But will Russia really win? As of the last that I saw, Ukraine was doing remarkably well in getting Russian forces to pull back from many positions they initially captured, and what they have captured has cost them considerably. A German invasion of Poland this is definitely not in terms of agility. It's more like Italy's invasion of Greece, but without a bigger power to step in and take the reins. Putin can try other means of pressure, or go all out, but so far, the former isn't very visible and the latter will prove much costlier, even if he somehow takes a majority percentage of Ukraine. In other words, even if he did pull off exactly that, what then? How much would it cost to continuously occupy a country of 48 million largely hostile people? Remember what the U.S. occupation of Iraq cost? For how long could the 10x smaller Russian economy sustain anything close to such an expense bill while maintaining a friendly puppet regime, let alone directly occupying territory?
Well- if they cement their hold on the separatist regions, expand them a little, and ensure a fresh water supply for Crimea, they can probably spin it as a win and declare victory.
Ukraine is also suffering a lot from this war, even if they don't mention it much. They will feel a lot of pressure to accept a smaller Ukraine in exchange for peace.
All indications are that Russia and Putin simply can't allow Ukraine to win. Their attempt at (probably) Blitzkrieg and regime change failed, and of course they don't have the resources to occupy Ukraine.
So instead, unless Ukraine acceeds to their demands, they will get more and more bloody and bomb it to the ground. If that is the only course of action afforded to them, that is what they will do - as they have done in Afghanistan and Chechnya before.
This is monstrous and disturbing, but doing otherwise is seen as an existential threat to Russia. They have already shown they lack the power to pose any kind of threat to NATO (beyond nukes of course), so their only hope is to go all in on this.
There appear to be more nuanced balances than that. Putin avoided escalating the war via an explicit and public mobilization on May 9th, yet he certainly doesn't think he can easily win with the forces on hand.
Consequently, he must feel as though a public mobilization would have a higher risk (public opinion?) than reward (additional military manpower?).
In lieu of an influx of manpower, the existing Russian forces seem destined to grind down over time, both in terms of personnel and materiel.
IMO, he annexes Kherson-Crimea-Mariupol-Donbas, and calls it a victory.
Unfortunately, Kherson is still semi-resistant, Mariupol still (somehow!!) has active defenders, and ~1/3 of Donbas is still under Ukrainian control.
Donbas also has the misfortune of being an explicitly delineated area... so there's less wiggle room to redefine it as the portions already under Russian control.
And it's unclear that the Ukrainians would accept the above under any terms. Maybe "give us this and the rest of the country can join NATO"? But Kherson & Mariupol seem huge sticking points.
So the most likely outcome is that the war grinds on, with Russia attempting to achieve the above goals, Ukraine continuing to stubbornly resist (with NATO armaments and supply), and Russia continues to launch long-range strikes against western Ukrainian industry to increase pressure for peace. Which is to say, ugly.
Notice who is pushing the narrative of Russia bogged down - journalists, politicians and their nominees, economists, and people with an active career in the military. There are also some dissidents in the West pushing the opposite narrative - ex-marine, retired intelligence officer, weapons inspector, colonel from a neutral country. Which group knows more about how a modern war is waged? Which group has a better track record so far? Which group openly admits they're releasing unverified claims in order to shape the public opinion?
> How much would it cost to continuously occupy a country of 48 million largely hostile people
If Russia limits the territorial acquisition to Russian-speaking regions, they'll be fine. Minorities are almost always strongly in support of unification with their nation-state. Some historical examples - 77% of Sudeten Germans voted for Nazi Sudetendeutsche Partei. 99.7% of Austrians voted for unification with Germany in 1938 referendum. 95.6% of Crimeans voted for unification with Russia. 95.7% of Cypriots voted for unification with Greece in 1950
> There are also some dissidents in the West pushing the opposite narrative - ex-marine, retired intelligence officer, weapons inspector, colonel from a neutral country.
And above all, right-wing kooks, useful idiots, and outright Putler trolls. Quite a few of the people you mention also seem to belong to at least one of these categories.
> Notice who is pushing the narrative of Russia bogged down - journalists, politicians and their nominees, economists, and people with an active career in the military.
> There are also some dissidents in the West pushing the opposite narrative - ex-marine, retired intelligence officer
> Which group knows more about how a modern war is waged?
Ahem...
> Which group has a better track record so far?
Well, not the ones who said "This will be over in less than a week!" eleven weeks ago.
Even Ukraine said they aren’t interested in fighting for the eastern parts of the country because the local population will likely be hostile and make
their jobs much harder.
They are strictly focusing on preventing any greater expansion than what happened prior to the invasion.
There are arguments that Mariupol and maybe even Kherson have a relatively large pro-Russian population compared to other parts but I still believe they want to protect them regardless since they aren’t nearly as large as the more eastern parts and it blocks access to the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea ports.
> Even Ukraine said they aren’t interested in fighting for the eastern parts of the country because the local population will likely be hostile and make their jobs much harder.
Source?
This is simply not the case, their is intense fighting in the Donbas region by both UA and Foreign legions, and places like Bucha and Kharkiv are all on the East and are all subject to the indiscriminate shelling of residential areas of mainly Ethic Russian Ukrainian citizens in what are some of the worst crimes against of Humanity seen since maybe the Croatian-Serbian conflict.
These places may not be as nationalistic as Lviv, very few places are in fact, but it would be absolutely foolish to say that considering this [0] was just released last month which specifically states it's intention to de-occucpy Crimea from Russia.
And after what is seen in Bucha, Irpin, Kharviv, Mariupol etc... there are no Russian speaking regions who think they are going to be spared from the indiscriminate and needless death they have seen of women, children, men. They now see them for the violent murderers that they are. Those that remained probably left for Russia.
Even the dissenters posting on social media are being tracked down by the Ukrainian military and being arrested/detained which honestly is fucking terrifying, but consistent with it's actual intended use--State surveillance.
This isn't 2014 anymore, where it was mainly the Azov holding off things in the Donbas against Russian sponsored separatists and sympathizers, things have drastically changed and while I doubt loyalty is 100% to he Ukrainian government it's really crazy how united that country has gotten since the invasion. I had mixed feelings of Azov because of how they violently dealt with Russian-leaning supporters back in 2014, but after what they've done in Mariupol it goes to show that it's not something they tolerate any longer. They sacrificed themselves in order to protect them in the steel mill and are bravely still the only thing left from total Russian occupation of Mariupol.
People around here don't know this but Bitcoiners were some of the first non Government affiliated volunteers in Ukraine to help back in 2013 during the Maidan Revolution and then 2014 for the war in the Donbas. This is where our technology got battle tested for real, hence why it has played such a pivotal role in distribution for funds when the Ukrainian Central Bank suspended withdraws of UAH on the day of the invasion just as it did during the capital controls and hyper inflation in 2013/14.
I won't go into a tirade about it, but this is why many of us Bitcoiners get so upset when we hear some misinformed arm-chair coder in the comfort of his apartment in SV tells us why 'bitcoin doesn't matter, no one uses it' type diatribes. It's a waste of my time but all it's all there for people to see that it was critical in both 2014 and 2022 to support Ukraine.
And the fact that you can make such blatantly misinformed statements reflects the level of ignorance on all of the aforementioned topics.
I'm honestly curious, how did/are bitcoiners using BTC and crypto tech to help people in these regions? What's the methodology? And also for actually spending/using the coins.
Also, from your wider comment, by the way you phrased it, I can't quite tell who you're saying is shelling ethnically Russian men, women and children in these areas a crime against humanity, the Ukrainian military or the Russians?
> I'm honestly curious, how did/are bitcoiners using BTC and crypto tech to help people in these regions? What's the methodology? And also for actually spending/using the coins.
Start here [0], this discusses BTC involvement in the Maidan Revolution, and then the come back alive campaign with the Azov in the Donbas region in 2014, and then touches on the Government backed initiative by the Ukrainian Ministry of digital reform in '22. Ultimately, the Zelensky government backed the creation of United24 with BTC at it's core.
It's worth doing your own research, I can assure you it's really worth your time to see how effective open source technology can boot-strap itself so quickly in conflict zones. Ultimately, it's a testament of Human ingenuity and perseverance in some of the most daunting situations.
> Also, from your wider comment, by the way you phrased it, I can't quite tell who you're saying is shelling ethnically Russian men, women and children in these areas a crime against humanity, the Ukrainian military or the Russians?
Sorry?
Even if you were completely lost by what I wrote, are you seriously not aware of what is happening in Crimea, Kharkiv, Bucha, Irpin, Mariupol? It's Russians killing other Ethnic Russians on the Eastern and Southern parts of Ukraine; then turning around and saying it's Ukrainians killing their own citizens as we see Russian soldiers shell, loot, steal, rape, murder all over Ukraine without any hesitation or regard for Human life.
