# Russia invades Ukraine {2022-02-24} (Part 1)
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Tags:** ukraine-invasion, breaking-news
**Created:** [February 24, 2022, 8:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037 "2022-02-24T08:30:03Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 187
### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3730 "2022-03-31T05:42:25Z")
> [@](#):
>
> U.S. exports to Russia of items subject to new licensing requirements have decreased by 99 percent by value.
That’s a very precise statement. Which is to say, it seems like a p-hacked statistic.
a) How many goods _are_ subject to new licensing requirements?
b) A decrease of 99% by value would seem to say that they’re foregoing products that are expensive. Last year they might have been buying a billion dollars worth of finished products, now they’re buying a billion dollars of basic parts that can be assembled into those same finished products?
I’m sure that the results have been good if you’re getting to 99% of anything that still sounds fairly general. I’d just prefer to not to have to read lawyerese from the government and have to translate back to human.
---
### Author:  [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3731 "2022-03-31T10:57:34Z")
> [@JaneDoe42](#):
>
> It’s easy to feel sorry for the poor cannon fodder until you remember about children being shot in the face and women being raped.
Not all of the cannon fodder is raping people and shooting people in the face. The ones that do are criminals and should be treated accordingly. There are plenty of other “cannon fodder” that have surrendered and are revealed as just scared man-boys of 17 or 18 years of age who don’t have any real interest in fighting a war.
> [@Fear\_Itself](#):
>
> 7 busses with Russian soldiers suffering from Acute Radiation Syndrome have arrived to a hospital in Belarus from the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in Ukraine.
>
> They allegedly dug trenches in the highly radioactive Red Forest - UNIAN News Agency
Predictable. Preventable.
The worst of the hot spots have warning signs. They must have been ignored. There are solid reasons this is called an _exclusion_ zone. How much do you want to bet these soldiers were given _no_ radiation monitoring devices whatsoever?
Want to know how utterly stupid and sad this is? [_You can use a cell phone as a radiation detector!_](https://factsheets.inl.gov/FactSheets/cellphone-based-radiation-warning-system.pdf) Go to your app store and look for radiation detectors. They use the camera in the phone as a crude gamma detector. Not as sensitive or accurate as a dedicated instrument but it would give _some_ indication of no-go zones. Enough that the US government is talking about equipping first responders and others who might encounter radiation sources (border personnel, junkers/scrappers) with these apps. Yes, we know that soldiers’ cell phones were confiscated but IF the commanders had had them and IF they had paid attention… They don’t need to be connected to the internet to give this information to the user. So, so, so unnecessary for _busloads_ of soldiers to be suffering ACS.
But, beyond apps, there are non-tech warning signs, both man made and natural:
[ ](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fcbsnews1.cbsistatic.com%2Fhub%2Fi%2F2014%2F03%2F26%2F61491af3-9d7d-46cd-bbf4-d66c9a50b095%2Fchernobyl.jpg&f=1&nofb=1)
Aside from the man-made sign with a radiation danger icon, there are the creepy dead trees (some spots are still radioactive enough to inhibit normal decay), barren patches of ground, and, around those, twisted weird mutated plants. Sure, it’s winter/early spring but these are _pine trees_ , they should be green all year round. Gee, you’re next to the most famous nuclear accident site in the world and there’s a bunch of dead trees standing on bare ground, just _maybe_ these are warning signs? And, oh yeah, the man-made yellow and red sign. Even if you’re so inured to government lies you don’t believe official warnings any more the natural world is also letting you know there is a serious problem here.
It is possible to travel safely through the exclusion zone, people even work in the exclusion zone, but you still have to avoid certain areas, especially if you don’t have proper protective gear. The people who placed the warning signs were wearing protective gear and they didn’t stay any longer than necessary. They _certainly_ weren’t trying to dig trenches in these areas.
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### Author:  [@Chad\_Sudan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chad_Sudan)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3732 "2022-03-31T11:29:40Z")
The Falklands War was likened to two bald men fighting over a comb.
The battle for Chernobyl is like two men fighting over a comb that will make you bald.
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### Author:  [@Cardigan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardigan)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3733 "2022-03-31T13:18:53Z")
Latest Task & Purpose analysis of the conflict:
[Is the Ukraine War in a Stalemate or Checkmate? - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REBRCVqnbiA)
Apologies, I’m not particularly savvy at posting embedded videos or images.
The analysis maintains that Russia appears to still be committed to its primary goal of taking Kiev and are doing a variety of things that all telegraph that intent, such as shifting concentration of artillery fire to all the villages and suburbs on the approaches surrounding Kiev, so as to prepare for an encirclement, and pulling back select units to regroup and prepare for another assault. The big question is, will they be able to assemble the men and materiel that’s needed to do so. Things have very clearly not gone the way the Russians expected, but Putin seems to be committed to playing the long game and - with the help of the Chinese - will spend whatever treasure and blood that’s required over as many months or years that it takes to grind out a Pyrrhic victory destroying Ukraine in the process. That’s what he’s done elsewhere (e.g. Chechnya, Syria). No reason to suppose that isn’t the game plan now.
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### Author:  [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3734 "2022-03-31T13:50:25Z")
I’m surprised the soldiers immediately got sick. I had thought they were worried about long term exposure. Getting cancer ten years later.
It’s scary to realize that ground is so dangerous 35 years after the nuclear accident. Digging is the worst thing they could do.
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### Author:  [@Sauron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sauron)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3735 "2022-03-31T16:21:59Z")
> [@Broomstick](#):
>
> you’re next to the most famous nuclear accident site in the world
Just speculating … I’d be willing to bet not a lot of information about Chernobyl got shared within the USSR. These 19-year-old conscripts (and, shoot, even their commanders) may not know much, if anything, that actually happened there.
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### Author:  [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3736 "2022-03-31T16:43:23Z")
> [@Sauron](#):
>
> I’d be willing to bet not a lot of information about Chernobyl got shared within the USSR. These 19-year-old conscripts (and, shoot, even their commanders) may not know much, if anything, that actually happened there.
I doubt it. The HBO mini-series got a lot of exposure and attention in Russia a couple years ago, mostly because the government objected to the show’s focus on government lies in the aftermath. Russian media deflected by highlighting the heroism of Russian responders and their bravery in light of the horrible consequences of radiation exposure. It’s also worth noting that few if any of those conscripts were born before the USSR ceased to exist.
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3737 "2022-03-31T17:13:51Z")
> [@Fiendish\_Astronaut](#):
>
> The problem Putin has with his military is that he has been constantly splitting it up and decentralising it in order to prevent the possibility of a military-backed coup. It’s an organisational mess, configured purely to protect one man and his neurosis.
See [Coup-Proofing: Its Practice and Consequences in the Middle East | RAND](https://www.rand.org/pubs/reprints/RP844.html)
Also "[Why Arabs Lose Wars :: Middle East Quarterly](https://www.meforum.org/441/why-arabs-lose-wars)
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### Author:  [@GreenWyvern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreenWyvern)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3738 "2022-03-31T17:41:08Z")
> **[Russian invaders leaving Chornobyl NPP – Energoatom](https://www.ukrinform.net/rubric-ato/3444941-russian-invaders-leaving-chornobyl-npp-energoatom.html)**
>
> The Russian military, who seized the Chornobyl nuclear power plant and other facilities in the exclusion zone, moved in two columns towards the Ukrainian border with Belarus. — Ukrinform.
> According to Energoatom, it has been also confirmed that the Russian military were building fortifications, trenches in the “Red Forest” - the most toxic zone in the entire exclusion zone.
>
> “So it is not surprising that the occupiers received significant doses of radiation and panicked at the first symptoms of the disease, which occurred very quickly. As a result, almost a riot broke out among the military, and they began to escape from there,” the company wrote.
Darwin Award? 😄
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### Author:  [@GreenWyvern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreenWyvern)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3739 "2022-03-31T18:45:16Z")
There are [reports](https://twitter.com/RooslanTotrov/status/1509320247081410567) that 300 soldiers from South Ossetia who had been sent to fight in Ukraine deserted and went home.
Apparently the Russians didn’t trust them and wouldn’t give them maps or enough ammunition, but expected them to launch suicidal assaults on Ukrainian positions.
Then there was a major incident when a Russian commander ordered them not to retrieve the body of one their men who had been killed. So they simply left Ukraine en masse and threatened to shoot anybody who tried to stop them.
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### Author:  [@FlikTheBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlikTheBlue)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3740 "2022-03-31T18:47:00Z")
I wonder if Putin knows about any of that stuff, or if his advisors are too afraid to tell him.
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### Author:  [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3741 "2022-03-31T18:48:51Z")
Reports I’ve seen indicate they’re afraid to report the bad news to Putin. But hard to say overall.
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### Author:  [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3742 "2022-03-31T18:54:52Z")
Do my ears hear the dripping of mutiny that heralds the flood of rebellion?
The greatest weakness of the isolated dictator is that no one tells hims when he’s no longer in control.
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### Author:  [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3743 "2022-03-31T18:59:53Z")
Putin doubling down on insisting that Europe pay for Russian gas in rubles really shows how he doesn’t expect or plan for any pushback or opposition from anybody. His demand has been rejected out of hand with no equivocation whatsoever by Germany, France, and the UK. Starting tomorrow - Putin’s deadline - Europe is just going to learn how to live without Russian gas and several billions of Euros won’t be propping up the Russian economy.
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### Author:  [@Sauron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sauron)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3744 "2022-03-31T19:08:09Z")
Here’s what Wikipedia had to say about the HBO miniseries on Chernobyl:
> It was reported that Russian [NTV](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTV_(Russia)) television channel has been producing its own version of the Chernobyl story in which _**the [CIA](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Intelligence_Agency) plays a key role in the disaster**_.
Emphasis mine.
> The [Communists of Russia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communists_of_Russia) party called for a libel lawsuit against _Chernobyl_ 's writer, director and producers, describing the show as “disgusting”. In a statement, party member Sergey Malinkovich spoke of the party’s intentions to lobby TV regulator [Roskomnadzor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roskomnadzor) to request that it block local access to the series. Marianna Prysiazhniuk of _[Vice Media](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_Media)_ notes that multiple Russian media outlets describe the miniseries as one-sided, incomplete, or anti-Russian propaganda. _[Argumenty i Fakty](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumenty_i_Fakty)_ dismissed the show as “a caricature and not the truth.”
> “The only things missing are the bears and accordions!” quipped Stanislav Natanzon, lead anchor of [Russia-24](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia-24), one of the country’s main news channels.
Sooo … Russians may indeed know about Chernobyl, but what they “know” was heavily influenced and / or completely whitewashed by state-controlled media.
In other words, the guys digging trenches probably didn’t think it was all that dangerous to do.
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3745 "2022-03-31T19:15:42Z")
> [@RickJay](#):
>
> > [@aceplace57](#):
> >
> > Why? What’s the point of lying? Who do they think they’re fooling? Lying accomplishs nothing except ruining their diplomatic reputation.
>
> It’s not lying. It’s bullshit.
>
> To combine your question with the mention of Oliver Stone, Stone was involved in a bullshit documentary a few years ago called “Ukraine On Fire.” The film is 100% polyunsaturated Kremlin propaganda; Stone is a useful idiot. It’s not even good propaganda; it’s just so comically obviously propaganda it’s difficult to believe. It is to propaganda what those Nigerian prince email scams are to the field of con artistry.
It’s been said that lies at least care enough about the truth to want to impersonate it; whereas bullshit just says “that’s my story and if you don’t like it, too bad”. Reality control means that everyone you say is as pure and true as if God himself had said it, so of course anyone who disagrees with you is a liar, a monster, the Devil himself for daring to have blasphemed “the truth” (i.e., whatever you claim).
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3746 "2022-03-31T19:24:49Z")
> [@Broomstick](#):
>
> > [@BeepKillBeep](#):
> >
> > I think it is clear that Russia (well Putin) has changed their war goals and is willing to settle for Crimea and independence for Eastern Ukraine (with Russian puppets).
>
> The fly in the ointment there is that it is not at all clear the _Ukrainians_ are willing to settle for that.
Or indeed, that the Ukrainians _need_ to settle for that.
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### Author:  [@Akaj](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Akaj)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3747 "2022-03-31T19:31:32Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#):
>
> Putin doubling down on insisting that Europe pay for Russian gas in rubles …
IANAEconomist (or even a particularly savvy financial person) but wouldn’t it be better to be paid in stable currencies such as Euros instead of the increasingly worthless ruble?
Or is the idea that they’d have to buy rubles (from Russia) and thus prop up the collapsing currency?
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### Author:  [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3748 "2022-03-31T19:35:25Z")
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> Do my ears hear the dripping of mutiny that heralds the flood of rebellion?
>
> The greatest weakness of the isolated dictator is that no one tells hims when he’s no longer in control.
I know it’s been said before, but when do we get to see Putin repeat the meme from the movie “Downfall”?
---
### Author:  [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2022, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russia-invades-ukraine-2022-02-24-part-1/960037/3749 "2022-03-31T19:37:25Z")
> [@Akaj](#):
>
> Or is the idea that they’d have to buy rubles (from Russia) and thus prop up the collapsing currency?
More or less. They’d have to buy rubles on the open market.
I hope the Russian currency is essentially worthless scrap in a year’s time.
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