What are the Russian objectives in Ukraine?

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by Airbornelawyer

For Putin, best-case scenario is...

Thanks very much for the detail. Wonder if he's ready to interdict EU-marked (not NATO) vehicles with supplies that are marching in from Poland. Airport right there at Rzeszow that is pushing things across to Lviv.

[Penn]

I suppose Putin may be said to have miscalculated, expecting the same poor military response and Western political response to his previous actions in Georgia and Crimea. In population, Ukraine is 10 times larger than Georgia, and almost 1/3 the size of Russia, and has a military tested in battle with Russians and Russian-Ukrainian separatists since the Crimea annexation. By sheer numbers alone, Russia will likely prevail militarily, but the cost has been far greater then expected.

Prevail, perhaps due to lack of will.

Viewing war reports from media external to USA, for an open-source assessment of strength and capability, an image emerges of the Russian Army as a ground force that is not formidable.

Supply line problems, food shortages, with huge numbers of conscripts that are poorly trained, who are not engaging and are sabotaging equipment, leaking fuel, delaying moving to contact, and surrendering in mass, etc., etc,. Not certain how much of that is true, but considering the weapons employed thus far, one would have to conclude, that all the destruction is standoff arty and other airborne delivery methods, rather than move to contact infantry assaults.

When contact has occurred and been documented, it appears the Ukrainians are holding their own in the field.

That said, one must consider that for all the hype of Russia’s million-man army, it’s a paper tiger. Relying on standoff weapon systems, rather than boots on the ground to force its will on its adversaries.

A forty mile long convoy of 7000+ vehicles, math-ed at 176 per mile x 40, conservatively may be carrying 10+ soldiers each, is ¾ of the army, exposed. Is it any wonder the Putin placed the nuclear option on the board?

Putin understands his gamble is based on the west fear of his psychological unknowns, would he push the button? It’s his only game.

If the west were to augment the Ukrainians army with equipment and advisors right now, they could destroy the whole the Russian army in the field, with the Ukraine’s as the proxy.

[Box]

I wish I could draw a reasonable conclusion from all of the experts, consultants, advisors, and elected representatives that went from being respected virologists to becoming experts on foreign policy with Russia and former Soviet states in a matter of weeks...
...but I can't.

If I had a silver dollar for every time one of these motherfucking leftists have been right about foreign policy in the last 30 years I'd have about 63 old pennies and a pull tab from a half drank can of Fresca - now all of the sudden I'm supposed to believe that anyone from the government is going to get it right?

No thanks

[Penn]

Viewing war reports from media external to USA, for an open-source assessment of strength and capability, an image emerges of the Russian Army as a ground force that is not formidable.

Supply line problems, food shortages, with huge numbers of conscripts that are poorly trained, who are not engaging and are sabotaging equipment, leaking fuel, delaying moving to contact, and surrendering in mass, etc., etc,. Not certain how much of that is true, but considering the weapons employed thus far, one would have to conclude, that all the destruction is standoff arty and other airborne delivery methods, rather than move to contact infantry assaults.

When contact has occurred and been documented, it appears the Ukrainians are holding their own in the field.

That said, one must consider that for all the hype of Russia’s million-man army, it’s a paper tiger. Relying on standoff weapon systems, rather than boots on the ground to force its will on its adversaries.

A forty mile long convoy of 7000+ vehicles, math-ed at 176 per mile x 40, conservatively may be carrying 10+ soldiers each, is ¾ of the army, exposed. Is it any wonder the Putin placed the nuclear option on the board?

Putin understands his gamble is based on the west fear of his psychological unknowns, would he push the button? It’s his only game.

If the west were to augment the Ukrainians army with equipment and advisors right now, they could destroy the whole the Russian army in the field, with the Ukraine’s as the proxy.

Box, or anyone, please tear this assessment/idea apart, the goal is to improve the process.

[Box]

Putin cut his teeth on the "Seven Days to the River Rhine" doctrine.
By some accounts, he had a front-row seat to the fall of the USSR because he was sitting in a KGB post in East Germany when the music stopped in the soviets 70 year old game of musical hairs. I think taking the position that he is somehow afraid of public opinion might be a dangerous gambit.

Now he is being disrespected by a guy that gave a shout out to the brave Iranians fighting to keep Kyiv free, the same guy that said during the same speech that You can't build a wall high enough to keep out a vaccine
He is being globally mocked by a nation with a senate minority leader that is so accustomed to kabuki theater that he stood up to clap while people are still booing and a house speaker that stood up to do a jig when the POTUS talked about veterans getting cancer from burn pit exposure. He is being mocked by a nation that releases violent criminals from jail because the cops are racists while threatening to jail "domestic terrorists" that disagree with the administration's approved messaging as well as extremist soccer moms that are concerned about their children's ejukayshun.
Last, of all, he is being mocked by a nation that is cheering the act of handing out AK-47s to the citizenry while demanding that their own citizens register all firearms because you can't fight a military that has fighter jets and nukes.

Putin is certainly the bad guy - he always has been - always will be - but ask yourself...
...if you were Vladimir Putin, would you be willing to gamble that you could push onward against such a threat with little or no relevant threat from a nation that is screaming about sanctions while still cutting you checks for 600,000 barrels a day filled with Texas tea - bubbling crude
...(Oil that is, black gold, Texas tea)

Putin isn't done yet. Why would he be?

[Airbornelawyer]

One oddity to me is that Putin's rise to power was facilitated in part by Russia's poor performance in the First Chechen War. Due to poor planning, poor intelligence, poor motivation on the part of Russian soldiers, and the general decline of the former Soviet Army in the 1990s, the Russians were shocked by their armed forces' failures in what they probably expected then to be a cakewalk. Dudayev's forces were far weaker, and themselves divided among Chechen nationalist, Islamist and gangster/smuggler factions who didn't really trust each other, yet prevailed.

When Putin came to power, he engineered a series of events to allow him to re-launch that war, and Russia crushed Chechnya. Now, he seems to have decided to make many of the mistakes Yeltsin made in miscalculating the state of the enemy and his own forces.

[JJ_BPK]

What does Putin want?


He wants all of the old USSR restored to the 1989 pre-dissolution EMPIRE.
He's 69 and not getting any younger
He has not made his (self-perceived) mark as Mother Russia's HERO
He knows the fallacy of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, so Muslim expansion is off the table.
He started in 1999 going West when he tried to Kosovo, then Georgia (2008), Crimea(2014), and is currently trying to occupy Ukraine.

He wants it all restored as his legacy..

Putin Pledges To Protect All Ethnic Russians Anywhere. So, Where Are They?

April 10, 2014, 10:58 GMT, By Robert Coalso

https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-ethni.../25328281.html

The whimps in the EU/NATO and USA are willingly helping him.

PS: Forgot to add,,

How are the "Russian locals" percentages so high in some countries?

When FDR & Churchill GAVE Joe Stolin Eastern Europe in 45, Joe installed hundreds of thousand loyal Russian comrades to run the local governments,, and they are still there..

[EricV]

Interesting Video by an Iraq vet...

https://youtu.be/K5BAZ2bBUzM

[GratefulCitizen]

Just saw this clip from a couple days ago.
Col Macgregor presents an interesting analysis.

https://youtu.be/uRi_TCehkBY

[LarryW]

Just my opinion, sirs. My apologies in advance to those who have greater vision, and there are many in this community.

JMHO: Putin's objective is more than to reconstitute the borders of the former USSR. His goal is to support the creation of a new communism along the model of China, that is using capitalism to support communist objectives. For quite a while now cities in China have been buying up free world companies, from food suppliers to big pharmaceuticals. Next will come buying up healthcare companies and insurance companies, and Russia has nothing to lose anymore by chiming in to the same model. It's a pretty smart way for those cities in China (and soon in Russia) who are struggling to feed their people and support their propaganda industry to keep going. Then there is skimming of Bitcoins to make new world communist oligarchs.

Here are two links;

https://www.dw.com/en/china-asked-ru...ine/a-60994583

https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/Int...ncial-alliance

[7624U]

https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11625

Guess our Govt never reads its own publications.

This is very in depth little older but informative with the inter workings.

https://www.armyupress.army.mil/port...au-bartles.pdf

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by 7624U

https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11625

Guess our Govt never reads its own publications.

This is very in depth little older but informative with the inter workings.

https://www.armyupress.army.mil/port...au-bartles.pdf

Hey, Dr. Grau, can I get a double facepalm?


Jeebers. On point.

[Joker]

An interesting and accurate assessment of the situation and China’s bolstering Russia’s economy.

Link

[Box]

It's easy to become desensitized to the current news cycle. More and more it seems like our government really is brought to us by Conrad Brean and Stanley Motss.
The only thing missing is a washed-up dope-smoking country singer performing a tear-jerking rendition of "Old Shoe"
...we've already got heroes like the Ghost of Kyiv and the Sunflower Seed Planting Grandma instead of poor old Sergeant William Schumann

For fuck sake - ever since the Russians bombed Pearl Harbor, they have been costing us money - Now, they just about have the Iranians encircled - the worlds Chicken Kiev supply is in danger, and there's no end in sight - we should kick the Russians out of NATO ASAP and just be done with it.

If I've got to watch one more fucking retired militician explain what we poor ignorant Americans just don't understand, I'm going to shit an 18 pack cartoon full of golden eggs. Just three weeks ago these mother fuckers all seemed to be microbiologists specializing in antiviral medicine - now all these assholes have Ph.D.'s in the study of ancientpostmodernneoliberalfacistcommunism and full spectrum strategic cossack warfare at the hyper operationalized tactical level.

Well, fuck right off. Most of these cock suckers couldn't have earned a legitimate Associates' Degree from Faber College and they just won't go away. Of course, the news channels won't tell you that almost every single talking head they parade out for comment is on the hook for a defense company that makes billions every time we do a war...
...but that's a different story.

Let's not worry about the Russians - let's build a wall that keeps the vaccine safe so we can work on unity and inclusivity and all of that jazz.


Good Bless America
Thank You
Go get him.

[Roguish Lawyer]

Faber College, LMAO