That could be anyone's burning Russian vehicles at Kherson airport!"

Any Ukrainian success in taking back Kherson would be a huge blow to Mr. Putin’s war effort, making it harder for Russia to follow through on any plans to seize control of Ukraine’s Black Sea coast and the southern port of Odessa, defense officials said. Losing Kherson would also endanger Russian troops who have been fighting in nearby Mykolayiv, the Pentagon official said.

But Russian forces, while stymied on the ground, have continued to strike Ukrainian cities from the skies. In addition, the official said that Moscow had begun drawing on its forces in Georgia for movement to Ukraine.

In another sign of the ground stalemate for Mr. Putin’s troops in Ukraine, Russian soldiers have adopted “defensive positions” on the ground near Kyiv, the capital. They have also abandoned efforts to capture it from the ground, the official said.

“They don’t show any sign of being able to move on Kyiv from the ground,” the official said. He added that U.S. officials believed that Russia was “prioritizing” the fight in eastern Ukraine, where Russian-backed separatists have been fighting Ukrainian troops since 2014.

The official’s comments echoed those of General Rudskoi, who said that Russian forces would now focus on the Donbas region in the east. Asked whether General Rudskoi’s statement represented a shift in Russia’s strategy, the Pentagon official said, “Clearly, they overestimated their ability to take Kyiv and overestimated their ability to take any population center.” He added that it was “fair to say they faced some intelligence failures of their own.”

The Pentagon also confirmed Ukrainian reports that their forces on Thursday destroyed a Russian warship that was docked in Berdyansk, in southeastern Ukraine.

Emphasis mine. Also shout-out to...was it @Easo ? who called out that warship earlier.

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Because alternative can be bully hitting his target until it dies.

No.

The alternative is the bully never hits the target. Put the blame where it belongs and stop justifying violence towards innocents.

[Bakis]

"Innocence" is in the eye of beholder; Russia doesn't see Ukraine that way, and we're long past the point where you could convince it otherwise.

Agree since the overwhelming majority only gets their news from Goebbels Kremlins propaganda machine.
Russians are essentially serfs when it comes to accurate information.

[Breccia]

EU needs Russian’s gas. There is no denying that. However, Russia needs EU also. China is no replacement for EU. At least not in the near future.

Let's not forget, as we've seen in this very thread, China pays less than the EU does, per unit. Even if China could take the excess, Russia would still lose. I mean, continue losing.

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Russians are essentially serfs when it comes to accurate information.

That's not true, they have YouTube and Twitter and...shit, Putin banned those. Nevermind.

[Saradain]

"Innocence" is in the eye of beholder; Russia doesn't see Ukraine that way, and we're long past the point where you could convince it otherwise.

Because alternative can be bully hitting his target until it dies.

Sounds like Russia needs permanent sanctions and war crime tribunals for the next 100 years, just like the world did with nazis. Denazification, right?

[Fugus]

It’s baffling how his suspensions are still of the temporary sort after this long.

Endus already explained it once, basically it boils down to the moderation here being virtually powerless outside of them passing certain lines.

I personally could lie and claim the most outlandish stuff I wanted about any person in the news, I could push the theory that Tom Hanks was a pedophile that tag teamed boys with Hillary Clinton and they would not have the authority to do anything about it. So long as I wasn't directing the lies towards a person on these forums, I am effectively untouchable to them. Even if I know it's a lie even before I say it and been called out for lying about it 50 times.

Unless I outright insult or threaten someone on here, I am effectively safer than a hacker in Russia who makes sure he doesn't target anything in Russia.

And I toyed around with it and strung on a thread for a page or 2 derailing it some just as an experiment and was really overt about it too and pointed out what I was doing, and people here still took the bait because they couldn't help themselves. So, even if someone is overt, people will still feed them and the moderation won't do anything about it.

[Breccia]

More from the NYTimes because I paid for the sub dammit.

Russia signaled on Friday it may be reducing its war aims, announcing that it would now focus its forces on taking more territory in eastern Ukraine and that the goals of the “first stage of the operation” had been “mainly accomplished.”

With Ukraine putting up fierce resistance and Russia having failed to seize key cities in the early days of the war, Friday’s statement from a senior general amounted to the most direct acknowledgment yet that Russia would not be able to take control of all or most of Ukraine. The plan now, the general said, was to focus on taking the eastern region known as the Donbas, where Russia has recognized the independence of two Russia-backed separatist “republics.”

Ukraine’s combat power had been “significantly reduced,” Maj. Gen. Sergei Rudskoi, the chief of the Main Operational Directorate of the Russian military’s General Staff, said in a statement. “As individual units carry out their tasks — and they are being solved successfully — our forces and means will be concentrated on the main thing: the complete liberation of the Donbas.”

It was General Rudskoi’s first public statement since the start of Russia’s invasion on Feb. 24, a signal that his comments carried more significance than the daily updates on the course of the war delivered by the Defense Ministry’s spokesman, Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov. And while it was far from certain that Russia was prepared to end the war quickly, his comments laid the groundwork for the Kremlin to be able to make the argument that Russia was getting what it wanted despite the challenges on the battlefield.

“The demilitarization of Ukraine is being achieved” through missile strikes on military infrastructure and attacks on Ukrainian units, General Rudskoi said. “Demilitarizing” Ukraine was one of the main goals that Mr. Putin set for the war when it began on Feb. 24, and Russian and Ukrainian officials have been negotiating the contours of a settlement in recent weeks even as the fighting has continued.

General Rudskoi said Russia could still mount an offensive against Kyiv and other major cities, but that the main purpose of positioning troops outside those cities was to prevent Ukraine from sending reinforcements to the east. Russian troops have been slowly advancing westward from the portion of eastern Ukraine occupied by Russian-backed separatists, and have been bombarding the port city of Mariupol, the biggest population center in the part of the Donbas that was controlled by Ukraine before the war.

“We do not exclude” the possibility of storming cities, General Rudskoi said, but “our forces and resources will be concentrated” on the Donbas.

Russia has said that its terms for peace also include Ukrainian recognition of Russian control of Crimea, which President Vladimir V. Putin’s forces seized from Ukraine in 2014, and of the independence of the Russia-backed Donbas statelets, the “Donetsk People’s Republic” and the “Luhansk People’s Republic.” President Volodymyr Zelensky has ruled out ceding Ukrainian sovereignty to stop the war, and Russia’s continued offensives appear aimed at creating facts on the ground to force him to accept.

The West supplying weapons to Ukraine is “a huge mistake,” General Rudskoi said. “This prolongs the conflict, increases the number of victims and will not be able to influence the outcome of the operation.”

But even winning control of the full Donbas region would be a far cry from Russia’s more expansive, earlier war aims, which appeared to include taking control of Kyiv and toppling Mr. Zelensky’s government.

General Rudskoi said 1,351 Russian soldiers had been killed in the war, the first figure Russia offered in more than three weeks. Last week, the U.S. Defense Department estimated that at least 7,000 Russians had died, and the Ukrainian government has claimed more than twice that many Russian war dead.

Pavel Luzin, a Russian military analyst, cautioned that the public pronouncements of Russian military commanders should not be taken at face value. While Russia could indeed be narrowing its war aims, he said, General Rudskoi’s statements could also be a feint as Russia regroups for a possible new offensive.

“We could say that this is a signal that we’re no longer insisting on dismantling Ukrainian statehood,” Mr. Luzin said. “But I would rather see it as a distracting maneuver.”

So yes, of course this could be a trick. This could be more of Putin's clever planning and strategy that's gotten them to this point so far.

[Bakis]

That's not true, they have YouTube and Twitter and...shit, Putin banned those. Nevermind.

They still got YouTube only cos its so huge and Russians whould raise questions, it is hard for even Kremlin to play the extremist card.
Plus its a platform for dissinformation from Putler.

However given the decline in the last non-statecontrolled forms of information and news I think YouTube will be banned shortly.

[Breccia]

Sounds like Russia needs permanent sanctions and war crime tribunals for the next 100 years, just like the world did with nazis.

Actually, he did say "There is also independent (from both of us) justice system that could potentially protect me." So it sounds like he'd be in favor of this.

[MCMLXXXII]

Vladimort and the war that shall not be named.

[Dadwen]

No, i'm not against violence.

I prefer world without it aesthetically, and i'd rather not suffer it personally (or see anyone else suffer), but as it exists it remains as a tool in human arsenal. Like surgery - people being cut is clearly bad, but sometimes seen as necessary.

And limiting use of violence requires a lot more then wishful thinking.

Noone who paid any attention is surprised.
Non-negotiable "NATO expansion show-stopper" only related to Ukraine and Georgia.
If you look at articles that was quite clear to IR scholars.

Really threat of Finland formal NATO expansion seem to have gotten ole Putin's blood pressure a bit up too.

Well Russia keeping their expansion aspirations in it's pants would be wishful thinking? (without a lot less countries would really be bothered with NATO for the most part *using that military money for something else as they have been doing and EU would have just been happy letting Russia alone running itself how it likes as long as it's keeps being their gas station.) * why there is a need for NATO is Kinda like a burglar asking why people need a security system.

[Saradain]

Actually, he did say "There is also independent (from both of us) justice system that could potentially protect me." So it sounds like he'd be in favor of this.

I mean the way he posts makes me think that he agrees with the "if you got sentenced, you did something wrong" sentiment. So he has nothing to fear as the justice system surely would not arrest first, invent the crime later.

[Poopymonster]

They still got YouTube only cos its so huge and Russians whould raise questions, it is hard for even Kremlin to play the extremist card.
Plus its a platform for dissinformation from Putler.

However given the decline in the last non-statecontrolled forms of information and news I think YouTube will be banned shortly.

Hey Google, if you're reading, oh who the fuck am I kidding, of course you are. You are GOOGLE.

Reroute any Russian IP traffic from Youtube to the vid of your choice or a message saying WHY they've been denied.

[Breccia]

They still got YouTube

Fuck, you're right, I was thinking of Facebook.

And Instragram.

If they do ban YouTube, there's only one logical reason, of course. Normally I'd say "I won't hold my breath" but...in this case I might be able to.

Here's a TIME article explaining why Bakis is right about YouTube for everyone else.

[Poopymonster]

Vladimort and the war that shall not be named.

Vladdy Putin and the Comedian of Kyiv.

[Breccia]

I mean the way he posts makes me think that he agrees with the "if you got sentenced, you did something wrong" sentiment.

Man, I hope he's not bringing home a bag of Skittles.

On topic: More on natural gas.

Germany released a report on Friday showing that the country was cutting its dependence on Russian energy sooner than many thought possible.

Robert Habeck, the vice chancellor and economic minister, said Germany expected to cut its imports of Russian oil in half by the midsummer and nearly end the imports by end of this year.

The need for Russian coal could be halved in “the coming weeks,” he said. And he estimated that Germany could be free of Russian gas by the middle of 2024, if all goes well.

“We have made intensive efforts in recent weeks, together with all relevant stakeholders, to import less fossil energy from Russia and broaden the supply base,” Mr. Habeck said.

Sounds like they're...warming up? Eh? Eh?...to Biden's proposal. Yeah, it can't be done overnight. But we can take the first step right now.

[bladeXcrasher]

EU needs Russian’s gas. There is no denying that. However, Russia needs EU also. China is no replacement for EU. At least not in the near future.

According to EIA, Russia exported 7 trillion cubic feet of natural gas to EU in 2021. Around 0.7 trillion cubic feet to China. Which coincidentally matched the current maximum capacity of the 56-inch diameter Power of Siberia pipeline with the currently operating compressor stations. The schedule before the war indicates that it will reach a capacity of 1.3 trillion cubic feet per year by 2025, and the pipeline peak capacity of 2.2 trillion cubic feet by 2030. Even at peak capacity it is still not enough to replace the loss of EU natural gas consumption.

For comparison, Australia is the largest exporter of natural gas to China with 40% of the market. US is #2 (and growing) and Qatar is #3. In 2021, Russia was #6. Behind Indonesia.

It boils down to the fact that there are 2 major issues with natural gas export from Russia to China - capacity and cost.

The maximum capacity of transporting gas through pipeline is governed by Boyle’s law. The only limit to transporting LNG through the sea routes is the availability of tankers.

Then there is the cost. Including the pipeline cost amortized over 30 years and energy cost, even heavily discounted, the Chinese currently pays around $780 per ton for Russian’s natural gas. LNG tankers are much cheaper. LNG from Australia & US cost the Chinese less than $500 per ton.

For years China's been working on financing off-shore liquification facilities here in the Gulf of Mexico. Before I left my old job to go back to school they had already purchased the warning lights to mark the multiple platform pylons which were scheduled to be installed.

[Shalcker]

EU needs Russian’s gas. There is no denying that. However, Russia needs EU also. China is no replacement for EU. At least not in the near future.

You just destroyed reason why Russia "needed" EU. It's quite hard to earn back trust when you steal hard-earned Russian money.

What is the point of selling you anything if Russia cannot buy what it wants from Europe in turn, and anything it saves for rainy day Europe just steals?

Russia can trade with everyone else in their own currencies; it doesn't need European money in other markets, especially with far-reaching sanctions potentially going into those markets and banning transactions for Russia either way.

Can't you just look one step ahead?

According to EIA, Russia exported 7 trillion cubic feet of natural gas to EU in 2021. Around 0.7 trillion cubic feet to China. Which coincidentally matched the current maximum capacity of the 56-inch diameter Power of Siberia pipeline with the currently operating compressor stations. The schedule before the war indicates that it will reach a capacity of 1.3 trillion cubic feet per year by 2025, and the pipeline peak capacity of 2.2 trillion cubic feet by 2030. Even at peak capacity it is still not enough to replace the loss of EU natural gas consumption.

There are still new LNG facilities being built in northern ports. And some LNG facilities already operating - btw, those supplied LNG to Europe as well, got to find replacement for them too.

For comparison, Australia is the largest exporter of natural gas to China with 40% of the market. US is #2 (and growing) and Qatar is #3. In 2021, Russia was #6. Behind Indonesia.

Didn't you want to recruit Qatar to "save" Europe from Russian dependency? Didn't US pledge to do that same?

Which market do you think that gas will be missing from if not Asia?

The maximum capacity of transporting gas through pipeline is governed by Boyle’s law. The only limit to transporting LNG through the sea routes is the availability of tankers.

Which is also not unlimited.
How much "spare" tanker fleet is there?
How fast can you build new ones?

Then there is the cost. Including the pipeline cost amortized over 30 years and energy cost, even heavily discounted, the Chinese currently pays around $780 per ton for Russian’s natural gas. LNG tankers are much cheaper. LNG from Australia & US cost the Chinese less than $500 per ton.

I don't know where you get those numbers from, but LNG is pretty much never cheaper.

[Breccia]

Russia can trade with everyone else in their own currencies

No they can't. You said MOEX was the only source and foreigners don't use that. Were you wrong then or are you wrong now?

I don't know where you get those numbers from

So? You use unsourced numbers all the time. Seems a little hypocritical to call it out when others do it.