Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Says it all about who these Russian people are that they would do that to a Holocaust memorial. Disgusting. I hope the Latvians find out who did it and deport them back to Russia since they love their authoritarian dictatorship so much.

Yes

So if you don't support Putin, you're a coward? The mask is slipping fast great Gatling.

Honestly we have no idea of what game is genuinely being played behind the scenes with regard Ukraine/US/Nato.

Ukraine will have access to high-level Intel far exceeding Russia capabilities. They will know where they are, what they have and don't have, where thrusts and build ups are coming from, logistical information and weaknesses, and be advised as to what are smart and poor strategies, regardless of what's officially being said.

This is a war of a drastically smaller army backed by 21st century tech, in all aspects of the word, hammering and holding back a far bigger army with 20th century tech.

It's not entirely dissimilar to Israel beating the brakes off several invading countries at once for the same reasons. In the modern day, 1970's era tech, poor training/doctrine and whatever is always going to have an extremely difficult, if not impossible, task against a foe using/utilizing cutting-edge tech.

Let's be real, the Russian armed forces have utterly embarrassed themselves. A ground force that has lost half of its serviceable tank fleet, a massive air-force that can't establish air superiority over a drastically smaller foe, zero evidence of any ability whatsoever to lead combined arms operations, almost zero ability for effective tactical strikes using missiles, etc.

It's basically a mongol horde at this stage. It has nothing in the way of advanced modern weaponry, a professional core, or a professional leadership and is simply reliant on brute force. Which can work....to a point. As we did see.

But when that point tips over....

I'm sure the Ukrainians will be grateful for realdanbreens keyboard contributions, I'll let some of them know. They could do with the laugh.

I've always said it ,.I don't need a mask

I don't need a makey up story for sympathy either

You are correct.

Tsarist Russia and the Soviet Union always projected power and looked formidable.

Right up until the moment the two regime's disintegrated.

The West are going to be very caught off-guard when the putler regime collapses.

No one will have predicted it, the talking heads will proclaim it as unprecedented. In reality, it was an inevitability and one or two reading this will remember my words.

Yep, 100%.

putler acts in their name. He is their strong man and they worship him like the Tsar's of old.

Ordinary Russians are farm animals that are being led to slaughter. The tragedy is that they don't realise it yet.

Turned out to be nonsense.

Mariupol getting hammered this evening. What joy.

And a pretty good 2c, too. Good points especially if you take into account the almost constant top-down situational awareness given to the Ukranians through AWACS and SIGNIT. Remember, most of Russias IL-96 AWACS allocated to the invasion are still sitting in Belarus, and their SIGNIT capacity is negligible.

Not going to happen. Logically, they will have zero effect on the overall war, given the variants that could hypothetically be supplied. F-16's are inherently unstable, being the very 1st fly-by-wire fighter jet, with an airframe that is so unforgiving that the ECU is constantly giving inputs to the control surfaces. It takes 6 months to a year to get to grips with it. ( basic flying, Pushing the Envelope, Western Systems, Weapons Systems, Radar work A to A, Radar work A to G, BVR fighting ( however, I doubt an Amraam will ever get to UKR), asymmetrical warfare CAP work, defensive flying, emergency drills etc etc)

Then we have another crew being trained for maintenance which will take Months.

Folks just don't realise whats involved here. A good, well-connected anti-aircraft missile system and coastal system is the way to go here, in every way.

The absolutely only way this will work would be by the Korean War method. Chinese pilots, in N.Korean uniforms, were flying " N.Korean" Mig's.

Here, we could paint up a few F-16 Block A's. ( who's Radar, by the way, would be inferior to the Su's) in Ukranian colours, stick poor Belgian pilots in Ukranian uniforms in them. Then fly a 3-ship CAP. 1 x two seater and two singles. Both armed with a to a and GBU's. The two seater goes high, for top-down overwatch and the other two go hunting. It's It's huge waste of resources and time, in my opinion. Better QRA battalions with fast, powerful Western assets would be better. The Russians cannot fight "shoot and scoot".

You know what, I wouldn't be surprised if A-10's show up instead. There are rumours that many Ukranian pilots have been training on them in the States. That would make much more sense. To me, anyway.

Just think of the damage just one could do....

For me, in my comfy chair, in a warm apt, tapping away on a keyboard, I can see why Orcs is bad. Russians are people. It's important to remember that. When i hear the nazi's being called monsters I have to disagree because they weren't monsters. They were people, like us, and it's important to remember that. It's important to remember that it's not a creature doing this, it's people making choices.

If however i was in Ukraine, with a foreign army invading, bombing my cities, killing my people, I think Orc would be a very mild thing to call them.