I agree … and this should be an easy “sell”, as it has built a solid reputation of PROTECTIVE weapon against those ugly cruise missiles.
If things start get really ugly in kiev, that might be the most advanced piece of equipment we might see.
Donno how many of those it would take to make a dent - and they would obv. not work against shelling
abstraction is a complex thought process, innit?
I feel like I’m on a damn seesaw. Yesterday, I was all hopeful about China since I was hearing they were going to speak to the murdering scum Putin, but now I hear they are repeating the same story about chemical weapons that Russia is telling.
Meanwhile, hospitals are being bombed.
Here’s a question… during the Bosnian mess bill Clinton basically issued a letter of marque to a bunch of hackers that let them electronically steal whatever private funds they could find from Milosevic and his cronies …couldn’t Biden do the same for putin?
Video of large Russian column advancing from the north-east toward Kyiv. Arial view as a number of armoured vehicles at the head of the colum are destroyed and the rest retreat.
I think this was the incident referred to yesterday in this Ukraine announcement:
Russian column on the way to Brovary was destroyed near Velyka Dymerka, Bohdanivka, Rudnya villages. Security Service of Ukraine asking citizens to report on Russian soldiers who fled to nearby areas
Three more short videos on the ground, of Russian losses along the same road:
I didn’t see any of the Russian tanks return fire. They’re bunched up and can’t maneuver.
I’m certainly not knowledgeable. But it doesn’t look like the Russians are well trained.
Perhaps this is its own topic, but it seems like what must happen to Russia, if Putin is not soon deposed, is that it becomes a giant North Korea, a closed, totalitarian state with a carefully indoctrinated populace, impoverished and closed off from the world. They will be a petro-state vassal of China.
Can there be any other scenario?
That’s pretty much my expectation, if no one offs Putin sometime soon.
They’ll likely never be able to project power using conventional arms again - this whole mess in Ukraine has proven their military to be a hollow shell. No one will invade because they’re still a nuclear power, but everyone around them who has worried about possible Russian aggression will likely stop worrying about it. It’s clear that just about any NATO power would wipe out a Russian advance in days.
Every few years they’ll make some noise about nuking someone, and we’ll give them a crate of Pepsi or something to shut them up.
You cannot simply hand Ukraine a bunch of Patriots. This isn’t like a MANPADS that literally has simple instructions printed on the side. Patriot is a really, really complicated thing that requires months of training.
Which is why we sent Poland Patriot battalions not just the missile systems.
Yes, exactly.
I understand that it is a highly complex system, but if the west finds at some point that they can no longer stand on the sideline as hospitals, etc… are massively being targeted, that is probably the roadmap in.
My husband and I were talking about this last night. They’ll be like North Korea writ larger. In the space of just a couple weeks, they’ve managed to move themselves into contention for ‘most hated nation’ status.
I think China would very much like Russia to be dependent on it.
Suppose there is a negotiated end to the war, with Ukraine getting everything it wants but concedes to Russia that they will not join NATO. Would there be anything to stop them from entering into mutual defence treaties? ‘Hey, we’re not joining NATO!’
And then they petition to join NATO…
Does China really want to play nanny to two nuke-armed, economic basket cases right on her border? Or would they rather continue to sell shit to the West?
“Let’s give them air defense tools they might have online in June” does not strike me as being an effective response.
I’d point out that there are air defense systems Ukrainians ARE trained in.
I am sure Russia would insist on wording that would work around that.
It would be significantly more difficult for us to stop buying Chinese goods than it is to stop buying Russian oil. And I think China would very much like to be able to bend its neighbors to its will. But that is indeed another thread, so I’ll stop there.
At this point, I’d be okay with Ukraine just lying their asses off, in order to get the Russians back on their side of the border. It’s clear the Russians have been lying about just about everything for years now, so what’s sauce for the goose…
So yeah, promise No NATO. Promise Demilitarization. Promise No Nukes. Whatever it takes.
Then, immediately start doing all of that. In secret for as long as possible, but eventually, just in-your-face-Russia, what are you going to do about it?
Russia under Putin is an existential threat to Ukraine, and they’re justified in doing almost anything in order to survive that threat. If Russia doesn’t like it, they can get bent.
If Ukraine is in a position to get that deal, they’re in a position to not even need NATO.