LONDON, March 7 (Reuters) - Russia has told Ukraine it is ready to halt military operations "in a moment" if Kyiv meets a list of conditions, the Kremlin spokesman said on Monday.

Dmitry Peskov said Moscow was demanding that Ukraine cease military action, change its constitution to enshrine neutrality, acknowledge Crimea as Russian territory, and recognise the separatist republics of Donetsk and Lugansk as independent states. — Reuters

There's zero reason to assume this offer isn't genuine.

Unless Ukraine has some way to "win", then Russia will simply implement these conditions by force.

I have an idea that two months ago the average English member of the public did not know whether Ukraine was a district of Russia (as Yorkshire is a county of England) or a federated country with devolved powers (like Scotland) or a province (like Northern Ireland) or an occupied territory (like the North of Ireland) or an independent country (like Malta - 'Oh, is Malta independent?') . They could not point to Ukraine on the map or name its capital or its language. Some of them would have thought it was part of former Yugoslavia. A few would have insisted it is a fictional country featuring in a Bond film. Most will have heard of chicken Kiev and some would know the reference in the lyrics to 'Back in the USSR'. And now? Now, I listen to phone in radio and it seems like every expert medical epidemiologist of the past two years has suddenly retrained as a military strategist with intimate knowledge of global politics and European history of the last 1,200 years.

They have mobile cremations. Scary shit that we may never know the extent of. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

Maybe it's too expensive to send the bodies back? One thing Putin said that I sort of believe is that this was an exercise to give his military some real combat experience. Or at least that's what he seemed to be suggesting.

How will such a situation harm his grip on power, rather than simply cement the 'bulwark against the west' narrative which keeps him there? — Isaac

That's not the basis of his power. Russians aren't afraid of NATO.

Most of the propaganda has a grain of truth somewhere, denying that fans the flames of such propaganda, it doesn't quash it. — Isaac

The grain of truth is what I said [1]. And there is no need to fabricate any other narrative around this. Additionally, Putin wants guarantees that Russia will keep control over lands like Crimea, Donetsk, and Lougansk, without fearing any future demands or revenges by a Ukrainian (ultra-)nationalist government. So far all the parties involved can get it. But this has nothing to do with the label "Neo-nazi problem": Ukrainian does not need to be neo-nazi to re-claim control over Crimea, Donetsk, and Lougansk as much as the Spanish government does not need to be neo-nazi just to fight against the Catalunian separatist movement; and EU is not a neo-nazi government just because it fights against the far-right and far-left populist propaganda; and Trump is not a neo-nazi even if he flirts with neo-nazi right?
What I found dubious in your claims is that you were talking about joint investigations about the "neo-nazi problem" [2]. And this can not be since the label "neo-nazi problem" is evidently designed to support Russian propaganda to justify their expansionism and/or preventive war. We could label the same issue in many other ways: like the "anti-Russian nationalist problem" or the "Ukrainian far-right problem" or the "Russian minority oppression problem" or the "Russian separatism problem" or the "Russian expansionism problem" or the "'Ukraine belongs to Russia' problem". But probably the label "neo-nazi problem" sounds much better for the Russian propaganda inside and outside their country. So no, we shouldn't fall for this label.

[1]
Concerning the neo-nazi problem, what we can more prudently claim is that this conflict involves anti-Russian Ukrainian ultra-nationalists (which include some Ukrainian neo-nazi militants) as well as anti-Ukrainian Russian ultra-nationalists (which include some Russian neo-nazi militants).

[2]

Sweeping the rug out from under him by promising to jointly investigate the problem at least has a chance of undermining some of his support in Russia if he refuses. — Isaac

Maybe it's too expensive to send the bodies back? One thing Putin said that I sort of believe is that this was an exercise to give his military some real combat experience. — frank

All the combat experience gained by his military dies inside of the body, so it seems a little short sighted, no?

All the combat experience gained by his military dies inside of the body, so it seems a little short sighted, no? — ArguingWAristotleTiff

True

And now they appear to have had their newest class of patrol ship taken out by dumbfire grad spam, a BM-21 the Ukrainians just drove up to the shore :lol:. A definite casualty of this conflict is respect for the Russian military.

Imagine losing (maybe just temporarily) a $30 million war ship, likely carrying a $14 million helicopter to some 1960s artillery. Someone is in trouble.

I doubt the assault on Odessa goes well, that's when the Ukrainians will pull out the Neptunes. If the Russian air force is still MIA it seems like a disaster waiting to happen. They have around 72 R-360s, possibly more now. Enough to send the Black Sea fleet to the bottom of the ocean if they're able to get them off efficiently.

Sometimes things are so stupid they have to work I suppose.

Most of the propaganda has a grain of truth somewhere — Isaac

A grain of sand does not make a beach, so a grain in itself is irrelevant when defining a whole beach.

A grain of truth is also one of the most important parts of making the propaganda machine work. Build the lie on a small truth and you will make those who seek the truth have to work harder to prove that truth. And it's with small sentences like "...has a grain of truth somewhere" that propaganda thrives on.

I doubt the assault on Odessa goes well, that's when the Ukrainians will pull out the Neptunes. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Probably why Russia wants to end the conflict by telling them to give parts of Ukraine to Russia and lay down arms. Problem is that what's gonna happen to the people who don't want to live in Russia, are they gonna relocate to other places in Ukraine? The demands are a sham, a way to win something out of this. Russia has no rights to anything, they should just leave and go back home. Especially since Russia will have a hard time coming back from any of this, they need to rebuild things back home and just leave Ukraine alone. We're also now waiting for some word from the Hague court and there's not much telling any other narrative there than that Russia is conducting serious war crimes, which might lead to repercussions even if the war ends.

There's zero reason to assume this offer isn't genuine. — boethius

It's genuine, Peskov is Putin's man. Of course Peskov has thrown earlier wild pitches at opponents: for example he purposed to Trump "as a show of friendship" that the US would withdraw all of it's troops from the Baltics and Poland. Trump didn't even respond to the gesture.

But at least it's a start, at least.

Russia already had those areas and seems to understand that occupying larger parts of Ukraine isn't a good plan. Is this a long term salami-tactic chipping away parts of Ukraine every some years or so?
Ukraine sees what it is bargaining here for. And Ukraine can later always come to this proposal.

's with small sentences like "...has a grain of truth somewhere" that propaganda thrives on. — Christoffer

What makes you think that?

Demands are now for the territory they already held before the war started and a pledge not to join NATO, clearly not the original war aims, i.e. a change in government and Russian defacto control of the country. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Putin has been saying for a long time that Ukraine cannot join/apply for NATO without serious kickback from Russia. He has been pretty consistent.

But this makes no sense. Then why the Kool-Aid? — Isaac

Control? Just the "crafted Kremlin line" and no others?

They need the Kool-Aid precisely because their ability to just shoot dissenters is limited. — Isaac

Not necessarily shoot. But (authoritarian) oppression, yep. Remove the rest.
Alternatively, they need the Kool-Aid and just that, because they have no thought-control.
♫ or do "They"? (play theme from The Twilight Zone) ♬

There's zero reason to assume this offer isn't genuine. — boethius

Better late than never I guess?
Did sanctions have an effect of sorts? Ukrainians cause difficulties?
Anyway, seems the Nazi story fell out of favor.

At least the first sign of Pro-Putin patriotism can be seen in Russia with the application of the "Z" sign. Likely to be basically for the population a "support the troops"-sign as the saying goes.





Perhaps when your propaganda start from "we have no intention to attack" you have to wait few days to start rallying your people for the "special military operation". Because the absence of any shown support for the mission seemed strange.

What makes you think that? — Isaac

Because it nurtures the lie that muddies the waters of what is propaganda and what is not. Maybe not among people in here, but media and lots of people who never talk philosophy or politics etc. keep mentioning the grain of truth as if it validates anything of what Putin is doing.

Better late than never I guess?
Did sanctions have an effect of sorts? Ukrainians cause difficulties?
Anyway, seems the Nazi story fell out of favor. — jorndoe

But it's still not "we're leaving", it's "we're leaving, so long you put down your weapons first, and then we'll do it", except we'll keep some parts of Ukraine. It's arrogant to say the least, like a child who's crying over losing and wants to have a little cookie at least.

It's interesting that the "War Lord" Vladimir Zhoga, who was recently killed, was a neo-nazi criminal and that this is was supposed to be the elite who Putin sent in to "denazify" Ukraine. Now, Ukraine denazified part of the Russian army by killing him. Oh the irony :ok: :clap:

Control? — jorndoe

Isn't the threat of being shot control enough?

it nurtures the lie that muddies the waters of what is propaganda and what is not. — Christoffer

What makes you think that?

lots of people who never talk philosophy or politics etc. keep mentioning the grain of truth as if it validates anything of what Putin is doing. — Christoffer

Do you have any examples?

It's genuine, Peskov is Putin's man. — ssu

It's Reuters and they're reporting as Moscow's offer.

What I mean is that there's no reason to assume if the offer was taken, that Moscow would continue military operations and not withdraw as stated.

No one now believes Ukraine will ever join Nato, nor ever get Crimea back, nor get the breakaway provinces back.

Yet, the West has been telling, and is telling Ukraine to refuse to formally accept the obvious reality.

The usual logic of refusing to accept concessions of this kind is that maybe they ask more concessions later, and then more, and more and more, and you're forced to fight at some point anyways, but have now given concessions for no reason ... but that logic doesn't hold if the fight is happening.

I honestly don't get the logic, other than use Ukrainians as cannon fodder to setup the new cold war and all the arms sales that goes with that

True, but we aren't discussing the portrayed genocide that Ukrainian government according to Putin was doing in the Donbas. No evidence of that has been even given (or fabricated) from the Russian side I think. — ssu

There's been a lot of fighting and ethnic Russians dying in Donbas since 2014 (regions no one doubts wants to break with Ukraine) and likewise language and cultural suppression of ethnic Russians generally speaking. Certainly not the level of a "genocide," but, again, if you're tolerating neo-Nazi's who are extreme anti-Russian fanatics it's an easy sell to say they have genocidal intentions to remove ethnic Russians from Ukraine (which they say they do) and the policies and things like Azov brigade are the start to that genocidal plan, which left unchecked, would be appeasement, and may not be easy to stop later etc.

Better late than never I guess?
Did sanctions have an effect of sorts? Ukrainians cause difficulties?
Anyway, seems the Nazi story fell out of favor. — jorndoe

This has more-or-less been the offer the whole time, before the war too it seemed clear to all analysts there was an agreement that Ukraine was neutral and accepting the separation of break away regions, then there would not be a war.

If Putin makes this very, very, very good offer (accept not having what one already doesn't have and can never get: NATO membership, Crimea, Donbas), and Ukraine refuses, then it's again playing into Putin's hand to sell the war to the home audience as well as other non-aligned states.

Putin can go to the Indians and when they bring up the war, he can say "hey, I made a pretty good offer, it was refused; people can't be simply unreasonable in these issues".

It definitely succeeds in flipping the moral burden and lowers the cost of continuing the war, if Ukraine refuses the deal.

Now, if Ukraine accepts the deal and Putin continues the war anyways ... well, situation hasn't changed but it's a far harder sell both to the home audience as well as other states Putin will need to deal with to re-orient Russia's economy away from the West.

If Ukraine accepts the deal and it's implemented as stated, then we'll see if international opinion views that as Russia being "defeated" by Ukrainian resistance or just stopping a war started to achieve certain reasonable objectives and then stopping the war when those reasonable objectives were achieved.

The so called "ludicrous" demand that NATO pull back it's advanced forces to around Germany ... is honestly not that ludicrous. It's NATO that insisted those advanced forces weren't to target Russia, but the stated reason for missile bases in places like Poland was to strike the middle east if I remember correctly.

As for neo-Nazi's, Azov brigade is surrounded in Mariupol and will certainly be dealt with and their entire city already collectively punished, and, more importantly if there is an end to the war, the Ukrainian neo-Nazi or "ultra nationalist" delusion that war with Russia is actually a good thing may fall out of favour and Ukrainians maybe less sympathetic to having them proudly walk around with their Nazi inspired insignia.

Putin can easily say he's dealt with the neo-Nazi problem himself by killing hundreds, perhaps thousands of "ultra nationalists" on the battle field.

Furthermore, a peace deal would certainly have a whole bunch more details than the main points, and would certainly include Russia arresting any neo-Nazi's on the territories it is currently occupying, and would then have some trials for the home audience (call them show trials if you want).

Something think about, if one knows anything about military

According to the New York Times:

In less than a week, the United States and NATO have pushed more than 17,000 antitank weapons, including Javelin missiles, over the borders of Poland and Romania, unloading them from giant military cargo planes so they can make the trip by land to Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, and other major cities. So far, Russian forces have been so preoccupied in other parts of the country that they have not targeted the arms supply lines, but few think that can last.

Now 17 000 anti-tank weapons is huge amount. That it has been sent in less than a week is noteworthy: basically it means that this has been pre-planned in anticipation of a war erupting in Ukraine. Seems that NATO is really hurling everything and the kitchen sink against the Russia forces. And you can notice this, in a rare news clip showing the evacuation of civilians near Kyiv (of course) two Ukrainian soldiers briefly were in the picture. The other had and NLAW while the other one two older and lighter LAW anti-tank weapons. This can obviously change the tactics of Russia to use more indirect fire and cautiously try to advance rather than try to make dashes toward the objectives.



Also, more days go without Kyiv being surrounded and Zelensky alive means that also the Ukrainian position on the negotiations improves.

Now 17 000 anti-tank weapons is huge amount. That it has been sent in less than a week is noteworthy: — ssu

The US already gave Ukraine some 3 billion USD of weapons since 2014 ( / loaned them the money to buy them). That so far hasn't stopped the Russians.

From what I see in terms of militarily strategy--whereas the Russian build out of their logistics on 3 fronts does take time and has met some losses and setbacks--the Ukrainians logistics I don't think are going great.

Russia's strategy is to simply avoid urban combat (where these javelines would be most effective), surround cities.

If their south forces meet their North forces by simply going around urban areas and shelling to oblivion any ad hoc enemy positions along the way, then Russia can just setup a conventional defensive line North-South across the whole of Ukraine.

These anti-tank weapons have very limited use against a conventional defensive line (aka. trenches and other fortified positions supported by artillery) in flat open country.

Everyone is saying "urban combat, urban combat" ... but if Russian forces just avoid urban combat and cut the country in half it is effectively laying siege to not only Kiev but the entire East of the country.

Combat in the East after that point is simply a matter of time before ammo runs out, and mayors and commanders can only ask people to starve only so long.

In the West, assaulting a conventional battle line would require heavy artillery and tanks, anti-tank weapons would be relatively meaningless.

Notably, the only city the Russian's have so far actually done urban combat and occupied is the only city required to carry out the above plan: Kherson. Every other city the Russian's are simply laying siege at minimal risk to themselves.

The armor dashes at the start of the war make sense to simply take as much territory as possible as Ukraine didn't preemptively mobilize, also make sense in terms of public relations of starting "the soft way", and also gave the chance to Ukraine to get a "taste" of war and maybe accept the offered peace terms.

Ukrainian leadership decided that calling Russia's bluff of doing things the hard way was a better idea, and so started handing out small arms to civilians to make clear the cost of urban combat in a social media campaign the likes the world has never seen.

... Which is what Western media keeps on going on about, how it's a "second Russian Afghanistan etc." but, other than the only city Russia has taken with experienced Urban combat units, I don't see any need for Russia to do any urban combat at all.

Russia has never stated it wants to occupy and passiffy Ukraine, everyone agrees it's impossible to do with their committed troop numbers and would be a costly disaster if they did commit the troops to try to do it ... so maybe that's just not their plan, but what they can do is cut the country North-South and just wait out the Ukrainian will to fight.

Easy to be brave when your heroic and defiant statements immediately get a thousand likes on facebook. It's far harder hungry, tired, cut off from communications, running out of ammunition, and no viable pathway to victory in the face of continuous shelling.

I have actually trained to go up against conventional Russian military tactics. It's not a fucking game: it's building and sitting in multi layered networks of trenches and other fortifications for the purposes of protecting your own heavy artillery counter battery fire. Throw in a shit ton of mines, an air / anti-air game going on in parallel for control of the sky, armored offensives and counter offensives to break through enemy lines (for the purposes of destroying their slow moving heavy artillery), and you can "maybe" fight the Russians off within a days march from their own border.

I honestly don't see how javalins are going to stop the process of relentlessly removing any obstacles with a zillion heavy artillery shells.

I didn't know anything about the Maidan that happened in 2014.

The Ukrainian people had had enough of being controlled by putin; now they have to fight for that right of freedom. Poor bastards...

Also, we've seen this exact script play out before.

When Russia intervened in Syria, the "resistance" had an amazing social media campaign, took out many Russian tanks and vehicles (some of it real, some of it fake) with Western supplied anti-tank missiles, high praises from the Western media, and denigrating the Russian equipment and personnel, and predictions of the Russian's losing etc.

Russian's would respond to the social media offensive with a press conference pointing to having blown one thing up, with basically the message that "see, we blow up things too".

On the ground, Russian forces simply relentlessly took ground every day with heavy artillery clearing the way, with a few setbacks here and there.

That the exact same play book is now being used in Ukraine by the exact same people far closer the Russia's border there's little reason to expect won't work.

The argument "they didn't win in a week and therefore lost" doesn't really make sense.

Pointing to successful guerrilla tactics in a conventional war likewise doesn't point the way to victory.

For everyone of these guerrilla tactics to pick off a tank, the Russians will just shell to the ground several neighborhoods to express their frustration with that.

Setting up some sort of insurgency after the war doesn't benefit normal Ukrainians nor will it change the outcome of the war, just empowers extremists to cause mayhem for decades (which if the Russian's are too difficult to kill, they'll turn these weapons on Ukrainian "softies" trying to rebuild the country and their international relations in a common sense way).

And for everyone of these missiles that gets used against the Russians, 2, 3 maybe 10 (in the case of the manpads) will be sold on the black market. Likewise all the rest of the small arms as well.

People really want fanatics with manpads in the heart of Europe and almost zero barriers to bring them anywhere in Europe to fire at any civilian plane at any time for the next 20 years?

Abandoning conventional rules of war in favour of some sort of tictoc fueled "last stand against the galactic Empire" serves no one, least of all Ukrainians, and is simply undermining European security as a whole for decades.

Of course, American's are smiling about that, but why EU nations are going along with this madness for the "views" is truly disheartening.

If you can't win a conventional war, the duty of leaders is to surrender to avoid unnecessary loss of life. Neither Ukrainians nor Europeans will benefit from thousands of sophisticated missile systems being distributed to every extremist group in Europe that can buy them.

You think these "almost" neo-Nazi's won't sell these weapons to Jihadists?

It's true police madness.

If you don't care enough about Ukraine to send your own troops to try to win a conventional war with trained soldiers, flooding the place with sophisticated small arms changes nothing and will cause insecurity on the entire continent for decades.

And I say these things because, right now, if the EU stopped being little fucking bitches, they could negotiate a resolution that includes tracking down every single one of these weapon systems when the war is over.

The other thing that really pisses me off is the Western media taking at face value extra-judicial execution of alleged Russian special forces.

I saw a video where a Ukrainian brown shirt butted a guy in the face, had him run down the street, and then shot him in the back; and this was presented as "dealing" with Russian special forces. Not official media, just the youtuber caption for what was happening, but the mass media are not pointing out that these stories have zero basis to assume these people are Russian special forces and saboteurs, and, even if they are, extrajudicial killing of an unarmed captured enemy is still a war crime; Western media just casually mention Ukrainians have been finding and killing them.

However, what I did see on a Western mass media was footage of "civilians" getting hit by mortar fire ... without pointing out they included "civilians" carrying around assault rifles that got handed out out to them.

Even more absurd, the legal rational for these executions is these "special forces" are in civilian clothing (which would still need a legal process, but who cares) at the same time as Ukrainian leaders hand out weapons to civilians to Western media fanfare!

These reports of executing special forces in civilian clothing could reach Putin's desk and his reaction could literally be right now "good thing we have zero special forces in civilian clothing in Ukraine right now."

For everyone of these guerrilla tactics to pick off a tank, the Russians will just shell to the ground several neighborhoods to express their frustration with that. — boethius

That's one of the reasons why they're the bad guys.

That's one of the reasons why they're the bad guys. — RogueAI

Go fight them then.

And, what I describe is not unique to the Russians; if you use guerrilla tactics and arm civilians, then there's going to be more civilian casualties.

What's the American's excuse for when they're trigger happy with the drones and blow up civilians having a wedding or whatever?

Same exact thing. You kill a bunch of American soldiers with guerrilla tactics and suicide bombers and they retaliate one way or another.

It's basic psychology.

Not only does the perception of what is a legitimate threat change to encompass more things to shoot at and blow up, but empathy for the civilian population is also reduced.

The entirety of the rules of war is based on the visual distinction between soldier and civilian.

It is a "gentlemen's agreement" to not break these rules, but accept defeat rather than resort to blurring the line between civilians and soldiers, because A. if you need to resort to arming civilians you have probably already lost and B. it makes civilians legitimate targets and soldiers should protect civilians and not vice-versa (protecting civilians can include surrender).

Notably, the only city the Russian's have so far actually done urban combat and occupied is the only city required to carry out the above plan: Kherson. Every other city the Russian's are simply laying siege at minimal risk to themselves. — boethius

Destroyed columns say something else. And if the vast majority of the Russian forces are engaged, then combat is obviously happening elsewhere where the media isn't present.

Besides, every day the Ukrainian Capital holds out it improves the moral and the confidence of the Ukrainian side. If they want to pressure Ukraine to peace terms, I think losing the Capital would be significant blow to the Ukrainian moral.

When Russia intervened in Syria, the "resistance" had an amazing social media campaign, took out many Russian tanks and vehicles (some of it real, some of it fake) with Western supplied anti-tank missiles, high praises from the Western media, and denigrating the Russian equipment and personnel, and predictions of the Russian's losing etc. — boethius

Not actually. The videos typically show Syrian forces and Syrian tanks. Russia has basically had in Syria a rather small contingent of aircraft, air defense to protect their base and some field units and mercenaries. I haven't seen one video of a tank of the Russian armed forces destroyed in Syria. They are Syrian tanks, even if Soviet/Russian manufactured ones.

Russia has never stated it wants to occupy and passiffy Ukraine — boethius

Yes, It just has clearly stated that it wants large chunks of Ukraine to itself. :smirk:

Like Peskov has said in their peace offering, which you quoted.