most of times your line is slavishly following your masters' propaganda. — Olivier5
Paul Mason’s position is that if you say anything in public, particularly if you’re an academic, that aligns with what he calls Russian talking points or Kremlin talking points, then you must be silenced.
Some of this came out last week in leaked emails, where he’s allegedly talking about de-platforming people. He doesn't quite have the intellectual faculties to understand the implication of that. Virtually any criticism of Western foreign policy or mainstream media coverage is going to align in some way with Kremlin talking points.
He's basically saying you can no longer be critical of your own government. — Justin Schlosberg, professor of journalism at the University of Birbeck, and former Chair of the Media Reform Coalition
I am not 100% certain of much. Let's not pretend that things are impossible to tell in the specific case of Ukraine... There's more info on Ukraine than on many other issues.
And yes, Ukrainians in majority think that it is worthwhile to chase the Russians from Ukraine. You are welcome to disagree, but our opinion is not really important here. We're not fighting this war. — Olivier5
Vladimir Putin has compared himself to the 18th-century Russian tsar Peter the Great, drawing a parallel between what he portrayed as their twin historic quests to win back Russian lands.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/10/putin-compares-himself-to-peter-the-great-in-quest-to-take-back-russian-lands
Vladimir Putin has long insisted Ukraine is part of the country he rules.
Kiev is the mother of Russian cities,' he wrote in March 2014. 'Ancient Rus is our common source and we cannot live without each other.' A few days later, Russia completed the annexation of Crimea
'Ukraine is not just a neighbouring country for us,' he told the Russian people in a national broadcast. 'It is an inalienable part of our own history, culture and spiritual space.'
He [Putin] repeatedly denied Ukraine’s right to independent existence … In doing so, he revealed the structures of an imperial ideology with a chronology and ambition that goes far beyond post-Soviet nostalgia to the mediaeval era.
What Putin’s address reveals is the desire to plot Russian and Ukrainian history through the lens of imperialism. He is attempting to establish a direct line from shared ancient origins to a first and second Russian empire: one under the Romanov Tsars (1721-1917) and the second as part of the USSR.
https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/features/analysis-putins-imperial-ambitions-and-ukraines-300-year-road-statehood
Strikingly, the occasions Short records when outsiders have witnessed Putin’s inscrutable mask fracture nearly all relate to these “lost” lands, countries whose independent existence was to him an impossible outrage.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/jul/03/putin-his-life-and-times-philip-short-review-collapse-that-shaped-man-who-would-be-tsar
Every analysis of Putin tells the same story. — apokrisis
I also love how the assumption is that when someone disagrees with you they are simply uninformed. — Benkei
This is inconsistent with sending far too few troops to occupy Ukraine. — Benkei
↪boethius What a dull and confused reply. Nothing to see here. :yawn: — apokrisis
Or instead, the FSB’s expensive network of political stooges were meant to ensure a swift and easy win. — apokrisis
You are imagining you are talking to some unsophisticated soul. — apokrisis
I’ve no illusions about how the world really works. I’ve seen how it works up close. I’ve written about it professionally. — apokrisis
Mobilisation essentially means assembling and preparing troops for active service.
According to Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu, this will apply to just 1% of the country's total mobilisation resource.
Russia's estimated to have around 2 million reservists. These are people who have done their military service - it's compulsory in Russia.
The 300,000 reservists being called at this point are soldiers with military experience - although it is not clear what that means and who that refers to.
Shoigu did say that students won't be called up. — What does Putin mean by partial mobilisation?
Well, a total defeat of Ukraine...which seems quite remote now, would only alarm more the eastern NATO members and put to existential threat a country like Moldova.They probably won't start WW3, but the United States is deeply invested in Ukraine, starting with the Bush administration fourteen years ago in 2008, and possibly earlier.
A total defeat of Ukraine would be a major blow to the United States, both in terms of investments lost and reputation. That's something they cannot afford in a time where US hegemony is being overtly challenged. — Tzeentch
I wonder why you find it so hard to agree that a) Russians did try to take the Capital — ssu
That it wasn't a serious effort?Because I remain unconvinced that they made a serious effort to do so, and the attack was likely a probe, followed by a diversionary attack or feint. — Tzeentch
If I use the Occam's razor, that would be the answer. And I would add to that the fact that Russians ran also into unanticipated problems of their own: the armed forces were simply not ready for a giant war like this. There's simply too much anecdotal evidence of this, if we don't take listen to the general consensus that this operation didn't go well for Russia. Just like this brief encounter from the start of the war:Your particular take on it seems to be that the Russians ran into unanticipated resistance. — Tzeentch
As I quoted earlier a highly regarded Western think tank, they didn't believe that Ukraine could repel an attack towards Kyiv from the Russian armed forces just few months before it was tried. It's quite an apologist take to say that they really didn't try to take Kyiv.Had the Russians been able to take Kiev with such an attack, it would imply the Ukrainians let them walk into Kiev basically unopposed.
Honestly, that hypothetical scenario isn't really worth considering. — Tzeentch
The size of the attack and the use of paratroops to seize a central airport doesn't logically sound as a diversionary attack or feint. It goes totally against, actually the thing you mentioned, the Schwerpunkt-tactic. And what then was then the effort that was called Kyiv convoy, a 64km long convoy stuck there to do what? — ssu
Where the Russians did succeed was in the south attacking from Crimea. I think these formations were from the South and had seen combat in Georgia/Chechnya, so they were also a bit better (and obviously the Ukrainians basically were defending the North and the East. — ssu
Looks like Russia is running out of options. And while in a more rational society this might be an impetus for negotiations, now there is a ramping up - on both sides. — Manuel
A clear picture of Ukraine’s losses could not be independently assessed.
Denys, sitting upright on his hospital bed, said almost every member of his 120-person unit was injured, though only two were killed.
A 25-year-old soldier being treated for shrapnel wounds said that, within his unit of 100 soldiers, seven were killed and 20 injured. Ihor, the platoon commander, said 16 of the 32 men under his command were injured and one was killed. — Wounded Ukrainian soldiers reveal steep toll of Kherson offensive - Washington Post
Now the mobilization shows clearly what kind of failure this war has been to Russia. It's something like the Russo-Japanese war. And I think can easily have similar consequences as that war had.Looks like Russia is running out of options. And while in a more rational society this might be an impetus for negotiations, now there is a ramping up - on both sides. — Manuel
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