Jimmy_D

I agree that the justification for that war was thin, verging on being a war crime and possibly crossing that line. As in all wars civilians ended up being victims of collateral damage. Claims of civilians being targeted as a tactic, though, are very very far from the mark. That's the difference in what Russia are doing, and they're doing it during an invasion based on pretext with even less going for it.

Yeah, that one concentration camp we left standing for the Nazis was a shame, but...

You're the one making false claims of Western armies targeting civilians.

Care to provide documented examples of that?

Ukraine don't feel like they need to compromise. It's almost like Russia isn't winning on any front.

So do you think Russia's metric of success is 'how many Ukrainians can we leave without heat or water?'

So your train of thought here is what? Ukrainians are being terrorized by Russian missile attacks, so the solution is to assume that Ukrainians would be happier under Russian occupation?

Go on then. It's 'not hard at all to look up' so give some documented examples.

Propping up a currency unsustainably, everything is ok… until it’s not. This might be one of the first signs of ‘not’ for the general population.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Russian volunteer Murz on why Russia is not ready to defend Ukrainian winter offensive • WarTranslated Seems morale among those at the front for Russia isn't the highest it's ever been.

Putin won't even go to his front window at the moment, let alone the front line.

Sanctions have made the maintenance costs of everything higher for Russia, the breakeven point of oil for Russia will already have risen closer to $60 per barrel, and increasing production would only hasten that rising breakeven point. On top of that there’s only so much demand, logistics, and storage for Russian oil to China and India. There’s no magic bullet for Russia here, it’s going to be a further squeeze on them, with room to continue squeezing over time.

Looks like Russia attempted yet another wide range missile strike in revenge. It wasn’t completely stopped, but looks like Russia’s continually dwindling precision missile stock and Ukraine’s continually improving missile defence has tipped the balance a bit further in Ukraine’s favour, based on initial reports of damage caused.

Reported explosions at Russian air bases extremely deep into Russian territory, following reports of Ukraine developing very long range drones, although the exact cause is still unknown. Entirely possible that Russia had assumed they were completely safe and moved air defence from them closer to Ukraine, trying to mitigate the losses they’ve been incurring since Ukraine got HARM systems.

Seems to be accurate, at least to what's being claimed. Ukraine have claimed about 100,000 casualties in total since that statement by von der Leyen. Someone's put a translation of the relevent section in the comments here;

As the EU has since clarified, the 100,000 refers to external estimates of the total killed and wounded military casualties for Ukraine. Historically the ratio of that has been about 1:3 which would put Ukraine KIA at around 25,000 from those estimates. They have, however, been recieving NATO training and gear, including medical, which in recent years has done significantly better than 1:3 in terms of keeping the wounded alive. The 88,000 figure is Ukraine's estimate of Russian military casualties that have been killed, and doesn't include wounded or POWs. From the reports seen from troops on the Russian side about the lack of medical equipment and how the wounded are treated (or left behind), it seems likely they're doing significantly worse than that 1:3 ratio. Considering the disparity in terms of equipment, logistics, and training, especially recently in the conflict, as well as the direction of movement of the front lines and Ukraine's continued military capability, as well as the differences in military doctrine between Ukraine and Russia, there's no reason to think that Ukraine have 100,000 soldiers KIA.

For the low price of 85,000 troops, implementing a de facto state of total war, Russia now holds less territory than it did 7 months ago, including losing the only regional capital it had taken, and is able to cause temporary disruption when attempting to commit genocide via widespread terrorist attacks. What exactly does it look like if things are going badly for Russia, in your mind?

I’d imagine an investigation will take place, but from what I’ve seen of discussions between people with far more knowledge of the legal side than me, it’s perfidy. Fake surrender is yet another war crime to add to the list. It’s also an example of how well trained Ukraine are that they could deal with this eventuality, which is important, because it means Ukraine can continue to offer surrender as an option despite the risk.

Appears likely it was Ukrainian air defence that resulted in the hit in Poland, although no final conclusion made yet. It’s still due to the Russian’s illegal attacks that it even had the chance of happening, of course, and there’s no way Ukraine could have just ignored an incoming missile because it was close to the border, but it’ll be a different response to if it’d been directly from Russia, accidental or otherwise. Ukraine are getting better at defending all the time, between experience and cutting edge tech. NASAMS reportedly has a 100% success rate for interceptions so far, with the first two systems being used in Ukraine, and new systems due to be delivered as soon as they’re produced. EW systems have reportedly allowed Ukraine to start actually capturing Iranian drones. It’s incredibly tough for Ukraine, but it appears that they can repair their infrastructure faster than Russia have the ability to damage it now, with unsustainable numbers of missiles required to do anything at all.

Article 5 just means there has to be a joint NATO response if it's called for. Increased air defence along NATO's border could be one result of that. Point is, Russia just now, from a treaty point of view, landed missiles on the territory of every NATO member.

Considering it seems at least one Russian missile just came down on Polish territory, that seems unlikely. It's possible that Poland will invoke Article 5.

Might have actually got something out of that on another day. We just need one game where a few of the chances we're creating go in.