Ukraine

Surely MORE McDonalds, Coke, Pepsi, KFC, Burger King and PizzaHut all over Russia, every single village and town, would piss him off more?

I see ITV was speculating on what Putin would say avoid those jets "gifted" from Poland vid the US.

No need surely?

"Act of war...bla, blah, nukes, blah blah, retaliation, nukes...."

Another day another threat. Which is the point. Once you've threatened the ultimate punishment on an adversary, the world and yourself and nothing happens... where do you go from there?

Yes, there is a threat, of course there is but its obvious that the West isn't backing down in their support of Ukraine. The line has been drawn and there is no going back now or this guy will never stop.

ElShalimo
Full Member
How many planes are there? 16? 20?

23, not really enough to make a dent.

This is the current Ukrainian air force. Or was, not sure how much of it it is still intact?

[img] [/img]

Do the ex-Polish MIGs have ground attack capability? Wondering if they could be used to take out artillery, or could only provide air superiority.

I assume they've also been updated to support NATO standards, but I guess that shouldn't cause too much of an issue for Ukrainian pilots, and I'm sure people much more knowledgeable than me have worked out the finer details.

Putin would do this again if he wins, sanctions should only be ended when Putin is replaced. Of course I'm not being bombed so am not experiencing the fear.

binners
Full Member

I just never thought I’d see this on this scale in my lifetime. It still feels surreal

Is this the first time you've turned on the news in 40 years?

Is this the first time you’ve turned on the news in 40 years?

There’s a pretty ****ing big difference between proxy wars between nuclear-armed superpowers that they’ve been farming out to surrogates for decades and an ACTUAL war between nuclear-armed superpowers

And is anyone naive/stupid enough to believe that’s not we’re looking down the barrel of at the moment?

This is a completely different level in an end-of-the-world sort of way

^^ I agree and was just about to post similar. I can't think of a war such as this in the last 40 years where the stakes are so huge.

binners
Full Member
This is a completely different level in an end-of-the-world sort of way

Well, It isn't, but crack on.

Bugger..

See you all in the next life…

Well, It isn’t, but crack on

Ok then.., Can you give us a comprehensive list of any armed conflicts that even had the remotest potential to rapidly snowball into world war 3 over the last 40 years then?

Correct me if I’m wrong but Iraq or Afghanistan or Syria were hardly ever likely to end up with Russia and NATO going toe-to-toe and waving nuclear threats around, were they?

Did I miss any others that were?

Feel free to educate me in however patronising a manner as you judge applicable…

See you all in the next life…

Did nobody tell you .... 😯

.

Anyway, the point of anything should anything happen is to survive. So this time next year or sooner you might be sitting in your homemade door shelter looking at the dog with a wonder how many pints of stew you can get out a dog.

Those with cats fair slightly better as there might not be as much eating, but cats are probably more succulent.

binners
Full Member
Well, It isn’t, but crack on

Ok then.., Can you give us a comprehensive list of any armed conflicts that even had the remotest potential to rapidly snowball into world war 3 over the last 40 years then?

Can you explain how this turns into WW3 when NATO has no intention of engaging Russia directly? And Russia has no intention of engaging NATO directly?

Is this the first time you’ve turned on the news in 40 years?

binners
Full Member
And is anyone naive/stupid enough to believe that’s not we’re looking down the barrel of at the moment?

This is a completely different level in an end-of-the-world sort of way

Well, It isn’t, but crack on.

You're right. its not 40 years. this is the biggest shit going down for 60 years!

I’m going 80’s retro

And Russia has no intention of engaging NATO directly?

Vlad told you that did he?

stgeorge
Free Member
And Russia has no intention of engaging NATO directly?

Vlad told you that did he?

Phoned me, aye.

I find it amazing that a leader of an invaded country can address both the Houses of Parliament here and the seats of government elsewhere, from his bunker in Kyiv (or wherever he is). It’s incredible stuff.

Welcome to the internet, circa last century. GLHF

Can you explain how this turns into WW3 when NATO has no intention of engaging Russia directly? And Russia has no intention of engaging NATO directly?

1. Glad you’ve got the inside line from both sides. Clearly you’re some kind of James Bond character

2. The law of unintended consequences is now at a level I’ve never seen in my lifetime

**** gas prices and your wallet. A whole nation is being razed.

I can't see this stopping until other nations step in and start taking the fight to Russia. Ukraine in their own can only hang in for so long.

If Russia take Ukraine they'll be emboldened and start gearing up for their next territorial claim.

I think if the west/Europe took the fight to Russia then China won't be quite so bolshy. They'll see that the world is serious.

I can't see the sanctions against Russia and support of Ukraine through weapons doing anything other than prolonging the suffering of those populations. If we want this to end then there needs to be some collective suffering.

In the past when people like Krushchev or Leonid Brezhnev were in power at least there was a politburo to wrestle the big red button off him, but you get the feeling Putin is isolated and being a rat will hit out when cornered.

Phoned me, aye.

Well, next time he calls, your reply should be along the lines of "Russian President, go f""K yourself"

collective suffering.

On a scale not seen since 1945 most likely..

binners
Full Member

2. The law of unintended consequences is now at a level I’ve never seen in my lifetime

we all thought it when then first started, shit, what's going to happen here then. But as this continues, it's pretty apparent, this is all just about Ukrainians getting the life bombed out of them.

All the while, we are fortifying NATO borders, increasing military spending, giving Ukraine a few old Migs while Poland's airforce get's a bit of an upgrade.

That's nice and all, but it's Ukraine that is the issue here, the imagined fears of everyone outside Ukraine is hyperbole.

The US not so keen on the Polish idea - not hard to see why.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/08/poland-mig-29-jets-us-ukraine

Can you explain how this turns into WW3 when NATO has no intention of engaging Russia directly? And Russia has no intention of engaging NATO directly?

Monitor the economic sanction.

If the economic sanction starts to include those trading with Russia (eventually it will if the current situation prolong) then that's where situation will become extremely tense. At the moment it is still early days.
Once economic sanction starts to bite hard on the people (and their trading partners) and when the only employment available is the state or to join the army that's where things will start to kick off. A single spark will start the fire between neighbouring countries and propaganda will go into overdrive that they have been encircled (the only choice is to "breakout").

The current economic sanction targets ALL Russians regardless (including innocents) and this will only force people to unite (in hatred) as life will become really hard for them.

If the current situation cannot be settled within as short a time frame as possible, we better get prepare for the worst.

the imagined fears of everyone outside Ukraine is hyperbole.

Naïveté not to think there isn’t a risk. Very naive.

mrlebowski
Free Member
The US not so keen on the Polish idea – not hard to see why.

Interesting, I did think the wording around this has all be weird as hell tbh.

And Russia has no intention of engaging NATO directly?

Only two weeks ago Russia had no intention of a large scale invasion of Ukraine. And there are more countries outside NATO that Russia could invade that would prove even harder for all other countries in Europe to sit back and watch on helplessly as their cities were flattened. The next step for Putin is unlikely to be a NATO member country, but that doesn’t mean he is guaranteed that everyone will continue to avoid military engagement if the RF continues to expand by force.

The matter at hand is Ukraine though. It's only going to escalate if we stick our oars in too far. And we clearly aren't going to do that. See above about the planes that are currently a hot potato.

That’s nice and all, but it’s Ukraine that is the issue here, the imagined fears of everyone outside Ukraine is hyperbole

I can think of many, many things that are and have been hyperbole, but this certainly isn’t one of them

Far from it

Do you look at Putin and see a sane rational man who is taking calm considered decisions? Because I see a ****ing paranoid madman, determined to secure what he sees as his rightful place in history who could do pretty much anything at any moment.

I wish we could all be as relaxed as you about it

Oh… you’ve still not listed any of the similar conflicts that had such potential for Armageddon?

The matter at hand is Ukraine though. It’s only going to escalate if we stick our oars in too far.

Why? Your ignoring what Putin has said and done already. The idea that he only acts “in response” to the actions of others is naive at best.

That’s nice and all, but it’s Ukraine that is the issue here, the imagined fears of everyone outside Ukraine is hyperboleare justified.

I'm an old git (64 though that means nothing in itself) but I've not seen the like of this and fear for the consequences.

I’ll just bear in mind that 2 weeks ago people as flippant as you were calmly and dismissively telling us that this was all just brinksmanship by Putin and there was no way he had any intention of doing anything as mad as actually invading Ukraine

Now look where we are…

Hyperbole, yeah?

Another "hope" is that countries or provinces within Russia that have beef start kicking off, causing the Russians to have to fight on several fronts, thus stretching their forces further.

Back to UK ministers pretending to offer a tiny bit of help to Ukraine refugees, and the not even doing that…

https://twitter.com/lizwebsterld/status/1501187220941725705?s=21

binners
Full Member
Now look where we are…

'We' aren't anywhere, Ukraine is.

kelvin
Full Member
The matter at hand is Ukraine though. It’s only going to escalate if we stick our oars in too far.

Why?

The whole mutually assured destruction concept has offensive strategic uses too.. which is when you want to stick your oar into another countries business, it keeps others out. Which is what we are currently seeing.

Putin has no intention of getting himself nuked and watching the world descend into nuclear winter.

Glad you’re so confident about that ‘fact’

Because right now he looks like Mad Vlad McMad who wants to just watch the world burn (from the end of a long table)

binners
Full Member
I’ll just bear in mind that 2 weeks ago people as flippant as you were calmly and dismissively telling us that this was all just brinksmanship by Putin

I'm pretty certain Putin was playing brinkmanship, he clearly wanted certain things and if he got them he probably wouldn't have invaded. Problem with brinkmanship is you need to be willing to follow through with your threats.

The “world” won’t “nuke him” if he launches attacks on more non NATO states. He knows that. We all know that.

binners
Full Member
Glad you’re so confident about that ‘fact’

You can pull me up on it after we get nuked. 😆

The only thing that will save us is if he can’t reach the button 😂

if he got them he probably wouldn’t have invaded

No one believes that, do they? Still?

I'm I the only one that thinks Putin's tables are a pretty good piece of political theatre? 😆

He clearly wants to project the Mad Vlad image, that's most definitely by design.