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United States43953 Posts
On June 18 2022 18:40 Ardias wrote:Show nested quote +On June 18 2022 02:20 Mohdoo wrote:
A couple questions if people don't mind answering:
1) How is Russia making gains when the entire world is arming Ukraine? Are countries just giving Ukraine tiny bits of military stuff?
2) If countries are being really stingy with what they give Ukraine, are they trying to drag out the war to bleed Russia dry? It feels like the weapons and aid being given to Ukraine is entirely useless if Ukraine just ends up losing. So if countries are choosing to give Ukraine less than they could, what is the value of giving anything at all if Ukraine just keeps losing territory?
3) Is it possible that the west is basically just trying to make Russia think they have a chance of success, only to up their aid later on, and basically leave Russia in shambles? It is hard to understand the logic at play with how much countries are willing to help, but not enough to actually prevent land from being lost.
4) More generally speaking, is Russia doing a really good job right now, or am I missing something? In spite of everything against them, continuing to gain ground seems really impressive. But maybe I am just not understanding the actual extent of aid. Do we have a good understanding of Russian vs Western costs/losses? Is Russia just more efficient? 1) Western support, in fact, is much less than expected. I can understand, why supplies at first days were small - everyone was in shock, and thought Ukraine will fall within a week. I can undersrand why supplies at first weeks consisted only of small arms, body armor, anti-tank and anti-air man-portable weapons - they require the least time to train and much easier to maintain, than vehicles. But now, when it is clear than war will drag on for months, if not years, heavy equipment should definetly be on the books, but I don't see huge numbers of it. I mean, 4 HIMARS from US, when they have around 1400 MLRS systems? https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/us-to-provide-4-himars-systems-to-ukraine-in-latest-700m-arms-package/I believe this chart was posted here already, but still https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/ve6drb/committed_vs_delivered_weapons_to_ukraine/Counting stuff that was actually delievered, we see Poland on par with US, Czech on par with Germany, and Latvia/Estonia above(!) France/Italy. 2) I believe that countries sending aid are not united in their purpose. Eastern european countries want to kill as many Ruskies as possible as well as demand supply of modern equipment from other NATO countries in exchange for their active contribution to the conflict. For example: https://www.thefirstnews.com/article/poland-hopes-germany-will-replace-tanks-given-to-ukraine-30573https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-jets-slovakia-idINL2N2W91BVFrance and Germany are much less eager to do so, since it will be them who has to spend money on actual production of weaponry, plus as the economy leaders of the EU, they care less about destroying Russia, whatever it takes, and more about keeping their economy alive, so they are more eager to sue for peace and ease of sanctions, even if it means territorial losses for Ukraine. Italy seem not to be ager about this war at all, looking at public polls. https://ecfr.eu/publication/peace-versus-justice-the-coming-european-split-over-the-war-in-ukraine/Small EU countries just deliver what they can I suppose, since they sold out or scrapped a lot of their stuff after the end of Cold War. What's with UK and US - I'm not too sure, probably guys from there will explain better. But 108 M777, 200 old M113 and 4 HIMARS from US, when they have hundreds Bradleys, M1s, M109s, M270s? Come on. I understand preserving of weapons for yourself is important in case of war, but when one of your two biggest potential enemies is engaged in a full-scale war with third country, it seems strange not to support that country with every means possible. UK is also one of the main advocates of "fighting till the end", but they aren't that fast with supplies. Those AS-90 they talked about for so long only now seems to be shipped to Poland for training of the Ukrainian troops. https://thenortheastaffairs.com/uk-to-supply-ukraine-with-20-as90-howitzers-45000-shells-next-week/3) I probably answered that a bit in point 2), but will say again that countries providing aid look at this war differently and have different goals. Eastern Europe is geniuenly interested in crushing Russian Army; Germany, France and Italy seem to be reluctant about even inderect participation in this war, and just want to save face and show participation, UK and US seem eager to bleed Russia dry, but not with spending too much money doing so. 4) Gains are not significant, since Ukrainian army outnumbers Russian 3-to-1 or so (politico article states 330 000 Russian soldiers directly or indirectly participating in Ukraine war) https://www.politico.com/newsletters/national-security-daily/2022/06/16/outgunned-outmanned-outnumbered-outplanned-00040024and leader of Zelenskiys' political party and his advisor David Arakhamia claimed that 1 million people was mobilized in Ukraine army https://www.axios.com/2022/06/15/ukraine-1000-casualties-day-donbas-arakhamiaPlus Russia had lost a lot of infantry during the last four months, so now Russian Army changed tactics, and advances slowly, but methodically, preferring to spend shells and time, rather than manpower. Ukrainians, on the other hand, have a lot of men, but severely lacking heavy equipment and ammo (they literally almost ran out of 152-mm shells), and they have little to no domestic production remaining (especially in terms of ammo), so now they rely more and more on Western support (which I talked about above).
I think it’s worth remembering that the military aid effectively costs Europe and the US nothing. If Russia absorbed Ukraine there would be a need for a very expensive deployment to Poland with lots of expensive toys to match Russian capabilities. We would need to buy all the same equipment anyway and would also need to pay lots of people to go to Poland and hold it. Ukraine falling would be very expensive for Germany in terms of how it impacts their national security and the related necessary expenses. It’d be very expensive to the US which is responsible for Germany’s security. And so forth.
Keeping Ukraine in the fight is far, far cheaper. You don’t need to pay western soldiers to be ready to repel an invasion, Ukrainians are doing it for free. It saves a colossal deployment and the associated costs. Javelins aren’t that cheap but again, we’d have to buy them anyway. Enough to defend Poland from the Russian tanks. Every javelin you give to Ukraine is one less you need to give Poland.
Additionally the military industrial complex needs demand, whether or not there is a war. Militaries commission all this stuff and the price per unit goes down significantly as the number of units purchased increases.
My expectation is that for the west the cost of defending Ukraine is substantially lower than the cost of not defending Ukraine. The Ukrainians are doing for free what the west would otherwise have to pay for. The cost of keeping Ukraine in the fight is not a factor, there is a 0% chance that the west decides it would be cheaper to let Ukraine fall.
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Russian Federation618 Posts
On June 19 2022 05:29 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On June 18 2022 18:40 Ardias wrote:On June 18 2022 02:20 Mohdoo wrote:
A couple questions if people don't mind answering:
1) How is Russia making gains when the entire world is arming Ukraine? Are countries just giving Ukraine tiny bits of military stuff?
2) If countries are being really stingy with what they give Ukraine, are they trying to drag out the war to bleed Russia dry? It feels like the weapons and aid being given to Ukraine is entirely useless if Ukraine just ends up losing. So if countries are choosing to give Ukraine less than they could, what is the value of giving anything at all if Ukraine just keeps losing territory?
3) Is it possible that the west is basically just trying to make Russia think they have a chance of success, only to up their aid later on, and basically leave Russia in shambles? It is hard to understand the logic at play with how much countries are willing to help, but not enough to actually prevent land from being lost.
4) More generally speaking, is Russia doing a really good job right now, or am I missing something? In spite of everything against them, continuing to gain ground seems really impressive. But maybe I am just not understanding the actual extent of aid. Do we have a good understanding of Russian vs Western costs/losses? Is Russia just more efficient? 1) Western support, in fact, is much less than expected. I can understand, why supplies at first days were small - everyone was in shock, and thought Ukraine will fall within a week. I can undersrand why supplies at first weeks consisted only of small arms, body armor, anti-tank and anti-air man-portable weapons - they require the least time to train and much easier to maintain, than vehicles. But now, when it is clear than war will drag on for months, if not years, heavy equipment should definetly be on the books, but I don't see huge numbers of it. I mean, 4 HIMARS from US, when they have around 1400 MLRS systems? https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/us-to-provide-4-himars-systems-to-ukraine-in-latest-700m-arms-package/I believe this chart was posted here already, but still https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/ve6drb/committed_vs_delivered_weapons_to_ukraine/Counting stuff that was actually delievered, we see Poland on par with US, Czech on par with Germany, and Latvia/Estonia above(!) France/Italy. 2) I believe that countries sending aid are not united in their purpose. Eastern european countries want to kill as many Ruskies as possible as well as demand supply of modern equipment from other NATO countries in exchange for their active contribution to the conflict. For example: https://www.thefirstnews.com/article/poland-hopes-germany-will-replace-tanks-given-to-ukraine-30573https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-jets-slovakia-idINL2N2W91BVFrance and Germany are much less eager to do so, since it will be them who has to spend money on actual production of weaponry, plus as the economy leaders of the EU, they care less about destroying Russia, whatever it takes, and more about keeping their economy alive, so they are more eager to sue for peace and ease of sanctions, even if it means territorial losses for Ukraine. Italy seem not to be ager about this war at all, looking at public polls. https://ecfr.eu/publication/peace-versus-justice-the-coming-european-split-over-the-war-in-ukraine/Small EU countries just deliver what they can I suppose, since they sold out or scrapped a lot of their stuff after the end of Cold War. What's with UK and US - I'm not too sure, probably guys from there will explain better. But 108 M777, 200 old M113 and 4 HIMARS from US, when they have hundreds Bradleys, M1s, M109s, M270s? Come on. I understand preserving of weapons for yourself is important in case of war, but when one of your two biggest potential enemies is engaged in a full-scale war with third country, it seems strange not to support that country with every means possible. UK is also one of the main advocates of "fighting till the end", but they aren't that fast with supplies. Those AS-90 they talked about for so long only now seems to be shipped to Poland for training of the Ukrainian troops. https://thenortheastaffairs.com/uk-to-supply-ukraine-with-20-as90-howitzers-45000-shells-next-week/3) I probably answered that a bit in point 2), but will say again that countries providing aid look at this war differently and have different goals. Eastern Europe is geniuenly interested in crushing Russian Army; Germany, France and Italy seem to be reluctant about even inderect participation in this war, and just want to save face and show participation, UK and US seem eager to bleed Russia dry, but not with spending too much money doing so. 4) Gains are not significant, since Ukrainian army outnumbers Russian 3-to-1 or so (politico article states 330 000 Russian soldiers directly or indirectly participating in Ukraine war) https://www.politico.com/newsletters/national-security-daily/2022/06/16/outgunned-outmanned-outnumbered-outplanned-00040024and leader of Zelenskiys' political party and his advisor David Arakhamia claimed that 1 million people was mobilized in Ukraine army https://www.axios.com/2022/06/15/ukraine-1000-casualties-day-donbas-arakhamiaPlus Russia had lost a lot of infantry during the last four months, so now Russian Army changed tactics, and advances slowly, but methodically, preferring to spend shells and time, rather than manpower. Ukrainians, on the other hand, have a lot of men, but severely lacking heavy equipment and ammo (they literally almost ran out of 152-mm shells), and they have little to no domestic production remaining (especially in terms of ammo), so now they rely more and more on Western support (which I talked about above). I think it’s worth remembering that the military aid effectively costs Europe and the US nothing. If Russia absorbed Ukraine there would be a need for a very expensive deployment to Poland with lots of expensive toys to match Russian capabilities. We would need to buy all the same equipment anyway and would also need to pay lots of people to go to Poland and hold it. Ukraine falling would be very expensive for Germany in terms of how it impacts their national security and the related necessary expenses. It’d be very expensive to the US which is responsible for Germany’s security. And so forth. Keeping Ukraine in the fight is far, far cheaper. You don’t need to pay western soldiers to be ready to repel an invasion, Ukrainians are doing it for free. It saves a colossal deployment and the associated costs. Javelins aren’t that cheap but again, we’d have to buy them anyway. Enough to defend Poland from the Russian tanks. Every javelin you give to Ukraine is one less you need to give Poland. Additionally the military industrial complex needs demand, whether or not there is a war. Militaries commission all this stuff and the price per unit goes down significantly as the number of units purchased increases. My expectation is that for the west the cost of defending Ukraine is substantially lower than the cost of not defending Ukraine. The Ukrainians are doing for free what the west would otherwise have to pay for. The cost of keeping Ukraine in the fight is not a factor, there is a 0% chance that the west decides it would be cheaper to let Ukraine fall.
Well, your reasoning raises even more questions. US Army has enough M1s just in storage to reequip Ukraine tank formations three times from scratch.
https://armscontrolcenter.org/fact-sheet-m1-abrams-tank/
I wonder why only old pieces of junk that have seen Vietnam war were sent in terms of armor support?
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/17/russia-ukraine-war-summary-of-weapons-us-has-given-to-ukraine.html#:~:text=The U.S. has committed hundreds,mm howitzers around the battlefield.
And my point about 4(!) HIMARS (out of 370 US has, and I'm not even including a thousand M270s here) still stands.
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United States43953 Posts
On June 19 2022 06:02 Ardias wrote:Show nested quote +On June 19 2022 05:29 KwarK wrote:On June 18 2022 18:40 Ardias wrote:On June 18 2022 02:20 Mohdoo wrote:
A couple questions if people don't mind answering:
1) How is Russia making gains when the entire world is arming Ukraine? Are countries just giving Ukraine tiny bits of military stuff?
2) If countries are being really stingy with what they give Ukraine, are they trying to drag out the war to bleed Russia dry? It feels like the weapons and aid being given to Ukraine is entirely useless if Ukraine just ends up losing. So if countries are choosing to give Ukraine less than they could, what is the value of giving anything at all if Ukraine just keeps losing territory?
3) Is it possible that the west is basically just trying to make Russia think they have a chance of success, only to up their aid later on, and basically leave Russia in shambles? It is hard to understand the logic at play with how much countries are willing to help, but not enough to actually prevent land from being lost.
4) More generally speaking, is Russia doing a really good job right now, or am I missing something? In spite of everything against them, continuing to gain ground seems really impressive. But maybe I am just not understanding the actual extent of aid. Do we have a good understanding of Russian vs Western costs/losses? Is Russia just more efficient? 1) Western support, in fact, is much less than expected. I can understand, why supplies at first days were small - everyone was in shock, and thought Ukraine will fall within a week. I can undersrand why supplies at first weeks consisted only of small arms, body armor, anti-tank and anti-air man-portable weapons - they require the least time to train and much easier to maintain, than vehicles. But now, when it is clear than war will drag on for months, if not years, heavy equipment should definetly be on the books, but I don't see huge numbers of it. I mean, 4 HIMARS from US, when they have around 1400 MLRS systems? https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/us-to-provide-4-himars-systems-to-ukraine-in-latest-700m-arms-package/I believe this chart was posted here already, but still https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/ve6drb/committed_vs_delivered_weapons_to_ukraine/Counting stuff that was actually delievered, we see Poland on par with US, Czech on par with Germany, and Latvia/Estonia above(!) France/Italy. 2) I believe that countries sending aid are not united in their purpose. Eastern european countries want to kill as many Ruskies as possible as well as demand supply of modern equipment from other NATO countries in exchange for their active contribution to the conflict. For example: https://www.thefirstnews.com/article/poland-hopes-germany-will-replace-tanks-given-to-ukraine-30573https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-jets-slovakia-idINL2N2W91BVFrance and Germany are much less eager to do so, since it will be them who has to spend money on actual production of weaponry, plus as the economy leaders of the EU, they care less about destroying Russia, whatever it takes, and more about keeping their economy alive, so they are more eager to sue for peace and ease of sanctions, even if it means territorial losses for Ukraine. Italy seem not to be ager about this war at all, looking at public polls. https://ecfr.eu/publication/peace-versus-justice-the-coming-european-split-over-the-war-in-ukraine/Small EU countries just deliver what they can I suppose, since they sold out or scrapped a lot of their stuff after the end of Cold War. What's with UK and US - I'm not too sure, probably guys from there will explain better. But 108 M777, 200 old M113 and 4 HIMARS from US, when they have hundreds Bradleys, M1s, M109s, M270s? Come on. I understand preserving of weapons for yourself is important in case of war, but when one of your two biggest potential enemies is engaged in a full-scale war with third country, it seems strange not to support that country with every means possible. UK is also one of the main advocates of "fighting till the end", but they aren't that fast with supplies. Those AS-90 they talked about for so long only now seems to be shipped to Poland for training of the Ukrainian troops. https://thenortheastaffairs.com/uk-to-supply-ukraine-with-20-as90-howitzers-45000-shells-next-week/3) I probably answered that a bit in point 2), but will say again that countries providing aid look at this war differently and have different goals. Eastern Europe is geniuenly interested in crushing Russian Army; Germany, France and Italy seem to be reluctant about even inderect participation in this war, and just want to save face and show participation, UK and US seem eager to bleed Russia dry, but not with spending too much money doing so. 4) Gains are not significant, since Ukrainian army outnumbers Russian 3-to-1 or so (politico article states 330 000 Russian soldiers directly or indirectly participating in Ukraine war) https://www.politico.com/newsletters/national-security-daily/2022/06/16/outgunned-outmanned-outnumbered-outplanned-00040024and leader of Zelenskiys' political party and his advisor David Arakhamia claimed that 1 million people was mobilized in Ukraine army https://www.axios.com/2022/06/15/ukraine-1000-casualties-day-donbas-arakhamiaPlus Russia had lost a lot of infantry during the last four months, so now Russian Army changed tactics, and advances slowly, but methodically, preferring to spend shells and time, rather than manpower. Ukrainians, on the other hand, have a lot of men, but severely lacking heavy equipment and ammo (they literally almost ran out of 152-mm shells), and they have little to no domestic production remaining (especially in terms of ammo), so now they rely more and more on Western support (which I talked about above). I think it’s worth remembering that the military aid effectively costs Europe and the US nothing. If Russia absorbed Ukraine there would be a need for a very expensive deployment to Poland with lots of expensive toys to match Russian capabilities. We would need to buy all the same equipment anyway and would also need to pay lots of people to go to Poland and hold it. Ukraine falling would be very expensive for Germany in terms of how it impacts their national security and the related necessary expenses. It’d be very expensive to the US which is responsible for Germany’s security. And so forth. Keeping Ukraine in the fight is far, far cheaper. You don’t need to pay western soldiers to be ready to repel an invasion, Ukrainians are doing it for free. It saves a colossal deployment and the associated costs. Javelins aren’t that cheap but again, we’d have to buy them anyway. Enough to defend Poland from the Russian tanks. Every javelin you give to Ukraine is one less you need to give Poland. Additionally the military industrial complex needs demand, whether or not there is a war. Militaries commission all this stuff and the price per unit goes down significantly as the number of units purchased increases. My expectation is that for the west the cost of defending Ukraine is substantially lower than the cost of not defending Ukraine. The Ukrainians are doing for free what the west would otherwise have to pay for. The cost of keeping Ukraine in the fight is not a factor, there is a 0% chance that the west decides it would be cheaper to let Ukraine fall. Well, your reasoning raises even more questions. US Army has enough M1s just in storage to reequip Ukraine tank formations three times from scratch. https://armscontrolcenter.org/fact-sheet-m1-abrams-tank/I wonder why only old pieces of junk that have seen Vietnam war were sent in terms of armor support? https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/17/russia-ukraine-war-summary-of-weapons-us-has-given-to-ukraine.html#:~:text=The U.S. has committed hundreds,mm howitzers around the battlefield. And my point about 4(!) HIMARS (out of 370 US has, and I'm not even including a thousand M270s here) still stands.
Because they don’t want Russia to get their hands on Chobham armour. It’s a sensitive tech.
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Russian Federation618 Posts
On June 19 2022 06:16 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On June 19 2022 06:02 Ardias wrote:On June 19 2022 05:29 KwarK wrote:On June 18 2022 18:40 Ardias wrote:On June 18 2022 02:20 Mohdoo wrote:
A couple questions if people don't mind answering:
1) How is Russia making gains when the entire world is arming Ukraine? Are countries just giving Ukraine tiny bits of military stuff?
2) If countries are being really stingy with what they give Ukraine, are they trying to drag out the war to bleed Russia dry? It feels like the weapons and aid being given to Ukraine is entirely useless if Ukraine just ends up losing. So if countries are choosing to give Ukraine less than they could, what is the value of giving anything at all if Ukraine just keeps losing territory?
3) Is it possible that the west is basically just trying to make Russia think they have a chance of success, only to up their aid later on, and basically leave Russia in shambles? It is hard to understand the logic at play with how much countries are willing to help, but not enough to actually prevent land from being lost.
4) More generally speaking, is Russia doing a really good job right now, or am I missing something? In spite of everything against them, continuing to gain ground seems really impressive. But maybe I am just not understanding the actual extent of aid. Do we have a good understanding of Russian vs Western costs/losses? Is Russia just more efficient? 1) Western support, in fact, is much less than expected. I can understand, why supplies at first days were small - everyone was in shock, and thought Ukraine will fall within a week. I can undersrand why supplies at first weeks consisted only of small arms, body armor, anti-tank and anti-air man-portable weapons - they require the least time to train and much easier to maintain, than vehicles. But now, when it is clear than war will drag on for months, if not years, heavy equipment should definetly be on the books, but I don't see huge numbers of it. I mean, 4 HIMARS from US, when they have around 1400 MLRS systems? https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/us-to-provide-4-himars-systems-to-ukraine-in-latest-700m-arms-package/I believe this chart was posted here already, but still https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/ve6drb/committed_vs_delivered_weapons_to_ukraine/Counting stuff that was actually delievered, we see Poland on par with US, Czech on par with Germany, and Latvia/Estonia above(!) France/Italy. 2) I believe that countries sending aid are not united in their purpose. Eastern european countries want to kill as many Ruskies as possible as well as demand supply of modern equipment from other NATO countries in exchange for their active contribution to the conflict. For example: https://www.thefirstnews.com/article/poland-hopes-germany-will-replace-tanks-given-to-ukraine-30573https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-jets-slovakia-idINL2N2W91BVFrance and Germany are much less eager to do so, since it will be them who has to spend money on actual production of weaponry, plus as the economy leaders of the EU, they care less about destroying Russia, whatever it takes, and more about keeping their economy alive, so they are more eager to sue for peace and ease of sanctions, even if it means territorial losses for Ukraine. Italy seem not to be ager about this war at all, looking at public polls. https://ecfr.eu/publication/peace-versus-justice-the-coming-european-split-over-the-war-in-ukraine/Small EU countries just deliver what they can I suppose, since they sold out or scrapped a lot of their stuff after the end of Cold War. What's with UK and US - I'm not too sure, probably guys from there will explain better. But 108 M777, 200 old M113 and 4 HIMARS from US, when they have hundreds Bradleys, M1s, M109s, M270s? Come on. I understand preserving of weapons for yourself is important in case of war, but when one of your two biggest potential enemies is engaged in a full-scale war with third country, it seems strange not to support that country with every means possible. UK is also one of the main advocates of "fighting till the end", but they aren't that fast with supplies. Those AS-90 they talked about for so long only now seems to be shipped to Poland for training of the Ukrainian troops. https://thenortheastaffairs.com/uk-to-supply-ukraine-with-20-as90-howitzers-45000-shells-next-week/3) I probably answered that a bit in point 2), but will say again that countries providing aid look at this war differently and have different goals. Eastern Europe is geniuenly interested in crushing Russian Army; Germany, France and Italy seem to be reluctant about even inderect participation in this war, and just want to save face and show participation, UK and US seem eager to bleed Russia dry, but not with spending too much money doing so. 4) Gains are not significant, since Ukrainian army outnumbers Russian 3-to-1 or so (politico article states 330 000 Russian soldiers directly or indirectly participating in Ukraine war) https://www.politico.com/newsletters/national-security-daily/2022/06/16/outgunned-outmanned-outnumbered-outplanned-00040024and leader of Zelenskiys' political party and his advisor David Arakhamia claimed that 1 million people was mobilized in Ukraine army https://www.axios.com/2022/06/15/ukraine-1000-casualties-day-donbas-arakhamiaPlus Russia had lost a lot of infantry during the last four months, so now Russian Army changed tactics, and advances slowly, but methodically, preferring to spend shells and time, rather than manpower. Ukrainians, on the other hand, have a lot of men, but severely lacking heavy equipment and ammo (they literally almost ran out of 152-mm shells), and they have little to no domestic production remaining (especially in terms of ammo), so now they rely more and more on Western support (which I talked about above). I think it’s worth remembering that the military aid effectively costs Europe and the US nothing. If Russia absorbed Ukraine there would be a need for a very expensive deployment to Poland with lots of expensive toys to match Russian capabilities. We would need to buy all the same equipment anyway and would also need to pay lots of people to go to Poland and hold it. Ukraine falling would be very expensive for Germany in terms of how it impacts their national security and the related necessary expenses. It’d be very expensive to the US which is responsible for Germany’s security. And so forth. Keeping Ukraine in the fight is far, far cheaper. You don’t need to pay western soldiers to be ready to repel an invasion, Ukrainians are doing it for free. It saves a colossal deployment and the associated costs. Javelins aren’t that cheap but again, we’d have to buy them anyway. Enough to defend Poland from the Russian tanks. Every javelin you give to Ukraine is one less you need to give Poland. Additionally the military industrial complex needs demand, whether or not there is a war. Militaries commission all this stuff and the price per unit goes down significantly as the number of units purchased increases. My expectation is that for the west the cost of defending Ukraine is substantially lower than the cost of not defending Ukraine. The Ukrainians are doing for free what the west would otherwise have to pay for. The cost of keeping Ukraine in the fight is not a factor, there is a 0% chance that the west decides it would be cheaper to let Ukraine fall. Well, your reasoning raises even more questions. US Army has enough M1s just in storage to reequip Ukraine tank formations three times from scratch. https://armscontrolcenter.org/fact-sheet-m1-abrams-tank/I wonder why only old pieces of junk that have seen Vietnam war were sent in terms of armor support? https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/17/russia-ukraine-war-summary-of-weapons-us-has-given-to-ukraine.html#:~:text=The U.S. has committed hundreds,mm howitzers around the battlefield. And my point about 4(!) HIMARS (out of 370 US has, and I'm not even including a thousand M270s here) still stands. Because they don’t want Russia to get their hands on Chobham armour. It’s a sensitive tech.
I think Russia can get this info from Iran anyway
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/2018/02/08/nine-abrams-tanks-fell-into-the-hands-of-iranian-backed-militias-during-anti-isis-fight/
But still, I guess preserving a know-how from early 80-s is more important than keeping Ukraine alive.
And it doesn't answer the reason about lack of artillery deliveries. Even old M198 from storage would suffice, Ukrainians are not too picky at this point.
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I'm not sure but I think I'm not the only one who doesn't understand the focus on the whole potential famine thing. My impression is that it's a topic that's for some reason way more important to North American posters than euros.
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If ukraine can’t ship food, doesn’t that mean famine? Or is there a detail I am missing?
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Poland is literally the first customer for all the food Ukraine has planted and won't be able to ship South. If anyone in the world should be worried about the famines and wants to help/take advantage it would be Poland who could ship it up to Gdansk.
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The thing that makes me shrug off the famine thing is that if that were ever at risk of actually taking place, the US would be sending a fleet of planes to clean the situation up.
Nukes or famine, its all the same. Once Russia is choosing to basically burn the world down, there is no reason not to engage militarily.
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United States43953 Posts
Famine is like any other supply/demand situation, whoever has the least money goes without. The US and Europe will tolerate famine as a consequence of the war because it will not be within their borders. I think they’re right to do so, the argument that they’re prolonging the conflict by fighting it doesn’t really follow, 100% of the blame for prolonging the conflict has to rest with Russia who could stop at any time. But the acceptability of famine to the US does depend on who is going hungry.
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On June 19 2022 09:48 Sermokala wrote:
Poland is literally the first customer for all the food Ukraine has planted and won't be able to ship South. If anyone in the world should be worried about the famines and wants to help/take advantage it would be Poland who could ship it up to Gdansk.
It's actually Romanian ports because UA mostly shipped to countries on the Mediterranian, so you don't want to sail around Europe. But the bottle-neck is the same: UA uses different rail width than Poland and Romania, so all wagons need to be switched at the border. This takes a long time and reduces volume immensely.
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Its honestly wild to remember that Russia could have just not done any of this and everything would have been fine. It is very frustrating. They had no incentive to do this. Imagine if none of this happened. Sigh.
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On June 19 2022 13:57 Mohdoo wrote:
The thing that makes me shrug off the famine thing is that if that were ever at risk of actually taking place, the US would be sending a fleet of planes to clean the situation up.
Nukes or famine, its all the same. Once Russia is choosing to basically burn the world down, there is no reason not to engage militarily.
You can't ship grain by plane. We're talking a product in the tens of millions of tonnes. Product that would have to run on train lines through a space that Russia can just send down a missle to destroy. I have no idea if the train lines are even still intact at this point. Russia was happy to send rockets at train stations filled with civilians, what are they willing to do to traincars and grain silos?
This isn't an immediate issue for the US and Europe. We're both going to be just fine, what everyone should be worried about is the middle east and Africa's fragile governments collpaseing due to a lack of a food.
If you thought inflation on food was bad now just wait until there isn't enough in the world to go around.
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On June 19 2022 14:27 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On June 19 2022 13:57 Mohdoo wrote:
The thing that makes me shrug off the famine thing is that if that were ever at risk of actually taking place, the US would be sending a fleet of planes to clean the situation up.
Nukes or famine, its all the same. Once Russia is choosing to basically burn the world down, there is no reason not to engage militarily. You can't ship grain by plane. We're talking a product in the tens of millions of tonnes. Product that would have to run on train lines through a space that Russia can just send down a missle to destroy. I have no idea if the train lines are even still intact at this point. Russia was happy to send rockets at train stations filled with civilians, what are they willing to do to traincars and grain silos? This isn't an immediate issue for the US and Europe. We're both going to be just fine, what everyone should be worried about is the middle east and Africa's fragile governments collpaseing due to a lack of a food. If you thought inflation on food was bad now just wait until there isn't enough in the world to go around.
The US might see reduced selection available at shops but they are a net exporter. Thus will have enough food even if a few million in Africa die.
Using trains (which lack capacity and get bombed) to go northwest to then connect to boats that has a longer journey. Vs going south to a boat with a short route... Even if you get it all up to the northwest, how would you have enough boats with the added transport distance?
If you focus the boats on the food then global transport costs will go up, driving inflation even more than currently.
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On June 19 2022 14:13 Mohdoo wrote:
Its honestly wild to remember that Russia could have just not done any of this and everything would have been fine. It is very frustrating. They had no incentive to do this. Imagine if none of this happened. Sigh.
Yeah, that is the stupid thing.
Imagine this year, but Russia just doesn't invade. Everything is better for everyone involved, including Russia. And this result was fucking obvious.
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On June 19 2022 18:05 Simberto wrote:Show nested quote +On June 19 2022 14:13 Mohdoo wrote:
Its honestly wild to remember that Russia could have just not done any of this and everything would have been fine. It is very frustrating. They had no incentive to do this. Imagine if none of this happened. Sigh. Yeah, that is the stupid thing. Imagine this year, but Russia just doesn't invade. Everything is better for everyone involved, including Russia. And this result was fucking obvious.
The funny thing is that life if better even for Putin himself if he doesn't do shit. Imagine being this level of egomaniac shithead and having to meet some foreign president he doesn't respect 5 times and pretend you are hear to discuss.
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On June 19 2022 18:05 Simberto wrote:Show nested quote +On June 19 2022 14:13 Mohdoo wrote:
Its honestly wild to remember that Russia could have just not done any of this and everything would have been fine. It is very frustrating. They had no incentive to do this. Imagine if none of this happened. Sigh. Yeah, that is the stupid thing. Imagine this year, but Russia just doesn't invade. Everything is better for everyone involved, including Russia. And this result was fucking obvious.
With 20/20 hindsight, absolutely. And imho it was clear in advance as well, but Putin had surrounded himself with his own web of misinformation that convinced him that Ukraine was just going to collapse. It was going to be a quick in and out to accomplish regime change in Kiev. The whole drawn out campaign in the Donbas is what happened when that offensive hopelessly failed.
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It always seem obvious in hindsight, but the one certain fact of war is uncertaincy. I remember the first 48 hours of this war and it did look like Ukraine was going to capitulate. War is not a game of chess. It is easy to say it was clear that Putin could not achive any of his aims, whatever it may be in invading Ukraine, but we still don't know if this situation is preferable to Putin than to not invade, we do not know what would had happened if the invasion was launched earlier, or if American intelligence was not heeded in time and in scale.
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On June 19 2022 14:27 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On June 19 2022 13:57 Mohdoo wrote:
The thing that makes me shrug off the famine thing is that if that were ever at risk of actually taking place, the US would be sending a fleet of planes to clean the situation up.
Nukes or famine, its all the same. Once Russia is choosing to basically burn the world down, there is no reason not to engage militarily. You can't ship grain by plane. We're talking a product in the tens of millions of tonnes. Product that would have to run on train lines through a space that Russia can just send down a missle to destroy. I have no idea if the train lines are even still intact at this point. Russia was happy to send rockets at train stations filled with civilians, what are they willing to do to traincars and grain silos? This isn't an immediate issue for the US and Europe. We're both going to be just fine, what everyone should be worried about is the middle east and Africa's fragile governments collpaseing due to a lack of a food. If you thought inflation on food was bad now just wait until there isn't enough in the world to go around.
I meant sending military planes, bombers, and wiping out Russia’s entire occupation. Im saying the world is holding back a lot so as not to risk major confrontation, but once food supply is at risk, there’s a lot less to lose.
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On June 18 2022 18:06 xM(Z wrote:Show nested quote +On June 18 2022 13:14 KwarK wrote:On June 18 2022 13:02 xM(Z wrote:On June 18 2022 12:49 JimmiC wrote:On June 18 2022 12:41 xM(Z wrote:On June 18 2022 06:27 Gorsameth wrote:
I disagree that it is inevitable that Ukraine loses Donbas. Russia is making no progress and can't keep this up forever. Ukraine with western aid can outlast Russia in material, tho manpower might be the bigger issue. there is no western aid given to Ukraine that would make them win the war. Bold statement, do you have absolutely any proof or at least can you explain your reasoning preferably with a few facts to back it up? to me that conclusion was a given, from what i read since the invasion started i didn't see any other way it'll end. i don't have links prepared/at hand, but a random google search https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2022/06/what-west-has-given-not-enough-win-ukraine-says/367740/ , https://www.newsweek.com/zelensky-advisor-reveals-weapons-ukraine-needs-win-war-russia-1715133 “We need to liberate our land as soon as possible. To do that, we need heavy weapons, primarily MLRS [Multiple Launch Rocket Systems]. We also need artillery tanks, aviation, anti-ship complexes, new UAVs, anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense systems. We need them fast. We need them in the numbers matching the scope of the challenge we face,” said Reznikov, appearing via video link from Ukraine at the GLOBSEC Bratislava Forum. from the later Ukrainian presidential adviser and peace talks negotiator on Monday revealed the weapons Ukraine needs to end the war against Russia, as fighting intensifies in Ukraine's east.
"Being straightforward—to end the war we need heavy weapons parity," Mykhailo Podolyak said on Twitter Monday morning.
To bring an end to the conflict, Ukraine needs 1,000 howitzers caliber 155 mm, 300 MLRS (M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System), 500 tanks, 2,000 armored vehicles, and 1,000 drones, Podolyak added.
Podolyak also added that the "Contact Group of Defense Ministers meeting is held in #Brussels on June 15. We are waiting for a decision. and you sent them what?, maybe 30ish howitzers and several drones? ... You’re conflating what they’re saying they need to bring about a rapid conclusion to the conflict with what they need to win it. They’re saying they could end it if they had the things on their wishlist, not that they can’t possibly end it if they didn’t. The wishlist would give them more military hardware than any nation but the United States. They’re already holding their own with what they’ve received and there is a significant delay between the agreement to send aid and it being in service. Moving 500 tanks, plus their entire supply chain, to the front line would take months. Training and placing them into service would take longer still. The military aid is happening, but it doesn’t happen overnight. Ukraine is currently wiping out the Russian army (albeit in a war of attrition) with the weapons pledged months ago. Next month they’ll be turning the tide with the weapons pledged last month. The month after they’ll be crushing with the weapons pledged this month. Harpoons were pledged a while ago and yesterday morning we saw their first use sinking a Russian ship. These things take time. i read that and said to myself: "sure, hope should die last but ...", but the reality of it is that the 'aid' for Ukraine is trickling slow enough to make it useless(and it's not what's needed there), and on the ground russians are winning. you, pointing to moral boosting, single/rare/isolated incidents to score winning points, shows me the disconnect between people(western) perception and facts on the ground. in what universe do you see russians admitting defeat, signing capitulation treaties, then leaving?. Edit: maybe to clarify - there isn't a weapon Ukraine received that the russians don't have a better counter-weapon to. you send them bullets and guns, russians pull machine guns; you send machine guns russians pull out mortars; you send mortars, russians are pulling out tanks, and so on and so forth.
Russians haven't been using tanks effectively, they've been losing them at an alarming rate
https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html
Tanks (785, of which destroyed: 443, damaged: 22, abandoned: 49, captured: 252)
That's ridiculous, since that's just ones that we have photo evidence of. Some tank behind the front lines we won't see a picture of until Ukraine reclaims that territory. Most likely over 1000 lost by now.
Total equipment lost:
Russia - 4356, of which: destroyed: 2598, damaged: 82, abandoned: 321, captured: 1355
Basically Russia is running out of modern equipment, and older stuff is going into combat which is less combat effective, worse maintained, etc.
Ukraine only needs a few hundred pieces of heavy equipment from the West to get an upper hand, since it will be several times more effective
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EPT
