Russia offers Ukraine negotiations for surrender terms.

moon said:
Now we'll see NATO's agenda.
Will it advise Zelenskyy to accept and save his country from further damage- or will it throw Ukraine under the bus by continuing to ply it with weapons ?
Surely, the hypocrisy of NATO's ' self-determination' mantra is obvious to everybody. If Russia waged war on all of Europe for the next year it wouldn't kill as many people or occupy as many countries as NATO has done.
Back off. Let Ukraine negotiate with its neighbor. Peace before obstinacy.
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NATO can neither force the Ukrainians to fight, nor prevent them from surrendering. If the Ukrainians want to surrender, they can surrender easily. The Ukrainians want to fight, so they are fighting.

Moon may want them to surrender, but Moon, like NATO, gets no say in this.
 
moon said:
Peace before obstinacy.
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If Russia intends to surrender, that's great. I wouldn't even hit them with war reparations. I would only require two things for them to get sanctions removed (with the West helping Ukraine rebuild):

(1) Pull out of all illegally occupied territories (not just including their latest attempted land grabs -- the rest of Crimea, as well).
(2) Hand over Vladimir Putin to the Hague for war crimes prosecution.

Once Putin is handed over, Russians can get back to their lives. Until then, the pain must continue for them.
 
Walt said:
Very badly. Putin is the invader, like Napoleon and Hitler, and it is not going well for him.
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You are comparing Russia's invasion of Ukraine to Napoleon's Russian invasion and/or Nazi Germany's invasion?

You don't know much about history, I take it.

Those three campaigns are related in only the most simplistic and basic terms.
But they are all, vastly different from each other.
And CERTAINLY from the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
The Russian military has in recent years performed far above what American Intel claimed was possible. I am still not seeing any info on how they are doing in this operation, which is interesting.
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The Russian military has in recent years performed far below what American Intel claimed was possible. Russia was projected to roll to victory in Ukraine within just a couple weeks, at least in terms of seizing the capital and installing a puppet dictatorship. Instead, we're months into this and they just keep shrinking their ambitions.

This is part of a long-standing pattern. The CIA has CONSISTENTLY overestimated the Russians, going way the hell back to the supposed "missile gap" in the 1950's and '60s. The high point of that was in the 1980's, when the CIA was still portraying the Soviet Union as a powerful empire that was beating us in an arm's race, when in fact they were a paper tiger about to collapse utterly.

So, the question is why the CIA consistently gets things so wrong. I, personally, think it's deliberate. Our military industries expect over 10% year-over-year growth, and that can only happen if there's constant expansion of military budgets. That, in turn, requires us to obscure the fact we're in an arm's race with ourselves. We need a fellow superpower, perceived to be neck-and-neck with us, so we can justify hiking our military overspend. Thus, we get an endless string of terrible overestimates of Russian military potency. From that perspective, this humiliatingly Russian military meltdown in a weak little neighbor like Ukraine shouldn't have come as a surprise.
 
McRocket said:
You are comparing Russia's invasion of Ukraine to Napoleon's Russian invasion and/or Nazi Germany's invasion?

You don't know much about history, I take it.

Those three campaigns are related in only the most simplistic and basic terms.
But they are all, vastly different from each other.
And CERTAINLY from the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Click to expand...

I get the sense you never took a history class beyond high school. In reality, Russia's invasion of Ukraine is REMARKABLY similar to Germany's invasion of Poland. In each case, you had a fascist dictator who'd been slowly expanding his country's territory, with feeble push-back from other major nations. In each case, he was surrounded by a cult of personality, where everyone was deathly afraid to tell him he was playing with fire. In each case, he tried to get away with the same thing one too many times. In each case, he sent a military force into a neighboring country to grab land, but with some talking points about deep historical and ethnic ties between his country and the target, to try to justify it. In each case, he finally triggered the wrath of major western nations, and his country suffered horrendously for his mistake. Now I'm just hoping for the part where Putin's charred corpse gets identified by dental records.
 
Mina said:
The Russian military has in recent years performed far below what American Intel claimed was possible. Russia was projected to roll to victory in Ukraine within just a couple weeks, at least in terms of seizing the capital and installing a puppet dictatorship. Instead, we're months into this and they just keep shrinking their ambitions.

This is part of a long-standing pattern. The CIA has CONSISTENTLY overestimated the Russians, going way the hell back to the supposed "missile gap" in the 1950's and '60s. The high point of that was in the 1980's, when the CIA was still portraying the Soviet Union as a powerful empire that was beating us in an arm's race, when in fact they were a paper tiger about to collapse utterly.

So, the question is why the CIA consistently gets things so wrong. I, personally, think it's deliberate. Our military industries expect over 10% year-over-year growth, and that can only happen if there's constant expansion of military budgets. That, in turn, requires us to obscure the fact we're in an arm's race with ourselves. We need a fellow superpower, perceived to be neck-and-neck with us, so we can justify hiking our military overspend. Thus, we get an endless string of terrible overestimates of Russian military potency. From that perspective, this humiliatingly Russian military meltdown in a weak little neighbor like Ukraine shouldn't have come as a surprise.
Click to expand...

Given your lack of understanding of reality I see no need to invest into you.
 
Mina said:
If Russia intends to surrender, that's great. I wouldn't even hit them with war reparations. I would only require two things for them to get sanctions removed (with the West helping Ukraine rebuild):

(1) Pull out of all illegally occupied territories (not just including their latest attempted land grabs -- the rest of Crimea, as well).
(2) Hand over Vladimir Putin to the Hague for war crimes prosecution.

Once Putin is handed over, Russians can get back to their lives. Until then, the pain must continue for them.
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You're away with the fairies.
 
McRocket said:
You are comparing Russia's invasion of Ukraine to Napoleon's Russian invasion and/or Nazi Germany's invasion?
Click to expand...

Both invasions of Russia started far better than this, and ended very badly. Napoleon had no trouble capturing Moscow. Hitler reached the outer suburbs of Moscow. They both did that with ease. But there things slowed down, and later started to really collapse.

We will have to wait to see how Putin does in a stalemate war during Winter, but it says a lot that it now seems probable that Putin will be in a stalemate war during Winter.
 
moon said:
Define ' stalemate '.
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It is looking highly unlikely that Putin can invade all of Ukraine. He might agree to a ceasefire, but there is a good chance he will not. That leaves him fighting through the winter, but not advancing. There is a danger [for him] that his supply lines will get cut, and he will face a sudden collapse.
 
Walt said:
It is looking highly unlikely that Putin can invade all of Ukraine. He might agree to a ceasefire, but there is a good chance he will not. That leaves him fighting through the winter, but not advancing. There is a danger [for him] that his supply lines will get cut, and he will face a sudden collapse.
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The Russians are eating up Ukrainian territory in small, daily bites. As their captured territory is adjacent to Russia itself how do you envision their supply lines to be cut ?
Every territorial gain becomes part of Russia.
 
Walt said:
Both invasions of Russia started far better than this, and ended very badly. Napoleon had no trouble capturing Moscow. Hitler reached the outer suburbs of Moscow. They both did that with ease. But there things slowed down, and later started to really collapse.

We will have to wait to see how Putin does in a stalemate war during Winter, but it says a lot that it now seems probable that Putin will be in a stalemate war during Winter.
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Fair enough.

Though I have to disagree with the former.
Though the numbers vary.
Napoleon, by the time he entered Moscow (that was half burned down), he had lost anywhere from 1/2 to 2/3 of his original army.

1920px-Minard.png

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_invasion_of_Russia#Losses
 
Future generations will look upon America's refusal to defend the Ukraine with disgust.

Biden is the new Neville Chamberlain.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
I am annoyed that this late into it we are still getting no reports on the proficiency of the Russian Forces.

There seems to be an information embargo, and I have no idea why one would be in place.
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You were excited for this war to be a showcase for Russian military prowess and proficiency, but what this war actually did is show Russian military ineptness and weakness.

I don't think NATO armed forces have anything to fear from a conventional military engagement with Putin, especially with the addition of the professional and capable Swedish and Finnish armed forces.
 
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