6 ms·

> And nowhere on reddit or in the media do I see a discussion of the pros and cons of a Ukrainian surrender. It's really hard to see how Ukraine will successful

> And nowhere on reddit or in the media do I see a discussion of the pros and cons of a Ukrainian surrender. It's really hard to see how Ukraine will successfully fend off a country 10x its size. (If someone has an answer as to why that might be realistic, I'm open to hear it). It's really hard to see that Ukraine by itself could defeat Russia and it definitely seems far fetched, even if the Russian army has shown itself more inept than expected. But that isn't what is happening either, and a Ukraine bankrolled and armed by the west. That is something else, and that combination might definitely be abel to defeat Russia. So the question is more, is the west or parts of it willing to spend enough and accept escalating tensions with nuclear armed Russia by doing that? If you look at what Zelensky is doing at the drumbeat of asks for more weapons is obvious that Ukraine is fully aware of this.

throwaway0a5e 4y ago
>It's really hard to see that Ukraine by itself could defeat Russia There are many paths but they are all long term "replace the Taliban with the Taliban" type ones that people don't wanna talk about.
- einarfd 4y ago
  Fair enough, I was thinking more of a classic win by defeating the Russian army on the battlefield. But the kind of loss the USSR had in Afghanistan might be possible without much if any help from abroad.
  - watwut 4y ago
    The kind of victory Afghanistant had also means ending up with deeply authoritarian and violent society. It implies complete destruction of democratic civil society, unfortunately.
    - throwaway0a5e 4y ago
      >The kind of victory Afghanistant had also means ending up with deeply authoritarian and violent society. The current Taliban are way, way more liberal than the 90s Taliban. They've embraced modern communication, dropped most of their Pashtun ethnic supremacy stuff and are a little less violent across the board. That's really a big change all things considered.
      - KptMarchewa 4y ago
        Unless you're a woman.
        cudgy 4y ago
        Or a christian. Or your Jewish. Or an American. Or your gay. Or you want to educate your daughters. Or you …
watwut 4y ago
Russia has 3x times as many people as Ukraine, not 10x times. It has a lot more land, but I doubt it is 10x times more.
- chrismcb 4y ago
  It is more like 30x.
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  > Russia has 3x times as many people as Ukraine, not 10x times. It has a lot more land, but I doubt it is 10x times more. It's actually almost 30× the land area (6.6M mi² vs 233k mi²)
  - watwut 4y ago
    Ukraine is approximately 603,550 sq km, while Russia is approximately 17,098,242 sq km, making Russia 2,733% larger than Ukraine. The best effect of Russian admirers and propaganda alike is that people think it is bigger then it is and that everything Russian is better then it is. It is also country where huge amount of population does not have flushable toilet, have huge inequality and massive amount of internal issues. Russian main advantage is that it does not value human life and is OK with massive looses. And that it has zero ethical limits with regards to civilians. That is amount of greatness.
    - ahahahahah 4y ago
      This comment is really weird. It's written as though it's correcting an incorrect assumption in the parent. But it's literally confirming what the parent said. Parent: russia is almost 30x the size of ukraine This comment: what?! you're confused by russian propaganda! it's only 2733% larger than ukraine And then, even if you adjust to claim that you were trying to reinforce parent's point, that's not plausible either since parent was actually pointing out that people's belief that russia was 10x bigger was actually a large underestimate of its size.
- inglor_cz 4y ago
fhood 4y ago
Assuming no direct western intervention, I think the crucial next steps for a Ukraine victory will center around whether NATO can transition from providing soviet surplus to modern western arms, and get Ukrainians the training required in time. F-16s or even 35s and modern air defenses could play a huge role in making russian territory gains largely impossible, but the operational training would be measured in multiple weeks at a minimum.
cm2187 4y ago
You should look at it from Putin's point of view. Escalating with the west is even less of an option. Militarily, I don't think he has any doubt about US, French and UK nuclear deterrence. Even if you take nukes off the table, if you look how poorly his troops are doing in Ukraine, imagine that against NATO, even without the US. He might "escalate to de-escalate", i.e. make a lot of noise about escalation to intimidate Biden (so far it worked), but it can only be bluff. Whichever metric you use, the ratio of power between Russia and Europe is much greater than Ukraine to Russia.
- fhood 4y ago
  While I tend to agree, reading through the various nuclear close calls as far as I can tell, there were far more on the Russian side than the American one, and while American nuclear incidents tended to be headed off with everyone following orders and working within established systems, Russian ones usually involve one guy literally refusing an order. It's hard to know how accurate all of this is, but it does imply deterrent through incompetence. The concern is not limited to intentional nuclear strikes, every time Russian forces get put on alert the threat of an accident grows. Putin likely knows this, and NATO is also very wary of it.
- watwut 4y ago
  You assume same value system on Putin side as you have and that is unlikely.
- blub 4y ago
  What will the US, UK and France do if Russia uses a tactical nuke in Ukraine? Nuking Russia because they nuked Ukraine is… very unlikely.
  - cm2187 4y ago
    That’s not what nuclear deterrence protects against. If he does that there will be other forms of escalation. A Iran/North Korean style set of economic sanctions possibly (I don’t think India and China would support Putin anymore at that point). Possibly a direct confrontation over Ukraine (no fly zone or a no fly zone by proxy, giving the Ukrainians the missile defence sufficient to clear the sky). Etc.
gunfighthacksaw 4y ago
> It's really hard to see how Ukraine will successfully fend off a country 10x its size Every Ukrainian defender kills 10 Russian occupiers? Obviously some will be less fortunate, and a select few will go down in history as extremely effective removers of Russian conscripts.

throwaway0a5e 4y ago

>It's really hard to see that Ukraine by itself could defeat Russia There are many paths but they are all long term "replace the Taliban with the Taliban" type ones that people don't wanna talk about.

einarfd 4y ago
Fair enough, I was thinking more of a classic win by defeating the Russian army on the battlefield. But the kind of loss the USSR had in Afghanistan might be possible without much if any help from abroad.
- watwut 4y ago
  The kind of victory Afghanistant had also means ending up with deeply authoritarian and violent society. It implies complete destruction of democratic civil society, unfortunately.
  - throwaway0a5e 4y ago
    >The kind of victory Afghanistant had also means ending up with deeply authoritarian and violent society. The current Taliban are way, way more liberal than the 90s Taliban. They've embraced modern communication, dropped most of their Pashtun ethnic supremacy stuff and are a little less violent across the board. That's really a big change all things considered.
    - KptMarchewa 4y ago
      Unless you're a woman.
      - cudgy 4y ago
        Or a christian. Or your Jewish. Or an American. Or your gay. Or you want to educate your daughters. Or you …

watwut 4y ago

Russia has 3x times as many people as Ukraine, not 10x times. It has a lot more land, but I doubt it is 10x times more.

chrismcb 4y ago
It is more like 30x.
dragonwriter 4y ago
> Russia has 3x times as many people as Ukraine, not 10x times. It has a lot more land, but I doubt it is 10x times more. It's actually almost 30× the land area (6.6M mi² vs 233k mi²)
- watwut 4y ago
  Ukraine is approximately 603,550 sq km, while Russia is approximately 17,098,242 sq km, making Russia 2,733% larger than Ukraine. The best effect of Russian admirers and propaganda alike is that people think it is bigger then it is and that everything Russian is better then it is. It is also country where huge amount of population does not have flushable toilet, have huge inequality and massive amount of internal issues. Russian main advantage is that it does not value human life and is OK with massive looses. And that it has zero ethical limits with regards to civilians. That is amount of greatness.
  - ahahahahah 4y ago
    This comment is really weird. It's written as though it's correcting an incorrect assumption in the parent. But it's literally confirming what the parent said. Parent: russia is almost 30x the size of ukraine This comment: what?! you're confused by russian propaganda! it's only 2733% larger than ukraine And then, even if you adjust to claim that you were trying to reinforce parent's point, that's not plausible either since parent was actually pointing out that people's belief that russia was 10x bigger was actually a large underestimate of its size.
inglor_cz 4y ago

fhood 4y ago

Assuming no direct western intervention, I think the crucial next steps for a Ukraine victory will center around whether NATO can transition from providing soviet surplus to modern western arms, and get Ukrainians the training required in time. F-16s or even 35s and modern air defenses could play a huge role in making russian territory gains largely impossible, but the operational training would be measured in multiple weeks at a minimum.

cm2187 4y ago

You should look at it from Putin's point of view. Escalating with the west is even less of an option. Militarily, I don't think he has any doubt about US, French and UK nuclear deterrence. Even if you take nukes off the table, if you look how poorly his troops are doing in Ukraine, imagine that against NATO, even without the US. He might "escalate to de-escalate", i.e. make a lot of noise about escalation to intimidate Biden (so far it worked), but it can only be bluff. Whichever metric you use, the ratio of power between Russia and Europe is much greater than Ukraine to Russia.

fhood 4y ago
While I tend to agree, reading through the various nuclear close calls as far as I can tell, there were far more on the Russian side than the American one, and while American nuclear incidents tended to be headed off with everyone following orders and working within established systems, Russian ones usually involve one guy literally refusing an order. It's hard to know how accurate all of this is, but it does imply deterrent through incompetence. The concern is not limited to intentional nuclear strikes, every time Russian forces get put on alert the threat of an accident grows. Putin likely knows this, and NATO is also very wary of it.
watwut 4y ago
You assume same value system on Putin side as you have and that is unlikely.
blub 4y ago
What will the US, UK and France do if Russia uses a tactical nuke in Ukraine? Nuking Russia because they nuked Ukraine is… very unlikely.
- cm2187 4y ago
  That’s not what nuclear deterrence protects against. If he does that there will be other forms of escalation. A Iran/North Korean style set of economic sanctions possibly (I don’t think India and China would support Putin anymore at that point). Possibly a direct confrontation over Ukraine (no fly zone or a no fly zone by proxy, giving the Ukrainians the missile defence sufficient to clear the sky). Etc.

gunfighthacksaw 4y ago

> It's really hard to see how Ukraine will successfully fend off a country 10x its size Every Ukrainian defender kills 10 Russian occupiers? Obviously some will be less fortunate, and a select few will go down in history as extremely effective removers of Russian conscripts.