Will Russia invade Ukraine and what happens if it escalates with NATO/US getting involved

[Staffsknot]

17 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

Any of half a dozen countries could attach a few mines and terminate the discussion.

And the Europeans and Russians would therefore jointly ensure its survival. Not rocket science again.

Note Russia and Europe - so Europe is now protecting Russian interests.

In the military the ability to replenish forces is called sustainment capability. I've already posted quite a bit about it and Russian dependence on wide gauge rail.

I don't really need a Russian language website this was my job for a number of years.

[shlomo]

21 minutes ago, Dweller said:

Didn't know there was another thread so will re post earlier posts here:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/23/russian-ships-tanks-and-troops-on-the-move-to-ukraine-as-peace-talks-stall

 

Russian ships, tanks and troops on the move to Ukraine as peace talks stall

With negotiations deadlocked, Moscow is continuing to build up its military forces for a possible invasion

https://www.thejournal.ie/russia-missile-test-south-west-coast-ireland-5660829-Jan2022/

Russia to conduct missile tests in Irish-patrolled waters 240km off south-west coast

But even if the attack never comes, analysts say that there may never be a return to the status quo before the Russian buildup began last year.“I think it’s clear that even if a war is avoided, I don’t think we’re going to go back to the situation prior to April 2021,

[Peter Hun]

24 minutes ago, Staffsknot said:

And the Europeans and Russians would therefore jointly ensure its survival. Not rocket science again.

Note Russia and Europe - so Europe is now protecting Russian interests.

You have a sweeping description of European. The only country would be Germany, the other Baltics would tell it to get stuffed and they have plenty of anti ship missiles to scare off Russia.

Purely hypothetical at this stage, but protecting an underwater pipeline isnt easy.

[shlomo]

10 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

You have a sweeping description of European. The only country would be Germany, the other Baltics would tell it to get stuffed and they have plenty of anti ship missiles to scare off Russia.

Purely hypothetical at this stage, but protecting an underwater pipeline isnt easy.

Especially if it is in the immediate neighbourhood of someone who doesn’t wish you well

[Staffsknot]

27 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

You have a sweeping description of European. The only country would be Germany, the other Baltics would tell it to get stuffed and they have plenty of anti ship missiles to scare off Russia.

Purely hypothetical at this stage, but protecting an underwater pipeline isnt easy.

Given that the Baltics are EU nations and the gas will go into an EU power market no it isn't just Germany.

The Russians don't physically have to be out the length of the pipe, the nations of the EU will protect it as its infrastructure. That's the tie in and it also makes Baltics defend said pipe. EU is alsomoving for renewables so it will be less and less of a dependency. 

The US is trying to push Qatari LNG as the alternative because geoplotically if Europe and Russia have this MAD policy they are no longer the given anytime the Yanks want to counter Russia in their own interest.

Its all complex interactions in that regard as its not just this flare-up that is being looked at. US need Europe and they are reaping the whirlwind of taking it for granted and acting unilaterally once too often.

Right now there's a scheduled live fire Russian exercise at sea off Ireland. That is anti-ship missiles to demonstrate for the West.

Edited January 23, 2022 by Staffsknot

[Peter Hun]

1 hour ago, Staffsknot said:

Given that the Baltics are EU nations and the gas will go into an EU power market no it isn't just Germany.

The EU has no military capability, its up to individual countries to protect it. Several countries see this pipeline as a existential threat and will destroy it if required.

[Dweller]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jan/23/vladimir-putin-rogue-male-ukraine-war-russia

Putin, a ‘rogue male’ on the rampage, threatens to start a war no one wants

[shlomo]

24 minutes ago, Dweller said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jan/23/vladimir-putin-rogue-male-ukraine-war-russia

Putin, a ‘rogue male’ on the rampage, threatens to start a war no one wants

The guardian has an opinion of itself that is not relevant to the power it has.

[Staffsknot]

2 hours ago, Peter Hun said:

The EU has no military capability, its up to individual countries to protect it. Several countries see this pipeline as a existential threat and will destroy it if required.

No now you are being exceptionally melodramatic to being borderline Daily Mail

Because any state attacking civilian infrastructure, especially in peacetime would be handed their ****. They would also hand a pretext to Russia that West a threat and greenlight anything they want to do in future.

Nations have opposed it but they are not going to attack it overtly or covertly and piss away mutual defence. Also that would be NATO nation attacking fellow nation and believe me that would be a bad idea too for that nation.

EU nations cooperate on defence, conduct joint patrols and regularly take part in joint defence of infrastructure without having one designated army - have done for years outside of NATO joint operations.

Not understanding this is why the press continue to make tits of themselves and the Yanks think the way they do about NATO.

[Peter Hun]

1 hour ago, Staffsknot said:

Also that would be NATO nation attacking fellow nation and believe me that would be a bad idea too for that nation.

It wont come to it, if the Ukrainian pipelines are destroyed the Germans will back down and refuse to use Nordstream.

[Staffsknot]

2 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

It wont come to it, if the Ukrainian pipelines are destroyed the Germans will back down and refuse to use Nordstream.

This is about 30 seconds away from using the words Suwalki Gap and paradrop on Gotland and then we are truly into fantasy island.

Russia won't destroy those pipelines as its revenue.

Baltics won't as operations on Ukrainian soil if thwarted or unveiled will be even more serious and see DIY manual on how to ****** yourself by giving a pretext to enemies and attacking your allies.

Ukranians won't touch them as they greenlight Russian retaliation + erase a reason for West to stand by them.

This is all getting very Tom Clancy so bring it back to the realistic please.

 

[Peter Hun]

44 minutes ago, Staffsknot said:

This is about 30 seconds away from using the words Suwalki Gap and paradrop on Gotland and then we are truly into fantasy island.

Russia won't destroy those pipelines as its revenue.

Baltics won't as operations on Ukrainian soil if thwarted or unveiled will be even more serious and see DIY manual on how to ****** yourself by giving a pretext to enemies and attacking your allies.

Ukranians won't touch them as they greenlight Russian retaliation + erase a reason for West to stand by them.

This is all getting very Tom Clancy so bring it back to the realistic please.

 

This is a discussion about Russian invading Ukraine again. Hardly fantasy.

Russia wont destroy the pipelines but Ukraine may do if the Russians gain control.

"Pretext for your enemies" and giving a shit what Russia thinks,  is irrelevant once they invade.

[Staffsknot]

57 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

This is a discussion about Russian invading Ukraine again. Hardly fantasy.

Russia wont destroy the pipelines but Ukraine may do if the Russians gain control.

"Pretext for your enemies" and giving a shit what Russia thinks,  is irrelevant once they invade.

No you keep going wildly Daily Mail.

First of the response was on your crazy stuff about the Baltics bombing Nordstream. Then you came back about the Ukraine pipes, neither of which involve Russia invading Ukraine.

What part of Russia is ******ing with the West to see how we respond is going over your head? If they want Ukraine they will install a government by subterfuge or just promote instability and push regions to 'spontaneously break away'.

Seriously lots of casualties don't play well and jeopardises his position. Surging over the border to grab a small chunk of Ukraine isn't worth the effort for what it would achieve. He can't take Kiev before the West can react nor could he get anywhere near the Baltics or Poland, or any other Saturday night wet dream of American commentators hoping people don't watch something else.

But he is finding out how we all would react to provocative actions, showing his client states that the West is against them, creating a 'West vs us' narrative back home & pushing on fault lines to embarrass US & NATO allies.

Putin is not an idiot and he's not about to line up to give America a way to gain credibility shooting holes in his land forces to make them feel good post Afghanistan.

[pig]

2 hours ago, Staffsknot said:

No you keep going wildly Daily Mail.

First of the response was on your crazy stuff about the Baltics bombing Nordstream. Then you came back about the Ukraine pipes, neither of which involve Russia invading Ukraine.

What part of Russia is ******ing with the West to see how we respond is going over your head? If they want Ukraine they will install a government by subterfuge or just promote instability and push regions to 'spontaneously break away'.

Seriously lots of casualties don't play well and jeopardises his position. Surging over the border to grab a small chunk of Ukraine isn't worth the effort for what it would achieve. He can't take Kiev before the West can react nor could he get anywhere near the Baltics or Poland, or any other Saturday night wet dream of American commentators hoping people don't watch something else.

But he is finding out how we all would react to provocative actions, showing his client states that the West is against them, creating a 'West vs us' narrative back home & pushing on fault lines to embarrass US & NATO allies.

Putin is not an idiot and he's not about to line up to give America a way to gain credibility shooting holes in his land forces to make them feel good post Afghanistan.

Something seems odd about this. On the one had you have commentators insisting Putin is about to invade in the next couple of days, others have been claiming there aren't enough troops.

The  'hybrid war' - gaming must be beyond complex...

[Staffsknot]

7 hours ago, pig said:

Something seems odd about this. On the one had you have commentators insisting Putin is about to invade in the next couple of days, others have been claiming there aren't enough troops.

The  'hybrid war' - gaming must be beyond complex...

Simple thing is follow the support assets not the general troop deploys, they are the costly and most necessary to put in place - for instance if you burn through your ammunition on an exercise its a valuable lesson, do it in real life you are now static until resupplied or its redistributed within the unit. At Battalion level that's time consuming and not simple.

Also nobody can name a strategic objective worth capturing - surge 50 miles and dig in? What do they win? 

The US sent equipment to Ukraine, not troops. That's golden info for Putin. EU arguing and Britain ineffective with zero voice in that camp anymore.

Ireland had to ask the US to monitor ships off its coast as neither it nor UK had ability.

All the commentator chatter is because there needs to be political cover for any EU / US / UK response. Can't just ship weapons to Ukraine.

Its basically Putin testing his opponents. This was regular in Cold War. Its regular now with plane incursions / freedom of nav exercises, etc...

Can anyone give a strategic victory achieved by sticking Russian land forces in a position for NATO to put holes in them? Just the West's threats of retaliation give him enough propaganda for back home

[pig]

4 hours ago, Staffsknot said:

Simple thing is follow the support assets not the general troop deploys, they are the costly and most necessary to put in place - for instance if you burn through your ammunition on an exercise its a valuable lesson, do it in real life you are now static until resupplied or its redistributed within the unit. At Battalion level that's time consuming and not simple.

Also nobody can name a strategic objective worth capturing - surge 50 miles and dig in? What do they win? 

The US sent equipment to Ukraine, not troops. That's golden info for Putin. EU arguing and Britain ineffective with zero voice in that camp anymore.

Ireland had to ask the US to monitor ships off its coast as neither it nor UK had ability.

All the commentator chatter is because there needs to be political cover for any EU / US / UK response. Can't just ship weapons to Ukraine.

Its basically Putin testing his opponents. This was regular in Cold War. Its regular now with plane incursions / freedom of nav exercises, etc...

Can anyone give a strategic victory achieved by sticking Russian land forces in a position for NATO to put holes in them? Just the West's threats of retaliation give him enough propaganda for back home

OK so how are the support assets coming along lol ? I have no idea. But 100,000 troops = 40,000 fighting troops apparently, that in my completely ignorant and inexperienced mind doesn't sound enough to swamp Ukraine.

So this does looks like something more complicated than traditional invasion. Perhaps as the US claimed an internal coup, a puppet regime with a bit of Russian muscle as backup.

Yes it could be a 'testing' or another gaslighting exercise- but sounds a bit of an expensive/complicated gamble thats going to drive states to speed up their applications to NATO.

But that would seem a strangely clumsy move by the Russians, with a leader who has all the time he wants to implement a decades long grand strategy.

Then again, the UK is in a mess, other countries apparently given up on dealing with BJ - although apparently happy to functionally deal direct with Defence Secretary.

Events from 2016 in the UK have 'conspired' to help Putin. And whatever you think of Party-gate, Cummings has followed an almost perfect script and timing to feck us up entirely.

Counterfactual speculation: Supposing Trump was in power now ? bearing in mind their peculiar relationship wouldn't that have completely screwed up the Wests response to Ukraine ?

Could it therefore be that Putin has decided while he's not going to get as much out of it as he might have wanted, this is the best moment (lets add Europe panicking over energy prices) he's going to get to d1ck the West around ?

[byron78]

22 hours ago, shlomo said:

The guardian has an opinion of itself that is not relevant to the power it has.

 

I mean, if we can't all agree Putin is a bigger threat to the world right now then The Guardian...

 

[Staffsknot]

20 minutes ago, pig said:

OK so how are the support assets coming along lol ? I have no idea. But 100,000 troops = 40,000 fighting troops apparently, that in my completely ignorant and inexperienced mind doesn't sound enough to swamp Ukraine.

So this does looks like something more complicated than traditional invasion. Perhaps as the US claimed an internal coup, a puppet regime with a bit of Russian muscle as backup.

Yes it could be a 'testing' or another gaslighting exercise- but sounds a bit of an expensive/complicated gamble thats going to drive states to speed up their applications to NATO.

But that would seem a strangely clumsy move by the Russians, with a leader who has all the time he wants to implement a decades long grand strategy.

Then again, the UK is in a mess, other countries apparently given up on dealing with BJ - although apparently happy to functionally deal direct with Defence Secretary.

Events from 2016 in the UK have 'conspired' to help Putin. And whatever you think of Party-gate, Cummings has followed an almost perfect script and timing to feck us up entirely.

Counterfactual speculation: Supposing Trump was in power now ? bearing in mind their peculiar relationship wouldn't that have completely screwed up the Wests response to Ukraine ?

Could it therefore be that Putin has decided while he's not going to get as much out of it as he might have wanted, this is the best moment (lets add Europe panicking over energy prices) he's going to get to d1ck the West around ?

Think about what message he just sent to Ukranians - where is the cavalry - they are sat in the Baltics and protecting Poland and Romania.

So if you were thinking lets go to NATO or the West you just got the message 100,000 Russians can turn up and you'll get a few token bits. So Ukranians will now outside of the media and political class want to stay neutral on NATO or at least know zero help coming.

As for troop strengths - a platoon of 30 men needs feeding / resupply. They can carry 48hrs food and a lot of ammunition but in any kind of intense manouvre warfare you need to be able to give them food and ammunition, which means people loading and unloading trucks, truck drivers, repair and medical support. Engineers to build up supply and clear obstacles, etc... you have comms to coordinate and whatever strength you have you need a reserve as people get injured / killed / knackered & everything grinds down.

That's before you throw in mechanical failures chucking a literal spanner in the works.

Why would Putin spend this long holding drills on the border and signal intent? Why put a taskforce in the Med and off Ireland if he is going to attack Ukraine and risk war with West? All of it is in harms way and if designated a threat it gets sunk.

If he was going to hit Ukraine he'd have done it before the West had even finished formulating a statement. They would have grabbed a chunk of land and took up positions that mean NATO has to go on the offensive, which just won't happen.

Trump would have washed his hands of it or demanded something from Ukranians - besides he hated NATO too.

Putin is also seeing how far we'll go to avoid war - expect him to get concessions about US deployments of Patriot, etc...

[Staffsknot]

4 minutes ago, byron78 said:

 

I mean, if we can't all agree Putin is a bigger threat to the world right now then The Guardian...

 

Depends where you sit in the No10 briefing room 😉

[shlomo]

14 minutes ago, byron78 said:

 

I mean, if we can't all agree Putin is a bigger threat to the world right now then The Guardian...

 

OK, you are right on that one

[pig]

11 minutes ago, Staffsknot said:

Think about what message he just sent to Ukranians - where is the cavalry - they are sat in the Baltics and protecting Poland and Romania.

So if you were thinking lets go to NATO or the West you just got the message 100,000 Russians can turn up and you'll get a few token bits. So Ukranians will now outside of the media and political class want to stay neutral on NATO or at least know zero help coming.

As for troop strengths - a platoon of 30 men needs feeding / resupply. They can carry 48hrs food and a lot of ammunition but in any kind of intense manouvre warfare you need to be able to give them food and ammunition, which means people loading and unloading trucks, truck drivers, repair and medical support. Engineers to build up supply and clear obstacles, etc... you have comms to coordinate and whatever strength you have you need a reserve as people get injured / killed / knackered & everything grinds down.

That's before you throw in mechanical failures chucking a literal spanner in the works.

Why would Putin spend this long holding drills on the border and signal intent? Why put a taskforce in the Med and off Ireland if he is going to attack Ukraine and risk war with West? All of it is in harms way and if designated a threat it gets sunk.

If he was going to hit Ukraine he'd have done it before the West had even finished formulating a statement. They would have grabbed a chunk of land and took up positions that mean NATO has to go on the offensive, which just won't happen.

Trump would have washed his hands of it or demanded something from Ukranians - besides he hated NATO too.

Putin is also seeing how far we'll go to avoid war - expect him to get concessions about US deployments of Patriot, etc...

Yes a 50 thousand fighting troops going slowly mad moping about in wintry forests doesn't sound like an invasion force but part of a broader hybrid strategy.

This is what I mean by its all looks a bit odd - its a bit more complicated than the headlines. And what if the cavalry had come to Ukraines defence  - wouldn't that have meant joining NATO is unnecessary ? As it stands Putin telling all countries in two minds about NATO to join lickety-split or exposing how important other factors are.

There are many factors here I know I don't know, but I suspect that this juncture either Putin simply has an imperfect hand but his best hand for the foreseeable future, or theres a curve ball coming that I'm simply ignorant of.

 

 

[pig]

On 23/01/2022 at 14:13, Peter Hun said:

The EU has no military capability, its up to individual countries to protect it. Several countries see this pipeline as a existential threat and will destroy it if required.

Apparently it has a scary army perfectly capable of sending Brexiters quivering into mental fox holes.

[byron78]

1 hour ago, Staffsknot said:

Depends where you sit in the No10 briefing room 😉

🤣

[Staffsknot]

45 minutes ago, pig said:

Yes a 50 thousand fighting troops going slowly mad moping about in wintry forests doesn't sound like an invasion force but part of a broader hybrid strategy.

This is what I mean by its all looks a bit odd - its a bit more complicated than the headlines. And what if the cavalry had come to Ukraines defence  - wouldn't that have meant joining NATO is unnecessary ? As it stands Putin telling all countries in two minds about NATO to join lickety-split or exposing how important other factors are.

There are many factors here I know I don't know, but I suspect that this juncture either Putin simply has an imperfect hand but his best hand for the foreseeable future, or theres a curve ball coming that I'm simply ignorant of.

 

 

Well it folds under the see how they react. The Baltics are in NATO - all they got was 4 Danish F-16s and a frigate when this kicked off.

There are EFP forces deployed and what used to be a ARRC is tied down in the 4 overseas forces in each of the forward deploy battlegroups.

The demo to NATO wannabes is - you aren't getting much.

If the cavalry had come and 2 armoured divs land in Ukraine he has tied up a force like Afghanistan did, knowing US won't charge over border to Russia and a great threat to drag the client states and Russian public into his NATO want to attack us myth.

Its a multi-faceted setup and he sees who is earmarked and what goes where in a crisis.

The Americans have sent Javelin & SMAW to Ukraine, same as there were some in Afghanistan when it fell. If there's a nasty incident shooting across the border better check those serials as US 'defensive' weapons suddenly crop up being used as a pretext.

There are so many angles they can play and if NATO reacts withdeployments he's tied up forces for a time in serious cold weather many aren't equipped for.

Russians also get a mass of training and readiness, for when he needs them.

[rollover]

It looks like the EU (mostly Germans) is going to foot the Ukraine's bill. US and UK weapons are not for free.

EU to support Kyiv with 1.2 bln euro financial aid package

The European Union aims to help Kyiv with a 1.2 billion euro financial aid package to mitigate the effects of the conflict with Russia.

"The Commission proposes a new emergency macro-financial assistance package of 1.2 billion euros," von der Leyen told reporters in Brussels, adding the package would be made up of both emergency loans and grants.

"This package will help Ukraine now to address its rapid escalation in financing needs due to the conflict," she said.

Yahoo