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Ukraine on the brink of civil war. Mod Warning in OP.
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woodrow wyatt wrote: »I see India scraped the Rafale Fighter Deal With France, instead India will go with Russian planes.
126 planes were supposed to be purchased directly from Dassault but seeing France fail to deliver the mistral ships to Russia, india pulled out of the deal.
Billions of euros lost by France, unintended consequences of the sanctions on Russia.
Someones head will roll in Paris.
Do you want to post actual facts .
oddly Egypt are spending 6 billion on the jets too
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Shurimgreat wrote: »The Minsk agreement was the last chance for Russia to save face and back out from a quagmire. That looks impossible now. They were never going to stop until they created a land bridge to Crimea.
I just don't see how longterm this benefits Russia, especially if there are more sanctions on the way. In the short term they should be fine. In the long term they become an international pariah, with a contracting economy, dwindling foreign reserves, junk bond status, low oil prices.
Putin in trying to defeat a phantom threat from NATO and the EU has instead destabilised his own economy.
A big price to pay for a small piece of land.
The Minsk agreement was always doomed to failure. how could it possibly work or hope to work when Washington wasnt a party to the talks. and the Americans are directing the Ukrainians and are making and have made policy decisions that have escalated the conflict from a Russian perspective and the conflict itself is a proxy war between Washington and Moscow. no Americans around the table there was never any hope of it working doomed from the beginning.
I dont think Putin or the Russians care about losing face its gone way beyond that stage. this is going to keep escalating unless everyone involved sits down together and gets a grip of things including the Americans. but for that to happen there has to be genuine will for it to happen. right now I dont think thats the case. theres a US battalion heading to Ukraine next month to train their soldiers. they have already supplied them with mortar radars and there is talk of supplying them with more weapons. but that could have an opposite
than the one desired.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-weighs-supplying-ukraine-with-missiles-1422918663WASHINGTON—The U.S. government is considering providing Javelin antitank missiles, small arms and ammunition to Ukraine, part of an effort to try to deter further aggression by Russia-backed rebels there, according to U.S. officials.
The Pentagon has long supported providing some lethal aid, but until recently the White House has signaled little interest in such a move to avoid escalating the confrontation with Russian President Vladimir Putin .
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/opinion/article/if-u-s-arms-ukraine-russia-could-arm-iran/515998.htmlThe war drums are once again beating in Washington. An attention-grabbing report released by three of America's leading think tanks recommends that the United States save Ukraine by arming it. The U.S. government, the report argues, should alter its policy and begin providing lethal assistance to Ukraine's military — $3 billion over the next three years. That is serious money.
The rationale used by Washington's legion of escalation focuses on the notion of "raising the costs for Putin." If Kiev had advanced weaponry, so the argument goes, it would be able to inflict higher casualties on the Russian troops Putin has apparently sent into the Donbass to support the separatists there. Boiled down to its essence then, the idea is that an increase in Russian soldiers coming home from Ukraine in body bags will force Putin to back down to prevent a domestic backlash.
While it is easy to see the seductive simplicity of this reasoning, let's not forget that if the U.S. raises the ante, Putin will almost certainly do the same in Ukraine and elsewhere. First and foremost, the pro-escalation argument greatly underestimates the lengths Putin would be willing to go to in Ukraine.
Since the first stirrings on Kiev's Maidan, the West has consistently overlooked the tremendous importance of Ukraine to Russia. Russia views Ukraine similarly to how China looks at Taiwan: as an existential issue in which certain red lines must not be crossed.
Once we understand that Ukraine's status is an existential issue for Moscow, it is clear that Putin will never allow the separatists to be defeated — and indeed Russia possesses the military might to ensure that this never happens. In this regard, Putin possesses what analysts referred to during the Cold War as "escalation dominance," described by American nuclear strategist Herman Kahn as "a capacity, other things being equal, to enable the side possessing it to enjoy marked advantages in a given region of the escalation ladder."
Put simply, in Ukraine Putin enjoys escalation dominance at every level of the potential military escalation chain, and no amount of wishful thinking will change this fact.
Another fact overlooked by those in favor of arming Kiev is that Putin could choose to escalate asymmetrically, outside of Ukraine. Iran would be the worst case. In late January, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu visited Iran and signed a military cooperation pact with Tehran.
One item from this trip was particularly alarming. Retired Russian General Leonid Ivashov summarized the Tehran meetings, noting that "a step was taken in the direction of cooperation on the economy and arms technology, at least for such defensive systems as the S-300 and S-400. Probably we will deliver them."
Debaltsvo looks like it might fall by this time tomorrow with thousands of Ukrainian troops encircled somewhere though not quite sure exactly where they are.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-02-17/ukraine-truce-fails-withdrawal-deadline-passes-debaltseve-situation-deteriorating*POROSHENKO SAYS UN MUST NOT ALLOW FULL-SCALE WAR IN EUROPE
As the game of chicken between Greece and the Eurogroup hots up, it appears another - potentially far more deadly - is escalating in Ukraine as neither side is willing to follow through on the terms of the Minsk Summit peace deal - removing heavy weaponry from the frontlines - as a key deadline passes without agreement. As The Guardian reports, The Ukrainian military have stated that "as soon as the militants cease fire, the Ukrainian side will begin to withdraw heavy weaponry from the frontline," and the pro-Russian separatists proclaim, "We do not have the right [to stop fighting for Debaltseve]," adding that as far as the truce, "we have everything ready for a mutual withdrawal. We will not do anything unilaterally – that would make our soldiers targets."
As The Guardian reports, and Interfax confirms, the situation in Debaltseve is deteriorating...
peace for now looks a fair bit away.0 -
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woodrow wyatt wrote: »Debaltsevo has fallen to the rebels, they have defeated the best units the Ukrainian army had.
The Ukrainian fourth wave of mobilization has only just begun,reports of only 6% of people responding to their call up.
The forces at Debaltsevo were the remnants of the regular Ukrainian military. They are now gone and Kiev junta can count on a trickle of replacements.
Whatever equipment they brought with them to Debaltsevo is going to fall into the hands of the rebels.
Their heavy equipment is for all intents and purposes irreplaceable. Once these tanks and artillery are gone, they are gone for good, and it will take a long time to bring the Ukrainian military back to the state it was only two months ago.
So far the conflict is not official war, but it looks like it will have to be call one now, and with that the economy of Ukraine which is already suffering will completely collapse, Why you ask, the IMF won’t give money to a country at war.
Its game over for Poroshenko, he has no options left.
Says who exactly
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zoF_bb9-D9AThis discussion has been closed.
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