Russia-Ukraine War Politics Thread Mk. 2

Perhaps independent reports, like the one I cited?
Is this guy there?
Don't think so.

Franz-Stefan Gady is a Fellow with the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London and a columnist for The Diplomat.

Not sure about the politics of that institute, but i won't take an automatic claim of independence for granted.
 
Is this guy there?
Don't think so.

Franz-Stefan Gady is a Fellow with the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London and a columnist for The Diplomat.
Not sure about the politics of that institute, but i won't take an automatic claim of independence for granted.

Neither is the guy you cited, so whats your point?

Source: Ivan Fedorov, Mayor of Russian-occupied Melitopol, on Telegram
Quote from Fedorov: "'There is no panic' [as Russian propaganda often claims when facing failures at the front to head off unrest among the population – ed.], but there is panic. The occupiers on the Melitopol front are preparing for a hot autumn. It is already scorching in Tokmak: a few weeks ago the occupiers began to evacuate 'authority' bodies, and a few days ago the Russian officers began intensively evacuating their families."​

As for IISS, who do you think Michael Kofman was tied in with?
 
Wow, it's just...if you think losing that Kilo, landings ship, and the Black Sea Fleet evacing Sevastopol is nothing but 'equipment losses' that 'won't impact the current situation', you obvious don't understand how important those Kilo's have been to the attacks on Ukraine.

Has any of that had an impact on the counteroffensive? Has it gotten Ukrainian armies into Tokmak? Does it make up for the enormous losses in men and materiel? No. Subs can be replaced. Ships can return. Crimea cant and wont.
 
Jesus Cristo! Hamas has decided to carry out their own Bucha massacre. Well that's one way to stop aid. I hope Russia, Iran and Syria remembered to file their manufacturing markers off those weapons. I'm thinking Gaza will be razed to the ground within a few days. Santa Maria!

I don't think they, HAMAS and the Palestinians, understand they lost the war the moment they decided to broadcast the massacres on live TV. I have a feeling Iran will be made to regret their publicly broadcast gloating soon after
You should probably make a new thread about this rather than dumping it into a Ukraine thread
 
You should probably make a new thread about this rather than dumping it into a Ukraine thread
Jesus Cristo! Hamas has decided to carry out their own Bucha massacre. Well that's one way to stop aid. I hope Russia, Iran and Syria remembered to file their manufacturing markers off those weapons. I'm thinking Gaza will be razed to the ground within a few days. Santa Maria!

I don't think they, HAMAS and the Palestinians, understand they lost the war the moment they decided to broadcast the massacres on live TV. I have a feeling Iran will be made to regret their publicly broadcast gloating soon after
No need for a new one.
 
But apparently, the United States is willing spend tens of thousands of lives (and a Taiwan contingency will very likely see thousands of Americans dead and dozens of ships sunk even if we are successful) to challenge China?
Yes, insofar as we (American citizens) aren't gonna accept that either. 3,600 American casualties a day necessitating the return of slavery conscription for sufficient cannon fodder means the end of the country. The same oligarchy who created superpower China by sending them all our jobs as slave labor was cheaper than unionized American workers now want to enslave said American workers to fight to solve their mistake? Fuck that, instead of enslaving us confiscate their money and spend it on rebuilding our domestic manufacturing sector so we don't have to care about foreign wars.
A draft would be Imperial Suicide by Kulak said:
substack

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Conscript dragged away by Press Gang. Ukraine.

The Army War College, neo-con publications, think tanks...

All of them have their knickers in a knot trying to talk the American regime up into reinstituting a draft.

Part of this collapsing recruitment with most US armed services now 10-25% below their annual recruitment targets.

Which combined with the hard DC consensus that under no circumstance, in no scenario, not to save the republic... will an Infantry Private EVER make more than an entry-level DC paper pusher with a master's degree nor will VA benefits ever be more reliable than that DC paper-pusher's union benefits... Ya that problem isn’t going to be solved.

(No way they're going to try to tempt the oil rig workers, lumberjacks, or crab fishermen away with pay and benefits commiserate with hard, dangerous, outdoor work)

.

Now this would not be a problem, America rules the waves, and the international financial system, and has two oceans and two allies providing security for nearly 10,000 miles around...

(Or well OK Mexico is a massive security hole... but DC doesn't care and considers that a benefit, so same difference)

EXCEPT: Washington wants a war with China.

Now this wouldn't be a problem since America again controls the Waves, the Financial system, has bases in 150 out of 200ish countries, has allies all over the world with billions of potential troops, Oh and is almost entirely internally self-reliant with all the oil, natural gas, food production, and resources it'd need to weather decades of blockade (if it could somehow lose the sea) directly within North America...

Whereas China has almost no natural resources, a supply line for oil and fertilizer that stretches tens of thousands of miles through the straits of Malacca, Hormuz, and other key choke points America could shut down in an instant, is surrounded by enemies... and has an economy and population that are both in terminal decline (both are about to start shrinking in absolute terms like Japan in the 90s, if indeed they haven't already)

So this should be the easiest war ever... park an aircraft carrier by Singapore, let the sailors bankrupt themselves trying to hire a prostitute in the most expensive city on earth... and point and laugh as China desperately tries and fails to reroute all of its international energy and food base trade through the Trans-Siberian railway as the last of the Mainland Han Chinese go bankrupt from their failure to build a domestic market, and die-out of Blue-Balls from their failure to breed.

Hell Putin might even negotiate a lasting peace with NATO at the end of it, he'd so enjoy the highway robbery prices he'd charge.

It should be the easiest war ever... Any old-school royal navy captain would be salivating at the risk-free merchant prize money he'd rake in by the BILLION...

Except America doesn't want that war.

America doesn't want to play Britain to China's Napoleonic France. America doesn't want to get rich picking off China's trade whilst funding any one of China's dozen of enemies it's likely to lash out at as it flounders and drowns...

America wants a high-casualty war over Taiwan.

And when they saw Ukraine, and how deadly peer ground-war is against a technologically advanced enemy... They didn't ask if they should fight an even deadlier war over Taiwan, they salivated and asked HOW.

America WANTS thousands of Marines, Sailors, and Soldiers to die daily fighting in ruthless trench and urban warfare in the middle of a tropical island 7000 miles from home as its ships and carriers are sunk with thousands of hands onboard, under a rain of hypersonic ballistic missiles, 200 miles from the Chinese mainland and 7000 miles from Los Angeles, with its supply lines under constant danger of being severed and the threat of Nuclear escalation around every corner...

WHY!?

BECAUSE WASHINGTON DC WANTS IT.

Taiwan has zero strategic value, its chip manufacturing is easily destroyed by a US strike and nothing about the tech could not be replicated by the US whilst the US wins the easy geo-economic war...

Except America doesn't WANT to win an easy economic war, Washington DC want a million dead in a tropical Verdun + Stalingrad against a country with a population of 1.4 billion.

And if America's young won't volunteer to die like this then they'll draft their teenage boys and make them die with a gun pointed at their back.

.

This is how much America hates its boys.

Never forget this. Never feel you owe these people a thing. Buy a gun. Practice tax [redacted].

.

Except, of course, a draft wouldn't work.

Set aside the fact that 70+% are completely unfit to be conscripted... set aside the fact that we just had a "medical emergency" which taught everyone they should bribe and fake medical wavers as soon as possible... Set aside the fact that the border patrol is at its breaking and there are now millions of Americans who've spent an inordinate amount of time contemplating the tissue paper security of land and sea borders...

Set all that aside... Americans hate the government and have vastly more arms than the federal government could hope to command against them.

Black, white, latino, man, woman, gay, straight, Democrat, republican... Americans are unified in one sentiment:

That the American government is illegitimate and set up to screw them and their group specifically.

Ask a Democrat about the Electoral College or 2016… ask a Republican about voter ID or 2020.

Turns out that when you implement inconsistent and capricious rules the groups that benefit are not nearly as grateful as the groups that suffer come to loath you... repeat that enough times and everyone hates you.

.

Of course, a suitably tyrannical and totalitarian state could overcome this... And if you think the US is anywhere near being able to even potentially enforce this with authoritarian methods you are completely delusional and out of touch with the numbers.

.

I've read almost a dozen paper now suggesting the US reinstitute a draft or that it would need a draft in a war with China...

I've not seen a single paper suggest how that could be achieved. My ctrl-F on "Press Gangs" is strangely somehow always 0/0 in these pieces.

.

America's compliance rate for most things is shockingly low compared to most countries... And its crime rate is consistently high. Whether it is the homicide rate or vaccination rate, America's compliance with rules of any kind, legitimate and illegitimate, ten commandments or tax code, drops off massively around 3 groups of people: African Americans, Latinos, and Whites of Scots-Irish ie. borderer (Hill billy) descent (a double-digit percentage of all whites).

These people will not comply, in massive numbers, and unless you're willing to start a hot civil war enacting violence against them for their non-compliance (and immediately start wars in America's cities, forests, and a war when the cartels see an opening)... If you're not willing to do that then their non-compliance will immediately cripple every effort to force compliance on the rest of the population the same way Vax-Mandates had little coercive power in the US compared to elsewhere.

Also, remember any institutional penalties meant to extort compliance with bureaucracy will be completely zapped of their sting, both because Jimmy Carter was the president and therefore We KNOW draft dodging will be pardoned within a decade of the end of the crisis (sooner if the draft dodging and protests are effective and America loses quickly)... AND because right now dozens of Amercian cities and states are setting up infrastructure to create entirely new identities and to live off the grid as an illegal.... sorry, "undocumented" immigrant.

.

So I ask: Why when I hit ctrl-F do none of these supposedly serious commentators mention PRESS GANGS!?

Masked men with guns Grabbing Americans and immigrants off the street, kicking the crap out of them, and throwing them in the back of unmarked white vans to become "soldiers" such as we've seen in Ukraine is basically the only way a draft could be effectively enforced in this country.

And of course, because of federalism, the US does not even have men, vans, or ski masks to do that.

Local counties and states control their police forces and the disproportionately obese and elderly men who'd be called upon to kidnap teenage boys off the streets or out of their parents’ homes...

And as has been clearly established with sanctuary state laws, California's Drug Legalization, and all the "Second Amendment Sanctuary" laws now working their way through red states:

These non-federal police forces are under ZERO (0) obligation to cooperate or assist with federal law enforcement like immigration enforcement, or drug enforcement, or draft enforcement.

That leaves the police forces the federal government controls itself... Yes. The Feds.

Nazi Germany had 32,000 employees of the Gestapo and 100,000 SS members before they expanded to become another army on the eastern front...

This for 70 million people, or about 1 secret policeman for every 530 people.

the Postwar East German Stasi had 91,000 regular secret police 174,000 informal secret police for a population of 18 million...

About 1 for every 68 people.

And this was to control the famously high trust, high morale, rules-following Germans.

.

By contrast, the FBI has 35,000 employees. The DEA 5000 agents. The Border Patrol 21,000 (and they'd be pretty busy keeping people in). The ATF 5000. 7000 Secret Service...

Hell throw in the US Coast Guard (who'd be damned busy in a naval war) for 47000 (active and reserve).

For maybe 121,000 federal "enforcement" personnel... and probably half to a third of that accessible.

But taking the full 121k, that's 1 potential secret policeman for 2727 Americans. And realistically closer to a third of that.

This is why I laugh at Online right-wingers who think there's a fed listening to everything they say and do and trying to infiltrate their circles at every opportunity... man per man they're some of the least surveilled people to exist in history.

And I'll remind you, Americans have guns, lots of them. Many Americans practice “everyday-carry” of a hidden gun or two on their person.

Sure you might think ordinary Americans would just comply with being dragged off to die in some miserable pointless war and no parent would seek out revenge on the federal agent who nabbed them...

but one need only look at American policing today to know that the very fact the guns are out there makes American cops A) A little jumpy, B) Aggressive in how they move C) Rather likely to just back off and take an L or fail to enforce and D) Unlikely to do much of anything without a sizeable number of fellow officers backing them up.

You can watch videos where routine evictions are enforced by a half dozen cops! American police do very little without numbers... And that cripples the number of enforcement actions you can take.

If you need a partner with you to do anything then your force can do half the things. If you need a 4 man team… 25%.

Considering there were numerous shootouts in America over mask mandate enforcement, and Teenage American boys in certain neighborhoods regularly shoot each other over rap lyrics and Nike shoes... and Teenage girls in Appalachia seemingly murder each other all the time over boys...

Ya America's hypothetical fed-powered press-gangs would be eternally behind schedule to conscript any of the numbers they'd need.

Meanwhile, the attempt to do so would almost certainly start a civil war.

.

Beyond that: When the first shootout happens between federal press-gangers what do you expect regime media and their clapping seal congressmen to do?

Call for a gun ban.

What do you think the Supreme Court would do in the midst of a war when they've repeatedly shown they'll stay mum on absolutely everything labeled "national security"?

Nothing.

How do you think the federal government will enforce its new gun ban when everyone is already stretched thin fighting a war or fighting Americans to force them to fight the war?

Very very poorly.


The US military and foreign policy establishment seem hellbent on taking a geostrategic trade and proxy war that a third-rate British Admiral would be able to win without firing a shot... And turning it into a hot Amphibious war in southeast Asia they have no way to win, whilst pre-commiting that they'll double down and start a civil war over it which they're guaranteed to lose.

.

Functionally America is an hourglass-shaped empire.

It's really two empires barely connected.

It is a 19th-century land empire conquered by the American settler populace, and it is a 20th-century Maritime and global empire conquered by the US Navy and the barely closeted communist bureaucrats of the federal government, along with the foreigners they funded.

These two empires barely interact, indeed America is amongst the most autarkic economies in the world with 90% of its trade flows isolated to North America.

The place they meet, the narrow center of this hourglass, is Washington DC.

And here's the thing, whereas Washington is consistently able to push about its overseas maritime empire sending troops and its agents into Afghanistan or Korea or Vietnam or Ukraine whilst all of its bureaucrats and tax collectors remain safe behind the twin moats of its oceans, and the mountain that is the curvature of the earth and the north pole on its third side... and its completely open border with Mexico on its fourth, (but no one cares about that)

Whilst Washington remains completely safe from any threat to its 20th-century Maritime empire...

Washington's 19th-century land empire has it by the throat.

Bin Laden is the only one of Washington's Maritime enemies to actually strike the Imperial city. And all his followers involved paid with their lives to do so.

The Jan 6th protestors showed up to change the result of an election, forced their way into the Capitol... and then left, the vast majority of them never facing any consequence... and they didn't even have to bring guns.

The only shot that day killed Ashley Babbit, an unarmed protestor.

Something the Kaiser, Hilter, and Moa Tse Tung never dreamed with all their armies, was achieved in one afternoon by ticked-off TrumpenProletariot driving in a few hours from the surrounding states.

If the 19th-century American land empire feels at all threatened by the 20th-century American Maritime empire... Most likely they'll descend on DC and sever their only connection with it.

.

So ya, implementing a draft to fight a war with China is about the dumbest military idea imaginable. One of those things that could actually cause the country to just implode.

So expect the Military and think tank establishment to keep promoting it.

You don't signal your usefulness and loyalty by proposing restrained smart ideas, you get that promotion by showing your willingness to say the dumbest thing possible if you think it fits your boss's agenda.

Just pray to god our leaders aren't so senile as to believe the yes men around them...

...

sweet Jesus.
Ukrainian-style pressgangs = Alexander Solzhenitsyn's advice with 42% of the world's civilian gun ownership and China winning the resulting war by default.
 
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Yes, insofar as we (American citizens) aren't gonna accept that either. 3,600 American casualties a day necessitating the return of slavery conscription for sufficient cannon fodder means the end of the country. The same oligarchy who created superpower China by sending them all our jobs as slave labor was cheaper than unionized American workers now want to enslave said American workers to fight to solve their mistake? Fuck that, instead of enslaving us confiscate their money and spend it on rebuilding our domestic manufacturing sector so we don't have to care about foreign wars.

Ukrainian-style pressgangs = Alexander Solzhenitsyn's advice with 42% of the world's civilian gun ownership and China winning the resulting war by default.
Everyone takes that fucking army paper out of context.
It is if the Army fought without combined arms and without allies.

Should i mention what the US estimated casualties would be for desert storm? D-Day?
 
What the hell is acceptable "context" for "we think lots of you are going to die and we want to enslave you"?

And the fact that any sole male children if drafted are sent to non combat roles, as they already do with soldiers that have no other family members etc.
Because they arnt stupid....
And yes, the context does matter.
The entire paper was written in the context of "could the Army alone win the war." "Not without a draft."

I can assure you this paper has been used to change how the Army is fighting for a reason.
Because we have been reliant on old methods it is forcing us to change to a new method. This report is just that.
A informed look.

Again, do I need to point out "10k in the first day, 20k by the end of the second" for desert storm?
 
"could the Army alone win the war." "Not without a draft."
So in other words, to win the war would require a draft. So what they're saying is, if they start the war they'd have a draft.
And the fact that any sole male children if drafted are sent to non combat roles, as they already do with soldiers that have no other family members etc.
Because they arnt stupid....
Slavery's still wrong regardless of what the masters are forcing the slaves to do.
 
So in other words, to win the war would require a draft. So what they're saying is, if they start the war they'd have a draft.

Slavery's still wrong regardless of what the masters are forcing the slaves to do.
>alone
So what happened to Navy, AF, NG and allies?
 
So in other words, to win the war would require a draft. So what they're saying is, if they start the war they'd have a draft.

Slavery's still wrong regardless of what the masters are forcing the slaves to do.
Army is a single branch.
Of we went to Ukraine it would be a combined arms of the Army Air Force and allied nations.
 
So in other words, to win the war would require a draft. So what they're saying is, if they start the war they'd have a draft.

Slavery's still wrong regardless of what the masters are forcing the slaves to do.
Army would not be alone. Navy, Marines, National Guard and allied Military would be coming along. I've seen the Logistics Command. US military can deploy 50,000 men of the ready commands within three weeks. The Stryker and Mobile infantry can be air dropped anywhere on earth within 32 hours. The Armour Divisions will land 2 weeks after.
 
Yes, insofar as we (American citizens) aren't gonna accept that either. 3,600 American casualties a day necessitating the return of slavery conscription for sufficient cannon fodder means the end of the country. The same oligarchy who created superpower China by sending them all our jobs as slave labor was cheaper than unionized American workers now want to enslave said American workers to fight to solve their mistake? Fuck that, instead of enslaving us confiscate their money and spend it on rebuilding our domestic manufacturing sector so we don't have to care about foreign wars.

Ukrainian-style pressgangs = Alexander Solzhenitsyn's advice with 42% of the world's civilian gun ownership and China winning the resulting war by default.
Good idea for you,not so for your allies - unless you gave us your H bombs and missiles for them.Then i have no problem with it.
P.S How find your enemies? look who own or owned Fed during last 100 years.
 
If you do not support Ukraine and continuing to aid them, you support Russia's actions against it and Russian goals in Ukraine.

There is no third option, even if you think the political isolationist stance is 'not supporting Russia'.
Bacle you are as dumb as Bush. "If your not with us you are against us." That is the dumbest saying ever coined in politics. No there are three options. You can support Ukraine like you do, you can do nothing, or you can support Russia. Tell me let's say that Trump got elected again and he ordered a carrier group to launch an attack on Ukraine. Note the attack is on Ukraine not Russia and America destroys the entire Ukrainian rear line, which allows Russia to occupy all of Ukraine. Then he says he supports Putin and that Ukraine is not a real nation but is part of Russia instead.

Do you really think that is no different from doing nothing and being neutral isolationist? Note while that position is very rare I have met some dumb people who want America to join up with Russia and beat up Ukraine together. So no people who are neutral are not supporting Russia.
 
Bacle you are as dumb as Bush. "If your not with us you are against us." That is the dumbest saying ever coined in politics. No there are three options. You can support Ukraine like you do, you can do nothing, or you can support Russia. Tell me let's say that Trump got elected again and he ordered a carrier group to launch an attack on Ukraine. Note the attack is on Ukraine not Russia and America destroys the entire Ukrainian rear line, which allows Russia to occupy all of Ukraine. Then he says he supports Putin and that Ukraine is not a real nation but is part of Russia instead.

Do you really think that is no different from doing nothing and being neutral isolationist? Note while that position is very rare I have met some dumb people who want America to join up with Russia and beat up Ukraine together. So no people who are neutral are not supporting Russia.
I'm not going to indulge your ridiculous hypothetical.

Also, the fact is there is no third option, either someone supports Ukraine or they support what Russia is doing to it.

Neutrality is not an option, it's just tactic approval of what Russia has done to Ukraine since 2014, or the cowardice of wanting to not piss off Russia more than wanting to help Ukraine.

Don't like it, tough shit.
 
I'm not going to indulge your ridiculous hypothetical.

Also, the fact is there is no third option, either someone supports Ukraine or they support what Russia is doing to it.

Neutrality is not an option, it's just tactic approval of what Russia has done to Ukraine since 2014, or the cowardice of wanting to not piss off Russia more than wanting to help Ukraine.

Don't like it, tough shit.
You aren't going to indulge it because you are a coward. Because if you indulge it then you have to recognize there is a differance between neutrality and support.

And no someone can be neutral not just because cowardice, or they approve of what Russia is doing. People are allowed to not give a fuck.

Don't like it, tough shit.
 

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