The full paper can be found here. "this report seeks to outline key lessons, based on the operational data accumulated by the Ukrainian General Staff, from the fighting between February and July 2022." https://t.co/YfL4LrrLW0

— Shashank Joshi (@shashj) November 30, 2022

Quote:

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Factoring in the idiosyncrasies of the Russian campaign, there are five key areas that should be monitored to judge whether the Russian military is making progress in resolving its structural and cultural deficiencies. These areas should be used to inform assessments of Russian combat power in the future.
[ol]

The AFRF currently operate with a hierarchy of jointery in which the priorities of the land component are paramount, and the military as a whole is subordinate to the special services. This creates sub-optimal employment of other branches.

The AFRF force-generation model is flawed. It proposes the creation of amalgamated combined arms formations in wartime but lacks the strength of junior leadership to knit these units together.

There is a culture of reinforcing failure unless orders are changed at higher levels. This appears less evident in the Russian Aerospace Forces than in the Ground Forces and Navy.

The AFRF are culturally vulnerable to deception because they lack the ability to rapidly fuse information, are culturally averse to providing those who are executing orders with the context to exercise judgement, and incentivise a dishonest reporting culture.

The AFRF's capabilities and formations are prone to fratricide. Electronic warfare (EW) systems and other capabilities rarely deconflict, while processes for identifying friend from foe and establishing control measures are inadequate. The result is that capabilities that should magnify one another's effects must be employed sequentially.

[/ol]

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Cal88 said:

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The real divide here is pro-Russian invasion of a non aggressive neighbor vs anti-Russian invasion of a non aggressive neighbor.

Most of the MSM has been anti-Russian invasion of a non aggressive neighbor, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

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Cal88 said:

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The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

Cal88 said:

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Without the massive US/NATO $100 billion military aid, Ukraine would have reached a settlement with Russian and the Donbass provinces back in April, which would have spared nearly a quarter million Ukrainian casualties.

Those were the terms:
-neutrality of Ukraine
-autonomy for the Donbass along the federal models of Canada, Belgium, Spain, the UK or Switzerland
-recognition of Crimea as Russian

In the end, Russia is going to get all these items by force, and then some, with the destruction of Ukraine as collateral damage.

Ukrainian troops are dying right now at the rate of 1,000/day, mostly in the Bakhmut and Donbass region.

This war has been a waste, sold in the West as a way to help Ukraine, when the real goal is to weaken Russia in a global chess game, using Ukraine as a fodder. The 100,000 Ukrainian KIA figure announced by Milley and von der Leyen is an undercount. The whole infrastructure of Ukraine, which had been largely intact, is going to be wrecked.

Ukraine will run out of men and come back to the negotiating table next year, they will not get the terms they could have gotten in April, or before the war for that matter (Minsk II).

This war is a waste!

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tequila4kapp said:

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sycasey said:

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Cal88 said:

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The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

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Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

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sycasey said:

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tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

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Cal88 said:

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sycasey said:

---

tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

---

I'd like my 26yo nephew to stop losing any more of his classmates, and to visit his grandmother's farm just outside of Dnipro next year in peacetime conditions. I'd very much like that.

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Cal88 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

---

I'd like my 26yo nephew to stop losing any more of his classmates, and to visit his grandmother's farm just outside of Dnipro next year in peacetime conditions. I'd very much like that.

---

Cal88 said:

---

Without the massive US/NATO $100 billion military aid, Ukraine would have reached a settlement with Russian and the Donbass provinces back in April, which would have spared nearly a quarter million Ukrainian casualties.

Those were the terms:
-neutrality of Ukraine
-autonomy for the Donbass along the federal models of Canada, Belgium, Spain, the UK or Switzerland
-recognition of Crimea as Russian

In the end, Russia is going to get all these items by force, and then some, with the destruction of Ukraine as collateral damage.

Ukrainian troops are dying right now at the rate of 1,000/day, mostly in the Bakhmut and Donbass region.

This war has been a waste, sold in the West as a way to help Ukraine, when the real goal is to weaken Russia in a global chess game, using Ukraine as a fodder. The 100,000 Ukrainian KIA figure announced by Milley and von der Leyen is an undercount. The whole infrastructure of Ukraine, which had been largely intact, is going to be wrecked.

Ukraine will run out of men and come back to the negotiating table next year, they will not get the terms they could have gotten in April, or before the war for that matter (Minsk II).

This war is a waste!

---

Cal88 said:

---

tequila4kapp said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

Without the massive US/NATO $100 billion military aid, Ukraine would have reached a settlement with Russian and the Donbass provinces back in April, which would have spared nearly a quarter million Ukrainian casualties.

Those were the terms:
-neutrality of Ukraine
-autonomy for the Donbass along the federal models of Canada, Belgium, Spain, the UK or Switzerland
-recognition of Crimea as Russian

In the end, Russia is going to get all these items by force, and then some, with the destruction of Ukraine as collateral damage.

Ukrainian troops are dying right now at the rate of 1,000/day, mostly in the Bakhmut and Donbass region.

This war has been a waste, sold in the West as a way to help Ukraine, when the real goal is to weaken Russia in a global chess game, using Ukraine as a fodder. The 100,000 Ukrainian KIA figure announced by Milley and von der Leyen is an undercount. The whole infrastructure of Ukraine, which had been largely intact, is going to be wrecked.

Ukraine will run out of men and come back to the negotiating table next year, they will not get the terms they could have gotten in April, or before the war for that matter (Minsk II).

This war is a waste!

---

I have seen no report of 1k deaths per day, anywhere. Most western estimates show 10-20k Ukrainian combatant deaths total since the start of the war.

You are correct that the war is senseless. Tell it to Putin, he started it.

It seems obvious your list of April peace terms were never tenable for Ukraine. Russia invaded in late February. 8 years earlier they invaded Crimea. Let's just say Russia had credibility issues for stopping at the Donbas region, and that's not accounting for Putin saying things like Ukraine is part of Russia. Only a fool would trust Putin to stop in a way that respects your April terms.

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Google search term "general milley ukraine deaths" returns:

All
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About 227,000 results (0.42 seconds)

"Last month, the most senior US general, Mark Milley, said around 100,000 Russian and 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed or wounded since the start of the war. In a video address on Wednesday, EU Commission head Ursula Von der Leyen said that 100,000 Ukrainian troops had been killed."
5 days ago

--------------------------------------------------


Those figures cited above by Milley and von der Leyen are most likely an undercount of actual Ukrainian deaths and an overcount of Russian deaths. Russia has conducted this war with a directive to minimize its casualties, they did not hesitate to cede territory whenever they fell into a strategically disadvantageous position, as was the case in Kharkov and Kherson this Fall, preferring to fight this war on its own tactical terms, in an artillery duel where they have an edge of close to 10 to 1 in amount of ammo fired. Ukraine has at several points in time tried to hold untenable positions at all costs, as was the case in Mariupol last Summer on the Bakhmut front today.. As well, the recent Uukrainian reconquests have come at a very high cost, especially in Kherson.



Russia also fought this war so far with an overall numeric disadvantage of over 2 to 1, a situation which is going to be reversed next year as Ukraine has lost over a quarter million troops KIA, injured or MIA, while Russia is injecting 350,000 fresh troops.

In other words, Russia has escalatory dominance, and is currently ratcheting up the war in accordance to this.

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blungld said:

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Cal88 said:

---

sycasey said:

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tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

---

I'd like my 26yo nephew to stop losing any more of his classmates, and to visit his grandmother's farm just outside of Dnipro next year in peacetime conditions. I'd very much like that.

---

Yeah. Who cares if they do it as Russians under authoritarian regime that invaded them and stole their national identity.

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Cal88 said:

---

blungld said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

---

I'd like my 26yo nephew to stop losing any more of his classmates, and to visit his grandmother's farm just outside of Dnipro next year in peacetime conditions. I'd very much like that.

---

Yeah. Who cares if they do it as Russians under authoritarian regime that invaded them and stole their national identity.

---

In an old continent like Europe, people from across a valley, a river, a mountain range or even just an hour's drive away tend to have different local cultural identities. You cannot impose a single national identity on the rest of the country, especially on its periphery, and especially in a country like Ukraine which is huge and encompasses a large minority population. That's very much true across Europe, in Spain, France, UK, Switzerland, Belgium etc, where the central government limits its imposition of a national culture on its ethnic, cultural and linguistic minorities.

---

Cal88 said:

---

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-chechnya-cia-idUSTRE58N5S120090924

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Cal88 said:

---

blungld said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

---

I'd like my 26yo nephew to stop losing any more of his classmates, and to visit his grandmother's farm just outside of Dnipro next year in peacetime conditions. I'd very much like that.

---

Yeah. Who cares if they do it as Russians under authoritarian regime that invaded them and stole their national identity.

---

In an old continent like Europe, people from across a valley, a river, a mountain range or even just an hour's drive away tend to have different local cultural identities. You cannot impose a single national identity on the rest of the country, especially on its periphery, and especially in a country like Ukraine which is huge and encompasses a large minority population. That's very much true across Europe, in Spain, France, UK, Switzerland, Belgium etc, where the central government limits its imposition of a national culture on its ethnic, cultural and linguistic minorities.

Modern Ukrainian nationalism contravenes this basic European human rights standard, by imposing an identity from Galicia/north-central Ukraine on its eastern and southern regions, which are at the very least hybrid cultures where the majority identify as Russians, at the very least wrt their language and cultural heritage. Modern Ukrainian nationalism has defined itself in opposition to that identity, very much along the same lines set up in the 1920s/30s by the OUN and Stepan Bandera.

In the past France and Spain tried to erase the cultural identities of minorities like the Bretons, Basques, Catalans etc by banning their regional languages and traditions. In Spain that repression was actively carried out into the 70s by Franco's regime. These kinds of policies are no longer tolerated in Europe, yet they are endorsed and celebrated in Ukraine today:

🇺🇦How the Russian identity is being erased from the little children in Ukraine. (Video from before the war)

Everyone who supports Ukraine should watch this video and ask themselves how they would like this to be happening to their kids with no way for parents to object.
⬇️ pic.twitter.com/tRuq80CSK8

— 🐾Aleksandra Opalic ♈♎🌛♑⚜ (@aleksandraopal2) December 6, 2022

Ukraine’s culture minister wants to cancel performances by Russian composers. pic.twitter.com/hmS08281IV

— Lexi (@missylexilou) December 7, 2022

People in Odessa, Kharkov, Donetsk, Mariupol etc don't want to be told that their children can no longer have the same nicknames as their parents and grandparents, or that they can no longer read Dostoevsky in school, or hear Tchaikovsky at the local theater. The marginalization of Russian culture within Ukraine is the root cause of the conflict in Ukraine.

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Cal88 said:

---

blungld said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

---

I'd like my 26yo nephew to stop losing any more of his classmates, and to visit his grandmother's farm just outside of Dnipro next year in peacetime conditions. I'd very much like that.

---

Yeah. Who cares if they do it as Russians under authoritarian regime that invaded them and stole their national identity.

---

In an old continent like Europe, people from across a valley, a river, a mountain range or even just an hour's drive away tend to have different local cultural identities. You cannot impose a single national identity on the rest of the country, especially on its periphery, and especially in a country like Ukraine which is huge and encompasses a large minority population. That's very much true across Europe, in Spain, France, UK, Switzerland, Belgium etc, where the central government limits its imposition of a national culture on its ethnic, cultural and linguistic minorities.

Modern Ukrainian nationalism contravenes this basic European human rights standard, by imposing an identity from Galicia/north-central Ukraine on its eastern and southern regions, which are at the very least hybrid cultures where the majority identify as Russians, at the very least wrt their language and cultural heritage. Modern Ukrainian nationalism has defined itself in opposition to that identity, very much along the same lines set up in the 1920s/30s by the OUN and Stepan Bandera.

In the past France and Spain tried to erase the cultural identities of minorities like the Bretons, Basques, Catalans etc by banning their regional languages and traditions. In Spain that repression was actively carried out into the 70s by Franco's regime. These kinds of policies are no longer tolerated in Europe, yet they are endorsed and celebrated in Ukraine today:

🇺🇦How the Russian identity is being erased from the little children in Ukraine. (Video from before the war)

Everyone who supports Ukraine should watch this video and ask themselves how they would like this to be happening to their kids with no way for parents to object.
⬇️ pic.twitter.com/tRuq80CSK8

— 🐾Aleksandra Opalic ♈♎🌛♑⚜ (@aleksandraopal2) December 6, 2022

Ukraine’s culture minister wants to cancel performances by Russian composers. pic.twitter.com/hmS08281IV

— Lexi (@missylexilou) December 7, 2022

People in Odessa, Kharkov, Donetsk, Mariupol etc don't want to be told that their children can no longer have the same nicknames as their parents and grandparents, or that they can no longer read Dostoevsky in school, or hear Tchaikovsky at the local theater. The marginalization of Russian culture within Ukraine is the root cause of the conflict in Ukraine.

---

Cal88 said:

---

golden sloth said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

blungld said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

tequila4kapp said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

The real divide here is pro-war vs anti-war.

Most of the MSM has been pro-war, the Guardian article linked here is a good specimen of that position.

---

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that if the US does not send aid to Ukraine, that means there will be no war. No, it just means the war will continue without us.

---

Sure, but it will be much shorter and guarantee the war ends with a Russia win.

---

Which is what Cal88 really wants.

---

I'd like my 26yo nephew to stop losing any more of his classmates, and to visit his grandmother's farm just outside of Dnipro next year in peacetime conditions. I'd very much like that.

---

Yeah. Who cares if they do it as Russians under authoritarian regime that invaded them and stole their national identity.

---

In an old continent like Europe, people from across a valley, a river, a mountain range or even just an hour's drive away tend to have different local cultural identities. You cannot impose a single national identity on the rest of the country, especially on its periphery, and especially in a country like Ukraine which is huge and encompasses a large minority population. That's very much true across Europe, in Spain, France, UK, Switzerland, Belgium etc, where the central government limits its imposition of a national culture on its ethnic, cultural and linguistic minorities.

Modern Ukrainian nationalism contravenes this basic European human rights standard, by imposing an identity from Galicia/north-central Ukraine on its eastern and southern regions, which are at the very least hybrid cultures where the majority identify as Russians, at the very least wrt their language and cultural heritage. Modern Ukrainian nationalism has defined itself in opposition to that identity, very much along the same lines set up in the 1920s/30s by the OUN and Stepan Bandera.

In the past France and Spain tried to erase the cultural identities of minorities like the Bretons, Basques, Catalans etc by banning their regional languages and traditions. In Spain that repression was actively carried out into the 70s by Franco's regime. These kinds of policies are no longer tolerated in Europe, yet they are endorsed and celebrated in Ukraine today:

🇺🇦How the Russian identity is being erased from the little children in Ukraine. (Video from before the war)

Everyone who supports Ukraine should watch this video and ask themselves how they would like this to be happening to their kids with no way for parents to object.
⬇️ pic.twitter.com/tRuq80CSK8

— 🐾Aleksandra Opalic ♈♎🌛♑⚜ (@aleksandraopal2) December 6, 2022

Ukraine’s culture minister wants to cancel performances by Russian composers. pic.twitter.com/hmS08281IV

— Lexi (@missylexilou) December 7, 2022

People in Odessa, Kharkov, Donetsk, Mariupol etc don't want to be told that their children can no longer have the same nicknames as their parents and grandparents, or that they can no longer read Dostoevsky in school, or hear Tchaikovsky at the local theater. The marginalization of Russian culture within Ukraine is the root cause of the conflict in Ukraine.

---

You are wrong. Completely and totally wrong.

The root cause of the invasion of Ukraine was Russia deciding they wanted it and invading it. The NAZIs, the expansion of NATO, the ethnic Ukranians are all bull **** reasons the Russian government keeps tossing out to justify their attempted conquest and colonization of a sovereign people.

---

The expansion of NATO right into Russia's western border as a reason for this war has been advanced by countless western analysts, from Mearsheimer, Kissinger, Chomsky, to Bradley and many western intelligence directors.

Yes, these people are wrong, and there are far more geopolitical analysts that state the Russian invasion of Ukraine is completely unprovoked (Ian Bremmer, Peter Zeihan, etc.). Further prior to the outbreak of war Ukraine had agreed to permanent NATO neutrality, and Russia invaded anyway. Therefore, Russia never cared about NATO and Ukraine, they just wanted their land. This does not justify Russia's invasion.

Zbignew Brzezinski also stated that Ukraine needs to be used as a tool to keep Russia in check, the same way Taiwan is being used to keep China in check.

This does not make any sense whatsoever. If Russia doesn't invade, how is Ukraine keeping Russia in check? Since, Russia did invade, should Ukraine accept subjugation for fear of being considered a tool? Its a pointless comment and does not justify Russia's invasion.

Ukraine has been bombing the Donbass continuously since 2014, firing indiscriminately at civilians, but if it's not on MSNBC, CNN or Fox, it never happened.

So when Russia creates and funds a break-away group to launch civil unrest with the aims of controlling territory in a foreign country, the country in charge should just let this happen? This is not an isolated incident. Russia did this in South Ossetia and Abkhazia. It is their strategy. Again, your claim is essentially Ukraine has no right to defend itself from Russia. That is wrong, and it does not justify Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Merkel as well as former Ukrainian president/billionaire oligarch Poroshenko who declared that Donbass children will grow up in bomb shelters while Ukraine children will go to school, both came out recently and stated that the Minsk Agreements signed in 2015 were just meant to give Ukraine more time for NATO to rebuilt its military, they had no intention to respect the cease fire.



Russia, invaded and stole Crimea in 2014, this action was both unprovoked and illegal. In response to Russia's aggression Ukraine has a right to defend itself.

Ukraine is the most corrupt and poorest country in Europe, it went from being the crown jewel of the Soviet Union to a total basketcase led by one of the richest comedians of all time (right up there with Seinfeld), a guy who has been built by the media as the love child of Winston Churchill and Mother Theresa, who banned all political opposition and the church of one third of the country and is callously feeding hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians into the meat grinder.

This does not prove your point that Russia invading Ukraine is justified. A country's poverty level is not justification for war. Zelensky was voted into office to fight corruption, this is not a justification for invasion. And when his country was invaded, he took actions to defend it, this is not justification for an invasion.

Zelensky sends his hundreds of thousands to prevent his 40 million people from being subjugated by a foreign power with a long history hurting and killing them. Putin sends his hundreds of thousands for the colonial conquest of a foreign nation with no real tangible benefit to his 140 million people. Putin's reasons for fighting are far more callous than that of Zelensky. If you are angry at Zelensky you should be furious at Putin for callously feeding hundreds of thousands of Russians into the meat grinder.

This is the kind of Ukraine propaganda that doesn't get questioned by the "Slava Ukraini" crowd, then again I don't think this made it into the Vogue Magazine Zelinsky special:

https://t.co/Ge0ZpZm8EE

— AZ 🛰🌏🌍🌎 (@AZgeopolitics) November 28, 2022

I'll be honest here, I don't click on Twitter because I hate Twitter (always have, even before Musk took it over), so on this point I did not review the source material. All I see is how Russian Women are encouraging Russian soldiers to rape Ukranian women. I have no idea how this supports your argument that Russia was justified in invading Ukraine.

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Cal88 said:

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while Ukraine has just banned the Russian Orthodox Church in their country.

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sycasey said:

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Cal88 said:

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while Ukraine has just banned the Russian Orthodox Church in their country.

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By the way, what's your source for this claim? As far as I can tell, Zelenskyy has proposed (not passed) laws that would bar specific branches of the Orthodox Church suspected of having continued ties to Moscow. This is not the same thing as banning an entire religion.

https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2022-12-08/scrutiny-of-ukraine-church-draws-praise-fear-of-overreach

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/02/world/europe/zelensky-ukraine-orthodox-church.html

---