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Russia and its “Special Operation” in Ukraine


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4 minutes ago, choffer said:

Already seeding the concept of their climb-down? There will be peaceful coexistence (hopefully) but Russia will be finished as a global super power.

Well yes,. It's quite a climbdown in rhetoric

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20 minutes ago, choffer said:

Already seeding the concept of their climb-down? There will be peaceful coexistence (hopefully) but Russia will be finished as a global super power.

Yep, that's definitely a climb-down. 

And I wonder if it has emanated from a totally different source than Putin. 

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14 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

Looks like the concept of the ‘armoured train’ is making a comeback in Russia’s military. 
 

 

 

I looked into that whenever it first surfaced (Yesterday possibly) and it appears they've used it before in maybe Chechnya or Georgia

Shouldn't be exactly hard to take out, especially with a drone

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20 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

Yeah you know you’re in trouble when your begging for the good old days of the Cold War back. 

Leopard doesn't change its spots though. Putin may have overstretched himself in Ukraine - will he just pause and be better prepared next time.

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Ironically, the loathesome oligarchs are probably the best hope for a solution. Putin extending his empire in eastern Europe is no use to them. They need to be moving money around in the west. If there's a way to remove him, they'll do it. 

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4 minutes ago, hippo said:

will he just pause and be better prepared next time

It's going to take some considerable time before he can build the replacement vehicles let alone more that he'll need on top. You'd also think they may need to also come up with some rather new tech to combat what they've encountered, including more suitable aircraft than they currently have.

All that in a tanking economy?

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6 minutes ago, bickster said:

It's going to take some considerable time before he can build the replacement vehicles let alone more that he'll need on top. You'd also think they may need to also come up with some rather new tech to combat what they've encountered, including more suitable aircraft than they currently have.

All that in a tanking economy?

Who blinks first.....I don't see the west sanctions holding - as soon as hostilities cease govt and business will go creeping back...

Any plans for Western governments to increase defence spending will soon be swept under the carpet as elections draw near and tax cuts need to be promised.

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13 minutes ago, mjmooney said:

Ironically, the loathesome oligarchs are probably the best hope for a solution. Putin extending his empire in eastern Europe is no use to them. They need to be moving money around in the west. If there's a way to remove him, they'll do it. 

Sadly, the general analysis seems to be that the oligarchs are much less politically influential than we think in the West. Putin has structured his state institutions so that military / police / intelligence power is held by strongmen who owe all their authority to him. The oligarchs exist in a separate sphere, and although they have loads of money, they owe it all to Putin's largesse, and don't really get involved in displays of force.

Of course this is damaging to them, and therefore they will be frustrated with what Putin has done, but the question is whether they can act on that frustration usefully. Seems like Putin has thought very carefully about insulating himself from this kind of thing.

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56 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

Looks like the concept of the ‘armoured train’ is making a comeback in Russia’s military. 
 

 

 

Shame for the Russian bully that Ukraine essentially wrecked the railways going in from Russia on day one of the war. The Russian planners seem dumber than dirt. That train is essentially toast if a tractor pulls the train lines apart by 5 cms..

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3 minutes ago, bickster said:

Has anyone heard the one about the Russian encrypted battlefield communication devices called ERA, not working?

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It needs to use the 3G / 4G network and they destroyed all the masts when they were advancing :crylaugh:

You really couldn't make this shit up

Russian military phone calls hacked after 3G goes offline (yahoo.com)

Russian forces in Ukraine have been ‘hacked’ after abandoning their own secure encrypted phone system, according to investigative journalism organisation Bellingcat.

The switch to insecure messaging meant that a conversation revealing the death of Major General Vitaly Gerasimov - chief of staff of the 41st Army - was able to be intercepted by Ukrainian intelligence.

Russian soldiers have switched off their encrypted phone system after towers were destroyed and are using normal phones with local sim cards, according to Bellingcat, an open-source investigative journalism organisation.

Bellingcat’s executive director, Christo Grozev, said in a series of Tweets: ‘The idiots tried to use the Era cryptophones in Kharkiv, after destroying many 3g cell towers and also replacing others with stingrays. Era needs 3g/4g to communicate.’

‘In the phone call in which the FSB officer assigned to the 41st Army reports the death to his boss in Tula, he says they've lost all secure communications. Thus the phone call using a local sim card. Thus the intercept.’

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12 minutes ago, hippo said:

 

Any plans for Western governments to increase defence spending will soon be swept under the carpet as elections draw near and tax cuts need to be promised.

I'm not so sure on that part. Most European govts are under the 2.0% NATO target anyway, so there's always been an acceptance that defence spending probably needs to increase over time anyway.

The Eastern European countries will want to arm themselves now their is a big threat on their border. 

The new govt in Germany seem to accept that Germany needs to step up and be a leader in defence.

Macron wants a European defence force which he's been pushing before this invasion.

The UK is always pretty hawkish when it comes to defence spending, mainly so 'friends of govt ministers' can benefit from the money floating around.

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I can see it now, the Russians communicating on Nokia 3060's from 1998..

'Blyat, we're going to hammer Kiev so hard with our mahoosive Russian armored lada fun fest!'

Ukrainians:

'MEET MY inLAWS!!!'

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1 hour ago, bickster said:

Russia trying to frame future European security architecture as a bilateral issue between Washington and Moscow, denying the agency of European states.

That approach has succeeded historically but is unlikely to fly again now, whichever side tries it - unless Germany’s epiphany on Defence was just a cynical ploy to distract from its reprehensible behaviour towards Ukraine. 

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