↪boethius Likewise, if you want us to believe that the Russian government gives a rat's ass about the lives of ethnic Russians in Ukraine, do try and explain why Russian forces are bombing so many ethnic Russians in Ukraine... — Olivier5

Sure, yeah, I don't see how the proposals are mutually exclusive.

My basic thesis in this discussion is that two sides of the story are needed to reach a diplomatic solution.

Now, if Ukraine is going to win, and you care about Ukrainians, ok, no need for diplomacy, just let them "win" as the vast majority of Ukrainians seem to be in favour of fighting and winning and support Zelenskyy

However, if Ukrainians aren't going to win, the diplomacy now is almost always better than diplomacy tomorrow in this sort of situation.

Likewise, fighting to a stalemate ... only purpose is to then have a diplomatic resolution, so still requires both sides of the story (whatever we may morally think of any particular point or who's right and who's wrong or who's more right and who's less right and so on).

Russian state-controlled media is still pushing the "biolabs" story. — SophistiCat

Nuland literally answers this question about biolabs with with a non-no answer. If there was no bioweapons Nuland would just confidently state there's no bioweapons. Just like if she was asked if Ukaine had nuclear warheads and ICMB's ... she would just say "no, Ukraine does not have nuclear warheads and ICBM" as obviously it doesn't.



Things are not necessarily how they appear ... even the above video could be some deep cover Russian plant; difficult to tell, nothing is clear cut.

Anyone that can watch this video:



And maintain the West and NATO are sincere in their sudden concern for war victims ... feel free to explain how.

Well, The Germans did pocket whole armies when they attacked in 1941, so encirclement of enemy forces can be done basically anywhere. — ssu

Yes, but the Germans pocketed soviet armies using armor. Motti tactics are about encircling columns without armor, which was possible if the Soviets are stuck in long columns on roads through the forest and were also not prepared for Finnish winter.

And, as I've explained, the armor component to armor is somewhat secondary to the mobility part. If you simply can't get to the front without a tracked vehicle in a reasonable amount of time, then you can't reinforce a breakthrough to cut through enemy lines to encircle them.

In addition to just the speed problem, there's simply a limit to how much ammunition you can carry on foot, so even you do get to the front you maybe out of ammunition pretty quick, especially anything heavier than bullets (but they can go pretty fast too).

would not be surprised if the Russian army already lost 10,000 or more soldiers, and many more to come. — magritte

It maybe true Russia has suffered 10 000 losses or more. And in terms of casualties I would agree that's a reasonable figure. However, depends a lot on how casualties are defined; after a war it's usually killed and seriously wounded, but during a war the smallest of injuries can get infected and make you non-combat effective, even if you're back to basically 100% after a week in an infirmary.

These small injuries don't really matter in a conflict like Afghanistan (to US troops) as attacks are relatively infrequent, "low-intensity conflict" (compared to what's happening in Ukraine) and so they just go back to base and heal up and any given time there's some sick and wounded soldiers, but the don't accumulate.

However, in a high intensity conflict with shelling and explosions all over the place, people can get cut, concussed, fractured limbs or ribs, infected or just get sick due to stress and exhaustion, or simply reach their physical and psychological limits.

So, we'd need to know the statistics on these casualties, to decide if 10 000 is a big number or not.

And that's also the basic problem with all the negative reporting on the Russian military situation, it's really sparse data that doesn't give much statistical insight. The "Task and Purpose" video has a really good contrast (by someone a lot more qualified than me on these tactical issues) of a totally incompetent armor response to an ambush and a pretty competent response. It's entirely possible the incompetent response was because the tanks weren't even driven by a tank crew but just logistics people to get them to the front and it was believed the area was cleared (obviously a mistake).

However, ambushed don't take territory and unless they stop logistics completely, don't really change anything fundamentally. German U-boats sank plenty of merchant ships resupplying UK, but obviously enough got through for UK to hold out. In supplying some location where resupply can be targeted it's a question of if those losses are worth it for whatever strategic location is being supplied.

I expected that modern technology would have proven cumbersome tanks and even expensive airplanes obsoleted by this war. Movements of large machines can be tracked by satellites making them easy targets for attacks from the distance by small groups of scattered defenders armed with portable and shoulder fired rockets. — magritte

The problem is that everything has a counter. If you don't have tanks ... enemy use weapons and tactics that highly effective against an enemy without tanks, if you do have tanks they'll employ weapons and tactics to try to take out your tanks. Of course, you'll then try to deal with their anti-tank weapons and tactics and they'll try to deal with those.

Air power is definitely the tanks biggest weakness, and drones extremely effective air power for this purpose, so facing this threat counters will be developed, and then counters to those counters and so on.

So, to evaluate anything we need some statistical information of how much a given tank is able to accomplish before being destroyed, how many anti-tank drone missions can be done before the drone is destroyed (or drone command center targeted with cruise missiles), and so on. What we'd want to know is the Russian tank's survivability generally speaking in front line combat and against ambushes as well as the survivability of the crew.

We basically don't have any statistical information at all.

All we know is that Russia can take and hold territory in Ukraine pretty effectively, and regularly advances key positions, but we don't really know what the cost is to Ukraine or Russia. Are Russians regularly tactically retreating to inflict heavy losses ... or are Ukrainians methodologically tactically retreating to inflict heavy unsustainable losses.

We definitely don't know, my main purpose is to simply point out that Western media claims are totally unsubstantiated and can represent Russia winning as easily as Ukraine somehow winning.

I'll look this up. But do note that this was before the current war. — ssu

That's why it gives really context of what Russia's strategic doctrine may have been before going into the war.

The analysis is not biased by trying to interpret current events as it was done before.

A lot of actors do have genuine reasons to get a realistic picture of the war. — ssu

I don't say otherwise, but most material just so happens to be published by Ukraine as basically the foundation of their strategy is the social media battle, to get international support, to get weapons and sanction pressure on Russia, so publishing material to support the narrative that they are winning, or inflicting serious unsustainable losses on the Russians, is critical for that.

Even observers tying to be unbiased may not have any unbiased sources. Sure, you're free to believe Western intelligence sources are just unbiased truth tellers if you want.

What is really lacking is that Ukraine would make larger counterattacks and surround larger Russian units and hence use as Finland did in Winter War the famous motti-tactics. — ssu

Motti-tactics were specific to the Finnish Boreal Forest North of lake Lagoda, where the Russians were constrained to narrow roads to move any heavy equipment or supplies through the forest; Finns could use their advantage of ski and other winter forest tactics to cutup and destroy these columns (including excellent mortar teams trained precisely due to the near vertical terminal descent of mortars perfect for hitting targets between tall trees). It should also be noted that the Soviet Union was still wary of and positioned for a war with the Nazi's and Stalin purged some 90% of the officers. So these weren't Russia's best troops and officers sent into said forest / death trap.

However, south of lake Lagoda there is more of an open plane of farmland that the Finns must defend a more traditional line against armor and artillery, but there's a big bottle neck between the lake and the gulf of Finland where a small force can hold hold a line against a larger force due to the constrained space making flanking maneuvers impossible and the entire region will be impassible mud for armor and artillery come spring--hence "the Winter War".

The situation was very different.

Notice that the map hasn't changed much for days. — ssu

This is the basic pattern of the war, as forward operating bases need to be built, and defenses to protect them, to supply forces for the next step (otherwise armor just runs out of fuel as we saw in the first days of the war). Russia has a unit dedicated to building tactical pipelines for example, which apparently has been stealing tractors from farmers for digging and landscaping for this project.

The other reason there's a pause is that Kiev has been nearly encircled, which means the affect of this will be tested diplomatically and also strategy rethought considering this strategic objective being achieved (consolidate, move forces around, decide and plan the next military operations). For example, Russia may decide Kiev is encircled "enough" and so dig in where they are now to focus on other objectives, or decide to storm the capital, or decide to fully encircle the capital.

Lastly, there may not be a pause at all, but rather the next critical step is not taking more territory but something more subtle when looking at a map of the entire country.

Or maybe there's a pause as things are falling apart, and casualties and losses are unsustainable.

It's very difficult to tell, but a few days pause, even if literally nothing much was happening, may indicate a setback or may indicate Russia is simply preparing it's next major offensives and moving things into position.

All the anti-tank weapons are definitely clearly dangerous, but what we don't know is if Russia has developed effective counter tactics. Russia has had experience with a lot of anti-Tank weapons in Syria and developed counter tactics in that context, but the environment was very different and they weren't NATO's best in stock. We really have almost no insight into what Russian generals are thinking of these weapon systems (except obviously they'd rather them not be there; so, if they simply inflict unsustainable losses without any counter-tactic, then Russia will likely dig in where they are now; but if they, at least feel, they can deal with them somehow, then we may see major offensives demonstrating that confidence--I honestly don't know what the situation is with the ATGM's, except both sides are trying to learn and adapt, and they clearly haven't stopped Russian getting to wherever they are now).

For those confused about the current mainstream maps getting more and more ambiguous, such as replacing Russia "territory" with arrows, there's 2 reasons for this.

There's a good faith reason that journalists simply don't know the situation on the ground. At the start of the war there were journalists a bit everywhere and almost everything was documented on social media.

It's sort of the reverse of pre-telegraph times where the start of a war was the most confusing and word travels on foot and can be inaccurate and rumors spread on purpose by enemy spies and so on, and the reality becomes clearer only over time. And also "journalists" didn't necessarily exist at all.

However, there's also a bad faith reason of "map propaganda" in that if one wants to make the argument Russia has completely stalled ... one simply need not update the map for a few days to give that impression. Likewise, a pro-Russian source may do the opposite and so paint as much of the map Russian as can be possibly argued. So, whereas both pro-Ukraine and pro-Russian maps of the war started out largely agreeing, I have noticed they can now be really far apart (not just between different partisans but also even between the same partisans maps can now be very different).

There is one mapper that not only seems genuinely making an effort to be as objective as possible, but even makes videos explaining sources and confidence level of different reports as well as tactical implications and what's been reported about different battles.



It's so far the most insight into what's actually happening on the ground I have found so far, and where things are very unclear (basically still internet rumors with no confirmation) it at least gives insight into the tactical stakes in different battles and fronts (such as if the rumor is true what that may mean etc.).

My first comment on this thread was mainly asking for insight into how Russian's perceive things, to balance out the inundation of what Westerners think.



This video is pretty good for that purpose.

Here's some analysis of the fog of war situation from someone who's actually been in a war.



He also comments on the use of conscripts situation and that they seem useless to him as front line soldiers.

It definitely could be a "send the cannon fodder situation" but from what I can tell we're not talking about a lot of conscripts.

For me, the buildup is over a year and conscripts will simply be integrated into the war games and training, so it makes sense to me that they'd just be deployed like everyone else, especially in a chaotic 1 week to plan situation (again, that has many cons, but means Ukraine has no time to deploy their own conscripts).

I think it's really difficult to evaluate what risk Putin saw in the current situation happening, and maybe none, but it seems clear to me that both Putin and Russian generals would want to avoid a Ukrainian sizable conscript deployment along the West of the Dnieper and Belarus border, with all the bridges wired to blow. Even if Russia then takes the East side it's not really a victory as that would be exactly Ukraine's strategy.

In any case, to understand decisions you have to know what risks they were intended to mitigate. There can be a lot of negative consequences for a decision, but if it mitigated worse risks then it may still be the best one, and certainly rational.

It's possible Russia is somehow losing, but it's also possible they are happy the West thinks they are losing so that Ukraine keeps on fighting so they can destroy more of their military capacity (the stated 'de-militarization" objective which Putin told the Finnish president was currently 'happening'). Of course, the negative is Russia is certainly experiencing losses, but without knowing how many and some idea of the acceptable loss level, it's basically impossible to evaluate the Kremlin's view of things and what motivates decision making.

This entire process is Zelenski and the West calling Russia's bluff, and now Russia calling the West's bluff.

Who's actually bluffing ... we'll find out soon enough.

Completely agreed, and those governments will therefore soon want the conflict to be resolved one way or another.

The party (that they can influence) that can most easily end the conflict is NATO, by stopping the supply of weapons (or just negotiate behind the scenes, and then telling Zelensky to accept the deal or the arms supplies ... well, aren't necessary going to stop but, it would be a damn shame if anything were to happen to them once in Ukraine--there's a nice supply line of ATGM's here, I wouldn't want to see anything to happen to it, capiche, kind of remark).

↪boethius, the Nazi thing wasn't in Putin's demands (other than used as a pretext/excuse perhaps). Either way, UN peacekeepers ain't up to him to decide, as he apparently thinks, only to go in with his bombs blazing instead. — jorndoe

Legitimate grievances are rarely directly addressed in a resolution, rather compensation is represented in some way to make the deal acceptable.

For example, if a company screws up, they may offer you a gift card to "resolve the issue", they won't commit to writing that they accept whatever the grievance is has any legitimacy; it's their offer that represents that and their proposal to solve it.

Russia knows that the Ukraine and NATO will never admit to a neo-Nazi problem, so there's no use in negotiating that directly. Most leverage in a negotiation is implied. Someone much bigger and stronger than you shouldn't need to actually point that out if "you're in their seat".

Completely agree.

However, Russia is also currently holding the world's food hostage. This is going to create a log of diplomatic pressure from all sorts of countries on NATO to resolve the crisis.

On-top of the Ukraine-Russian military struggle, there's also this battle of wills. Russia is hurting from the sanctions ... but the whole world is hurting from the sanctions as well as commodity price increases. At some point, various "neutral" governments, that NATO still "needs" to deal with for various reasons, are simply not going to care who wins or loses the fight ... only that their people are gong to be able to eat.

What we can be sure of is that the whole situation is tense.

Thanks for these insights, always pause for thought someone describing something happening today ... about a century ago.

Reminds me of a passage from Marx about how the "liberal" party of UK, whatever it was called at the time, just represents the aristocrats and their fellow rich friends that benefit from economic liberalisation and getting rid of the rest of aristocratic privileges, and they'll never deliver on their "ideals" of freedom and equality and the rest of it; that it's all talk and you'll never see actions no matter their majority in parliament ... it will always be close but "shucks, can't do it".

↪boethius For what it's worth, the Ukrainian side estimates that the Russians will have exhausted their stock of cannon fodder by end April - early May.

With any luck, Ukraine can save part of their wheat harvest, that should take place in June I think. If the conflict last longer, the harvest will be compromised, with significant repercussions on food prices and possibly famines in a number of food-importing countries. — Olivier5

Even if true about the cannon fodder, which is certainly difficult for us to know, is this leverage Ukraine has on Russia, or leverage Russia has on Ukraine and the entire world?

In Russia every man who is qualified for military service is either on active duty or in reserve - up to the age of about 50. So imagine all those men with families, jobs and beer bellies being called up to fight in the "brotherly" nation of Ukraine! — SophistiCat

Definitely if they need to start forced conscription, this would be a sign of strategic troubles.

However, a military recruiting like mad during a war is not unusual, US marines are recruiting all the time.

Should also be kept in mind by everyone that conventional warfare produces a lot and a lot of casualties on a very wide spectrum of injuries. During my own training I was several times inured / exhausted to a point of 0 combat effectiveness, but then recovered in a week or two after a doctors note; and this was just training and more or less "sports injuries" without anyone actually shooting anything at me. So in a real war you're going to have all these "sports injuries" and limits of exhaustion, likely a lot more, in addition to shrapnel and bullet wounds and psychological limits as well. The stress of just training for war has a big effect, and there's basically zero trauma of anyone dying or actually trying to kill you.

So, all this affects the Russians, but so too the Ukrainians, and pauses are not just to resupply and buildup forward operating bases, they are also to wear down the enemy psychologically, physically, allow small wounds to get infected etc.

And being able to rotate out troops to infirmaries in Russia, even for small wounds or psychological recovery, is an immense strategic advantage. Soldiers that do "break" you want to immediately send somewhere far away so it doesn't take time of effective troops to manage and affect their morale.

And people break all the time just training for conventional warfare, so, I can only really imagine what a real conventional war is like.

One guy on our base broke his foot with a chair, to get out of the experience. This other guy (far more intelligent) just refused to speak nor do anything other than eat and go the bathroom, he'd just lie in bed, and progressively higher ranked officers would come and yell at him--even the commander of the entire base, so the legend goes--until they finally let him go do civilian service after two weeks (once the army "has you" they won't let you go easily, if they believe you can actually fight--of which they prefer your opinion on the matter not to count).

And, the motivation to break people down (especially in basic training) is extremely high, as from the officer's point of view the people that break are not only not-effective soldiers and just a combat liability ... but are somewhat likely to shoot you if you give them a riffle and bullets. But these are still just simulations that don't even get remotely close to the psychological pressures of a real war.

Russian army reserve is not like US army reserve - it is not just a branch of the military that you can join for a few years of service. — SophistiCat

I am aware of this, I mean they will first try to recruit conscripts as full time regular soldiers voluntarily, as you describe, before conscripting people (i.e. force people who do not want to volunteer). The conscripts we've heard about so far were active duty conscripts that were thrown in to the war. Active duty conscripts train in the context of regular forces and bases (there's no separate base just for conscripts), as it's regular full time soldiers and officers that train the conscripts but also the regular forces train to deploy and manage conscripts in war games.

So, to use conscripts without calling it conscription, you just need to hire them as full time soldiers. For the active duty conscripts that got sent in with regular forces, I guess Kremlin is calling this an "error"--but of course it's purely just a PR thing, no one's "suing" the Kremlin over it.

Of course, there's a limit to how many people want to volunteer, but they'll certainly exhaust the voluntary recruits first. And by voluntary in this context, I mean someone wanting to join regular forces, not "volunteers" as has been labeled foreign fighters (by both sides).

Russian Ground Forces consist of only 280 000 troops.
— ssu

That's the number of active duty troops as of 2020 per Wikipedia, but that would include both conscripts and professionals (Russia has both). — SophistiCat

I have done a bit of digging into the numbers, all of which seem to come from US intelligence estimates and refer to troops "in and around" Ukraine, which includes the bases around Ukraine.

For me, these figures represented total personnel of front line soldiers and support personnel.

However, the basic point that however many troops in Ukraine at any given point, it's easy for Russia to rotate troops out of combat for rest and recovery, whereas very difficult for Ukraine will remain true even if 100% of Russia's troops were committed to the war (they would still rotate some percentage at a time for recovery).

The following video also gives a lot of context:



The critical part for understanding Russia's overall doctrine (at least what they are trying to do) is the explanation of the basic organisation of brigade and division.

Basically, they have a divisions that are meant for large scale offensives and permanent defensive positions (i.e. the division, if things go well, can supply itself indefinitely in the field), and then they have smaller brigades that are smaller and mobile with limited sustainability in the field.

(According to the analysts at least) the Russians do not believe in long defensive lines, but rather manoeuvre based warfare including a lot of tactical retreat to inflict losses and then rapidly retake the area in question.

So, however "good" things are going for Russia in terms of absolute losses and relative losses vis-a-vis Ukraine, it makes a lot more sense to me at least what the Russian's basic idea is.

They have "divisions" setup around Kiev and in the south to protect core strategic objectives (Kherson to cross the Dnieper, land-bridge to Crimea, and of course encircling Kiev). Everything else is consistent with this manoeuvre based warfare of brigades that have limited sustainability, so might break through create a salient and then retreat. The sign of a "failed salient" is encirclement of forward forces.

Another interesting part of the video is describing the toppest-top level strategic thinking (again according to them) of the Russian military, which is their belief that any large scale conflict will involve a first phase of basically lot's of missiles and quick strikes at key strategic objectives (and giant air war; but that would apply more to a large air-power such as NATO) and then after that chaotic phase, a second phase of more prolonged warfare, where it is the side that adapts best that will prevail.

So, it definitely appears to me that this doctrine has been put into practice; it's of course up for debate how well it has worked and extremely difficult to evaluate based almost solely on information Ukraine side chooses to public.

They haven't called in reservists yet (by law, that can only be done in wartime, but then again, "law" is a very flexible thing in Russia), but they are actively recruiting. People are being called up under any pretext and asked to sign a contract. — SophistiCat

Yes, this seemed to me extremely likely that they'll just make reservists "full time" and so avoid calling conscripts (who don't want to go) as much as possible.

This may also explain why Putin has put so much effort into arguing Ukraine is already part of Russia, in case they need conscripts they can argue their defending Russian soil.

So the Russians decided to kill Russians outside of Donbass.... Makes things more even, right? — Olivier5

Russian's really don't like the original Nazi's or neo-Nazi's, and the Russian government nor the Dombass breakaway regions have any evidence of any institutional integration with neo-Nazi groups nor any evidence of tolerating such groups existing in the first place.

We've already dealt with this strawman and also deflection from the self-described neo-Nazi's in Ukraine.

Says who, and to whom? There's no grievance without an aggrieved party. — Olivier5

Russian's are legitimately aggrieved by the neo-Nazi's killing Russians in Dombass. You can engage in apologetics for the neo-Nazi's, but that doesn't change the Russian's perception of them being neo-Nazi's and their perception of them killing Russians in Dombass and elsewhere since 2014.

But, you clearly haven't understood what the basic concept even is. I'll need to continue tomorrow, but maybe someone else will re-explain it to you

It is useful also for the non-intended purpose of showing how immoral you guys are. — Olivier5

Things are perhaps not as black and white as you believe.

Understanding the history, nuances, perspective and what in negotiation we call "legitimate grievance" is essential for a diplomatic solution. Likewise, the evaluation of the military situation influences whether one believes diplomacy is even "necessary" for your aims, and, if so, then what a reasonable deal would be considering the military situation (of which, we don't really know the true state of things on the ground, but need to make deductions from larger events and considerations).

Recognizing someone's legitimate grievance does not mean agreeing everything they say.

To bring up the example of police negotiators, if they are talking to someone who they are certain is the suspected murder, and the suspect asks for a coffee ... they are likely to provide it as it's a legitimate grievance to be denied a coffee as a police captive, likewise food, and, likewise, indeed, the murder itself can be motivated by legitimate grievances and police negotiators will recognize that to get the suspect to talk and admit to the murder and so wrap up the case with far less resources as well as satisfy their own and other people's desire to at least understand the motivations and events.

And, it's these police murder suspect negotiators videos that you can find plenty online, as it becomes public evidence in trial, that are probably the best examples of negotiation that are accessible. Corporations and governments also have good negotiators ... but they tend not to film it and post it online afterwards.

One of the key themes in these police negotiations is responding to legitimate grievances and opposing non-legitimate grievances (for example: avoiding a question). It's the only way to have a constructive conversation with a counter party regardless of the moral context. Even higher stakes is hostage situations which can be available online as well.

So, in the situation in Ukraine, just so happens that neo-Nazi's is a legitimate grievance. Now, as already discussed with @ssu a response to legitimate grievance doesn't mean "agreeing"; a legitimate response to a legitimate grievance can be proving it's not true, or then exaggerated or then arguing about it; recognition just means acknowledging it's important for the other person and that they have valid feelings about the issue that warrant engagement, not-recognizing would be just ignoring it (for example, maybe there simply is no coffee left and I can't have a coffee; ok, that would be a legitimate response and good faith if it's true, but not-recognizing my grievance about a coffee would be just to completely ignore my asking for a coffee). So, EU could "prove" there are no neo-Nazi's and the Azov brigade didn't do any active fighting as a paramilitary force, would be one response, just bad faith if there are neo-Nazi's and Azov brigade was doing parallel paramilitary fighting in Dombass outside a legitimate chain of command. Likewise, Russia's grievance about being threatened by NATO with nuclear Armageddon is also a legitimate grievance, as is our grievance of Russia's threat to us of nuclear Armageddon.

I don't know what you're talking about. I'm sure that on the basics, we agree. Maybe we differ on strategies for dealing with bullies, but we're still on a dead rock hurtling through nowhere on the way to nowhere for no reason.

As we pass into oblivion we whisper into the darkness: "we did the best we could..." — frank

Very possible out positions are close. If you're sympathetic to @ssu position, then we are mostly debating different sides of the issue. Obviously he recognizes the Russians could win, and I recognize the Ukrainians could win, just by some big surprise we don't know about. My analysis is mostly based on the assumption that the arms Ukrainians have can't really assault Russian positions.

And, I'm sure with your experience you experience of the true scale of the carnage and trauma; if more can be avoided by talking then I think that should be attempted, and talk requires mutual understanding, so, in this case, understanding the Russian perspective as well as Ukrainian.

Of course a stalemate is possible, or peace deal happening at anytime, and who really "won" is up for a debate. A good peace deal mid-war, both sides can claim they won. For instance, both Soviet Union and Finland could make a legitimate claim to having "won" in WWII, and it's that kind of peace deal that is more stable than a WWI armistice type deal that humiliates one side.

I do indeed hope we both can say we do the best we can.

I don't have any righteous rage. This is nothing new. Same shit different day. — frank

Ok, well then re-imagine my little bully story but you're not motivated to do anything at all about the situation except for some purely academic analysis on the internet.

Although the bully analogy is useful for the intended purpose of imagine I tell you guys I got a whole group of marines going to back you guys up, totally for sure, we're buddies, to go take on that bully. And then you guys channel your righteous rage that this bully is also a rapist or will soon be a rapist, and go to beat down on him (by which you mean me and my marine buddies that can easily do so).

Obviously, first you just start just pissing him off with symbolic gestures, like an SS battalion emblem as even though he's a bully he really hates neo-Nazi's as they killed his gandma ... ok, you pissed him off and he starts coming at you, and you guys start backing up like the raised arm batman meme waiting for me and my marine buddies to jump in front of you and take care of business, any moment now ... any day now ... gonna happen ... we're gonna do this. This is it. Today's the day. Any moment now.

Instead, my marine buddies and me toss you a few sticks to defend yourselves, which you totally have righteous cause to do and we get crazy mad likes for backing you up where it counts (to us personally in our ability to "slay puss", as us tough guys refer to copulation): social media.

That would be the analogy in evaluating the NATO's moral position. Definitely NATO starting "the process" with Ukraine and Georgia was a "we got your back bro" statement ... or then a deceptive tactic to bait Russia into a war to restart a cold war at their expense. One way to tell: does NATO actually have either Georgia's or Ukraine's back?

While you ponder that question, what "having someone's back means" (only talk and slipping them a shank in a fight they'll lose count?) ... perhaps consider there are also two sides to the story. How are we sure it's not Ukraine that's the real bully refusing to let people have their "right" to democratic self determination?



Deep cover Russian agent social media provocateurs?

So NATO is careful about who joins them as well, some sort of a balance. — FreeEmotion

Exactly why NATO didn't just let Ukraine in a month ago when a invasion "might" happen and "NATO's Ukrainian friends" could have easily been helped without any loss of life at all.

NATO can't have it both ways and say they care "oh, so, so much about Ukrainians", enough to supply weapons and expend the massive political energy to sell Germany on F-35's and chnage the entire posture and financial position of NATO overnight (which doesn't save a single Ukrainian life, but is obviously the priority and 99% all the actual big boy talk intra-NATO) ... but doesn't care enough about Ukraine to let them in the alliance, because that would be irresponsible (so why bait them with that in the first place again? someone please remind me), which is basically what the argument is, nor put much energy to negotiate in the interest of any civilians or Ukraine itself (just cheer on social media for Ukrainians to die to demonstrate the effectiveness of NATO weapons for the purposes of the arms sales that have already happened, are happening and will happen due to NATO pumping in arms into Ukraine to demonstrate their effectiveness and simply leads to Russia to escalate indirect fire, the reasonable tactical response to infantry that make themselves a nuisance--that any commander on the entire planet, including every single NATO officer, would do without question, which causes more collateral damage (which last I hear NATO doesn't even bother keep count of) that can easily be used to justify sending more shoulder launched systems to cause even more escalation and prolong the war causing vastly more death and trauma to, most of all, children.)

To put it bluntly, joining NATO gives a nation absolute impunity, because any military action, whether sanctioned by the UN Security council or not, with our without just cause, cannot be responded to by Russia in kind because that would mean attacking a NATO member, which is tantamount to attacking them all, including the United States.

This was Putin's point when he suggested that if Ukraine joined NATO, they could attempt to take back Crimea and he would not be able to do anything about it. — FreeEmotion

That's why countries want into NATO; way easier to be defended by the largest military block on the planet.

Come to think of it, a good strategy would be for everyone to join NATO and paralyze Russia's ability to use their military ever again. Whom is Russia going to have left to attack? China? — FreeEmotion

The problem with this is that, sooner or later, in particular unstable regional powers, but generally speaking, diplomacy breaks down and push comes to shove. May also not be clear who fired the first shot.

By letting in unstable nations with their own regional ambitions, if not today perhaps tomorrow, then war inevitably follows and NATO won't actually respond to some cluster-fuck regional shit-show. I.e. in NATO, plenty of nations will abuse the position, NATO won't do anything as otherwise it will just encourage more abuse, and so the Article 5 will be undermined and the alliance start to fall apart in a practical sense.

How does the civilian population figure in all this? Surrounding a city and asking the civilians to leave seems like a good strategy but the combatants are unlikely to let civilians leave, when they make avoiding civilian deaths more difficult, and also, combatants become civilians when they drop their weapons. Isn't it reasonable to expect civilians to be prevented from leaving a battle zone? — FreeEmotion

What mattes in the rules of war is who's to blame. Russia also has video cameras and as soon as the war ends will start to justify their military decisions based on the intelligence that they had.

If Russia wanted to kill civilians it could just drive a thermobaric multiple rocket artillery launcher up to the front lines and fire everything it has into a city center, or just carpet bomb cities relentlessly.

However, it's not doing that, and so will state that it conducted the war to minimize civilian casualties, although some collateral damage cannot be avoided (same as the US says), and that it's offers of civilian corridors were good faith and maybe will publish video of Ukrainians breaking these cease fires. Russia may also simply prosecute / discipline some soldiers who "broke it's rules of engagements"and pay reparations for those "errors". From there is will get all technical legal all sorts of details needing investigation, and, therefore, drop out of the news cycle and that will be that.

Well, 90% of 280 000 is 252 000, hence even if you take into account the National Guard units fighting in Ukraine, not so much is committed to Ukraine. But it's logical that they cannot withdraw troops for example from Kaliningrad and leave other places totally void of troops. — ssu

Ok, well we'll see, but I have not seen any similar analysis that Russia is engaging a majority of it's total force.

Or then start calling in the reserves. — ssu

Yes, Putin committed to not conscript anyone for the war, but there will be plenty of reservists wanting to become full time soldiers. The Kremlin does not have a short term war financing problem so it can simply start hiring more troops, especially pre-trianed (to some degree) reservists. Especially with the sanctions causing deep recession in Russia there is certainly plenty of people looking for a job.

Of course, this doesn't instantly replenish the force, but mitigates losses and frees up existing full time soldiers to replace with new recruits.

Point is, Russia can "tap" their reserve force without technically using any reserves, as it can just convert reservists to professional full time soldiers.

No, the fact is that dictators and authoritarian regimes are basically scared of their own security apparatus and hence they divide the apparatus to various competing organizations. — ssu

Agreed, some force is necessary to protect the Kremlin from revolution.

I'm not accusing you of that! I'm only making the point that it's wrong to say only 1/10 of Russian forces are deployed to Russia. There isn't the 9/10 to be deployed there. — ssu

I was just responding to your mention Putin as a dictator, which I initially interpreted as just moral condemnation, so wanted to make that part clear. However, if it was just to point out the units committed to protect Putin, then I agree with your point.

However, we seem to be on the same page. I'm not saying 9/10'ths could be thrown into the fight.

My point is that the troops can be rotated out of the battle space. This is a large strategic advantage.

First, front line companies, or units, or individual soldiers (depending on the situation) can be rotated back to rearguard / Russia / Crimea for just basic sleep recovery and then just sent back to the front line if needs be or then for the next company to rest. Just as even US soldiers in the Middle East do some patrol or fight a battle and then rest up in the "green zone"; they are still in a war zone but have safe space to rest and aren't literally sitting in a trench for their entire tour. It maybe counter productive to send soldiers to relax on the beach, but sleep is a basic need and difficult to do with constant explosions.

Whatever the force committed to Ukraine, it's not some absolute figure, but just "at any one time" Russia can support so many troops in the war. If companies become ineffective they can be rotated out with a fresh company with just a few train rides. For example, let's say 35% of troops of some base have been requisitioned for the war in Ukraine, as things go on, they will start to be rotated out with the fresh troops still on base; still 35% from that base committed to the war, but different people. Keep in mind many professional soldiers "want" to go to war and use their training and get experience and have stories to tell. The morale level of conscripts sent in on the first day by surprise (as mentioned, so Ukraine doesn't mobilize) is not indicative of the moral of the entire Russian military; which also can explain why Russia didn't organize it's best (as that would signal imminent invasion and preemptive mobilization).

Likewise, lightly injured soldiers can be sent back to base as part of the garrison and maybe have some productive things to do in an arm sling, and so can be replaced with a fresh soldier.

Lastly, soldier that die can be replaced by recruiting more soldiers.

The point of this fact is that a war of attrition with Russia needs to take their overall force into account.

Of course, not that Russia is willing to fight until the destruction of their whole army, but that their overall force outside the battle space makes "force repair" far easier in a purely military sense. As with the United States, likely the political tolerance for losses is reached far ahead of a purely military tolerance (mainly due to nuclear weapons, Russia doesn't actually need to fear an opportunistic invasion by a neighboring empire or upstart, unlike basically any time before nuclear weapons).

Just add up the figures and you do get the nearly one million. 280 000 + 340 000 + 200 000 +.... — ssu

The analysis I've seen of the Russian overall military position is they are still garrisoning their usual border positions, in particular close to Georgia but also in the North-East and West.

I have seen no one add up the personnel they're committing in the way you describe.

However, one must include their reservists as part of their overall force and their stockpiles of armor and artillery etc. The proper way to do things is weight each person / equipment in terms of battle readiness and effectiveness.

I agree maybe 10% is too low ... but nearly 90% committed to Ukraine seems too high.

What has to be understood that Putin truly is a dictator, and just like Saddam or Ghaddafi, he is scared about the Armed Forces being a monolithical power in Russia. — ssu

Neither me nor @Isaac or @Benkei (to the extent he's criticizing NATO / EU as well) have defended Putin's decisions morally.

We are simply being realistic that we cannot convince Putin to just give up on the war and turn Russia into an participatory devolved direct democracy somewhat loose confederation of cantons as a resolution to the problem of Ukrainians dying and children dying and being traumatized for life.

And, we are simply being realistic that, regardless of what we think of Putin or his moral character, using NATO planes in the air and troops on the ground is simply not going to happen due to nuclear weapons.

Does this mean Ukrainians don't have a right to fight? None of us have said so.

However, if you're going to fight in a war for your country, you'd probably want that fighting to actually serve your country and not be one big NATO arms demonstration.

If Ukrainians have a chance of winning (which we've been debating in good faith and I'm not saying your wrong; Russia itself orchestrated the most famous and consequential counter offensive in all of history ... so, maybe it's possible with weapons and tactics we've never seen before) that obviously affects the evaluation of the purpose of continued fighting.

"A bit more fighting" might increase leverage and get a better deal in a lost situation, or it might simply solicit a far worse deal.

It's precisely because Germany fought for 4 years instead of only to Christmas, that the allies imposed the humiliating and financially impossible Armistice, as a retaliation for not giving up sooner, which then resulted in Hitler proposing to "fix that" and then the cost of fighting to the death (including children soldiers) was the partition and essentially direct administration of Germany for many decades.

It does not go without saying that further resistance and "holding out" as long as possible is better for your country in this sort of situation--maybe, or maybe not.

On top of the military situation, there is a political situation. Even if Ukraine can't actually stop Russia relentlessly achieving it's objective, there is of course political consequences to Russia for continuing the war effort, mainly the sanctions. To evaluate this we need to know how the average Russian sees things, which we have little information on so decisions based on them "rising up" any day now is, at the least, a big risk to take.

The biggest sanction we could do is shutting off the gas ... but we're not about to do that.

Russian Ground Forces consist of only 280 000 troops. If you have 190 000 in Ukraine, that's basically it. Putin is not sending the personnel of the Air Force or the Navy or the Strategic Rocket forces to fight it out in urban combat in the streets of Kyiv. — ssu

... I've heard a lot of Russia analysts mention this 1/10th figure.



Russia could also use it's conscripts and reserves, even if it's saying it won't right now.

There's also number of tanks and equipment etc. as part of the "force".

But, from my understanding, the personnel committed to Ukraine currently include logistics and support units. Looking at Aljazera's info graphic it seems to me 1/10th is a reasonable assessment.

Keep in mind a significant amount of Russia's military hardware will be in fixed forward positions, that it could go get and move into Ukraine if it wanted too.

Except for cruise missiles, Russia is not about to just "run out" of anything else anytime soon.

But maybe this figure is wrong, but you'll need to breakdown your analysis, as clearly 10% and 90% are pretty far apart.

Are you advocating that NATO nukes Moscow to save Mariupol? Because that would be a bit odd, ligically speaking, to kill millions of civilians here in order to save thousands of civilians there. — Olivier5

I just explained it pretty clearly. The whole basis of Russia wanting Ukraine not to join NATO and commit to neutrality, is because NATO has nukes.

Hence NATO has this leverage vis-a-vis Ukrainian neutrality because it has nuclear weapons.

I just explained that "leverage" rarely means "threaten" in a negotiation. Indeed, the only time you directly threaten someone in a negotiation is when they don't already understand what you're capable of and so not already acting in a rational way according to that.

Peace and resolutions are usually obtained through constructive dialogue focused on positive outcomes, with what people can do to each other if negotiations break down something everyone should already know because they put at least some effort into understanding the situation they are in.

This strategy is discussed on Fox news, just saying the public is aware (or some of the public). — FreeEmotion

Yes, when I say "Western media" I mean the dominant narrative, but there's definitely exceptions.

And, of course, even the journalists are sometimes clearly not believing anymore the assurances Ukraine is "winning in some way". I saw this video the other day of a guy explaining to these two news anchors that NATO is working on supplying Ukraine with Russia's S-400 system, and explaining how great a system that is ... and news anchors were clearly just like WTF is going on.

You don't really pay attention, do you? — Olivier5

NATO and EU represent more nukes, more conventional military power (both direct and indirect by supplying Ukraine), and more economic power than China. Therefore, they have more leverage than China in the situation.

China also has leverage, and I hope they too use it to deescalate and help end the conflict, but to say China has more leverage than NATO in a military situation ... is to say Russia fears China's military power more, which is untrue.

Russia needs China to deal with the military leverage (pumping in ATGM's and Manpads) and, even more so it's almost not comparable, the economic leverage of pulling Western corporations out of Russia all of a sudden, requiring substitutes for those technologies and equipment and services in the short term.

However, if China had more economic leverage to begin with ... it would have already out-competed all those Western firms using the "efficiency" of the communist approach to capitalism.

This is what this whole nuclear escalation situation has been about ... that Russia has nukes, and so too NATO. And it is this nuclear standoff that creates intense motivation for Russia to want Ukraine not to join NATO in the first place (if NATO did not have nuclear weapons, and Russia did, Russia may not be so concerned about NATO).

You do not understand how negotiation works.

Leverage does not mean "threaten", it could but it could equally mean what you have that the counter party wants, with only implied threats that go along with not reaching a resolution (which in most negotiations don't exist as you just go to the next supplier, bring in the next interviewee, if you fail to reach a deal with the current one).

Russia wants a commitment that Ukraine doesn't join NATO, that's the biggest chip in play, and not only could NATO give this commitment directly it can also pressure Zelensky to accept that (for instance, by informing him he isn't getting into NATO anyways nor getting a NATO no-fly-zone).

It's the biggest chip in play because NATO also has a whole bunch of nuclear weapons. That's the basic geo-political question being sorted out in the Ukraine war: how far is both Russia and NATO willing to escalate to a war, and at one point does escalation go nuclear. For example, pumping in ATGM's and Manpads is an escalation, in response to Russia's escalation of invading the entire country, but that was not sufficient to go nuclear ... but, seems everyone agrees, the next escalation by NATO of a no-fly-zone would likely be responded to first with tactical nuclear weapons, first in Ukraine and also maybe in the air to take out superior NATO planes the easy way, and then maybe even in space as a giant EMP, which then means NATO can only respond to this escalation with tactical nukes of it's own, which can easily destroy all the Russian positions in Ukraine, leaving Russia with the only "viable" (from a military perspective) way of responding to that with a strategic nuclear strike on NATO cities inviting a similar philosophy about that.

Leverage is what you have or what you can do, you don't literally have to say it in a negotiation.

Russia is a aware that NATO has nuclear weapons. One thing Russia wants is better protection from those weapons, which Ukraine joining NATO doesn't accomplish, and so this is part of NATO's leverage in the situation.

Continuing my analysis of the military situation, which is obviously relevant to make decisions about it.

Again, only Ukrainian commanders can know if they have military objectives that can be feasibly attained.

Diplomacy is then informed by this military situation. If you are losing a war, you have less and less leverage as the war goes on. Hence, if one wants Ukrainians to selfless sacrifice themselves and their country to bleed Russia and create a new cold war, then you need to convince both Ukrainians and the whole world that they are winning, even if you know they are losing.

However, obviously NATO and EU also knows Ukraines chances, so Western media repeating over and over the idea Ukraine is "winning" is ... maybe true, or then maybe a lie to justify pumping more arms into Ukraine.

For, the moment the Western Media says that Ukraine has lost militarily the immediate followup question is that "isn't sending more arms into a lost situation creating more bloodshed for other purpose and also a 'low-blow' to the Russians that will be retaliated against us sooner or later" (if you think the Russians will forget ... you haven't met many Russians). And, indeed, the entire purpose of the rules of war is that fighting is done with honor and integrity and rationally based to protect civilians, to avoid cycles of retaliation. Regardless of who is morally / politically, correct, one side wins and one side loses in a war, and fighting with honour avoids drawing things out longer than it needs to be (sometimes decades) which then create cycles of retaliation and no peaceful building.

Sure, the Taliban eventually "won" ... but are Afghan civilians really better off due to all the cowardly civilian-clothed ambushes and suicide bombings the Taliban needed to win an insurgency?

Which is an exemplary case, for whatever we think of the morality of the US invasion of Afghanistan (who had nothing really to do with 911), imagine the state of Afghanistan today if the Taliban followed the rules of war and accepted defeat and there was no insurgency? Regardless of the initial war and it's reasons, imagine what 20 years of peace would have built in Afghanistan. So, Taliban are certainly morally responsible for that outcome even if the US invasion not justified to begin with ... but, of course we know ahead of time there will be an insurgency and Jihadist fighters aren't going to follow our little rule book, so US is responsible for the outcome as well on that account.

So, a useful contrast in terms of what the rules of war are even about in the first place, but also Taliban insurgency serves as a contrast to conventional warfare. The Taliban did not win a single conventional style battle against NATO, and didn't "win" in the end in any military sense, just tired NATO out essentially.

Both Afghanistan insurgency and first person shooter games, it seems to be most people online base their understanding of the Ukrainian conflict.

This basis of understanding leads to, for example, the narrative of the day that "tough guy" foreign fighters are going to arriving in Ukraine and that matters; as you just need a bunch of tough guys with riffles and shoulder launched missiles to "do tough guy shit" and win battles. The mental image seems to be that tough guys can go out with a riffle and a bottle of Jameson and "find the enemy" and shoot them.

First misconception with this mental image, is that you mostly don't see the enemy at all in conventional warfare, at least not in the sense that you can then just shoot them with a riffle.

Conventional warfare is not fought on the basis of tough guys, although they can play a role, but is mostly a positional battle between artillery and the logistics to supply that artillery. It is a "system" and not a individual first person shooters bravely fucking up the enemy.

The core thing first person shooter games lack as a basis to understand real warfare is the mortar. Of course, you could have a mortar team in a first person shooter game, but it would be insanely boring to be on said mortar team. Which is why in every single conventional battle, pretty much anywhere on the world, you will at least find assault riffles and mortars even in the poorest military engagements (at least on the winning side).

The system of mortars and rifles is already insanely more dangerous than just assault riffles, and you can't just "throw a bunch of tough guys together" and work a mortar team. It takes real training and skill on several levels.

On television we sometimes see soldiers casually dropping mortars into tubes that go off and explode somewhere, but this is not the whole "team" and, hopefully, they aren't just firing in the general direction of the enemy but actually at something. The whole process starts with an observer and his communications side-kick, who sneak around and find a target. If all goes well the observer figures out where the target is on the map, the communications side-kick then gets that information to the calculator guy, usually at the command post wherever it is but he can also be just hiding under makeshift umbrella in the rain. The "gold standard" of communication in this context is a wired line that sends (little) signals, but could also be just communicated by sneak. Anyways, the calculator guy works out the direction and the distance, takes into account wind speed and rain, and therefore the angle and additional powder / high explosives (mortars go like 20 feet with just the shotgun shell that sets them off), and whoever is in command approves the strike, and then this information is relayed to the team running the actual mortars. The actual fire team then needs to work out how to get the mortars in the right direction and angle (this is not some trivial task, and starts with setting up a guide stick as a reference direction, but sight on a mortar is not fixed in space and so moving the mortar around moves it off the guide-line which needs to be compensated for), and then the mortars are backed with powder / high-explosive required, pins removed and away they go.

Obviously, this whole process is in the context of some officer having some workable plan, we hope.

Now, the difference in accuracy between a good mortar team and a bad mortar team, and the difference in the observer (of which the whole process depends) not-getting-killed first and getting-the-enemy-killed first, and the time to setup, camouflage and setup a adequate defense of the mortar battery / escape plan, is really immense. A good mortar team can not only avoid getting killed, but can achieve the accuracy of the mortar, which on relatively short distances on a windless day can be a few meters.

Observer can also observe where rounds land and so send back corrective instructions (which are then very quick to process).

There are also other weak links in the chain such as the communications guys and calculator guys.

Point is, takes a lot of training. However, the result is that indirect vertical-ish fire can be brought down on an enemy position such as directly into their trenches. Also, mortars going off in the general vicinity (fire for effects) causes people to hide and the opportunity to maneuver or then tactically retreat.

Mortars can also fire other kinds of ordinance like anti-tank mortars, anti-other things, and giant flares that case a shadow at several kilometres. When assaulting a position at night, what feels save may not actually be safe if a artificial sun goes off overhead and you're totally visible and come under immediate mortar fire. We don't see the US using flares in an insurgency as A. they have really good night vision and so B. if would only give the opposing side an advantage. However, in conventional warfare flares are insanely useful to defend a dug in position.


The point of this long explanation is that this system takes a pretty long amount of training to use effectively and the tactical upgrade from just guys with riffles is immense.

From this basic riffle / mortar system, the purpose of bullets is mostly to pin down enemy forces to then hit them with mortar fire. Nearly all bullet firing in conventional warfare is suppressive fire for the purposes of striking the enemy position with indirect fire.

A war system then builds up from this, mostly just doing the same thing. Artillery serve the same basic purpose of mortars but against harder targets or farther away and requires the same basic info chain, and the basic purpose of air power is to both observe and substitute artillery strikes. Armor comes in precisely because the bullets and indirect fire system is so effective, sending a wave of infantry just get slaughtered like in WWI. WWII was totally different because armor can be concentrated to break through enemy defensive lines. And so, since armor is so amazing effective against the basic bullets and shells game, air power became so critical because it's armor's biggest weakness.

"Peak armor" was certainly the Nazi's invasion of France, and ever since then significant effort has been put into systems and tactics to defeat armor.

However, all these other way more expensive systems, such as planes and missiles of different kinds, is all happening at the end of the day to get tactical advantages (information and strikes of key things / critical moments) needed to make defensive lines of infantry and mortar/artillery cover (as bullets and shells are insanely cheap compared to cruise missiles and jet fighters).

The basic thing you want to accomplish in conventional warfare is surround your enemy cutting them off from reinforcements and supplies. So, in this basic strategic situation of lines of infantry supported by indirect fire, the counter is to break through the line at some point creating the problem for the enemy of either abandoning their positions and falling back to make a new defensive line (costs time and energy and gives up ground) or then risk being encircled. Hence, the counter offensive is critical to be able to deploy, but this requires armor and / or air power (who can both show up to the fight in a relatively short amount of time). You can't easily send infantry by foot to reinforce a position twenty kilometres away; the battle maybe over by the time they get there, so you need vehicles, civilian vehicles are extremely vulnerable, so you may need armor personnel carriers to even get reinforcements to the battle front requiring reinforcements.

The conclusion to be drawn from this analysis is that talk of "hundreds of thousands" of Ukrainians joining the fight may not be effective in any conventional military battle. Pretty much the only thing an untrained conscript or civilian can do is simply wait in a trench or some urban trench-like location for the enemy to arrive.

Hence the pumping in of ATGMs and Manpads which can be used by infantry individually with even minimum training, and does not require a coordinated team. However, these weapons can only slow the enemy as they are great to ambush armor, causing losses and caution, but they cannot really be used to assault a infantry line (insane waste of money) nor can do anything about relentless shelling of your own infantry positions, and, without good logistics, ATGM's may run out in a given location allowing the enemy to break through with armor that then no one there can do much about.

Because Nuland is not a CBRN expert either. — Count Timothy von Icarus

A. you don't need to be a CBRN expert to have such experts in your staff somewhere who have told you the state of bio-weapons.

B. if she's just talking nonsense as she's not an expert and the answer requires real expertise to answer, then she would have just said "I'm not an expert".

The question does not require being a CBRN expert to answer.

The lengths you're willing to go to try to deflect from the core thing: Q. is there bio-weapons in Ukraine A. non-no-answer, is truly remarkable.

And your long explanations of the difficulty of bio-weapons for tactical purposes, which have a lot of good info and point ... as @Isaac points out, only undermines your case, such as:

1. If there's no tactical reasons to have bio-weapons such as viruses that seem to be included in what Ukraine has/dad, then the only possible reason is for strategic purposes such as starting a pandemic for whatever reason. This would be the only rational explanation of why the CIA would be running bio-weapons labs in Ukraine or then letting Ukrainians, very potentially neo-Nazi's do so.

2. If the Russians have only non-communicable diseases like anthrax to use tactically in an invasion of Ukraine, there's not really any bio-research that helps against that. We know where to find anthrax, we know what it can do, it's more a mechanical (i.e. gas masks) than biological problem in dealing with an attack.

3. Considering the difficulties in bio-weapons development that you point out, there is zero legitimate reason for Ukraine, ranked more corrupt than Russia, to be working on any bio-weapons research of any kind. If there was some legitimate bio-weapons "defensive" research Ukraine "like super needs" it could be done in the United States at a secure lab run by people literally at the top of their field and qualified to work with insanely dangerous pathogens (and even then we worry about the risks and lab escapes do happen), and whatever reason Ukraine could legitimately have ... would also apply to the US who would therefore do that research with far more funds and skills, and just tell the Ukrainians whatever the defensive info is (... like the basics of CBN gear and usage? which, I've done, and is basically put on your gas mask and your rain suite ... and tuck your sleeves into your boots and gloves and hope not to die a terrible, terrible death ... so critical defensive information supplied? You really need bio-weapons research labs for basically the only defensive thing you can do in a tactical situation?).

Looks like Russia is taking a breather. Simply to stack on supplies and some brigades that have endured losses have been withdrawn. — ssu

This is the pattern of the war, as Russia needs to setup forward operating bases before going to the next objective.

Russia has only committed 10% of it's standing army to Ukraine, and so can also rotate units in and out of the war as well as reinforce if it needs.

No doubt Russia has suffered losses, but so too Ukraine. We can't really evaluate relative losses and operational capacity of each side with the information we have, we can only really evaluate general strategic situation (such as Russia doesn't have a fuel problem in any fundamental sense, but Ukraine may), strategic objectives that we can be sure have no strategic or tactical reason to give-up. Obviously, Ukrainians would have prevented the encirclement of the capital if they could have.

This narrative that the Russians have "stalled" makes zero sense. Had Russia failed to siege Kiev (the biggest single strategic objective), ok, then clearly a big stall, but it didn't fail. Reporters are essentially reporting Kiev is now under siege. It may not be completely surrounded, but if it can cover the Southern gap with artillery fire then it becomes significantly harder to resupply Kiev.

It is completely expected that Russia is consolidating this strategic gain to then workout their next move and the logistics for that. Had Russia really been stalled in their encirclement of Kiev, then likely we would have seen some big move on a second priority, but insofar as Russia was making progress then strategy is a very "eye's on the prize" game, and they would prioritize completing that objective with only a defensive posture and easy gains everywhere else (to keep pressure on Ukrainian forces, pin them down and tie them up to avoid them reinforcing Kiev).

There was an attempt to cut off the North-West salient, which simply revealed a long defensive completely straight line of defense the Russians had built up to protect their encirclement.

The evaluation metric the Western media is using of how much land Russia "occupies", makes zero sense. If you want to trap the enemy forces and encircle them (common sense strategy), then the goal is not to just take and occupy a lot of land, but to take the land required for encircling.

What we see now is the start of the next phase of Russian salients forming to encircle Ukrainian forces in the East, in multiple ways and multiple levels.

Again, maybe there is some surprise counter offensive in the works that will rout the Russian forces, but it seems to me an essentially impossible military task.

Ukrainian forces also need water, food, fuel, ammo and to get at least some sleep; there is zero indication that Ukrainian supply lines are working better than the Russians.

That is simply false. China has greater leverage right now. — Olivier5

This is simply false.

NATO has far more nuclear weapons than China, far more and more advanced aircraft (could make a "no-fly zone" or help the Ukrainians directly if it wanted to), far more intelligence capabilities, and EU and US and co. are together far larger economies than China.

China also has leverage, but China is a totalitarian state in a "special friendship" with Russia right now and clearly backed the invasion ahead of time (frustrate the US "pivot" to Asia).

You should probably learn something about the world before discussing world affairs. Corporate truisms, as @Benkei as so aptly pointed out, are not an actual basis of understanding pretty much anything at all.

Why the EU? Why not China or Zimbabwe do that? What's the unsaid assumption here? — Olivier5

They should too.

This is classic whataboutism.

The reason to focus on EU / NATO and US policy is because:

A. They have the most leverage with Russia currently. Russia's top demand in Ukraine doesn't join NATO and so NATO has what Russia wants. Likewise, the sanctions are from the US and EU and the whole point of sanctions, diplomatically, is to create leverage. Germany can open the second pipeline that would be good for Germany, Russia and the entire EU.

B. These parties nominally claim and have voters who not only claim but actually believe, unnecessary loss of life should be avoided, and so criticising people who claim to want to do something ... but aren't, is a lot more productive than criticising parties that make no such claims. If you look at India and Africa media: a pretty strong theme is that this is a white person problem that white people are crying about and not their issue, go fuck yourselves (certainly a stronger theme than in the Western Media).

Now, if you want more carnage and want a 20 year insurgency for Russia to deal with as that would be some sort of "cold war 2 win" than say so. If you care about Ukrainians then you should want the best resolution possible to Ukrainians.

More fighting could help get Ukrainians a better deal ... or it could make it that the deal must be worse for Russia to justify the further loss of life that Ukraine insists on. "Morally supporting" Ukraine losing lives, traumatising children (and everyone else), losing homes and livelihoods, to "stick it to the Russians" is not helping Ukrainians, it is harming the Russians with Ukrainians as a tool to do so.

Maybe Ukrainians have a way to "win" the war with only handheld weapons, and maybe we'll see that.

However, distributing small arms to civilians is just distributing random death to visit those civilians. Media complained of a mortar attack on civilians ... but a guy with a riffle was literally in the foreground of that video (the subject of the videographer).

Professional soldiers would not just wander around a civilian area in range of mortar fire. Professional soldiers will try to keep the fighting away from civilians even at some risk to themselves.

So, this policy is a bloodlust policy with zero military benefit.

Likewise, not trying to evacuate civilians from coastal areas ... by a fucking boat, is a bloodlust policy.

Neither of these policies are Russian. Obviously, Russia has bloodlust too driving their policies, but they at least make reasonable offers that are preferable to further blood being spilt at each step. If US, Nato, EU and Ukraine had counter proposals that are "more reasonable" then they could credibly blame Russia for everything.

Fact of the matter is, one Azov brigade, from my point of view, can easily justify invading a country to destroy the entire armed forces and institutional structure that tolerates an Azov brigade. This argument is, as far as I can see, completely valid one.

It would be Putin appeasing these neo-Nazi's by not invading, not us appeasing Putin by not-pumpin-weapons into Ukraine that we don't care enough to have join Nato or send any troops to defend.

And, the military support to Ukraine during the civil war phase was predicated on an "officially" Azov brigade wasn't doing any fighting, but journalists went and demonstrated that to be false. The West was supporting neo-Nazi's fighting a war. I don't actually like neo-Nazi's, Putin simply has a point on this particular issue, which has been documented by the Wests own media since 2014.