Of course all this talk of Putin and nukes is predicated on the comfort myth that he’s losing, verging on desperation and sees a tactical nuke as his last gambit.
Deafcon 1 Essentially agree with G8tr Civilian Evacuations Covert Operation to kill Putin by any means If they launch retaliate Say goodbye to loved ones
first of all lol. Second of all things seem to not be going as planned since that July post. I guess the Russians have suffered 70-80 thousand casualties as part of a grand effective strategy. Every loss is a strategy, every win exactly as they planned it. Lmao.
I think one option would be to provide Ukraine with non-nuclear longer range missiles that could reach Moscow. Tell Putin that if he uses a nuke, he could expect Ukraine to hit the Kremlin with a conventional missile, supplied by the U.S. for that purpose. That gives Ukraine and the U.S. the high ground for not responding with a nuke, yet still causing devastation to property that Putin finds valuable. If Russia uses a second nuke, we might have to step in and respond with a nuke of a military base in Russia, plus another nuke on Putin's favorite vacation home. We tell him what will happen ahead of time, so the responsibility is on him.
Here’s my own answer: Summon the Russian ambassador and advise a complete cut in direct diplomatic relations. Russia is now in a direct conflict with the U.S. but the degree of that conflict depends on what Russia does next. Immediately place all strategic forces on DEFCON 2, conventional forces on DEFCON 3. This has the effect of putting our bombers on airborne versus ground alert, all warships to sea, all ground forces out of their bases to mitigate the effects of Russian nuclear attack. Full activation of Guard and Reserves, primarily for civil response, secondarily for overseas service. Once our immediate readiness posture is complete, President goes on television to advise Russia that their “special military operation” is now at an end. They have 96 hours to withdraw from Ukraine at the end of which the President will request a declaration of war from Congress. Channeling Kennedy, the President asserts that any future nuclear attacks from Russia against any nation in the world shall constitute such an attack on the U.S. and will result in a proportional retaliatory response. During that 96-hour ultimatum, parallel diplomatic measures occur. The U.S. sponsors Ukraine for emergency NATO membership. U.S. requests a General Assembly vote to expel Russia as a permanent member of the Security Council. U.S. advises China that it has reason to believe China has colluded with Russia in its invasion of Ukraine and nuclear escalation; in the event of another Russian nuclear attack, if China does not immediately retaliate against Russia, the U.S. shall consider China as part of the nuclear aggression. The purpose of this part, of course, is to get China to back Russia down. That would be my advice to the President. There are many what-ifs and how-abouts in that course of action, and I understand how dangerous that move is. But I simply don’t see how we can allow Russia to use nuclear weapons and not push the matter toward war.
Not a bad strategy. Sure hope we don't need to go there... but the Doomsday clock is certainly ticking faster the last few months.
If the Russians have suffered 70-80 thousand casualties that means their entire contingent has been killed or wounded. There has likely never been more than 80 thousand, in Ukraine, providing support for an equal or greater number of Ukrainian freedom fighters. The Ukrainian freedom fighters have been doing most of the close-in fighting. Ukraine’s only advantage, to date, is that it outnumbers Russia, on the contact lines, up to 5:1. Of course partial mobilization has flipped the calculus.
The US has the means to do that now. But of course Russia has the means to destroy them. Possibly even before they’re set up. And of course that would only escalate the war further.
Question for @duggers_dad. If Russians fleeing from their motherland to avoid conscription is positive as your implied when you in effect referred to it as a self-purge, why is Putin doing this? Just asking. Putin to shut borders for conscription age men as huge queues form: Report
The fact that it is not a conscription rules this out. Conscription is what the US did, for Vietnam, and what Ukraine has been doing for months as over half it’s standing army, formerly the largest in Europe, has been eliminated. Side note, there are more Ukrainians and Georgians fleeing to Russia than the reverse. And whatever losses Russia is incurring is offset by the nine million it will gain come Friday.
A goodly number of American reservists defected or resisted during the Iraq War of 2003. Many were punished. Putin is just more proactive.
According Putin's announcement he was only going to recall Russians with previous military experience. It's not turning out to be the case and even if that was initially true Russians of military age without previous experience would be next. Russia drafted an old man with diabetes, a 17-year-old, and people with no training to fight in Ukraine, reports say — a sign of desperation
You mean like Edward Snowden? For some reason I haven't seen long lines of cars at the US borders with Canada and Mexico transporting Americans trying to flee the country. In fact the opposite seems to be true especially at the Southern border. In 2020, 6,705 Americans renounced their citizenship out of a country with a population of around 330 million. Almost all of those did so in an attempt to avoid US taxes.
