Cont: The Russian invasion of Ukraine part 6

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arthwollipot said:
Gonna say I'm a little surprised by people supporting assassination as a political tool.
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It was a rocket attack on a Russian building in occupied Ukraine, within range of the frontline.

She and the others killed were more responsible for this war than many Mobiks.

You would be correct if you surmise that my only objection to assassination of war criminals during war (or if they are out of reach of judicial justice) is practical.
 
jimbob said:
It was a rocket attack on a Russian building in occupied Ukraine, within range of the frontline.
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What was?

jimbob said:
She and the others killed were more responsible for this war than many Mobiks.
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Who are you talking about?

jimbob said:
You would be correct if you surmise that my only objection to assassination of war criminals during war (or if they are out of reach of judicial justice) is practical.
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I was talking about the assassination of Nazis by Israel post-war. What are you talking about?
 
arthwollipot said:
What was?

Who are you talking about?

I was talking about the assassination of Nazis by Israel post-war. What are you talking about?
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This, which possibly prompted that chain of thought.

https://metro.co.uk/2022/12/06/ukra...-putin-killed-in-ukrainian-shelling-17891144/

But Nazis who escaped justice and were out of the reach of justice?

It would have been better to make them stand trial, but it was better to assassinate them rather than let them evade justice. Assuming that they were who they were supposed to be and participated in crimes against humanity.
 
arthwollipot said:
Assassination and the death penalty are very different things. One is the result of a judicial process, and the other is extrajudicial murder.

I want to see war criminals caught, tried in an international criminal court, and given an appropriate legal punishment. Is it really that controversial an opinion that even war criminals are entitled this basic human right?
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It's not really controversial to prefer to see war criminals going to trial. It's just not going to realistically happen for a huge number of war criminals.

Assassination and a potential death penalty may be distinctly different things in some aspects, but end result to the criminal is much the same and the former can be done to those that that can evade being tried in court while the latter cannot, along with any other form of legal punishment for actual crimes. It's one of those things where the perfect would certainly be preferable, but often isn't truly an option in the first place.
 
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arthwollipot said:
What was?

Who are you talking about?

I was talking about the assassination of Nazis by Israel post-war. What are you talking about?
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I think you should cut jimbob some slack. He was talking about the death of a Ukrainian separatist "MP" in Eastern Ukraine. You were talking about fugitive Nazis. jimbob just wrongly assumed you were commenting about something that was on topic.

I entirely sympathise with you about the Nazi war criminals. I'd want justice to be done. If you are just going to go around assassinating people you don't like, we might as well have left them in power. They were very good at that.

However, if assassinating Putin would bring this war to an end or even stop the bombing of civilian targets, I'd say let's do it, or at least, let's help the Ukrainians to do it. Unfortunately, the idea that he would be replaced by somebody who would stop the war may be misguided.
 
Gulliver Foyle said:
The "for better or for worse" thing always smacked as a kind of retrospective justification for all the mid 20th century despots they picked.
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No. Henry Luce, the founder of Time, stated that criterion from the very beginning. See also here:

Even when the relevant magazine issue was published in January 1939, TIME’s selection of Hitler as the Man of the Year was far from laudatory.

“Hitler became in 1938 the greatest threatening force that the democratic, freedom-loving world faces today,” TIME wrote.

“What Adolf Hitler did … left civilised men and women aghast. Civil rights and liberties have disappeared.”​
 
jeremyp said:
However, if assassinating Putin would bring this war to an end or even stop the bombing of civilian targets, I'd say let's do it, or at least, let's help the Ukrainians to do it. Unfortunately, the idea that he would be replaced by somebody who would stop the war may be misguided.
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Disposing of Putin won't cure Russia of its fantasies of empire, and Ukraine has an important role in those fantasies. The way to address this problem realistically is to defeat the Russia invasion, expel Russia from Ukraine, and fold Ukraine into the EU and NATO.

Another way would be to destroy and dismantle Russia, which given their monstrous behavior has a moral argument to recommend it, but that's not realistic. In any case, Russia will always want to own/control Ukraine through corruption or force.
 
arthwollipot said:
Well then I'm a little surprised that people are supporting that.
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Right or wrong, we're arguing morality (which I dont wish to do), but we'd be hypocrites in the USA if we expected Ukraine not to track down and try to kill or try and execute, Vlad Putin... we essentially put a kill order on Osama bin Laden and many other perpetrators of 9/11 and by any measure that was minor compared to Russia's attack on Ukraine.
 
lobosrul5 said:
Right or wrong, we're arguing morality (which I dont wish to do), but we'd be hypocrites in the USA if we expected Ukraine not to track down and try to kill or try and execute, Vlad Putin... we essentially put a kill order on Osama bin Laden and many other perpetrators of 9/11 and by any measure that was minor compared to Russia's attack on Ukraine.
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We'd be hypocrites for not expecting others to repeat our past mistakes?
 
arthwollipot said:
I was more referring to the people expressing the idea that Israel should have assassinated more Nazis.
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The way I see it, assassination in the context being discussed here is essentially just warfare on a very personal scale. Ukraine popping an airfield full of bombers and getting a few people there killed in the process; Ukrainian commandos or partisans popping rebel leaders in the occupied territories; six of one, half dozen of the other.

Israeli versus Nazis, I'd say those two factions are and always will be at war. Any Nuremberg-dodgers still alive are valid military targets for Mossad, in my book.
 
lobosrul5 said:
Youre gonna find very few people in the US that think it was a mistake to hunt down bin Laden. Although plenty wouldve preferred a trial and an execution.
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Yup. He's hardly the only terrorist that's been hunted down and their demise celebrated, for that matter.

There's probably more sympathy to be found for those who are collateral damage in the course of killing the terrorists, of course, but even that will likely be limited, I think.
 
lobosrul5 said:
Youre gonna find very few people in the US that think it was a mistake to hunt down bin Laden. Although plenty wouldve preferred a trial and an execution.
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I suspect the intersection of people who wanted Bin Laden dead with the people who wanted due process is probably quite small. I, for example, would have preferred a trial followed by incarceration for the rest of his life. I don't think the state should be killing people for crimes.

Putin is a different case. I'd regard him as a combatant in a war. He's a legitimate target.
 
Anyways, to poke at the ongoing fighting, just because it hasn't been done in a while... Not much change overall, but movement looks like it has been happening at a gradually increasing pace as the weather gets colder and the ground starts to firm up a little. Ukraine's apparently been picking its way forward on the battle lines around Kreminna and north from there. Russia's been taking a tiny bit of ground back in Bakhmut after it had been driven back, as well as a couple not too close settlements as they try to encircle Bakhmut. An encirclement of Bakhmut at this point is probably nearly as much of a pipe dream as their prior larger plans for encirclements, frankly. Russia might also be stepping up a more urgent assault Bakhmut, though, as they try to score a much needed victory to appease domestic displeasure before General Winter causes massive damage to their thoroughly unequipped for it cannon fodder. Putin's apparently declared that Russia's bombed Bakhmut into rubble by now, too. I would guess that such is meant to help appease the public and to set conditions for a better narrative in case they fail to take Bakhmut than a simple Russia lost narrative.
 
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jeremyp said:
I suspect the intersection of people who wanted Bin Laden dead with the people who wanted due process is probably quite small. I, for example, would have preferred a trial followed by incarceration for the rest of his life. I don't think the state should be killing people for crimes.

Putin is a different case. I'd regard him as a combatant in a war. He's a legitimate target.
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I'd regard bin Laden as a combatant in a war, too. And I'd say he got exactly the correct process due to combatants in a war: Either surrender on terms agreeable to your enemy, or get rocked at a time and place convenient to your enemy.

The criminal justice process is due to civilians during peacetime who are entitled to not be unduly oppressed by their government, when that government accuses them of a crime.

Commanders of an army at war have a target on their forehead not because of any crimes they may have committed, but because they're commanding an army at war.

And yes, Osama Bin Laden was doing exactly that thing.
 
Aridas said:
Anyways, to poke at the ongoing fighting, just because it hasn't been done in a while... Not much change overall, but movement looks like it has been happening at a gradually increasing pace as the weather gets colder and the ground starts to firm up a little. Ukraine's apparently been picking its way forward on the battle lines around Kreminna and north from there. Russia's been taking a tiny bit of ground back in Bakhmut after it had been driven back, as well as a couple not too close settlements as they try to encircle Bakhmut. An encirclement of Bakhmut at this point is probably nearly as much of a pipe dream as their prior larger plans for encirclements, frankly. Russia might also be stepping up a more urgent assault Bakhmut, though, as they try to score a much needed victory to appease domestic displeasure before General Winter causes massive damage to their thoroughly unequipped for it cannon fodder. Putin's apparently declared that Russia's bombed Bakhmut into rubble by now, too. I would guess that such is meant to help appease the public and to set conditions for a better narrative in case they fail to take Bakhmut than a simple Russia lost narrative.
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Russia seems to be fighting a two-pronged war of strategic attrition right now: One against the Ukrainian power grid, to slow down economic activity, wear down the labor force dedicated to keeping the country running, and demoralize the population. The other against the main strength of the Ukrainian armed forces, by turning Bakhmut into a meat grinder for them as much as for the Russian troops being thrown at them.

These wars of attrition are basically races against the clock for Russia. Its hope is to push Ukraine to the point of breakdown, economically and militarily, before Russia's own economic and military breakdown finally catches up to them. However, with the west's backing, it is unlikely that the Russian goals in these wars of attrition will be realized.
 
theprestige said:
Russia seems to be fighting a two-pronged war of strategic attrition right now: One against the Ukrainian power grid, to slow down economic activity, wear down the labor force dedicated to keeping the country running, and demoralize the population. The other against the main strength of the Ukrainian armed forces, by turning Bakhmut into a meat grinder for them as much as for the Russian troops being thrown at them.

These wars of attrition are basically races against the clock for Russia. Its hope is to push Ukraine to the point of breakdown, economically and militarily, before Russia's own economic and military breakdown finally catches up to them. However, with the west's backing, it is unlikely that the Russian goals in these wars of attrition will be realized.
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I hope so :o

Russia had very deep pockets. Even with a lot of their assets frozen, they still have tens (hundreds?) of billions of dollars in reserves and even though they're selling at a discount, China, India and a number of developing countries are making sure that the economic taps are still open.

Sanctions are significantly constraining what they can buy with those mountains of cash. It's clear that Iran is happy to supply them but China and India seem to be more circumspect. Then again Russia's stockpiles of weapons are legendary even if a significant proportion is useless and much of the rest is substandard. If you don't care about collateral damage then they might do a job.

Despite the partial mobilization, Russia appears to be short of skilled combatants. Then again that may not matter as long as you don't care about putting them through the meat grinder.

IMO you're right, Russia is likely to run out first, and the critical shortage will be manpower.
 
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