It would lift the collective IQ of the thread. Ideally, posters would approach commenting on the war as a neutral observer.
That’s because you’ve got the map turned the wrong way. We lost over 58K killed and around 153K wounded badly enough to require hospitalization. Tell me that wasn’t the key factor in U.S. domestic unrest that ultimately led to terminating the war short of goals. Westmoreland famously said to Senator Hollings, “We’re killing these people at a ratio of 10 to 1.” The Senator replied, “The American people don’t care about the 10. They care about the one.” I believe Putin is likewise overestimating his country’s patience and tolerance for friendly losses. That patience and tolerance certainly exceeds ours, but it isn’t infinite. And Putin does not even have tactical victories or positive kill ratio to sell his people on the casualties being “worth it.” In the last 120 years, three Russian governments have fallen or had to bow out of a war to prevent the government from falling, and the primary engine for the unrest was casualties.
I second the notion, but I must add the caveat of "with Ukrainian victory." Our Civil War was also terrible in its own way, and no sane person would have wanted it to last one more day than necessary, but most of us in the present realize it was better for everyone that the U.S. in 1863 didn't just say "This is too hard, and the cost is too great. Just let the Confederacy have its independence and its slavery." The world will become a darker and scarier place if Russia is allowed to normalize conquest. And if it does, the people of our future will point to this moment in history when the world at first gave only half-ass assistance to Ukraine and then forced them into an unequal peace because it was "too hard" to help more, the "cost was too great," it was just easier to "let Russia have it." Just the way I feel.
No, unfortunately, I believe I have the map turned the correct way. It is more likely public sentiment inside the United States will end the war in Ukraine before public sentiment inside Russia will. Some of the big reasons the public turned against Vietnam will never happen inside Putin’s Russia. We had the advantage of a free press, free speech, free right to assembly. So once the draft began and it became clear Johnson and his administration were lying through their teeth, it was just a matter of time. That would never happen in Putin’s Russia. Notwithstanding, it took 4 years of public demonstrations here at home just to get our troop numbers down some in Vietnam. The demonstrators started long before we knew the final US death toll. There is nary a hint of such demonstrations inside Russia right now. It would take years of internal strife inside Russia before it could cause a change in policy on Ukraine. On the flip side, it won’t take much to turn US policy on Ukraine upside down. Public sentiment is already waning. Biden’s biggest opposition in the Democrat Party is staunchly anti-war. Biden probably beats RFK Jr. easily in the primary, but you’re still going to get another year or so of RFK Jr. explaining to the country why it’s a bad idea to stay involved in Ukraine. Then you move on to the general, where Biden’s two largest obstacles are anti-war. So if anything goes wrong in Ukraine, it’s almost assuredly going to bring what support is left inside the US to its knees rather quickly. Wars like this don’t age well with the American public. And I could go on and on about the similarities this situation has to our involvement in Vietnam. Some of the parallels are frighteningly spot on. Many of the pro-war arguments are right on schedule with what we heard with Vietnam. You’ll also have to accept this probably is a little more personal to Russia than was Vietnam to the U.S.
You are naive if you think that a loss to Ukraine wouldn't put Putin on the hot seat for one or more of the oligarchs (or military leaders) to bump off Putin and install a new government. There is a reason that all of Putin's gov't cronies have started drinking heavily when the counter-offensive started--they don't know how far down the ladder a coup would do away with. The people will not start protesting in the street until they run out of food, but that is also a possibility if the war drags out for 2-3 more years. Putin has really destroyed the Russian economy, and the wealthy do not appreciate that. It may be decades before Russia's economy recovers from Putin's adventure, especially if Putin remains in office afterwards. This war will age just fine with the American public, for two reasons: 1) No American troops are going in harm's way. 2) This is the best military spending we've had since WWII, as far as taking Russia down a peg and defeating the Russian military. That is one of the biggest reasons we have a military and we spend money on it. As long as Trump doesn't get re-elected, I don't see a problem with continuing support for Ukraine in this war.
That's your prediction, and we will see. But it doesn't change the fact that the Ukrainian strategy is the soundest available to them, again, short of successfully bringing in allies. You point out that the U.S. was a free society in the 1960s relative to Russia of today. Well, no [kidding]. The last three times Russia suffered serious domestic turmoil over war that was also true. What makes this situation in Ukraine remarkably different than the Russo-Japanese War in 1905, when the Czar had to quit a war that his ground forces were starting to win and give in to the people's demand for a legislature (the Duma of today); World War I in 1916-1917, when the Czar had to abdicate (a lot of good it did him personally) despite having the first real tactical victories of the war just months earlier; or Afghanistan in 1985, when turmoil and strikes brought a reformer to power only too late to stop the rot? The only difference I can see is that the Russian populace is even better informed than they were then due to the internet. The people may not be as well informed as we are, but they will eventually put two and two together. Victories can do much, historically, to not make the people not reflect too deeply on the justice of a war. But casualties sans victories turn up the temperature anywhere, but especially when you're not really fighting for national survival (like Ukraine is and Russia isn't). You have made a prediction but no compelling argument that the West will turn off the pump before domestic turmoil undermines Putin's ability to govern. The election you speak is a long, long ways off if that's Russia's hope for exhausting Ukraine. You really think they can just sit there, continue to cede the strategic initiative to Ukraine, and keep taking the kind of losses they have been? I think not. They don't have 13 months to win this thing at this rate. Your gut tells you otherwise, but my history is more reliable.
Your history isn’t reliable or accurate. Your first two examples happened over 100 years ago and share no similarity to the situation today in Ukraine. You say Russia doesn’t have 13 months to figure this out, but then you reference Gorbachev coming to power in 1985 through turmoil and strikes. Where are the turmoil and strikes in Russia right now? They have 3% unemployment, wages are rising and they are exporting more oil now than they did before the war began. And even if there was another Gorby waiting in the wings, it was almost 3 years after Gorby took office that he pulled out of Afghanistan. But this is all magically going to happen within 13 months? Your historical analogies don’t fit the narrative. I do not see any independent verification of any sort of mass turmoil brewing, strikes, demonstrations or any of that inside of Russia. If anything, that has leveled off since the start of the war. As long as their economy continues to persist, there’s nothing Ukraine could do to change the sentiment inside Russia. The front line of the war hasn’t moved in 6 months. I absolutely do see a scenario where Putin runs out the clock, as he has air superiority and can dent the counter attackers very effectively from a distance. There’s always that possibility as well that Russia could carry out an effective offensive and this turns into a net positive for Russia.
A “net positive for Russia?” their military is in tatters. It will take them a decade easy to replace the equipment they lost in Ukraine. And that doesn’t even begin to address the human loss. And even if they keep the land they took - it’s in shambles. It’ll take a generation to rebuild. net positive… smdh
I’m probably not the only person confused by this response. You must have the person that picture was intended for on block and can’t see what the reply was intended to address.
If you don't hold it out as a possibility Russia could mount a successful offensive that nets them more territory, there's no point in continuing the discussion, as you're not being objective or paying attention. Bring something to the discussion other than Ukrainian cheerleading points and we can talk.
You lost me at “Putin … has air superiority.” The only thing that now makes sense is that you’re watching a different war than the rest of us.
Well then Zelenskyy must have lost you as well as he has admitted several times over the past few months Ukraine lacks air superiority against Russia for this counteroffensive. What evidence in verified press are you seeing that suggests Ukraine is controlling the skies?
Air superiority is defined thusly according to DoD and NATO: “The degree of air domain control wherein opposing air force is incapable of effective interference.” I never said Ukraine has achieved that, but that does not automatically grant it to Russia. The skies above Ukraine remain contested, and Ukraine’s Air Force not only dominates the western sector but regularly conducts successful sorties into Russian-held battle space. Russia in no shape or form has air superiority over any of the contested areas along the front. This is a particularly embarrassing fact for them (which is why I just love to bring it up), given that they were projected to have air superiority within 12-48 hours of beginning their “special military operation” but still don’t have it 14 months later, and in fact the trend in the air fight has been favoring Ukraine. If Russia were to achieve air superiority, this fight would be going completely against Ukraine and would probably be over in short order.
Different person than the one you’re referencing. You probably have other people blocked besides him. I don’t see that guy’s posts anymore.
I've pointed out here before that Russia has held back their best assets for most of this war, particularly in the air. Russia has a pretty good air force, but they're not risking those assets over Ukrainian held territory currently, nor have they for the entire war. That doesn't mean they can't hit targets from inside Ukraine's borders, it just means they're not spending those assets currently in that way. So it's easy to say "Ukraine anti-aircraft is dominating Russia", but that's not really telling the whole story. And when Russia can knock out Western tanks and armored vehicles from 60 miles behind the front line, with precision, they probably figure there is no need to risk their air force over Ukrainian territory. I'm seeing lots of reports of Russian helicopters hitting Ukrainian targets in the past two weeks, but not seeing much about Ukraine hitting behind Russia's front line. So I would still give the edge to Russia in the air, but it's not an unimportant detail that Russia have kept most of their air force jewels out of this fight thus far. They are well supplied in that area too.
I didn’t make any claims regarding russias ability or inability to make additional territorial gains. Russia could conceivably take over the entire country. But I would argue even such an unlikely turn of events would not make this a net positive. Their losses are already too great, and to take significantly more of the country, barring a total western collapse of supplies tomorrow, would require the mobilization of hundreds of thousands more troops. They have already lost thousands of pieces of equipment, and anywhere from 180-220k casualties according to the pentagon and that was from April 2023. So any gains would not be a net positive. It’s a Pyrrhic victory at best. And imagine that western backing probably doesn’t stop until late 2024. Woof.
