Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Excellent, more of this please.

The irony is the Germans have the ideal weapon (Taurus) to take out the bridge, but refuse to supply them to Ukraine. Well they do come up whit good excuses, takes 6 months to Train Ukrainians, German soldiers would need to be involved, they don't have enough stock (it only takes one). Funnily enough I never heard the only plausible excuse being used, that Ukraine lack the aircraft to fire it from. (I'm aware Stormshadows have been used, they could have easily make up an excuse related to Ukraine not having NATO planes rather than their current lame excuses)

It's an interesting conversation though, didn't someone on here claim the US had told Ukraine not to attack the Kerch bridge (I assume, what would be the third time) in order not to upset Russia?

I don't buy the BBC's suggestion. Ukraine has already attacked it twice. All western countries do not see any of Crimea as off limits. They also don't see any attacks within Russia (with Ukrainian weapons) as off limits. I was reading (I forget the country, may have been a Baltic country) who recently said they are not restricting Ukraine in what targets they choose, within Ukraine or within Russia.

I think Finland said that.

Yeah.. shoot wherever you like. Then again, Finland hasn't really provided Ukraine with anything that could reach targets in Russia, so it's not saying much.

Ukraine is doing worse that's the reality.

Good to see a European leader publicly talk about what measures may be needed for Ukraine to win.

There will be no victory but as you say if there was they would rename pyrrhic to Putin victory,he is putting Russia back decades, some legacy.

Haha, what is Russia gonna do? Invade Ukraine?

Oh you absolutely are. Nothing bizarre about it. Dime a dozen in fact. One of the most repeated Russianbot bingo board points was and always has been "Why is the west fueling this pointless war?". A line which you parroted earlier. Ignoring the fact that Ukraine were fighting for years before a single american bullet showed up. Every poll shows overwhelmingly that Ukrainian people don't want to be Russian boot-lickers like you okay?

It's probably one of the most boring and easily countered points for many reasons. You're boring. Stop being so boring. Maybe that'll help.

No it's not the reality. Ukraine is fighting for basic survival. The threshold for collapse is about infinitely higher than it is for Russia, the invading nation.

Ukraine's economy being worse than Russia's is actually quite irrelevant in the overall scheme of things.

The invasion was a titantic blunder, Russia is being bled dry, and there's only so long they can keep up their current effort, and their current effort being pretty pathetic, notwithstanding the horrific level of Ukrainian casulties.

A $60bn army versus a $5bn army and Russia's only tactic is 1916 style human wave and artillery assaults. Of course domestically they have to package it was if they're fighting the entirety of NATO but we know where the truth is there.

This is basic stuff. Russia is a laughing stock, the world knows it, Putin knows it, his generals know it. The only people who maybe don't know it are the Russian people, and even at that, a fair portion of them completely understand what's going on, but can't say anything.

We're still at the very initial warfare stages two years in and Russia had made neglible headway while their economy is being battered. Ukraine's defenses are intact. Their army is intact. Their airforce, air defence...all intact. There's several stages Russia has to pass to even look like it's winning, and the idea that their economy could sustain each and every stage is laughable.

Creeping forward metres at a time at enormous human casulties and equipment loss is a) not sustainable and b) not exactly a war-winning strategy. Russia has proved it is completely incapable of delivering any sort of knockout blow, time and time again.

It's obviously crap for Ukraine, who don't want to give away land or lives, but at the rate Russia is going, it'd take them a decade to defeat Ukraine militarily, if even, while they're in a full war economy that will collapse in the near term. And even if that defeat was forthcoming - which it is not - they haven't the faintest hope of being able to occupy, pacify, and integrate Ukraine.

Putin in 2024 is Hitler in 1944. Defeat is far enough away that you can keep the charade going in a propoganda blitz, you control enough territory on a map that gives an illusion of strength, but the eventual result remains inevitable.

Like Hitler, for Putin there is no option B. He'll just keep hammering away at option A until he can't because option B is his head a proverbial pike; he has nothing to lose. He made a gamble in February 2022 that didn't work, a misfire for the history books of "worlds great military blunders" in the near future.

But Russia is fighting an unwinnable war. It doesn't mean that Ukraine won't suffer greatly, and worse, but the war is ultimately unwinnable. There is zero scenario where Russia emerges from this as a winner, or stronger.

And in case you may not know , the war was STARTED by Russia invading Ukraine for NON REASONS - even though he has proffered thousands of them

eh? EU tried just before it started. It didn’t work because someone was not interested.

The yanks could only dream of having a President as young as Putin ;-) lol , I dont see a civil war as a likely scenario , that's a 1%er

let me rephrase , in the first few months of it. My point was the West thought Russia had fallen into a trap. I was a kid during the Falklands war but I remember there was more interest in sorting it out before the British Task Force got down there than anything that has happened in this one which I see as a miscalculation by the US

"let me rephrase"

So you are saying evil putin is not so bad because Falklands comparison blah blah and it was a mistake not to bow down to putin's terrorist acts and criminal behavior towards Ukraine. You do realise there was a peace treaty between Ukraine and putin's terrorist state where internationally recognised borders were agreed and putin has by his actions torn up that treaty. Why would it make sense for the people of Ukraine to trust putin to adhere to any future agreement when he now claims their country should not even exist? There are no countries that can order Ukraine to fall for the mistake of trusting putin.

putin has made a huge blunder by invading Ukraine and allowing his army be demolished by his desire for conquest, genocide and terrorism. It would serve him right if his folly paves the way for a collapse in the state he claims to serve. Civil war would imply the russian federation is a legitimate country rather than a collection of states which were conquered by moskow and would be much better served breaking away from moskow now.