The Russian Invasion of the Ukraine.

[crescent]

More civilian vehicles pressed into use by Russian forces.

 

[theprestige]

It all says "caroonish Bond villain" to me.

To me, it looks like a massive miscalculation and action that cannot be successful, for a purpose that was unclear in the first place.


However, this is far from over. We'll see how it shakes out in the end. Maybe Putin will prove that he was a genius after all. Right now, it's not looking like that to me.

It says "mundane dictator succumbing to the dictator failure mode of having to rely on others to accurately report reality" to me. Cartoonish Bond villains do silly things that have very little connection to realism. Real-world villains do realistically clever things and sometimes fail at them. Ordering this invasion was a mistake, not a cartoon.

 

[theprestige]

It looks like the "invasion stripes" have switched from a Z to a V today.

I think those chevrons are just subunit identifiers. Lots of militaries use the same symbol to distinguish platoons in a company, for example. You can see similar chevrons on US and Israeli tanks.

 

[trustbutverify]

Putin has very explicitly explained his zero-sum worldview.

Only a complete failure to achieve his objective will do. Putin will otherwise spin even a partial "victory" as what he intended all along.

Putin would never have agreed to this meeting (and never would have blacked out local media coverage) if the campaign had gone well. His fallback position is to declare complete victory regardless of how much compromise he's forced into. After which his useful idiots will flood the media with stories of Putin humiliating the West yet again.

 

[theprestige]

Hmmm.
For a sum of two summands to be zero, there are two possibilities:
- Both summands are zero
- One summand is <0, the other is >0

Corrolary: If both summands are >0, the sum cannot be zero; if both summands are <0, the sum cannot be zero.

I gave two examples where Putin appears to believe, contrary to common understanding that it is not possible that both sides could win (both summands >0) or both sides lose (summands <0).
This is consistent with him believing that politics, econonics and war (or, taken together, statesmanship) is a zero-sum game: If the other side loses, then automatically his side wins. That's why he refuses cooperation and engages in war.

Does that clear it up a bit?

Not really.

 

[Oystein]

Not really.

Are you saying the examples I gave are NOT consistent with a zero-sum view of statesmanship? Or do you disagree that in friendly trade both sides can win, and that in a draw-out war both sides can lose? Or do you assert that Putin figured he would win a trade war like the one he had since Crimea? Or that he figured both Ukraine and Russia could win the war? Or that his true objective was for both Ukraine and Russia to lose the war?

 

[David RP]

More civilian vehicles pressed into use by Russian forces.

No way ! surely that's photoshop ?

 

[Garrison]

Putin would never have agreed to this meeting (and never would have blacked out local media coverage) if the campaign had gone well. His fallback position is to declare complete victory regardless of how much compromise he's forced into. After which his useful idiots will flood the media with stories of Putin humiliating the West yet again.

Unless there's a dramatic Russian breakthrough in the next day or two that seems possible. Problem for Putin is that he may have set the likes of Germany Finland and Poland to adopt a harder line for years to come. Pushing the Germans into a serious expansion of military capabilities may be the biggest consequence of the invasion.

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

That analysis seems overly simplistic to me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-sum_thinking

Zero-sum thinking perceives situations as zero-sum games, where one person's gain would be another's loss.

To paraphrase Mark Twain: Invade countries, they're not making anymore of them!

 

[shemp]

More civilian vehicles pressed into use by Russian forces.

Dump trucks, school buses and weekend campers? There's no armor at all. That convoy is dead meat! If it's true, of course.

 

[Klimax]

Yeah, he's decided to go all in Bond Super Villain mode it seems. I'd assume when they went to full nuke alert it automatically switched the U.S., NATO, France, GB, etc. to DefCon 4 as well. I'd like to know what Putins friends in China are thinking about now.

How to stop him. Any madness like that even if it wouldn't affect them directly, would be extremely bad for their economy.

Knocking out communications is supposed to be step #1 in an invasion.

Likely they didn't have enough capability to do that. They couldn't even knock out Ukraine army enough to prevent strong interference from taking Kiev. (And that target is far closer to staging grounds than any other)

 

[trustbutverify]

Perhaps that's why Putin has moved up the status of Russian nuclear weapons and is testing out the Iskanders from Belarus - he's planning to use tactical nuclear weapons.

My thoughts exactly.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Unless there's a dramatic Russian breakthrough in the next day or two that seems possible. Problem for Putin is that he may have set the likes of Germany Finland and Poland to adopt a harder line for years to come. Pushing the Germans into a serious expansion of military capabilities may be the biggest consequence of the invasion.

Persuading Sweden to give up their neutrality too.

ALso the EU sending military supplies is a big step. Farage will be having a field day!

 

[Andy_Ross]

No way ! surely that's photoshop ?

Could be vehicles pressed in to service to run stores and replace losses.

I have my doubts though.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Foreign Secretary Liz Truss says the government is "urgently looking at what more we can do" to help Ukrainian refugees fleeing from the Russian attack on their country.

In updated guidance, the Home Office said the UK has "multiple official visa routes available for Ukrainians who are not dependants of British nationals".
The guidance says they can apply through a British consulate in the Ukrainian city of Lviv or a neighbouring country, such Hungary, Poland, or Romania.

When asked if the government would waive visa requirements for any Ukrainians coming to the UK, Ms Truss told BBC One's Sunday Morning programme: "It is a desperate situation.
"Of course, Britain has always welcomed refugees fleeing from war and we are urgently looking at what more we can do to facilitate that."

Labour's shadow foreign secretary David Lammy has said visa restrictions for those seeking sanctuary in the UK from Ukraine were "unacceptable".
He told Sunday Morning the government was "asking people to jump through hoops" and called on Home Secretary Priti Patel to "do more" and "act quickly".

"There's bureaucracy, there's red tape," Mr Lammy said. "Why would we ask people what their salary levels are when you're fleeing war? That is immoral. It is not in the traditions of this country."
He referred to a now-deleted tweet by immigration minister Kevin Foster, who said "there are number of routes" those wanting to move to the UK can take, "not least our Seasonal Worker Scheme".
Under the scheme, foreign nationals can apply for temporary visas to work on farms picking fruit and vegetables among other jobs in the UK.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-60545469

Difficult place for a govt that got elected on getting Eastern Europeans out of the country.

 

[theprestige]

Are you saying the examples I gave are NOT consistent with a zero-sum view of statesmanship? Or do you disagree that in friendly trade both sides can win, and that in a draw-out war both sides can lose? Or do you assert that Putin figured he would win a trade war like the one he had since Crimea? Or that he figured both Ukraine and Russia could win the war? Or that his true objective was for both Ukraine and Russia to lose the war?

I'm saying the choice of war over peace is more nuanced and complicated than this cartoonish zero-sum binary interpretation you're forcing on it. The way you seem to be using the term, it's essentially meaningless, and gives us no additional insight into Putin's thinking or motives here. If he were truly the comic book villain, Zero Sum Man, why hasn't he invaded and occupied Belarus, too? Or Kazakhstan? Or the Baltics, when he had the chance?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

You haven’t been paying attention. He was claiming the invasion warnings were a CIA hoax, claiming that Russiagate was a hoax, taking Trump’s side with the whole Hunter Biden thing and the extortion of the Ukrainian President by Trump for dirt on Biden. The list is endless. Of course he does not say “mmmm… I love Putin!” but a mere modicum of ability to read between the lines shows he is con

He hates the US and thinks we could have guaranteed Ukraine couldn't join NATO. That's a stretch from saying he loves Putin

It's stupid given whatever Putin doesn't want on his border, the other NATO countries have the weapons technology to simply send missiles over them. It's not comparable to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

So I don't think the NATO thing is really what Putin is trying to do.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Putin's popularity in Russia is up since the war began. His average popularity since 2012 is insanely high.

Can we believe those numbers?

From a link in your link in post # 1023: PUTIN’S APPROVAL RATING - 'About'

Levada Analytical Center (Levada-Center) is a Russian non-governmental research organization. The center conducts regular monitoring of Russian public opinion, and also conducts research projects on order. Levada-Center conducts research for companies, universities, NGOs in Russia and across the world, as well as for international organizations.

 

[theprestige]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-sum_thinking



To paraphrase Mark Twain: Invade countries, they're not making anymore of them!

I know what zero-sum thinking is. I think you're over-simplifying Putin's motives and rationale here.

 

[Oystein]

If he were truly the comic book villain, Zero Sum Man,

Wait wait wait.
Strawman!
I wasn't conflating "zero-sum" and "cartoon villain"!

why hasn't he invaded and occupied Belarus, too? Or Kazakhstan? Or the Baltics, when he had the chance?

Take a close look and observe where Russian troops are right now: Ukraine... and ... *drum roll* Belarus!

Belarus is essentially occupied already. Lukashenko is really no fan of Putin making him do things like participate in an invasion, but there he is: essentially powerless.
Belarus will come home to Mother Russia. Just you wait and see.