Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Russian army conducted 18 missile strikes, 39 air strikes at civilian and military objects across Ukraine. Damage in over 30 settlements, among them: Kramatorsk, Kostiantynivka, Dnipro, Pavlohrad, Velykomykhailivka. Russian army conducted missile strike at Kharkiv Power Plant, - General Staff of Armed Forces of Ukraine says in the morning

The next few days / weeks will be fascinating. It's still a bit early to say but we could be looking at a Ceausescu type scenario.

There may be a reckoning for the Russian public at some point too - they will surely find out about all the war crimes their regime has committed in a neighbouring country (Mariupol etc). It would be near impossible for the Russian army to be defeated and this not become common knowledge.

Quoting myself here but it looks possible they didn't just stop at the Oskil...

But this dents their narrative / delusion of Russia being a great nation and a force for good. They're not 'fine' with war crimes being committed by the regime in all the above places - they are in total denial that it ever happened.

I'm looking more at it now and apparently the river itself is not sufficient enough (read it's too shallow in a lot of places) to be considered a natural obstacle or a defensive line. You would assume the Russians know that too so where are they going to try and halt the advance? Line 5 on the original tweet I quoted maybe?

Well, not that I claim to have more than a surface level understanding but I would have thought the pre-February 'borders' between the 'peoples republics' are heavily fortified (on both sides) and would offer much more in the way of defence potential.

Of course one of the prerequisites of a successful defence is the willingness to fight and the Russians and their proxies seem to have run out of this commodity...

And they are still losing.

While in Pakistan, one day having a ( non-alcoholic ) drink on the sidewalk with some friends, a group of teenager students happened to pass by, all black haired and brown eyed except for one who had red hair and blue-eye's. We locked eyes as he approached and walked past, and ever after passing, he kept looking backwards, and I kept staring at him. Definitely some kind of communication across time was taking place. But then I remembered the British Army were in that part of the world especially when it was still a part of India, and where the British Army went, the Irish went too. With their red hair and blue eyes.

Blue eyes or red hair in pakistan originates from further north. You see similar on occasion in Afghanistan and the other stans, and in to central Russia. Nothing to do with the Irish. Pashtuns in Afghanistan often had red hair and green eyes, and similar can be found in pockets of north-central russia. A common ancestor, but not from the irish. There is plenty of historical record of red haired peoples living in that part of the world in the distant past.

If they were Irish they'd have big thick heads on them

Ukraine has ~1,200 KM border with Russia and another ~1,000 KM with Belarus. There is no choke point, those borders are impossible to seal and Russia will always be there, testing, looking for weakness, in addition Ukraine that is part of NATO (it de facto is given the tactics, training and weapons) presents a continued security threat to Russia. That makes Moscow paranoid and given the failure of their current tactics, it also makes them desperate and more willing to consider tactical nuclear strikes as a means to compensate for these failures.

Politically, Putins successor needs to be considered, there is no love for a Gorbachev type president in Russia, Yeltsin got caught between a rock and a hard place, i.e. between the Communists and the Oligarchs, Putin aka the Siloviki, was the middle way out at the time. Within the next 2 years Putin is gone, so today's situation can atrophy as he runs down the clock and Russia initiates a mass mobilisation which just draws the war out for his successor to deal with. Western Europe does not have the resources to hold that long, and will be facing internal political crisis of its own. In addition the United States will have changed, with an ongoing civil conflict of its own that will get much worse.

It does not matter how totalitarian the regime in Moscow is, Ukraine is going to have to do a deal with them, and then keep watching their backs. This situation can get much worse, for example the war expands on new fronts like the Middle East. World War II started in the 1930s with Japan, the Spanish civil war (a left vs right conflict), the sovereign debt crisis of the 1930s, the trade wars, and then German expansion, the final phase from 1939 took 6 years to play out. Going on that historic timescale it will probably be the early 1930s before we have an era of relative peace again, new Bretton woods type agreement and treaties etc.

Therefore, the parameters of a deal have to be explored because the politicians on all sides must lay the groundwork within their administrations which takes time. Today, the attitude is "we must win, no compromise", this is stalemate and will keep drawing more men into the meat grinder. Ukraine (aka NATO) has now drawn a line in the Chernozem of Ukraine and the Russian administration knows that it cannot proceed today with its original grand design, it will play for time.

Does anyone remember the story from a previous thread on ukraine,

An ortodox priest was doing some live stream or similar taking questions and giving opinions ,one young lad about 15 came on and had a chat but at some point the young lad said he didn't believe in god, considering his age not uncommon,

The following night a news broadcast showed a heavy handed police raid on his family's home,he was arrested and detained under some mental health grounds ,and carted off to a mental asylum for re-education.

This is the me mentality your dealing with as others on here who have real world experience in Russia have touched on

Careful there now Comrade...are you insinuating that the State is wrong in its news presentation?????