Another point to bring up when Russia’s action if brought before The Hague. Was there ever a clear-cut causus belli declared by them other than, “We wants it”?
“But NAZIS!!!”
That’s about it.
I think Putin’s official excuse is that Russia was being threatened by having a western nation directly on their border. Which doesn’t make sense, especially in light of the way the war has gone. Russia would clearly have lost a conventional war in which NATO strikes first, even if strikes are limited to coming from NATO territory. And if it comes down to nuclear weapons, a nuke being launched from the prairies of North Dakota is just as deadly as one launched from Kyiv or Odessa, so worrying about the location of the border in a nuclear scenario makes even less sense.
Not to mention that if Putin had been able to take Ukraine… he’d have NATO on his border.
Also, “ethnic Russian oppression!” Which of course was the rallying cry of both the Crimea action and the Donbas separatism. To the point of claiming they were trying to prevent genocide.
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Clearly, this would mean that Putin would have to occupy Poland and Slovakia next. Rinse and Repeat.
Poland has to be very worried. They were barely a speed bump during both world wars. I remember the textbooks saying their flat land offered few obstacles to infantry.
He’s not greedy, he only wants the land adjacent to Russia…
They were sandwiched though in WWII, between both invading Germans and Russians, this time they have the rest of NATO at their back.
And now the Russians are strangely short on tanks, almost like a huge number got destroyed or captured in a epically stupid move.
It makes even less sense if you look at their eastern border.
He wants to emulate Alexander the Great and weep when there are no more worlds to conquer.
The rest of NATO wouldn’t leave Poland hanging out to dry. There’s no way Poland loses a conventional war. The only two outcomes in that scenario are NATO winning a conventional war (likely within a few months) or nuclear Armageddon.
It’s not really that nonsensical. Eastern Russia is thousands and thousands of miles of sparsely inhabited forest and tundra, plus Valdivostok. The vast majority of Russian population and infrastructure is in the west. An invading army from the east could conquer two thirds of the country’s territory without taking any targets of particular value, or doing substantial damage to Russia’s ability to function. Without endorsing any of Putin’s specific claims about why he invaded, his treatment of Mariupol is consistent with a desire to have a similar wasteland buffer zone on Russia’s western front.
If Russia were to decide to attack Poland at the present time, it would have to transit a large number of it’s forces 600km or so through Belarus. This could not be done overnight. Plus, this assumes that it has completed all operations in Ukraine - it would need to continue to station some forces there.
So they’d need to move all that equipment and manpower that is excess to their needs in holding their Ukraine land that they captured. All those extra tanks and equipment that’s just sitting around, all maintained and ready to go.
Then they’d have to have air superiority over their supply lines in Belarus - otherwise NATO would just eliminate any supplies to the Poland border. And we’ve seen just how awesome the Russian air force has been in controlling the skies over Ukraine.
Once they’re positioned at the Poland border, they’d need to attack combined NATO forces who are supplied with troops, and weapons from 30 independent member countries. The Russians would need to attack with a force that now consists of mostly 50 year old tanks taken out of retirement, and troops that are newly minted 18 year olds and reserve troops over 40.
TLDR: Ain’t gonna happen, short term, long term, ever.
I agree. I was only following the hypothetical in which somehow or another Russia had conquered Ukraine and had subsequently decided that Poland was next on the list, with the attack coming through Ukraine rather than by proxy from Belarus. If it did somehow happen, they would lose the conventional war fairly rapidly. The only other possible outcome in such a fantastical scenario is a Russian first strike with nukes.
In other words, as you say, there’s no reason for Poland to be any more nervous now than a year ago. Russia is of no threat to them.
Infantry can get over almost any obstacle with enough time and stubbornness. It is cavalry/mechanized warfare that gets opened up in flat terrain. It is the major region cavalry lingered longer as the arm of decision in early modern Eastern Europe vs. the West. Highly discontinuous population centers (back in the old days, a bit less so now) and lots of “open” country (discounting massive areas of marshland and tracts of forest back in the day) heavily favored mobile warfare.
But that’s my point—the mere fact of a shared border means nothing, and Russia has other borders with the West (notably Poland). You’re talking about whatever Putin’s actual, practical goals might be, but FlikTheBlue was talking about Putin’s “official excuse,” and that it didn’t make sense even as a pretext.
I agree with you about the strategic weight of various borders and border zones.
What you call “obstacles”, infantry calls “cover”.