But thats my point.
Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) applies here.
And Russia knows that full well.
This War will stay conventional.
Any guesses on this? An single issue vote in the US House of Representatives on continuing military aid to Ukraine would be Yea ___ Nay ___
That has changed by ___ votes in the past 12 months.
My biggest concern with Ukraine is the Putin turns out to be correct about US politics. The US public just “gets tired” of funding the Ukrainian defense.
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This concern was highlighted by EU, UK, Ukraine in the latest round of talks.
US defense companies are moving production of the necessary equipment to Ukraine and bordering countries (as there is already an existing industrial base). The EU will be subsidising the cost with the US and UK.
That will take a few years to get online, but will work to mitigate the issues back in the US due to the political polarisation that you are experiencing.
Russia will not give in until after the 2024 general elections in the US.
There’s too much chance of Trump or other pro-Russian/anti-foreign-involvement folks winning for them to not at least adopt a “wait and see” stance.
If the US backs off its support levels for Ukraine…
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It makes sense for them to put it front and centre with the possibility of Trump (a known Putin sympathiser) being a contestant in the next US presidential.
PS was replying to @The_Polymath’s last post.
When Ukraine was given EU member candidate status, it fell within the European envelope for military assistance.
US Defense companies don’t need GOP permission to make profits.
Can they make the situation worse for Ukraine?
Yes. And like most on here, I do think its probably what Putin is banking on. But the correlation of forces arrayed against Putin now is pretty extreme.
Think about it. He is so desperate for ammunition and equipment that he is trying to strike a deal with North Korea (as China will not help him).
It will come down to a war of attrition, but the better weapons technology delivered by the west to Ukraine will be the deciding factor.
If you study Russian “campaigns” (Syria, Chechnya) in the past 30 years it was always the same story. Destroy the infrastructure from a distance (due to having better long range military technology) and then roll in the tanks and infantry to clean up the remnants.
They are facing an enemy (Ukraine) who now has far superior military technology. Their previous military doctrine simply won’t work when the opposing force has a longer (and more precise) range weapons technology.
The USA issue is not as big a concern to me as what happens if Zelensky steps aside (eg loses an election) and the new person aligns the country back to Russia.
However, US defense companies are still in business, and given the choice of filling orders from countries that have money and need to rebuild their supplies (due to having given excess materiel to Ukraine) versus Ukraine’s reliance on debt and international donations to buy gear…
Also, when it comes to missiles and aircraft…generally the defense companies need US government permission to sell such goods. If Trump won, it wouldn’t be difficult to imagine his administration saying “you can’t sell the good toys to Ukraine; we need more for my parade.”
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Sure, if Russia attacks NATO, it’s MAD. But would NATO really destroy the world over Ukraine?
NATO is giving Ukraine weapons that can easily hit stuff in Russia. I think we’re playing a tough game if brinkmanship right now and a miscalculation would be easy to make, especially if Putin’s regime is threatened.
Any place in Ukraine is within the range of Russian missiles, but I can see that some neighboring countries would be happy to get a weapons production capability.
The private companies that run these plants expect to make a profit. The revenue is supplied by? Has the EU reached the point where it is ready to carry most of the cost of military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine, so an American president can honestly say “The Europeans are paying for most of this, we’re just helping out.”? And, where is European public opinion on Ukraine?
The US made it clear to Ukraine that using the weapons to hit targets inside Russia would be strategically counter-productive, and would result in the US not supplying them anymore to Ukraine as well.
Targeting Crimea though is fair game. As it should be given it is Ukrainian territory.
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Yes. Thats why the EU gave Ukraine candidate status.
It could not render proper military assistance without that vote.
The EU is “all in” here.
There will be bumps in the road (like now with Poland and Hungary due to Ukrainian grain), but the EU is very much in this for the long-term.
So, all those attacks Ukraine has made inside Russia, were with the other weapons (drone strikes in Moscow, ships attacked in novorisk, planes attacked on ground…)
Those were not US weapons.
Thats the point. They can attack Russian targets inside Russia as much as they want with non-US weaponry.
I don’t see a problem.
They’ve been building their own drones, or adapting gear acquired from other contributions, or that they’ve been buying outright on the international market.
TANGENT:
Why is Ally Sheedy on his right side, but the mirror image shows her on the “left” side?
I know! Ally Sheedy is both sides-ing it!!
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They came close, 37 years ago.
And 39 years ago and 41 years ago, that we know of (according to wiki).
What you see is irrelevant, it’s what Putin sees.
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Putin can see whatever he likes as well
As I said, this conflict will be conventional. And Ukraine attacking Russian territory is fair game given Russia attacked Ukrainian territory.
Not sure why this is so surprising to you?
Putin will “respond”, but he does this via irregular means, as that it what he was trained on by the KGB/FSB.
He thinks “politically” and not “militarily”, which is also why Russian strategy has been downright awful. Its also why he is likely to lose this conflict. A military strategist he is not.
If Putin nukes Kiev, he wins the war, and the west will not respond by nuking Russia.
The only question is if other Russians will like or dislike nuking a neighbour.