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ChaosAnarchy wrote (edited )

So far it seems like it is fairly isolated, the West gives Ukraine weapons, yet Russia uses no nuclear weapons. It is kind of eriee, to be honest.

I guess Putin still thinks he can win, but Hitler believed that until his very death as well. I just hope he doesn't sent us a 'farewell gift' before he dies, though.

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NoPotatoes wrote

I would say that the Russian invasion is grinding to a halt, with an emphasis on the grinding. Very little territory has changed hands recently, and much of it has been in favor of Ukraine. But along that little changing front, there is a daily exchange of artillery fire, and Russian soldiers keep being commanded to storm Ukrainian trenches, at a massive cost of human life. The Russian cruise missiles keep coming through at a steady rate. Ukraine intercepts some, but I think in a recent night time attack they were only able to intercept less than half of them. The Iranian drones have stopped and/or slowed, supposedly due to the cold weather preventing their operation. We will see if they start back up later this year.

Meanwhile Ukraine is going to be receiving a handful of German tanks quite soon, and NATO states are in talks to increase their production of artillery. So the counteroffensive could be heating up, or at least that is what is being planned for. I think Ukraine would be wise to try to retake Melitopol and the ZNPP, which are strategic assets that are furthest away from Russian supply lines. That said, even smarter would be to negotiate an agreement where Russian claims in Donbas and Crimea are recognized after they pull out of Western Ukraine voluntarily. There will certainly need to be assurances that Russia won't relaunch another attack, though. E.g. by mandating limits on Russian military buildup in Donbas, Crimea, and Belarus (i.e. where Russia launched the current invasion from). TBH I'm not sure Putin would even agree to a minimum of leaving the ZNPP. Everything I've read points to Russian forces digging themselves in at that facility.

China has notably not thrown their weight around much in the conflict, besides buying Russian oil&gas at a large discount after Western sanctions. They are planning to release a peace plan soon, and have been in contact with Western European leadership while drafting that plan. There are concerns about how specific the plan will be with respect to actual claims/territory/guarantees.

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Tequila_Wolf OP wrote

I am unclear about what war looks like between two white countries, where

  • Russia has world-killing powers,
  • Russia may actually lose outside of using those nukes,
  • Nukes used on Ukraine may actually not provoke armageddon (correct me if I'm wrong, but if the attack is limited to a country largely uncared for by the west, it is not clear to me that the west would choose to end the world)
  • there appears to be a new Scramble For Africa - I can't speak for other places
  • what a non-nuclear global war looks like where Russia, China and strategic suboordinate countries work to upend the global order. Actually I guess it just means a new Cold War, with somewhat-rearranged western and eastern blocs.
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kano wrote

I don't know what to say about most of this, but I think it's possible that if Ukraine were to get nuked then fallout from that could reach the rest of Europe or individual NATO countries, so I guess that might mean there are grounds for retaliation.

I'm not sure that the West would retaliate with nukes either, just trying to say that the attack may well not be limited to Ukraine, even if Russia nuked only Ukrainian territory.

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existential1 wrote

  • If Russia nukes, we're all in trouble. Despite the common sense of non-proliferation, ain't no industry like the defense industry. They gon' get they money.

  • There's 100% a new Scramble for Africa and Cold War, except this time it's China...and like before...it's also in South America. Unlike before, China already has captured Western markets in a way the Soviet Union couldn't have dreamed possible. So if anything goes down, we all go down...except the defense industry.

  • Even though historically Ukraine wasn't NATO first priority, it is now. Them hawks want to expand until Russia has no cushion states.

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ArmyOfNone wrote (edited )

It was expected that Russia would also try a move on Moldavia, but that doesn't mean it's going "global". Russia can't invade anything beyond that as this would mean suicide for Russia and I'm sure even Putin knows. The current war operation in Ukraine appears to be already self-defeating for Russia, so why would they attempt anything bigger?

Sadly, both sides in this conflict seem fine with using Ukraine as the ultimate proxy war, as frontline for a war industry that profits without fighting an actual war directly (something nobody wants, regardless where they're from).

As for theorists, that lecture of Peter Zeihan posted recently here was pretty sound and balanced, I think. https://invidious.weblibre.org/watch?v=DXtScb_IZdg

Beyond that, as the saying goes, truth was this war's first casualty, so the media channels on either side went on being not too reliable on the information they're given. Like I've observed the Ukrainian Pravda is held as a legit source on Reddit, while RT has been flushed from most Western countries by now. Both are propaganda outlets with little credibility. It's kinda hard to know what's really going on...

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