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Ukraine Taking My Advice
When the Russians were pushed from Kharkiv back in September, I wrote an unpopular post advocating that Ukraine attack inside Russia. Here it is.
I just wanted to point out that Ukraine is now routinely doing this with the drones they have — Sunday night they hit a major Russian air base (Engels) some 300 km from the Ukrainian border. They are following Sun-Tzu: attack where the enemy is not defending. Leapfrog the guys on the ground, and make Russia pay where they are not expecting an attack. This is the way to force Putin to sue for peace. Ukraine should keep doing it with every tool available. The end of evil dictators is something we should very much desire.
I went back and read the comments. The things predicted by the naysayers on that post (loss of Western support, Russia escalating to nukes, etc.) have all NOT happened. Admittedly, I advocated attacking on the ground (not realizing Ukraine had the aerial reach to pull off these attacks), but the principle remains. And so does the result.
Sometimes, a guy just has to point out when he wuz right.
Published in General
Every day the Ukrainians don’t lose, they’re winning.
Every day the Russians don’t win, they’re losing.
Vladimir Putin is the leading recruiter for NATO.
I’d like to see them burn Moscow to the ground and hang Putin and Prigozhin and all their cronies as war criminals.
Russia is a Potemkin Country. Their equipment is outdated, their people have been demoralized for decades, and presented with real military power, their army would fold like a cheap suit. Too many believe their big boasts about their power, and not enough are bold enough to call their bluff.
Keep at it. Putin will never give up but the Russian people will.
Define ‘evil dictator’?
Someone who bans a major religion in his country, confiscates church property, and imprisons priests?
Someone who jails his main political opponent?
Someone who bans all independent press?
Someone who maintains secret police?
Someone who maintains a death list for those who criticize his government and do not slavishly adhere to his propaganda?
Someone whose military forces admire and adulate Bandera, whose forces sent Ukrainian Jews to the gas chambers?
Like that?
That would be Zelensky and Ukraine.
300km is a long distance. I am wondering if they are sneaking in drones by truck.
It seems that Russia has responded to the cross-border attacks by going after infrastructure in west Ukraine. This page says that Russian oligarchs might be pressured to pay more for war efforts. That might be a political fissure developing.
Moderator Note:
Arguing against a point of view is encouraged, but personally insulting other members is against the Code of Conduct.Hang On, [redacted]. Russia was and is far worse than anything Ukraine has done. [redacted]. Ukraine is fighting an existential battle against a country stuck in the past. They offer NOTHING to Ukraine but misery and they are trying to extract themselves from this hellhole after centuries of misery. If a country has been attacked, they have to do nasty things to survive. [redacted]. If you’re concerned about nuclear war or unchecked spending, fine. But you are actually taking Russia’s side. [redacted] There are people who think this war is about biolabs or Biden’s money laundering concealment. My god, the ignorance!
I don’t care if I get banned from here. [redacted]
Among the military gear Ukraine inherited from the Soviet Union were some Tupolev Tu-141 Strizh reconnaissance drones. They were adopted by the Red Army in the late seventies and have a range of over 600 miles. That is about 1000 km. TU-143 Reys was a later model. Either one could have its cameras and film replaced with explosives. I don’t know what the payload would be.
I think his point was the Ukraine isn’t such a noble cause if you look at it closely.
I don’t think the US is supporting Ukraine because it’s a noble cause, but because it’s in the US’ interests to weaken Russia and stick Europe with most of the bill. Voila.
@iwe – do you really think that Putin will sue for peace if Ukraine (or its friends) bomb enough airbases in the Russian interior?
What? You!?
War is seldom between the purely good and the purely evil. It is usually about perceived national interest. I suspect Ukraine is indeed very corrupt , authoritarian, and a hotbed of Democratic party money laundering. However, Russia attacked a sovereign nation and has engaged in a genocidal war against a nation that had not militarily attacked them. I think it is in the USA’s interests to have nations stay within their own borders and peacefully compete on the basis of trade, diplomacy, crime, etc. I think it is in the USA’s interests that Russia not methodically pick off little countries in Europe. I would rather have Russia less confident in their ambitions and more hesitant to go off on adventures. Best Case, I would like to see Ukraine repel the Russians and recover their Pre 2010 borders. However, recovering Pre 2020 borders would probably be sufficient, and just degrading the Russian military and keeping it busy and tied down is certainly a benefit.
Sounds like a good plan!
I do it less than I think about doing it. My early Covid posts were particularly prescient. Just sayin’.
Putin? He is closer than ever before: he went from “I never negotiate with Nazis” to, “We should talk.” But I concur that if he sues for peace he is toast.
The thing is, Putin is toast either way. Unless Russia triumphs, Putin loses. At some point, the ground will shift under Putin’s feet, and he will find himself underneath it.
@zafar, do you think Putin can thug his way out of the situation he thugged his way into?
Putin has dropped the “Ukrainian Nazis” thing in his propaganda of late. Curious, that.
If you squint, you can read “stick Europe with most of the bill” as “make Europe take its own security seriously.”
Ukraine has two options only. There is no independent option for them. They can be a Russian puppet or a western puppet. That is what the fight is about.
And frankly, you are the one who is profoundly ignorant of Russia because you swallow all the western propaganda and don’t consider the reality.
Wow. Do you really believe this? Do you think that citizens who are free to choose their own leaders are merely Western Puppets?
Can you even name the last time the US managed to have and keep overseas puppets? Our history is one of walking away (e.g. Japan, Germany, France, Philippines, etc.) Or would you argue that Western Europe is really just an American puppet?
Besides, what does the US want from Ukraine? Ukraine exported $70 billion in total in 2021. Almost all of it was related to grain or iron, hardly commodities that the US lacks (the US is the largest exporter of grain crops). Of all of it, a mere 2.4% of the exported products ended up in the US.
Until this war, Ukraine was not national security interest for the US. But once Putin invaded, our interest became clear: as a nation we do not believe that might makes right, and we believe that all peoples should have the right of self-determination. these beliefs underpin the ideology that created our nation as well.
Sez you. They seem to be able to count to three, unlike some people who see only 2 options.
Europeans certainly do, specifically the EU. When a country doesn’t tow the EU line, then bad things happen to them. And Ukraine would definitely wind up as an EU puppet. Or do you not see the EU as being part of the west? And as for ease of leaving the EU, look no farther than Brexit.
Ukraine was most definitely a part of US national security interests since 2008 when Bush signaled in Romania that Ukraine would be joining Nato.
I went back and read that post and all the comments. Back then you said Ukraine should invade Russia. They are not invading Russia now. They are using means other than invasion to attack military targets in Russia that are being used to attack Ukraine.
Invasion of Russia is still a bad idea, and I’m pretty sure the Ukrainians know it without our having to convince them. (Invading Crimea is not the same as invading Russia, of course.)
I re-read the comment by Hang On and didn’t see one word of support for Russia. What I read was a list of actions purportedly taken by Zelensky in Ukraine. In your response, Mr. UC, I didn’t read one denial of any of the Zelensky behaviors in Hang On’s list. Your use of ad hominem tactics did not convince me. Is it not possible that these are two bad places where none of us would like to live and we are being lied to by our leaders in order to support one side over the other for reasons that are not being made public? Is it possible that your understanding of the regional war is not complete? I never liked bullies and have always supported underdogs, but in this instance I am not sure if there are any “good” guys.
This is a logical argument.
I was going to respond to Hang On, but this is so well said there is nothing to add. Excellent reply. No western country is a puppet of another.
I can make the case for supporting Ukraine over Russia without trying to run it through a moral calculus any more complicated than Russia invaded an otherwise peaceful country “because the Nazis” when there was no objective evidence of Nazis then, and is none now. Zelensky suppressed his opposition after the invasion started? Putin has been suppressing his opposition, occasionally killing his opposition, since 2000. He hasn’t limited himself to the opposition within his own country. Zelensky has moved to suppress “the Orthodox Church?” There is more than one type of Orthodoxy in Ukraine. One part (around 14%) recognizes Patriarch Kirill of Moscow as their spiritual leader. Kirill has blessed the invasion and called it “just.” The other part broke with Moscow in 2018.
“That’s not my circus and those aren’t my monkeys” as the sweet old Polish lady who gave me kolaczki used to say.
Have you read Merkel’s interview in die Zeit a couple of weeks ago. She gave the game away. There was a peaceful path to addressing and potentially solving all of the issues through the Minsk agreement in 2014. But the western leaders, including the Obama administration, never had any intention of following this path – according to Merkel, who should know, since she was part of the process and probably one of the architects.
I see this war as nothing other than the global elites using all of their propaganda weapons to enforce their policy on everybody else when it has nothing to do with everyone else’s well-being. Ukraine will be just another thread in their policies of climate change, eating insects, having no property and all the rest. Conspiracy theory? Imagine a conspiracy coming from those who time and again have shown their conspiracy was far worse than the theory.
So, no, I don’t support this war. And wish all the worst for those who are carrying it out because it is the only way these people will be dislodged from the power to control everyone else’s lives – for the worse. War and slaughter are small potatoes for them.
Yes, there was a peaceful path through the Minsk agreements. Obama and Biden tried to sell out Ukraine through that path, but Ukraine wasn’t willing to give up its sovereignty and become a subordinated part of the re-constituted Russian empire. They’ve had quite enough of Russian repression of their nation through the past several centuries.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend …. Putin is the enemy of the United States, therefore Zelensky and Ukraine is a friend of the United States.
Yea, so we are told…by the same people who created the myth of “Trump the Russian Agent”.