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How should west respond to potential (likely) Russian invasion of Ukraine?

This is where I become woefully ignorant of Russia, as I have no idea what the power structure is like under (or over) Putin. If something were to happen, is it as simple as making Putin disappear, or is there a decent sized bloc that prevents any progress.
 
Jimmy Higgins said:
This is where I become woefully ignorant of Russia, as I have no idea what the power structure is like under (or over) Putin. If something were to happen, is it as simple as making Putin disappear, or is there a decent sized bloc that prevents any progress.
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Same here.
That's also why I can't feel blase concerning the nuclear threat.

If Putin felt in serious threat of "falling out a window", what would he do? Or attempt to do? What would prevent him from nuking whoever he could?
Tom
 
TomC said:
If Putin felt in serious threat of "falling out a window", what would he do? Or attempt to do? What would prevent him from nuking whoever he could?
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Presumably he doesn't want his legacy to be "Back before the apocalypse, there was a great Country called Russia, that elected a mad, power-hungry psychopath who started the war that turned western Asia/eastern Europe into a sheet of glass..."
He'd probably prefer that his offspring and their families live happily ever after, don't you think?
 
The Republican Party used to be the fiercest opponents of Russian aggression (Anyone remember Ronnie Raygun and his Star Wars system to protect Americans from the Russian threat?).

Now it's the fucking Muppet show, with Vlad Putin doing all the voices.

How the fuck did they go so bad, so fast?










(It's a rhetorical question. The answer is that Russia just bought the entire bunch of Muppets for the low, low price of a few political campaign donations).
 
Elixir said:
He'd probably prefer that his offspring and their families live happily ever after, don't you think?
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I see no reason to think that.

People like Putin, Trump, and Hitler don't think the way most of us do. People don't acquire that much power by empathizing with others.
Tom
 
Elixir said:
TomC said:
If Putin felt in serious threat of "falling out a window", what would he do? Or attempt to do? What would prevent him from nuking whoever he could?
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Presumably he doesn't want his legacy to be "Back before the apocalypse, there was a great Country called Russia, that elected a mad, power-hungry psychopath who started the war that turned western Asia/eastern Europe into a sheet of glass..."
He'd probably prefer that his offspring and their families live happily ever after, don't you think?
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Have you ever met a narcissist really? They see even their own children as a means to their own aggrandizement.

Re: my MiL
 
TomC said:
Elixir said:
He'd probably prefer that his offspring and their families live happily ever after, don't you think?
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I see no reason to think that.

People like Putin, Trump, and Hitler don't think the way most of us do. People don't acquire that much power by empathizing with others.
Tom
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That’s true. But is it true for everyone in the chain of command whose co-operation would be required to launch a first strike nuclear attack? I very much doubt it.
I also don’t think Putler wants to be “the guy who destroyed Russia”.
 
Elixir said:
That’s true. But is it true for everyone in the chain of command whose co-operation would be required to launch a first strike nuclear attack? I very much doubt it.
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I don't know how many people that is or what their loyalties or motivations are.

Suppose it wasn't even Putin who "pushed the button", but some general who felt in danger of defenestration? Would that matter to the human situation?
Elixir said:
I also don’t think Putler wants to be “the guy who destroyed Russia”.
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Take a quick look at the last year. I'm confident that Russia isn't as important to Putin because it's his homeland as it's important as a means to his own glory and power.

It's kinda how violent world leaders tend to operate. Which is many of them.
Tom
 
TomC said:
Take a quick look at the last year. I'm confident that Russia isn't as important to Putin because it's his homeland as it's important as a means to his own glory and power.
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Correct. It's best to think of Russian Hitler as a merchant. Nothing is more important to someone like that than personal gratification. He has no feelings for Russia or Russians.

TomC said:
Ironically, she probably wouldn't even get that joke without asking someone to explain it.
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She taught us all about peach tree dishes. No one had to explain that to her.
 
Copernicus said:
Harry Bosch said:
Copernicus said:
Yevgeny Prigozhin is the guy who could end up replacing Putin. He's a really nice fellow, isn't he? Great sense of humor when talking about dead Russian soldiers. Read this testimonial to learn how he fits in with the top leadership of the current Russian Federation:

Russian warlord’s feud with Putin’s generals explodes into the open with gruesome PR campaign​

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Yea, Prigozhin is a real piece of shit. He makes Putin seem nice. Very interesting to see what will happen. I think that there's a very good chance that he'll get a Russian Jump off a high building very soon.
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I think that Putin is trying to play Prigozhin and the generals off against each other, but he may end up caught in the crossfire. It is possible that this will drive some among the generals to try to take him and Prigozhin down in a coup. Prigozhin himself might want to try it, but I don't think that the Wagner Group is in a position to do that. They are a private company, in principle, not an official arm of the Russian government. I'm sure that many Russians in a position of power, especially the  siloviki, are thinking hard about where they will be in a post-Putin Russia. Most Russians would probably prefer a military coup by elements of the siloviki to a takeover by the likes of the ghoulish Prigozhin.
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I think the military would revolt against a prigozhin coup. He doesn’t have enough standing to throw Putin out of a window. He’s like Himmler, with his own Warren SS army behind him, or maybe Rohm with his brown shirts. The Army could take him and they hate him.

I think any realistic coup would have to come from within the Armed Forces. The problem is that Putin is avoiding any interactions with any of his insiders even. ( which tells you something about his state of mind). He’s doing zoom calls.

Thus the only realistic hope is not simply a Stauffenberg like attack, but a full fledged army revolt; take over the entire Kremlin, hunt him and Prigozhin down and dispatch them. Or defenestrate them both. Thye’ll simply announce he’s dead. We’ve had to take over in this emergency, but will concede power shortly to an interim government pending elections to be held. Cease fire in Ukraine. Then They’ll try to negotiate something palatable out of the debacle. But they know they’ll have to give up most all of Ukraine, probably Crimea too.
 
SLD said:
The vaunted Russian offensive has already fizzled. Outside of Vuhledar, which Russians have been trying to capture since November, they lost three combat brigades. Insane. They’ve been trying to capture Bakhmut since August and yet they still can’t cut off its supply lines. Heavy fighting there this week resulted in no significant gains. They’ve likely already crested. Wagner group, despite some initial successes with human wave attacks is spent. They’re no longer recruiting out of prisons. They’re fighting more with regular army units over supplies and press.
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And Ukraine's recent deep strikes will really mess up the Russian logistics situation--they're going to have to pull the point where they transfer from train to truck back out of range and the trucks moving it to the front are already a chokepoint.
 
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The ugly truth is that at this point, thousands, tens of thousands of Russians are being told to die to save face for Putin. Over 9000 posts in and Russia has made virtually no gains. For every post in this thread,, what 20 dead people that lived in Russia? Their only success was knocking out utilities to civilian populations. And it is getting warmer with spring coming. So the freeze them to death plan failed like every other stupid half measure. And all Putin can do is whine about how it is Russia or the world. The world be like, "we can do both". Russia or the world. Russia must take over Ukraine otherwise the world wins.

So more people who live in Russia will die because of some fantasy of Putin's... and his inability to either fucking takeover Ukraine or not. This trench warfare bullshit has gone too far. It is madness when the invader is fighting a war of attrition.
 
bilby said:
The Republican Party used to be the fiercest opponents of Russian aggression (Anyone remember Ronnie Raygun and his Star Wars system to protect Americans from the Russian threat?).

Now it's the fucking Muppet show, with Vlad Putin doing all the voices.

How the fuck did they go so bad, so fast?










(It's a rhetorical question. The answer is that Russia just bought the entire bunch of Muppets for the low, low price of a few political campaign donations).
Click to expand...

QFT
 
bilby said:
The Republican Party used to be the fiercest opponents of Russian aggression (Anyone remember Ronnie Raygun and his Star Wars system to protect Americans from the Russian threat?).

Now it's the fucking Muppet show, with Vlad Putin doing all the voices.

How the fuck did they go so bad, so fast?
Click to expand...
Are you fucking serious? Putin's Russia is exactly what Republicans think is a functioning free democracy. Elections that don't matter (gerrymandering and disenfranchisement), a government that caters solely to the upper class as an oligarchy (Mercer Group, Koch Industries, the Wilks Brothers), a media that only parrots talking points (OANN, RSBN, NewsMax, Sinclair Broadcasting and of course Rupert Murdoch) and a populace isolated from dissenting views (Magiots and Q-tards).

Putin's Russia is what Republicans have been masturbating over since at least the days of the competently evil McCarthy (as opposed to the modern one). In the eyes of Republicans, the Soviet Unions biggest most unforgivable sin was that they had shitty marketing. That's it.
 
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