Additionally, the United States must have expected full-scale war because that's what they sought to prepare Ukraine for for years, through all kinds of military aid, from training, equipment, to joint military exercises, etc. — Tzeentch
I agree it's not coincidence, just that it may not have been completely thought through, or then arming Ukraine post-Russia invasion was not the original plan. — boethius
As reported, in December 2008, NATO invited Ukraine to a new format of relations as part of the so-called annual national program on preparations for joining the alliance. Since then, Ukraine, along with NATO experts, has drawn up and implemented such a document for a second consecutive year.
LOL. — ssu
Hey guys!
Have noticed that the war between Ukraine and Russia actually has gone on since the year 2014?
And again the hubris of Ukrainians not having any role here... :smirk: — ssu
Notice how many things were absent from was all the military cooperation going around then, and earlier in Central Asia even with CSTO members. The basic fact is that US and NATO has had a lot of military cooperation even with other CSTO members. Ukraine was actually neutral, unlike them.Notice how the matter of Ukraine was conspicuously absent from all of what you quoted, and military cooperation between Ukraine and NATO did not cease, but intensified. — Tzeentch
Policies can and do come into existence after events. It's quite likely that ideas of a full-scale war with Ukraine came to existence after the astonishing success of capturing Crimea. In fact, the easiness of this brilliant operation can perfectly explain just why Putin would think that a 10 day operation is all what is needed to solve the Ukraine-problem once and for all.It's entirely possible that the policy came into existence after seeing the Ukrainians fighting back successfully enough to halt the invasion. — boethius
You are confusing the ability to take the initiative and make large scale offensive maneuvers with the ability to defend it's territory.Ukraine is 100% dependent on NATO, in particular the US who calls the shots in NATO, for arms, intelligence, training and planning support, and bankrolling the entire government — boethius
Policies can and do come into existence after events. It's quite likely that ideas of a full-scale war with Ukraine came to existence after the astonishing success of capturing Crimea. In fact, the easiness of this brilliant operation can perfectly explain just why Putin would think that a 10 day operation is all what is needed to solve the Ukraine-problem once and for all. — ssu
You are confusing the ability to take the initiative and make large scale offensive maneuvers with the ability to defend it's territory. — ssu
In parallel to cancel culture essentially suppress any critical analysis, at the bare minimum within, political institutions to arrive at coherent policies, there is also the essentially pure game theory problem, when everyone believes the other parties policies are an irrational bluff. — boethius
Notice how many things were absent from was all the military cooperation going around then, and earlier in Central Asia even with CSTO members. The basic fact is that US and NATO has had a lot of military cooperation even with other CSTO members. — ssu
Recalling our decisions in relation to Ukraine and our Open Door policy stated at the Bucharest and Lisbon Summits, NATO is ready to continue to develop its cooperation with Ukraine and assist with the implementation of reforms in the framework of the NATO-Ukraine Commission and the Annual National Programme (ANP).
In 2013, the Alliance updated its Political-Military Framework which ensures that partners can participate more effectively in Allied assessments, planning, and decision-making on current and potential operations. [...] Through these experiences, NATO and its operational partners improved their political consultations and gained higher levels of interoperability. To secure these gains, NATO's partners will be more systematically integrated into NATO's regular training and exercise programmes.
As part of these efforts, NATO is fostering partner participation in the NATO Response Force (NRF), NATO's rapid-reaction force. In 2013, Sweden joined the NRF alongside Finland and Ukraine, while Georgia pledged to make forces available to the NRF in 2015. In the autumn, four partners participated in the Alliance's largest exercise of the last seven years, Steadfast Jazz, which served to certify the NRF rotation for 2014.
I'm pretty confident that if a mainstream publication was talking about it, google would put it pretty near the top. — boethius
certainly would be interesting to see. — boethius
↪boethius I'm not sure about cancel culture. That seems to be something that mostly threatens public figures, whereas the people who cook up geopolitical strategy that remains constant throughout several presidencies are almost certainly not public figures ("deep state" / elite, in the US also known as "the Blob" or the foreign policy establishment). — Tzeentch
Russia and Ukraine may have agreed on a tentative deal to end the war in April, according to a recent piece in Foreign Affairs.
“Russian and Ukrainian negotiators appeared to have tentatively agreed on the outlines of a negotiated interim settlement,” wrote Fiona Hill and Angela Stent. “Russia would withdraw to its position on February 23, when it controlled part of the Donbas region and all of Crimea, and in exchange, Ukraine would promise not to seek NATO membership and instead receive security guarantees from a number of countries.”
The news highlights the impact of former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s efforts to stop negotiations, as journalist Branko Marcetic noted on Twitter. The decision to scuttle the deal coincided with Johnson’s April visit to Kyiv, during which he reportedly urged Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to break off talks with Russia for two key reasons: Putin cannot be negotiated with, and the West isn’t ready for the war to end. — Responsible Statecraft
I don't think the Americans' actions suggest they believed the Russians were bluffing, especially after 2014. They took the threat serious enough to intensify security cooperation with Ukraine. — Tzeentch
Generally, I am reluctant to accept explanations that rely on the big players on the world stage making irrational or ignorant decisions. I think more likely the opposite is true - that they know more than we do, and I tend to try and make sense of their actions through that lens. — Tzeentch
How could one of the world’s most powerful militaries, led by a celebrated tactician like Mr. Putin, have faltered so badly against its much smaller, weaker rival? To piece together the answer, we drew from hundreds of Russian government emails, documents, invasion plans, military ledgers and propaganda directives. We listened to Russian phone calls from the battlefield and spoke with dozens of soldiers, senior officials and Putin confidants who have known him for decades.
Across Ukraine, the Russian losses mounted. A giant armored column of more than 30,000 troops at the core of Russia’s force pushing south toward the city of Chernihiv was eviscerated by a motley group of Ukrainian defenders outnumbered five to one, soldiers and senior officials said. The Ukrainians hid in the forest and picked apart the Russian column with shoulder-fired antitank weapons, like American-made Javelins. — New York Times
This popular narrative of "a motley group of Ukrainian defenders" that eviscerated Russian armored columns "with shoulder-fired antitank weapons" was challenged in a recent report by RUSI. They maintain that, contrary to popular belief, most of the Russian losses during their failed Kiev push were inflicted by conventional Ukrainian artillery. — SophistiCat
It's been said that Putin postponed the attack several times and that it was the FSB pushing for the attack and Gerasimov and the military being hesitant. That Putin then made a "putsch" at the FSB afterwards does reinforce that this may be so. (The FSB was in charge of Ukraine, unlike other countries.)A lot of decisions revolve around avoiding embarrassment, so it's entirely possible the US planners did not think seriously beyond just trying to make sure Russia couldn't so easily take more of Ukraine, leading Putin to conclude, due to these actions being a threat and overconfidence from Crimea annexation, to "Putin would think that a 10 day operation is all what is needed to solve the Ukraine-problem once and for all".
Generally in large institutions, people have all sorts of elaborate theories and analysis and plans, but the logic and sequence of decisions is fairly simple, since a lot of people need to agree for anything to actually happen, and the complex analysis just explains why given people support given decisions at certain times (even if it's all mutually incompatible on the whole). — boethius
I'm not so sure that there even then was a moment to sue for peace. Remember that in the south and east Russia was gaining ground as Ukraine concentrated on defending Kyiv. And Putin wasn't going to talk to the drug using neo-nazis.This was maybe true at the very start, and had Ukraine sued for peace then, it would have been significant Ukrainian agency just as you say, both the fighting and negotiating (especially if the US disagreed and wanted more fighting to bleed the Russians). — boethius
Ukraine had a significant stockpile of weapons and equipment, and I agree (wherever it came from, mostly soviet days) it was (at the time) the basis of independent decisions action.
However, in the months that followed essentially the entirety of the Ukrainian original armour fleet and other heavy weapons were destroyed and a significant part of its officer corp killed, and munitions stockpiles fired, transitioning to complete dependence on the US / NATO to simply maintain current lines, much less make any offensive operations. — boethius
Where Ukraine needs that ammo is if makes large scale maneuvers. Then it has to attack Russian forces whereas if it is on the defensive, it can just pinpoint the fires to needed points. And even without artillery (or little artillery), Ukrainian infantry still can defend.Just treading water required thousands of rounds of artillery and other munitions a day as well as attrition of vehicles, and now also the electricity grid (requiring thousands of generators to try to cope with, which again Ukraine is 100% dependent on the US for). — boethius
It's been said that Putin postponed the attack several times and that it was the FSB pushing for the attack and Gerasimov and the military being hesitant. That Putin then made a "putsch" at the FSB afterwards does reinforce that this may be so. (The FSB was in charge of Ukraine, unlike other countries.) — ssu
I'm not so sure that there even then was a moment to sue for peace. Remember that in the south and east Russia was gaining ground as Ukraine concentrated on defending Kyiv. And Putin wasn't going to talk to the drug using neo-nazis — ssu
Yes. Basically Ukraine went through it's stockpiles of artillery ammunition quite quickly and then afterwards Russia enjoyed fire superiority. And obviously then was very dependent on Western assistance.
I think the simple fact neither Ukraine or actually the West was ready for such a long war fought with ammo consumption of WW1 or WW2 level. The West has basically looked at short conventional wars. The conventional wars in the Middle East (which are somewhat comparable) lasted only some days. Only basically Russia has hoarded old stuff and ammunition for such a conflict. Yet neither Russia or even the West have a military industry to produce huge amounts of munitions. At least yet. — ssu
Where Ukraine needs that ammo is if makes large scale maneuvers. Then it has to attack Russian forces whereas if it is on the defensive, it can just pinpoint the fires to needed points. And even without artillery (or little artillery), Ukrainian infantry still can defend. — ssu
Seems a bit surprising with the Nazi thing an'all ... — jorndoe
Wow.
I read several of those articles and found the talking points of boethius and Tzeentch in bold relief. In some cases, they have been transcribing the text verbatim. — Paine
Another of his sources is Brian Berletic, aka Tony Cartalucc — SophistiCat
I remember some of that messaging from the Syrian conflict. — Paine
I am an old carpenter and stone mason. — Paine
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