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United States42687 Posts
On August 18 2023 01:31 GreenHorizons wrote:Ukraine is remarkably corrupt. Firing all the regional military recruiters has got to put a cramp in Ukraine's ability to replace casualties on the front. Paying off oligarchs isn't cheap, and it's unclear just how much of the aid sent to Ukraine is being pocketed by their oligarchs. If we just presume the overt 10% kickbacks mentioned in the article (can be applied to all aid), that's almost the equivalent of the entire $20 billion Joe Biden recently asked to send. Could very well be more than that though. Show nested quote +WASHINGTON — Just last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy fired all two dozen regional military recruiters. Investigators found they were coming up with bogus documents to show a potential recruit was unfit for military duty. The price? $10,00 each.
And a few days later, the New York Times reported that a Ukrainian weapons dealer was inflating prices. This follows the dismissal of the chair of Ukraine's Supreme Court in May after being accused of taking millions of dollars in bribes. And before that Zelenskyy removed six deputy ministers and five regional administrators on charges of – you guessed it – corruption.
That's not all. Last fall the U.S. Agency for International Development's Dekeleptification Guide reported that costs for large scale state construction projects in Ukraine are inflated by 30 percent, including 10 percent kickbacks for government officials and their friends.
None of this comes as a surprise to Transparency International, which tracks corruption in government. It lists Ukraine as the second most corrupt state in Europe – after Russia. www.npr.org
Fortunately we’re not paying for large scale construction projects, we’re providing fully depreciated military hardware.
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United States42687 Posts
Does anyone remember what happened last time a fascist dictator tried to blitzkrieg Eastern Europe and then Britain/US armed the fuck out of the nation being invaded? As I recall it looked a little bit grim for a bit but ultimately the industrial power of the west was undeniable.
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On August 18 2023 01:48 ZeroByte13 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 01:44 Excludos wrote:
Thank god Russia is such an uncorrupt country Who said that? The excerpt GH included literally says Ukraine is 2nd most corrupt state with Russia being the most corrupt one. Or is this an example of whataboutism that everyone usually condemns here, as in "Yeah but what about Russia?"
The whataboutism is keep harping on Ukraine's corruption (Which isn't a secret, sure), and continuously claiming how it's ruining the war for them, while omitting anything about Russia's corruption, which is much much much worse. Ukraine has corruption. Russia IS corruption, from the ground to the top. The two doesn't even compare. The (previously) second biggest army in the world literally failed to invade a small country because of their rampant corruption on every level. This isn't whataboutism, it's "learn to look inwards first"-ism
It's the same shit you guys do every time you bring up "Nazism in Ukraine". Yes, it exists, but it's not remotely on the same level as Nazism in Russia
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I love how after all the anti reform reforms gh has been chirping for the moment he sees it in public he validated everything people said to him about them. Dude looks at a radical anti corruption initiative and thinks its proof that the country is iredemably corrupt.
It's something to celebrate and something gh should logically support but the moment it benifits imperialism gh just throws all that out the window.
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On August 18 2023 05:56 Excludos wrote:
It's the same shit you guys do every time you bring up "Nazism in Ukraine". Yes, it exists, but it's not remotely on the same level as Nazism in Russia "You guys?"
In 500+ pages of this thread, did I ever say a single word about Nazism in Ukraine? o_O
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On August 18 2023 07:18 ZeroByte13 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 05:56 Excludos wrote:
It's the same shit you guys do every time you bring up "Nazism in Ukraine". Yes, it exists, but it's not remotely on the same level as Nazism in Russia " You guys?" In 500+ pages of this thread, did I ever say a single word about Nazism in Ukraine? o_O
My apologies. I thought I was still replying to GreenHorizons
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Moscow is reportedly under another Drone attack.
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On August 18 2023 06:16 Sermokala wrote:
I love how after all the anti reform reforms gh has been chirping for the moment he sees it in public he validated everything people said to him about them. Dude looks at a radical anti corruption initiative and thinks its proof that the country is iredemably corrupt.
It's something to celebrate and something gh should logically support but the moment it benifits imperialism gh just throws all that out the window.
I think the Ukraine needs to remain a bit corrupt for the west to continue to support it. The support isn't really organic, its top-down western politicians worrying about having their side gigs being cut off. In the early 2000s the same politicians were all gung ho about Russia, also because of the opportunities for "business."
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Russian Federation610 Posts
On August 18 2023 05:50 KwarK wrote:
Does anyone remember what happened last time a fascist dictator tried to blitzkrieg Eastern Europe and then Britain/US armed the fuck out of the nation being invaded? As I recall it looked a little bit grim for a bit but ultimately the industrial power of the west was undeniable.
Well, except that
1) US/UK were direct participants of this war, bringing all their power to even the odds;
2) US/UK were at the state of mobilization and war economy;
3) UK had all their colonies and dominions to draw resources and manpower from;
4) nation being invaded had superiority over invaders in terms of manpower and natural resources;
5) nation being invaded had it's own formidable military industry;
6) invading nation was in complete naval blockade.
None of these points check for this conflict.
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On August 18 2023 03:00 CuddlyCuteKitten wrote:The posts below (with the Russian perspective) are interesting because it allows a clear demonstration about how the same situation is viewed very differently depending on which source you listen too. Read some Ukrainian sources and they would say the following: Why: it's to hard to breach the heavily fortified defensive lines head on without overwhelming air support and massed forces only invite the enemy to commit artillery and air power which causes heavy losses, with little or no gain. Further exacerbated by western training being to short and not adapted to the reality of the situation in Ukraine and the fact that most of the troops had no prior combat experience. What's next: Current strategy (according to the "analysts") is instead to use small units (sometimes supported by limited armour) after (drone)recon and artillery attacks. This is more like the fighting that Wagner and the 3rd separate assault brigade (aka the brigade formerly known as Asov) use. But instead of digging in when they hit resistance they pull back if it's to fierce. The primary goal is favourable conditions for counter battery fire and taking ground is only the secondary goal. If the enemy counterattacks they often pull back. In order to remedy the problem with inexperienced units and get experience fighting in the correct environment smaller parts of different units are now rotated in which would explain why you see smaller parts of the 82nd being activated for example. The idea being that you can't make a breakthrough unless the enemy is depleted so focus primarily on taking out artillery and making tactical gains where you can while taking as few casualties as possible in the process. Worth pointing out that this kind of tactics would not work if the primary trench line were manned by more than skeleton crews but both sides have wisely understood that stuffing the trenches is an even worse idea.
Yes but that's all tactics and I meant the wider strategic picture.
It doesn't necessarily matter if the problems are caused by mines, trenches, helicopters or lack of munitions - this should have been largely predicted at the planning stages.
When you miss your objectives by this much there is something fundamentally wrong with your estimations.
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On August 18 2023 11:32 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 06:16 Sermokala wrote:
I love how after all the anti reform reforms gh has been chirping for the moment he sees it in public he validated everything people said to him about them. Dude looks at a radical anti corruption initiative and thinks its proof that the country is iredemably corrupt.
It's something to celebrate and something gh should logically support but the moment it benifits imperialism gh just throws all that out the window. I think the Ukraine needs to remain a bit corrupt for the west to continue to support it. The support isn't really organic, its top-down western politicians worrying about having their side gigs being cut off. In the early 2000s the same politicians were all gung ho about Russia, also because of the opportunities for "business."
What side gigs?
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Russian Federation240 Posts
On August 18 2023 14:33 pmp10 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 03:00 CuddlyCuteKitten wrote:The posts below (with the Russian perspective) are interesting because it allows a clear demonstration about how the same situation is viewed very differently depending on which source you listen too. Read some Ukrainian sources and they would say the following: Why: it's to hard to breach the heavily fortified defensive lines head on without overwhelming air support and massed forces only invite the enemy to commit artillery and air power which causes heavy losses, with little or no gain. Further exacerbated by western training being to short and not adapted to the reality of the situation in Ukraine and the fact that most of the troops had no prior combat experience. What's next: Current strategy (according to the "analysts") is instead to use small units (sometimes supported by limited armour) after (drone)recon and artillery attacks. This is more like the fighting that Wagner and the 3rd separate assault brigade (aka the brigade formerly known as Asov) use. But instead of digging in when they hit resistance they pull back if it's to fierce. The primary goal is favourable conditions for counter battery fire and taking ground is only the secondary goal. If the enemy counterattacks they often pull back. In order to remedy the problem with inexperienced units and get experience fighting in the correct environment smaller parts of different units are now rotated in which would explain why you see smaller parts of the 82nd being activated for example. The idea being that you can't make a breakthrough unless the enemy is depleted so focus primarily on taking out artillery and making tactical gains where you can while taking as few casualties as possible in the process. Worth pointing out that this kind of tactics would not work if the primary trench line were manned by more than skeleton crews but both sides have wisely understood that stuffing the trenches is an even worse idea. Yes but that's all tactics and I meant the wider strategic picture. It doesn't necessarily matter if the problems are caused by mines, trenches, helicopters or lack of munitions - this should have been largely predicted at the planning stages. When you miss your objectives by this much there is something fundamentally wrong with your estimations.
-thats because these estimates in fact were a "fake it till you make it" thing, coordinated among all the major media. This is what a government does, when it wants the society to do something; in this particular case - accept further escalation of the war.
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On August 18 2023 15:16 a_ch wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 14:33 pmp10 wrote:On August 18 2023 03:00 CuddlyCuteKitten wrote:The posts below (with the Russian perspective) are interesting because it allows a clear demonstration about how the same situation is viewed very differently depending on which source you listen too. Read some Ukrainian sources and they would say the following: Why: it's to hard to breach the heavily fortified defensive lines head on without overwhelming air support and massed forces only invite the enemy to commit artillery and air power which causes heavy losses, with little or no gain. Further exacerbated by western training being to short and not adapted to the reality of the situation in Ukraine and the fact that most of the troops had no prior combat experience. What's next: Current strategy (according to the "analysts") is instead to use small units (sometimes supported by limited armour) after (drone)recon and artillery attacks. This is more like the fighting that Wagner and the 3rd separate assault brigade (aka the brigade formerly known as Asov) use. But instead of digging in when they hit resistance they pull back if it's to fierce. The primary goal is favourable conditions for counter battery fire and taking ground is only the secondary goal. If the enemy counterattacks they often pull back. In order to remedy the problem with inexperienced units and get experience fighting in the correct environment smaller parts of different units are now rotated in which would explain why you see smaller parts of the 82nd being activated for example. The idea being that you can't make a breakthrough unless the enemy is depleted so focus primarily on taking out artillery and making tactical gains where you can while taking as few casualties as possible in the process. Worth pointing out that this kind of tactics would not work if the primary trench line were manned by more than skeleton crews but both sides have wisely understood that stuffing the trenches is an even worse idea. Yes but that's all tactics and I meant the wider strategic picture. It doesn't necessarily matter if the problems are caused by mines, trenches, helicopters or lack of munitions - this should have been largely predicted at the planning stages. When you miss your objectives by this much there is something fundamentally wrong with your estimations. -thats because these estimates in fact were a "fake it till you make it" thing, coordinated among all the major media. This is what a government does, when it wants the society to do something; in this particular case - accept further escalation of the war.
The only party escalating anything is Russia.
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Guess that makes it official. Now the question is if said countries have already been training Ukrainian pilots. Secretly of course.
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Pardon more dooming but some interesting details from WP:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/08/17/ukraine-counteroffensive-melitopol/
Joint war games conducted by the U.S., British and Ukrainian militaries anticipated such losses but envisioned Kyiv accepting the casualties as the cost of piercing through Russia’s main defensive line, said U.S. and Western officials.
But Ukraine chose to stem the losses on the battlefield and switch to a tactic of relying on smaller units to push forward across different areas of the front. That resulted in Ukraine making incremental gains in different pockets over the summer.
That might explain the critique that leaked from Germany some time ago.
Ukraine was expected to continue large scale assaults despite losses in an attempt of a breakthrough.
Quite the arrogance from NATO to say that both sides fighting for over a year are doing it wrong.
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On August 18 2023 16:39 pmp10 wrote:Pardon more dooming but some interesting details from WP: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/08/17/ukraine-counteroffensive-melitopol/Show nested quote +Joint war games conducted by the U.S., British and Ukrainian militaries anticipated such losses but envisioned Kyiv accepting the casualties as the cost of piercing through Russia’s main defensive line, said U.S. and Western officials.
But Ukraine chose to stem the losses on the battlefield and switch to a tactic of relying on smaller units to push forward across different areas of the front. That resulted in Ukraine making incremental gains in different pockets over the summer. That might explain the critique that leaked from Germany some time ago. Ukraine was expected to continue large scale assaults despite losses in an attempt of a breakthrough. Quite the arrogance from NATO to say that both sides fighting for over a year are doing it wrong.
I think it would be incredibly easy for Ukraine to make simple calculations after the first few pushes on whether their losses would be sustainable or not. Continued pushes with huge losses for little gains would be downright stupid. Ukraine isn't the red army.
Pivoting when something doesn't work out as you expected in war is a sign of intelligence, not cowardice
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On August 18 2023 11:32 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 06:16 Sermokala wrote:
I love how after all the anti reform reforms gh has been chirping for the moment he sees it in public he validated everything people said to him about them. Dude looks at a radical anti corruption initiative and thinks its proof that the country is iredemably corrupt.
It's something to celebrate and something gh should logically support but the moment it benifits imperialism gh just throws all that out the window. I think the Ukraine needs to remain a bit corrupt for the west to continue to support it. The support isn't really organic, its top-down western politicians worrying about having their side gigs being cut off. In the early 2000s the same politicians were all gung ho about Russia, also because of the opportunities for "business." Europe spend centuries at war, the era of peace we have been enjoying since WW2 has in part been attributed to increasing economic integration, you don't want to go to war with your trading partner who's goods and markets keep your own economy running and population happy.
The idea was to do the same to Russia, 'pacify' them through increased economic integration. That plan has obviously failed rather spectacularly but the reasoning behind it wasn't necessarily wrong.
Dependency on Russia wasn't a flaw, the whole point was to make both the EU and Russia more dependant on each other to prevent future conflicts.
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On August 18 2023 17:36 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 11:32 cLutZ wrote:On August 18 2023 06:16 Sermokala wrote:
I love how after all the anti reform reforms gh has been chirping for the moment he sees it in public he validated everything people said to him about them. Dude looks at a radical anti corruption initiative and thinks its proof that the country is iredemably corrupt.
It's something to celebrate and something gh should logically support but the moment it benifits imperialism gh just throws all that out the window. I think the Ukraine needs to remain a bit corrupt for the west to continue to support it. The support isn't really organic, its top-down western politicians worrying about having their side gigs being cut off. In the early 2000s the same politicians were all gung ho about Russia, also because of the opportunities for "business." Europe spend centuries at war, the era of peace we have been enjoying since WW2 has in part been attributed to increasing economic integration, you don't want to go to war with your trading partner who's goods and markets keep your own economy running and population happy. The idea was to do the same to Russia, 'pacify' them through increased economic integration. That plan has obviously failed rather spectacularly but the reasoning behind it wasn't necessarily wrong. Dependency on Russia wasn't a flaw, the whole point was to make both the EU and Russia more dependant on each other to prevent future conflicts.
Aka "Change through trade".
The WW2 comparisons that were talked about don't stick for this conflict. Russia can destroy the world by nuclear means but had a GDP somewhere between Spain and Texas before the war.
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On August 18 2023 17:34 Excludos wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2023 16:39 pmp10 wrote:Pardon more dooming but some interesting details from WP: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/08/17/ukraine-counteroffensive-melitopol/Joint war games conducted by the U.S., British and Ukrainian militaries anticipated such losses but envisioned Kyiv accepting the casualties as the cost of piercing through Russia’s main defensive line, said U.S. and Western officials.
But Ukraine chose to stem the losses on the battlefield and switch to a tactic of relying on smaller units to push forward across different areas of the front. That resulted in Ukraine making incremental gains in different pockets over the summer. That might explain the critique that leaked from Germany some time ago. Ukraine was expected to continue large scale assaults despite losses in an attempt of a breakthrough. Quite the arrogance from NATO to say that both sides fighting for over a year are doing it wrong. I think it would be incredibly easy for Ukraine to make simple calculations after the first few pushes on whether their losses would be sustainable or not. Continued pushes with huge losses for little gains would be downright stupid. Ukraine isn't the red army. Pivoting when something doesn't work out as you expected in war is a sign of intelligence, not cowardice
That's exactly right. While determination and grand strategies are very important, they don't make mine fields disappear. People can't run through a wall of fire, likewise soldiers can't run through a mine field. I think Ukrainian command has wisely picked a grinding effort over large-scale assaults.
I'd also argue that defending Bakhmut was in fact essential for Ukraine. Wagner is now out of the picture, which is a huge accomplishment, and I think they left mainly because they have nightmares of that battle. Even tough mercenaries have a psychology.
Now that Russia has strong defense lines all over Zaporizhzhia, armchair analysts are arguing that Ukraine should've chosen to incur much greater losses for faster territorial gains? That's a wee bit arrogant of a claim considering that Russian command has learned from many mistakes made in 2022, and with Russian troops now taking a much more defensive stance over an (effectively) much smaller front line.
As an armchair analyst myself, I've been saying since early 2023 that we should not expect another major offensive very soon. I argued it could be delayed until 2024, maybe even 2025 if things don't go smoothly. 2023 didn't seem all that realistic to me after the front line had condensed so much late 2022. We're less than 1/3 into that timeframe, so I think patience remains the best policy.
Just as Russia has been learning, so should Ukraine and NATO. We didn't know back in 2022 that mine clearing will become the top priority. So now it's time to adapt and shift focus to that. Lets give Ukraine the best tools to blow these mines off their land.
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EPT
