Russia - threadbanned users in OP

A two-front war...bound to work. He can't lose.

😁

Putin may have thought his forces would be welcomed or that, at a push, resistance would quickly fall apart. It has long been speculated that Putin has grown detached from reality for various possible reasons like simple isolation or he's dying and has desperate need to be remembered as a great leader or to buoy flagging approval ratings. In a sense, the real reason doesn't matter because any reason to invade a country and indiscriminately slaughter, and loot and rape, and threaten loads of other countries while you're at it, is inherently invalid.

It was/is one man's war, and that man wanted Zelenskyy's head on a plate - probably literally.

Putin's commanders were just carrying out the objectives that Putin wanted to attain and maybe hoping to get the right side of a multitude of variables that didn't end up going their way. These include, but are not limited to, hoping the West's response would be confused, hoping their own troops would be motivated, hoping to knock out vital Ukrainian military infrastructure quickly, hoping their own army wasn't subject to decades of endemic corruption and poor maintenance.

I'm sure there's a good reason why there haven't been more Russian planes in the skies of Ukraine. After all, if they could get them up there, they would be up there. Stingers obviously play their part, but I would say there is more to the story that we'll only learn in retrospect.

Ukraine can count itself unfortunate that it has been invaded by a large army, but in that unfortunateness, there is at least a lesser good fortune that this army is mostly incompetent. It at least gives more hope than if the reverse were true.

Has there been any Russian POW's? How are they being treated?

Yes, a few thousand I believe. Treated well I gather, no suggestion of wrongdoing or breaches of the Geneva Convention (if there were, the Kremlin press and the legions of Putin fanboys on social media would be shrieking it from the rooftops).

You have to wonder if Putin is simply willfully taking another extraordinary gamble yet again with another big offensive in the east of the country, knowing this could get even worse, or if he genuinely believes Ukraine is on the brink of defeat.

The loss rates are already catastrophic. Oryx says Russia has lost almost 500 tanks, and we can safely assume a lot more lost that haven't been documented. That has to be a huge percentage of their actual "real" tank force - as in their overall tank force, not just exactly what was assembled for operations in Ukraine.

Let's say they had 3 thousand combat-ready tanks in actual decent shape back in February.....they realistically have probably lost 6-700 of them at least in two months and made pretty negligible gains.

It seems to me Putin is simply embarrassed and humiliated and wants to just punish Ukraine for resisting and daring to destroy his grand vision of conquest. I don't see how it could even be about legacy at this point given he will obviously know history books will inevitably record it as the time Russia was humiliated by its comparatively tiny neighbour and transformed itself into a total pariah state. That is literally the legacy he will leave behind and it's already cemented no matter what happens next. It can only get worse for him, not better, going forward.

Apart from all that, things are good with him!🤣

Enough said.

Potentially a break through to the troops in Mariupol.

https://twitter.com/militarylandnet/status/1513972931323478020?s=21&t=ov1vqhTHZPPfWhSZ9jWkZA

The face to face meetings with Macron and the Austrian Chancellor Nehammer yesterday might seem like they produce nothing but they do have a value for western intelligence. Macron and Nehammer are under no illusions that they were going to show up to Moscow and Putin would stop the war at their request, it is not about that. Putin is the adversary in war here so any opportunity for western leaders to meet him face to face should be taken as it allows an opportunity to assess his state of mind and his health, if he is truly a madman with nuclear weapons or if he is just bluffing. As the Japanese strategist and philosopher Musashi once said "Know your enemy and know his sword"

The other value in continuing to meet him is that Putin is surrounded by yes men who are scared of telling him the full truth of this war. Meeting a western leader is an opportunity to show Putin how badly his war is going despite what his generals are telling him. Now maybe Putin knows how badly it is going and he doesnt care. Or maybe the Russian figure of only 1,500 soldiers dead is disinformation coming direct from own generals who are too scared to tell Putin the truth of 10,000+ Russian soldiers dead for fear of their own safety. If the latter is the case him being shown how badly his war is going does has a value for Ukraine, especially if it results in a purge of Russian military leadership which in turn will destabilise the Russian armys war effort.

Yes. The account on Twitter just confirmed this. https://twitter.com/militarylandnet/status/1513985790149373954?s=21&t=tek8yKyaoS7I6Tw3zgTwow

Interesting, combined with the further $670m in funding that's been slated...

And it would even be better if NATO just came in and stopped this war. It can be done once it stays in Ukraine.