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>Is anyone at all worried about Russia retaliating directly against America for all this success? No. Direct retaliation would mean the end of the Putin regim

>Is anyone at all worried about Russia retaliating directly against America for all this success? No. Direct retaliation would mean the end of the Putin regime. Total financial aid to Ukraine from the US over the last 21 months has amounted to $77 billion so far. About $30 billion or so more has been appropriated but has not been spent yet. That is a lot of money, but the amount spent so far is only ~0.3% of the US's GDP and ~5.4% of its annual Federal Budget-- spread out over nearly 2 years. With that, and contributions from other allies roughly doubling that total, Ukraine has fought Russia to a standstill and is very slowly gaining ground. Any direct conventional retaliation against the United States would bring to bear a much, much, larger percentage of its resources and very likely result in the complete annihilation of any involved forces. Russian forces are very poorly equipped, trained, and led which means there have been single weeks (particularly the last several weeks) in the War in Ukraine where more Russian losses occurred than occurred in total over 20 years of US involvement in the Global War on Terror. So that leaves a nuclear response. A nuclear response would end in the annihilation of Russia itself. The Putin regime seems very interested in self-preservation. That leaves indirect proxy responses. Historically, proxy wars against the United States have not ended well for either the proxy or the supporter of the proxy. Even proxies who "win" are often damaged to the point of ruin, taking decades to recover.

whydonny 3y ago
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addicted 3y ago
Also very important is that the vast majority of military aid to Ukraine involves decades old technology the U.S. would never use. If anything, some of these will end up saving the U.S. money because maintenance and eventual disposal would have been far more expensive than shipping it to Ukraine.
coffinbirth 3y ago
[flagged]
- hydrok9 3y ago
  direct retaliation would bring the us and Nato into the war, and that would definitely spell the end of Putin.
  - coffinbirth 3y ago
    Yeah as we have seen in Syria, where Assad is still president, thanks to Russia. The US and its vassals (the bulk of NATO) actually lost the conflict in Syria (and Afghanistan). Keep in mind that Russia is not alone. There is China, most of the middle eastern countries, many south American countries, some European countries that will stand on Russias side. NATO is a meaningless, empty shell. At his point, they can't even provide enough ammunition to Ukraine. Additional, NATO and the US do not have the military industrial capacity required for an all out war with the BRICS alliance. NATO doesn't have any military combat experience, which the Russians have now. Just think about the experience Russia and China have regarding drone and robotic warfare, neither US nor European armed forces have anything like this at this time. Who produces all these drones? Right, China. It's all about resources and indrustrial capacity, Russia and China have both, which they can scale massively.
    - nradov 3y ago
      You've got more misinformation and errors there than I have time to correct, but to start with BRICS isn't an "alliance". There are no real security guarantees or mutual defense obligations, not even a written treaty. Of those five countries, Brazil, India, and South Africa have good relations with the USA and lack any real ability to project power much beyond their borders. They certainly won't go to war to protect Russia as they have nothing to gain and much to lose. They might sell some equipment to Russia in exchange for cash or oil but that's as far as they will go.
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > as we have seen in Syria, where Assad is still president You’re comparing a proxy war to hypothetical direct action. > they can't even provide enough ammunition to Ukraine This is nonsense. Can versus might decide not to, one. And are, moreover. > Who produces all these drones? Right, China Russia has no robotic warfare to speak of. Its top-of-the line kit is being reliably shot down by out-of-date NATO fare. (Their hypersonic were taken out by circa 1990 Patriot batteries.) China has a serious drone repository, but it’s not in play. Instead we’re seeing Iranian drones fight Chinese consumer drones operated by Ukraine, as well as Ukraine’s own drone production ramp up and learn. NATO drones are way too advanced for this battle and not a significant part of what’s being provided to Kyiv.
openasocket 3y ago
> Total financial aid to Ukraine from the US over the last 21 months has amounted to $77 billion so far. To put that in more direct terms: that's $77 billion over 21 months, spread across around 168 million US taxpayers. That comes out to $21.83/month per taxpayer.

whydonny 3y ago

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addicted 3y ago

Also very important is that the vast majority of military aid to Ukraine involves decades old technology the U.S. would never use. If anything, some of these will end up saving the U.S. money because maintenance and eventual disposal would have been far more expensive than shipping it to Ukraine.

coffinbirth 3y ago

[flagged]

hydrok9 3y ago
direct retaliation would bring the us and Nato into the war, and that would definitely spell the end of Putin.
- coffinbirth 3y ago
  Yeah as we have seen in Syria, where Assad is still president, thanks to Russia. The US and its vassals (the bulk of NATO) actually lost the conflict in Syria (and Afghanistan). Keep in mind that Russia is not alone. There is China, most of the middle eastern countries, many south American countries, some European countries that will stand on Russias side. NATO is a meaningless, empty shell. At his point, they can't even provide enough ammunition to Ukraine. Additional, NATO and the US do not have the military industrial capacity required for an all out war with the BRICS alliance. NATO doesn't have any military combat experience, which the Russians have now. Just think about the experience Russia and China have regarding drone and robotic warfare, neither US nor European armed forces have anything like this at this time. Who produces all these drones? Right, China. It's all about resources and indrustrial capacity, Russia and China have both, which they can scale massively.
  - nradov 3y ago
    You've got more misinformation and errors there than I have time to correct, but to start with BRICS isn't an "alliance". There are no real security guarantees or mutual defense obligations, not even a written treaty. Of those five countries, Brazil, India, and South Africa have good relations with the USA and lack any real ability to project power much beyond their borders. They certainly won't go to war to protect Russia as they have nothing to gain and much to lose. They might sell some equipment to Russia in exchange for cash or oil but that's as far as they will go.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > as we have seen in Syria, where Assad is still president You’re comparing a proxy war to hypothetical direct action. > they can't even provide enough ammunition to Ukraine This is nonsense. Can versus might decide not to, one. And are, moreover. > Who produces all these drones? Right, China Russia has no robotic warfare to speak of. Its top-of-the line kit is being reliably shot down by out-of-date NATO fare. (Their hypersonic were taken out by circa 1990 Patriot batteries.) China has a serious drone repository, but it’s not in play. Instead we’re seeing Iranian drones fight Chinese consumer drones operated by Ukraine, as well as Ukraine’s own drone production ramp up and learn. NATO drones are way too advanced for this battle and not a significant part of what’s being provided to Kyiv.

openasocket 3y ago

> Total financial aid to Ukraine from the US over the last 21 months has amounted to $77 billion so far. To put that in more direct terms: that's $77 billion over 21 months, spread across around 168 million US taxpayers. That comes out to $21.83/month per taxpayer.