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Any “analyst” suggesting that Ukraine brought this upon themselves is completely full of shit. Fuck that guy, whatever his name is.

Reconstruction is going to be paid for by the seized Russian currency reserves.

Unlike the Russians, it seems like there is a decent amount up “stand up against tyranny” amongst the Belarusian population.

Putin going full purge less than a month into the invasion tells you pretty much everything you need to know. They’ll be so busy executing “traitors” that Ukraine will be an afterthought pretty soon.

Are those child soldiers?

What Ukrainians call the invaders. I’m guessing it’s a reference to lord of the rings.

China sees an opportunity to exploit Russia for its natural resources for the next 50 years. They don’t maximize that opportunity by bailing Russia out. They’re going to let them lose the war. Next time Russia comes asking for help, they’re REALLY going to need it.

This must mean they’re launching cruise missiles from Russian territory?

To add to his already impressive resume, Mr. Mironov also starred in a popular sitcom in the early 2000s.

Only one more day til the Russian stock market opens.

Russia has already lost. It’s just a matter of how much deeper they want to dig the hole. Already their demands have been significantly reduced. They’re sending WWI armored trains to try to resupply their demoralized, unmotivated, and hopelessly lost invasion force. They just need to give up.

Japan starting to get a little frisky.

I take all of these interviews with Russian citizens with a grain of salt. They just passed a law that you can be imprisoned for 15 years for spreading “false information” about the war. And even before the law, your average Russian knew that you might get disappeared if you piss off the wrong government official. You’re not gonna find many of them willing to say “yeah Putin is full of shit and we need to end this war immediately”.

If UA is in fact responsible, I assume that they calculated that the side effects were not as bad as the implications of the armored divisions reaching Kyiv. But at the very least, lots of property was destroyed and will have to be rebuilt after the war.

I’m reading that UA opened a dam to flood the areas north of Kyiv and three Russian mechanized divisions are stuck in the mud. edit:

Yes. And I’d also bet that the number of active and reserve troops is severely inflated. We saw this in Afghanistan. Regional commander secures his budget for “5000” troops. Tells 3000 of them they shouldn’t bother showing up for work or drills. Pockets the difference on ammunition, food, and equipment. It’s a pretty good racket until you’re supposed to start fighting a war.

Who knew that the humble John Deere tractor was the greatest tool in modern land warfare.

I know it’s early but this is shaping up to be one of the worst geopolitical moves of all time. Putin has woken up ALL of his enemies out of their persistent complacency and inspired them to rebuild their militaries and strengthen alliances. To say that he collapsed the economy is an understatement. And to top it all off, he’s losing the ground war. He has framed this as fighting “Nazis” to his domestic audience. So if he wants to withdraw or is eventually forced to due to a lack of materiel and fuel he basically has to tell the country “I just decided to let the Nazis keep Ukraine because it was really expensive to fight them”. Pretty soon, all of his secret police are gonna get pissed that their wages are no longer enough to feed their family. At this pace I think he’ll be lucky to hold onto a unified Russia and not have a breakaway province (looking at you, Chechnya) stage a successful uprising. edit: Russians also can now look forward to a future filled with economic exploitation by the friendliest nation on earth - China.

I’m sure everyone in Russia is thrilled with their newfound poverty and information blackout. Anything for dear leader.

All of the police and military currently responsible for his security have to eat. They have families. Pretty soon, they’re going to realize that their wages are basically worthless. I read an interesting theory that it’s not simply suffering that leads to revolutions, it’s when quality of life drops sharply in a short period of time. Russians have basically been enjoying the benefits of European life for the past 20 years. The wealthier among them spent weekends in London and Milan and send their kids to private school in London. I don’t think they’re going to respond to 25% inflation and bread lines very well.

Once the reality of the economic situation in Russia sets in, Putin will be taken out internally. He’s literally destroyed all the progress they’ve made since WWII because he’s got little man syndrome. I don’t think he makes it to the end of the year.

It’s becoming clear that we (the US, EU, NATO, Japan, whoever) have no choice but to turn this into a war of attrition. It’s really sad that the Ukrainian people will suffer the consequences, but that’s on Putin. If they are allowed to take and hold Ukrainian territory it is only a matter of time until they move on another country and threaten nukes if anyone intervenes. Let their economy implode on top of them and keep supplying weapons and intel until they literally have no fuel to send additional troops into the fight.

Ukraine realizes that if they don’t fight now they will never, ever get this territory back.

At least 10.