Armchair General's DonbAss Derailed Discussion Thread (Topics Include History, Traps, and the Ongoing Slavic Civil War plus much much more)

[DarthOne]

 

[Terthna]

Everyone in this thread and the other Ukraine war threads are speculating based on unreliable intelligence filtered through there preexisting biases.

And many people, perhaps myself included, are going to end up with egg on their faces when everything is all said and done; here's hoping we don't end up with another indignant exodus of the offended, like we had in the aftermath of the 2020 election. A lot of fences are going to have to be mended regardless.

 

[strunkenwhite]

There are a number of problems with those comparisons.

First, Russia is not Afghanistan. Russia is a far more stable and cohesive country. You can do a comparative analysis here on this page and see that Russia, save on Human Rights violations and Rule of Law, far exceeds Afghanistan in every measure of stability (higher on the chart is worse). In fact, Russia has been steadily improving in several indicators for the past half decade. The Russian military is far more coherent, far more disciplined, and far more capable than the puppet army that the US installed in Afghanistan. The corruption levels in the Russian military is NOT the same as it was in Afghanistan. The Afghani army was used as a welfare program at best and was an outright welfare scam at worst--depending on who was involved. Afghan soldiers regularly went AWOL, regularly sold their own equipment, and regularly did not show up for training. Afghan officers regularly invented new soldiers from thin air, so they could snatch up their pay from the US government and go snort coke off hookers. Or literally stole it from the soldiers beneath them (who to be fair, had poor attendance anyway--though one wonders if that was causal or not). For a government that wasn't interested in staying to fight. So when the rubber hit the road, the Afghani army evaporated.

Say what you want about the Russians. Sure, they may shirk basic maintenance duties. Or steal portions of their armaments (or even ships) to sell on the black market. Or don't take training too seriously. Or have little to no experience before being sent into a meat grinder. But what they do have is a military institution with some level of discipline and pride. It isn't a glorified welfare program to be taken advantage of by the locals. The government does have a vested interest in fighting. And when the rubber hits the road, the Russians are fighting, not outpacing the civilians to escape the warzone. They're going into the warzone, fighting and dying. The Russian military force may have atrophied, but it is an actual military fighting force.

You're also wrong. The Kremlin views NATO as an existential threat. That's why it's invading Ukraine. In a sense, the level of resistance that the Ukrainians have shown in just eight years of military build-up and assistance from the West, justifies the amount of concern that the Russians have (although it does not justify invasion). What had happened if Russia had waited another 8 years? Would they be facing down outdated Soviet tanks or old American Abrams? Would they be fighting old Soviet Migs or old American F-15s and F-16s? Possibly F-35s?

Putin himself has been personally humiliated by the setbacks suffered by the Russians. The media has made it a point to do so. He has every motivation both personally and professionally to ensure that there are reforms after this. The poor performance and future need for a strong military that is more effective than it is large demands that he does some weeding. The personal humiliation will drive him to hold other people responsible. And those other people are going to do their best to make sure he doesn't have a reason to come after them. I don't think it will be clean or even efficient, but any slimming down and sharpening of abilities by the Russian military is a good thing.

Putin just needs to restrain himself in not removing the important people who actually know what they're doing.

I'm happy to admit that Russia is no Afghanistan, and perhaps my example was poorly chosen. I just grabbed the first thing I could think of to illustrate that the problems could get so bad that literally nothing is enough to motivate reform. Russia isn't that far down the scale and to the extent that I came of as suggesting that it was I apologize.

If NATO was an existential threat, why make an enemy of someone whose fondest ambition is to play both sides? I think that's a fair view of Ukraine pre-2014, wanting to keep its ties to Russia yet develop some with the EU. And Russia wouldn't be facing down any of those things as long as it didn't invade Ukraine, even if it joined NATO. No former Warsaw Pact country has got NATO nuclear weapons in it, either, unless you count Germany. But more importantly that's a long term concern: Russia is not immediately worried about NATO invading Russia, thus there is less incentive to fix the military.

"The media", by which I presume you mean Western MSM, is not necessarily Putin's first concern when he has most Russians listening to Russian and Chinese media which are doing no such thing. And to the extent that it is a problem, it's a political problem which could have political solutions other than the incredibly vast and costly task (in money, time, and political effort) of reforming the Russian military. Certainly doing that is one way to fix the problem of "I absolutely need to stay in power", and it may be the way he ends up going, but it's not the only way to fix that problem, whereas if your overriding concern is "we absolutely need to win this war" then fixing your military is pretty much the only way to go unless you have untapped allies.

 

[planefag]

And many people, perhaps myself included, are going to end up with egg on their faces when everything is all said and done; here's hoping we don't end up with another indignant exodus of the offended, like we had in the aftermath of the 2020 election. A lot of fences are going to have to be mended regardless.

Speculation is only bad if you don't realize it's speculation and weigh it accordingly. Some speculation is better founded and some less, but the confidence level is never 100% till hard evidence is in hand. And yet, even important people in positions of power have to make big decisions without said evidence in hand.

And, honestly? The one bright spot on the first day of the war was watching dumbass doctorate degree holders I'd sassed for years on Twitter for their dumbfuck takes eating a whole truckload of crow. A whole god-damned truckload. The Thing they said would never happen, did. History popped right out of that grave Khrushchev dug with his shoe and bit them in the ass and it was GLORIOUS. So if they could be wrong, and this here anime avatar shitposting on Twitter could be right, maybe we shouldn't be too hard on ourselves? 🤔

 

[Agent23]

And many people, perhaps myself included, are going to end up with egg on their faces when everything is all said and done; here's hoping we don't end up with another indignant exodus of the offended, like we had in the aftermath of the 2020 election. A lot of fences are going to have to be mended regardless.

I have no regrets, I managed to block a few drama queens and ignoramuses, and I won't miss seeing their nonsense.

 

[The Original Sixth]

All of the above logic applies to Russia, as well. Remember, they have the GDP of Canada. There's a reason we haven't seen a single T-14 Armata in Ukraine. Cost-efficiency is a very important concept; even Americans care about it when circumstances force us to. So the losses they're suffering in Ukraine are not trivial.

I didn't say they were trivial losses. I said they would improve the Russian army. Which it will. The conscripts who survive will be better than they were before. The officers who survive will be better than they were before. What Russia has to hope for is not to trade its most talented officers and engineers for its mediocre/less experienced engineers so as to be a net loss.

Also consider the cost in expertise. Russia is losing a lot of higher-ranking officers. They've lost two engineering officers that I've seen who were slain by artillery while the pontoon bridges they were overseeing the set-up of were struck. Same for vehicle crewmen. Infantry is a tough job. But you don't need to be a genius to be a rifle custodian. You do need a little more smarts to crew or command a tank, and even with Russian tanks having lower crew requirements, the way they tend to violently explode when hit means crew losses are high. Crew are significantly more valuable than the tanks they ride; even if it's an expensive Western tank. Training takes a lot of money and time, and it's not always easy to find smart people to fill certain roles.

Russia can't afford high level expertise, who are you fooling? The largest group of skilled engineers, scientists, and thinkers are all in their late 50s or early 60s. And most Russian men die in their early to mid 60s. Their oil and gas network? Entirely reliant on foreign companies like exxon to work them. The Russians lost the ability to afford high level expertise a decade ago. The best that Russia can afford, right now--is to build up the expertise in a large pool of people who are otherwise, to be blunt, worthless.

Russia has no choice but to grind away their young conscripts into something sharper. All their other tools are rusting away.

And guess what Germany did two weeks ago, after years of refusing everyone, even Trump? They signed a deal to build a natural gas terminal, to receive shipments of natural gas off of LP tanker ships. Sweden and Finland are very likely to join NATO in the future as public opinion has swung hard in its favor for the first time due to Russia's invasion. And I got news for you, my dude - Russia was always going to team up with China. In case you haven't noticed, their conventional combat power has been proven to be a hollow joke of what we thought it was, and China already has everything of military value Russia could sell them. Arms are the only real high-tech export industry they have. And despite that, China can't even reverse-engineer the things Russia sold them; they reverse-engineered the SU-33, which pissed off Russia because they were hoping to make bank selling them more, then had to come crawling back because their knockoff turbofans kept failing and dropping their fancy new carrier fighters into the drink. What can Russia sell China they aren't already? Oil? Already done. Food? Already done. Tech? Already done and anything China could then make itself has been. I'll remind you we've played this game before with an iron curtain bisecting world economies between superpower blocs - it was called the Cold War. And we are not the ones who's economies failed so utterly that our superpower state collapsed under its own weight.

Yeah, no. Russia and China's cooperation works only so long as Russia has a NATO to compete against. China has repeatedly undermined Russia's sphere of influence with its infrastructure builds throughout Central Asia. Russia has a long exposed border with China--and although those are mostly empty spaces, that space is slowly shifting to Chinese control, not Russian control. On top of that, the Chinese constantly steal Russian technology and hamper Russian arm sales.

And that high-tech industry is going to die anyway. Either because China finally catches up to the point that they don't need Russian arm imports--or because the Russians who can build and design the stuff simply die out.

As for India, they have to play nice with Russia because Russian equipment defines like 80% of their TO&E. Refer to everything I said above about how expensive military gear is. Then factor in that when you have to buy enough new equipment for a whole army, even replacing the damned rifles is heinously expensive. People said this same shit about "dividing allies" back when the sanctions against nations that buy military equipment from Russia went through. I pointed it out myself to hate-crazed people screaming about Russia because ORANGE MAN! And guess what? India got their waiver. As fucking retarded as our aristocrats can be, even they realize that India being on our side against China is incredibly valuable and it doesn't really matter what they shoot at China as long as they have something to shoot at all! Plus we're weaning India off Russian supply by offering them nice deals on shiny new Western equipment that makes Russia's best tech look like fucking tonka toys. Indian arms purchases from Russia, while still 49% of their buying, is falling precipitously compared to what it used to be. Instead of punishing India for something they cannot help, we're seeing a business opportunity. And since India's domestic arms industry is a rising star, with great potential hobbled by chronic problems, they have been very happy to engage in defense industrial cooperation with the West. The West in general is an aerospace and military tech leader; we have lots of things to teach them. And China is breathing down India's neck very hard these days.

China cannot meaningfully penetrate into India with its military forces and it would be suicide to do so. The mountains between them makes this next to impossible. There is a growing conflict, but it is not one that India needs to immediately address. The real difference is that the two are growing rivals; they're both major powers.

And the fact is that India has had good relations with Russia for decades. India is not some Western power that will fall in line with the US, nor is it a lesser power that must adhere to the United States. It sees itself as a rising (albeit slowly) great power that will have its own sphere of influence. That is slowly driving it to the US camp, but anyone with half a brain sees how well the US treats anyone under its umbrella; as subordinates who obey or get punished. India is not just going to fully jump in bed with the US. It's going to keep its options open. And antagonizing Russia makes it harder to keep India in-step against China.

So chill with the doomposting, my dude.

Not "doomposting".

Russia's invasion has done what North Korea and China could not - scare the shit out of the Western world and force them to acknowledge the reality that history has not ended and they had best be ready to fight in the not so distant future.

Where have you been? The US institutions realized that years ago. Even the American public was aware that we might be overtaken by China and we had overextended ourselves based on our own hype. Russia's invasion of Ukraine is a result of that arrogance and self-hype. Only the most stubborn of people were shocked out of their complacency--that is to say, dumb liberals.

The realization has been dawning slowly in some circles, but too slow; e.g. France's temper tantrum over that submarine contract, despite their efforts to increase naval/military cooperation with India and other regional allies. I don't think China is too happy with Russia right now, because the frog just jumped out of that slow-cooker and is croaking very loudly.

It's more to say that China isn't ready. China was stalling for more time in their confrontation with the West, while Russia is more or less out of time. As for France--most of the EU was never, ever going to wake up until war came to their neighborhood. The European refusal to address their problems comes from insane amounts of security and economic prosperity at the cost to someone else (Americans) and not themselves.

 

[The Original Sixth]

I'm happy to admit that Russia is no Afghanistan, and perhaps my example was poorly chosen. I just grabbed the first thing I could think of to illustrate that the problems could get so bad that literally nothing is enough to motivate reform. Russia isn't that far down the scale and to the extent that I came of as suggesting that it was I apologize.

Russia's main issues--aside from rampant corruption and a stagnating demographic, is the fact that a large chunk of their scientists, engineers, and leaders are about to die of old age. I argue that it is best to get these people out into the world and suffer now, so that there is at least a chance that they might dig out a few gems from the rough. There is just no way that I see Russia not trying to clean house after this debacle.

The only way it can't, is if the Russian military is so horrifically corrupt that it can't possibly do an honest assessment of itself, even after these setbacks. That isn't something I deem likely from the older ranks, but if they're badly disconnected with the younger ranks, then Russia is already probably dead and simply hasn't realized it.

If NATO was an existential threat, why make an enemy of someone whose fondest ambition is to play both sides? I think that's a fair view of Ukraine pre-2014, wanting to keep its ties to Russia yet develop some with the EU. And Russia wouldn't be facing down any of those things as long as it didn't invade Ukraine, even if it joined NATO. No former Warsaw Pact country has got NATO nuclear weapons in it, either, unless you count Germany. But more importantly that's a long term concern: Russia is not immediately worried about NATO invading Russia, thus there is less incentive to fix the military.

Russia is worried about NATO invading. Why? Because for no reason--that defied all state interests or rationality, the US involved itself with Libya. It caused the downfall of a regime. Invading Afghanistan was at least somewhat rational for what the Americans wanted; the destruction of Al Qaeda. DC being dimwitted in their approach was not exactly a problem to Russia or China or North Korea. And then we invaded Iraq on false pretenses, simply to remove a dictator we didn't like. Well okay, mission creep and some clown taking advantage of the political climate. But Libya? Libya wasn't even close to being a threat to the US or its interests or even a part of its interests. And the US still want out of its way to topple the regime.

That could be Russia. That could be North Korea. Or China. What the world learned then was that the US wasn't going to just topple your regime if you made the mistake of fucking with them...or living next to someone who fucked with them...but they'll do it simply because their leaders can win brownie points on fucking Twitter and Facebook. That's what happened in Libya. Social media and established media basically sucked Obama off, then a week or two later, forgot the whole thing ever happened.

And Libya? Libya is in a three-way civil war with no end in sight.

"The media", by which I presume you mean Western MSM, is not necessarily Putin's first concern when he has most Russians listening to Russian and Chinese media which are doing no such thing. And to the extent that it is a problem, it's a political problem which could have political solutions other than the incredibly vast and costly task (in money, time, and political effort) of reforming the Russian military. Certainly doing that is one way to fix the problem of "I absolutely need to stay in power", and it may be the way he ends up going, but it's not the only way to fix that problem, whereas if your overriding concern is "we absolutely need to win this war" then fixing your military is pretty much the only way to go unless you have untapped allies.

No, all of Russia's elite view the US as a threat. NATO pulling Ukraine away was one step too far. I personally feel that Russia ent about it all-wrong; it should have either waited or simply swept Ukraine away. Not take a few pieces and then allow Ukraine to stall for almost a decade.

 

[Battlegrinder]

But "Ree, Russia is losing because the Ukrainians killed over 9000 according to the MSM of Kiev..." is nonsense that shows more about the gullibility and bias of the poster.

1. I haven't said that Russia is losing. I've said they're doing far worse than everyone expected them to.

2. The 10k casualty figure came from Russia sources, not Ukrainian ones.

The portions the Russians seized in the start and wasn't fought over is, the portions fought over and being used to supply UkA are not. Russia is going for victory, and since the UkA won't quit, they are going to systematically destroy the logistical and economic means for them to continue to resist.

Right, and the fact that your version of their actions aligns not at all with Agent's version, where infanstructure in Ukraine is being carefully left intact, is why I distrust both claims.

It most certainly is not. Victory ends all arguments as the Victor is the one enjoying the spoils. And Russia will win, the math is in their favor, UkA is to be commended for not running and Zelensky as well, but they can't win. The only options are honorable peace or the path of martyrdom. Their choice.

Right, and this rebuts the fact that you can win a war while still making tactical, strategic, and doctrinal errors.....how? Winning the war settles the question of who won the war, and little else. The US Civil War was already brought up, but I'd also point to WW2 and the apparent failure of strategic bombing to accomplish anything as another example of winning the war while making mistakes.

2. Unless the ammo blows, which would pop the turret off, the tank can be repaired and sent back out. And if a round is even capable of penetrating to the armored carousel where the ammo is stored, that round is sufficiently powerful enough to affect a catastrophic kill on the tank even if there was no ammo in it.

There are more ways to kill a tank and it's crew then "blow it up and cook off all the ammo".

Though unfortunately for Russia, it appears javelin missiles are quite capable of blowing up their tanks and cooking off all the ammo anyway.

1. Well given the US Military lost in Iraq and Afghanistan, their opinions are shit. So they can go pound sand till they actually win a war.

Pretty much everyone that's not on Russia's side here (and several that are), including posters that are not American and have no need to pander the America's ego when it comes to war, have grasped the distinction between wining military conflicts in the field, and using those victories to achieve political goals. The fact that you and your ilk can't do this and keep resorting this tiresome arguement reeks of you having no real arguement and resorting to cheap shots and cope.

It won wars. Your argument is thus invalid. In order for sacrifices to mean anything, you have to win the war and dictate the peace in line with the Government's political directives.

"Any tactic is fine as long as we win". Well, if that's the thinking it explains a lot of Russia's current military ineptitude.

When fighting a peer adversary which UkA is, it is best to let second line troops take the counter attack, and pin the counter-attackers till they in turn can be hit.

I'm a military dilettante at best, but "let the enemy tire themselves out killing your second line forces" seems like the sort of military wisdom I would have heard of before just this moment if it was really the obvious answer. It's very odd I only learn of this when a bunch of Russian formations just got mauled and Russia shills need an excuse for why that's happened.

What are you going to come up with next, "drowning all your paratroopers in the black sea is a good idea, it's so when your forces reach the sea, they can use the bodies washing ashore to resupply?"

The pockets in the Northeast are a result of this with 70,000 UkA troops trapped and unable to break out for the past few weeks. As those pockets close, the UkA will have lost tens of thousands of troops and vital rear service units at minimal cost to Russia.

Yes, this alleged pocket of Ukraine troops that someone you're the only person to notice existing, which has been on the verge of defeat for like 2 or 3 weeks now.

 

[WolfBear]

Russia's main issues--aside from rampant corruption and a stagnating demographic, is the fact that a large chunk of their scientists, engineers, and leaders are about to die of old age. I argue that it is best to get these people out into the world and suffer now, so that there is at least a chance that they might dig out a few gems from the rough. There is just no way that I see Russia not trying to clean house after this debacle.

The only way it can't, is if the Russian military is so horrifically corrupt that it can't possibly do an honest assessment of itself, even after these setbacks. That isn't something I deem likely from the older ranks, but if they're badly disconnected with the younger ranks, then Russia is already probably dead and simply hasn't realized it.



Russia is worried about NATO invading. Why? Because for no reason--that defied all state interests or rationality, the US involved itself with Libya. It caused the downfall of a regime. Invading Afghanistan was at least somewhat rational for what the Americans wanted; the destruction of Al Qaeda. DC being dimwitted in their approach was not exactly a problem to Russia or China or North Korea. And then we invaded Iraq on false pretenses, simply to remove a dictator we didn't like. Well okay, mission creep and some clown taking advantage of the political climate. But Libya? Libya wasn't even close to being a threat to the US or its interests or even a part of its interests. And the US still want out of its way to topple the regime.

That could be Russia. That could be North Korea. Or China. What the world learned then was that the US wasn't going to just topple your regime if you made the mistake of fucking with them...or living next to someone who fucked with them...but they'll do it simply because their leaders can win brownie points on fucking Twitter and Facebook. That's what happened in Libya. Social media and established media basically sucked Obama off, then a week or two later, forgot the whole thing ever happened.

And Libya? Libya is in a three-way civil war with no end in sight.



No, all of Russia's elite view the US as a threat. NATO pulling Ukraine away was one step too far. I personally feel that Russia ent about it all-wrong; it should have either waited or simply swept Ukraine away. Not take a few pieces and then allow Ukraine to stall for almost a decade.

Libya in 2011 was a humanitarian intervention similar to Kosovo in 1999. There was a fear that Gaddafi was going to commit human rights atrocities against the Libyan rebels had he conquered Benghazi. This fear was not 100% irrational:

Libya: June 1996 Killings at Abu Salim Prison

www.hrw.org

 

[Floridaman]

Libya in 2011 was a humanitarian intervention similar to Kosovo in 1999. There was a fear that Gaddafi was going to commit human rights atrocities against the Libyan rebels had he conquered Benghazi. This fear was not 100% irrational:

Libya: June 1996 Killings at Abu Salim Prison

www.hrw.org

And now slaves are traded in an open air market..... ahhh progress.

 

[WolfBear]

And now slaves are traded in an open air market..... ahhh progress.

Blame NATO for not putting a post-war peacekeeping force in Libya like it did in Kosovo. Kosovo turned out somewhat better.

 

[Floridaman]

Blame NATO for not putting a post-war peacekeeping force in Libya like it did in Kosovo. Kosovo turned out somewhat better.

Because our peacekeeping operations in the Middle East turned out great.

 

[WolfBear]

Because our peacekeeping operations in the Middle East turned out great.

Iraq is a relative success story. Democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, et cetera. Still a problem with rogue Shi'a militias, of course, but better than dealing with Saddam Hussein's extremely brutal regime.

 

[Floridaman]

Iraq is a relative success story. Democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, et cetera. Still a problem with rogue Shi'a militias, of course, but better than dealing with Saddam Hussein's extremely brutal regime.

Yeah you went from Saddam a fairly standard dictator for the region, to now thousands of dead Americans, a million dead Iraqi civilians, ISIS, and that “democratic” regime is an Iranian proxy state, you know another enemy of ours. If that is your definition of success what on earth do you define as failure

 

[WolfBear]

Yeah you went from Saddam a fairly standard dictator for the region, to now thousands of dead Americans, a million dead Iraqi civilians, ISIS, and that “democratic” regime is an Iranian proxy state, you know another enemy of ours. If that is your definition of success what on earth do you define as failure

I suspect that the million dead Iraqis is an exaggeration and in any case, Iraq could have been in an even worse shape right now during the Arab Spring had we not ousted Saddam. And wasn't Saddam unusually brutal for a Middle Eastern dictator, such as with him using chemical weapons against the Kurds and brutally crushing the Iraqi Shi'ites and draining their mashes afterwards?

As for what I would consider a failure in Iraq, a total ISIS takeover of the country would be a pretty good example of this. And Iraq is trying to balance Iran and the US against each other rather than being a total Iranian client state. There's some resentment in Iraq against the pro-Iranian Shi'ite militias for crushing protesters during the 2019 demonstrations there.

 

[PsihoKekec]

Libya in 2011 was a humanitarian intervention similar to Kosovo in 1999.

Kosovo wasn't humanitarian intervention, it was Clinton PR intervention, after the impeachment clusterfuck.

 

[WolfBear]

Yeah, Ukraine certainly isn't perfect. No doubt about that. Still doesn't warrant a Russian conquest of their entire country, of course.

And Ukraine is actually about as corrupt as Russia itself is, though also much poorer than Russia itself is:

 

[WolfBear]

Kosovo wasn't humanitarian intervention, it was Clinton PR intervention, after the impeachment clusterfuck.

It was both. Of course, I certainly won't deny the very real possibility that the West considered the KLA to be more reliable agents than the pro-Russian Serbs.

 

[PsihoKekec]

Clinton needed to bomb somebody and Serbs were the popular choice, so the Serbian delegation at the Rambuuiliet talks was given terms it simply could not accept.

 

[WolfBear]

Clinton needed to bomb somebody and Serbs were the popular choice, so the Serbian delegation at the Rambuuiliet talks was given terms it simply could not accept.

Yeah, I know that the West did not try to be a genuinely honest broker in these peace talks. And that's a problem.