The Russian Invasion of Ukraine

[clearspira]

You bow to the threat, you essentially tell him to make the threat again and ask for more territory. The only way to react is to confront him and call the bluff.

Precisely - at least up to a point anyway. Him having what he wants is a lesser bad outcome than all-out nuclear war. This is where intelligence really comes in to play, and so far it looks like bluffs. Especially since overstepping the line will probably mean what support (or at least blind eyes) he's got actively start turning against him.

Is it a bluff though? As of now I'd say Putin detonating a nuke in currently Russian-controlled territory is a distinct possibility, so he can claim he knows he's serious, but he's also scared of failure and knows complete failure and destruction if the outcome both if he goes too far, and if he fails.

He has already proven that he does not care about murdering his own people in the slightest - the most conservative estimate of Russian dead at this point is 50,000. I could see him nuking his own country. I genuinely think we are at that moment.

[Riedquat]

He has already proven that he does not care about murdering his own people in the slightest - the most conservative estimate of Russian dead at this point is 50,000. I could see him nuking his own country. I genuinely think we are at that moment.

Oh he doesn't care about the people in Russia but he does care about some vague idea of Russia according to his view of it I suspect, and he definitely cares about his own skin.

[hammerofglass]

Even if it's not a bluff, it's a stupid plan. NATO is restricting itself to supplying arms specifically to avoid that kind of escalation; if he does it anyway the gloves come off.

[McAvoy]

Even if it's not a bluff, it's a stupid plan. NATO is restricting itself to supplying arms specifically to avoid that kind of escalation; if he does it anyway the gloves come off.

Exactly. Russia is struggling against the Ukrainians. Imagine if you piss off the EU, Britain and the US. Most likely China will step back and let the smack down happen.

[Madner Kami]

Even if it's not a bluff, it's a stupid plan. NATO is restricting itself to supplying arms specifically to avoid that kind of escalation; if he does it anyway the gloves come off.

Exactly. Russia is struggling against the Ukrainians. Imagine if you piss off the EU, Britain and the US. Most likely China will step back and let the smack down happen.

China already does. They're not even delivering appreciable amounts of ammunitions to Russia. Border-forces are thinned out badly due to the war and expectations were, for Russia to cycle a good amount of their newest recruits to their borders in order to cycle some more experienced units into Ukraine or re-staff border-forces in general, but instead they're directly funneled into Ukraine. Right now, only 3,000 troops are stationed at the border towards Europe/NATO. It doesn't look much better elsewhere. In ye olden times, Siberia would be speaking chinese by the end of the year...

[TGLS]

Yeah, I think China's pulling the same trick that Germany did with the Russo-Japanese War. Get the Russians on the border far from you so you have a freer hand in their sphere of influence.

[Riedquat]

Even if it's not a bluff, it's a stupid plan. NATO is restricting itself to supplying arms specifically to avoid that kind of escalation; if he does it anyway the gloves come off.

Exactly. Russia is struggling against the Ukrainians. Imagine if you piss off the EU, Britain and the US. Most likely China will step back and let the smack down happen.

China already does. They're not even delivering appreciable amounts of ammunitions to Russia. Border-forces are thinned out badly due to the war and expectations were, for Russia to cycle a good amount of their newest recruits to their borders in order to cycle some more experienced units into Ukraine or re-staff border-forces in general, but instead they're directly funneled into Ukraine. Right now, only 3,000 troops are stationed at the border towards Europe/NATO. It doesn't look much better elsewhere. In ye olden times, Siberia would be speaking chinese by the end of the year...

I imagine China's secretly looking at this with a great deal of glee. Russia's manoeuvred itself in to a position where it's pretty much going to have to be a vassal of China. I wouldn't be surprised if China's had a few words with Russia behind the scenes to tell them to not even think of escalating things to the unthinkable, but anything short of that plays in to China's hands.

The only sensible reason for Putin to make the sort of threats he's making is to try to give the impression it's better to let him get out of this with something than risk armaggedon. Well, assuming there's any sense there.

[clearspira]

China is not Russia's friend. They are only allies on account of the fact they hate America more and its geographically convenient. I very much doubt they will ever go to war on their side - and even if that was once a real possibility, the shambles in Ukraine would have dissuaded them of that. Its one thing to help out ''The Great Bear of the East'' if it had indeed taken Ukraine in a week, its quite different to help out some misguided old man cosplaying as a bear who is losing ground every single week.

Keep an eye on all of that ex-Chinese territory that Russia stole. That'll be interesting as time goes on what happens with that. The Chinese are like the Russians: if it was theirs once, its still theirs now.

[Riedquat]

Exactly - that's why China looks like potentially the big winners. Although it's gone a bit in the batsh1t direction China's tended to be more pragmatic than Russia; I suspect Putin might fall for the "we're pals because we dislike the same thing" spiel. That's the sort of direction being blinded by your bigotry leads you, and Putin is oh so blinded by it.

[hammerofglass]

Although given China's military is completely untested and has a lot of the same organization issues they could easily turn out to be just as much of a paper tiger.