It seems you aren’t making the argument that we should never have been involved in the first place. If so, then what do propose is the correct strategy for getting uninvolved? Why are you so impatient for it to end now? If you’re concerned about the Ukrainians who are doing all of the dying, then why don’t we just let them decide when they’ve had enough? We continue to get a good ROI on the weapons that we are sending to people who are still interested in defending themselves at the cost of their lives if necessary. Eventually it will end. I think the present situation calls for strategic patience.
That’s not what I’m saying. I was generally good with sending some aid, and you won’t find any particularly strong stance from me in this thread last year. My eyebrows get raised when we just start dumping cash on top of really shady people who are even shadier than the ones running the USA right now, along with all of the other broader concerns I’ve raised upthread.
We could rather easily demand that peace talks commence. Let the corrupt leadership of both countries make concessions so the people can move on with their lives as well as they can. We have the leverage for this, as we’re the ones taking loans out on our children’s labor for this and many other vast expenditures.
Not that our current leadership ever would, but turning off the funding remains a strategic option for the USA.
That’s how fights typically end, unless the side with the advantage decides to completely annihilate the other side…
I disagree with this notion. The returns on investment are rapidly diminishing. If you agree with my notion that Russia lacks the capability to threaten NATO with conventional forces right now, today, what’s the benefit of grinding their conventional forces down any further?
None of it changes their nuclear, chemical and biological capabilities in a way that reduces their ability to ruin us all.
Wars always end, one way or another.
How? By telling the Ukrainians that they have to give Putin whatever he wants in order to end the war? Because it’s not like Putin is likely to listen because we “demanded.”
Pressuring Putin to come to the table by fighting against him looks a lot like what we are doing right now.
I’d prefer decades but more than the material setback, I would prefer a change in attitude.
He considered them, in his words, baboons. He wanted the US to nuke the USSR after WW2.
No, but this war has no end in sight without insisting that concessions be made. As to how, like I said, restricting the aid to Ukraine is a strategic option for the USA. Not under this leadership, but under other leadership.
I don’t see how Ukraine taking back what’s been taken by Russia serves our interests, let alone the interest of the next several generations.
Maybe ATACMS pushes the Russian supply depots far enough back to break the front lines and be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. That remains to be seen, and if @ins is correct that a decisive gain will be made over the brutal winter than I’ll gladly admit that I’ve been wrong.
If the pattern we’ve seen so far holds, it’s just another slow trickle of weapons systems that prolongs the stalemate, prolongs the dying and prolongs the unbelievably profitable flow of cash to the handful of people who are making out FANTASTIC from maintaining the status quo.
We should all be happy for those people.
I wouldn’t say that the disputed territories don’t matter geopolitically. A lot of energy and agricultural products move through that part of the world. There is a reason there have been centuries of wars over the control of Crimea. That said, I would agree that this alone does not justify US interest in continuing the war.
But, as childish as it may sound, a lot depends on “winning” and making Russia “lose.” More than the loss of tanks or men, that is what will deter Russian aggression and embolden American allies in the region.
Lets say I’m your neighbor. You have a nice 5 acre lot that butts up to a lake and a really nice boat launch, fun in the sun area right on the beach.
I have 30 acres, but none on the beach. I also like to let rip with AK-47’s past midnight and drive around the neighborhood crashing parties and starting fights.
And a couple years ago I set up on your boat launch and decided its mine now. Hope you like Ministry and meth bro!
Now I have all of my friends over and we decide you don’t get to live there anymore. So we just drive up to your doorstep and start swinging.
While you’re busy fighting my bro, I go out back and the rest of my Adams Family pitch tents.
How much property would you like to give us to leave you alone. Btw, we’re keeping the dock, boathouse, barn, and garden.
Commence negotiating. Go ahead. Give me whatever you think it will take to make me leave you alone.
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Russia has already lost. They’ve lost very, very badly. They failed to invade Ukraine, while NATO has expanded.
@SkyzykS Your whole scenario is a good point of comparison, insomuch as the weaker shady neighbor failed to address the threats posed by their stronger and equally shady neighbor.
The weaker neighbor didn’t arm themselves well enough as the years went by and their funds were expended elsewhere.
They didn’t cultivate enough mutually beneficial partnerships with the more affluent folks living on the other side of the lake.
They didn’t take the threat of encroachment and fuckery very seriously at all, until things got really serious.
And now they’re asking the people on the other side of the lake for unlimited help. Why aren’t more Europeans lining up to learn Ukrainian and enlist in the defense of their land? Why aren’t more personal checks being written by people in the Balkans to the Ukrainian Treasury?
Why does this burden now rest on those folks on the other side of the lake?
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Because of the belief that everybody deserves the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Because that neighbor across the lake is the grand parents of the other neighbors across the lake, and they moved over to this side the last time our guy got genocidal and decided that nobody whose name ends in X should live on this entire planet, and even speaking their name or language was a crime punishable by death.
So it comes down to principles. Freedom. A people who want to live in their own country on their own terms- and a very bad neighbor who wants to genocide them, oh yeah and by the way, gonna take their entire land and all of its richness of resources to split with his buddies.
Some people would like to see the tennets that we live by propagate instead of being snuffed out by indifference.
[Insert something about the blood of patriots here.]
Edit: Personal anecdote-
I entered the Allegheny County Jail at the ripe age of 18, like clockwork, on some pretty serious charges. I’ve been pretty forthcoming about my past.
So a guy decides to shit test me at lunch time. He walks right up, looks me straight in the face, calls me a bitch cracker ass motherfucker and takes an apple off of my tray.
So I punched him in the throat and took my apple back.
He never did that again with me. In fact a few people thought that was freakin awesome. They became my friends, even though I already kinda knew the one guy.
So by the analogies, Since I was already trouble, dude should have made me his bitch, and I should have just let him because I was Obviously already a bad actor?
Some might say “Why would you do that for an apple?”.
It wasn’t about the apple. I fucking hate apples.
Good luck with that as long as Putin is alive.
You like to cite the Pareto Principle. I like to live by it.
Imho, 80% of the desired result has already happened. You’re obviously a history guy -when has Russia ever “lost” a battle of meat…errrr…men vs. men; either the planet destroying weapons get dusted off, or this war has grinded to a halt, notwithstanding overly optimistic opinions from both sides.
The right vs. wrong (if you will) of this war has already been decided. It is now at the money making stage.
Also, weren’t there “peace talks” at the start of this conflict? Now, not a peep, why is that??
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Russia is pitiful—>We’s gots to help the country that’s beating them beat them—>Russia is going to invade the U.S. once it beats Ukraine—>Russia is pitful—>We’s gots to help the country that’s beating them beat them—>Russia is going to invade the U.S. once it beats Ukraine.
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Ok, @twojarslave @punnyguy @NickViar & others-
Im sorry. I fucked up bigly. You guys are right and I have a murder of crows to eat.
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This is a proxy war to deplete Russian assets
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The Ukrainians breached the trench lines in Zaporozhie. The only thing stopping them to Advance to Tokhmak is a large group of military stacked north of the way to Thokmak which the Ukrainians are grinding at the moment.
You look at Zaporozhie and it is indeed a large land left to be taken, but it means nothing. Currently the entire land is not protected and the Russian army is located on the trench lines along the front line and in reserve centers which got demolished in Zaporozhie.
There is a limited amount of trained infantry. The elite special forces of Russians are almost depleted. There are not many trained infantry the Russians have left. New mobilization does not fix anything for them.
Yeah, on maps it just shows big zones and areas of conflict. The small victories of either side get kind of blurred by the scale.
I’d like to see maps of the troop locations, concentrations and armaments, but I don’t imagine those are reliably and readily available to basic dude on the internet such as myself.
Started by the Russians.
I don’t disagree that it is a proxy war to deplete Russian assets. That’s kind of why I’m saying it’s working out great for the US.
I have no idea what’s going on over there. I don’t care. I just know that Russia is either winning big(and we are being lied to even bigger), or it’s no threat whatsoever to the U.S.
I haven’t been worried about that since the Reagan years. There was really only a brief period in my life that I was cognizant of the possibility of MAD before the fall of the USSR.
So, like 1980-'87 or so. And past the age of 12 if it didn’t involve titties & weed, I just didn’t care.
Yes.