RE: Russian lawmakers authorize Putin to use military force outside the country, Part II
09-13-2022, 04:07 AM
09-13-2022, 04:07 AM
Yeah, ISW's main site understandingwar.org was down yesterday, but their backup iswresearch.org was available, since it's a Blogger (Google). My favorite phrase from yesterday's report:
Most of the "news" today has been highly unconfirmed, and I would not be surprised if a lot of it was Ukraine psy-ops. A quick sample of these questionable takes:
-- Kherson army leaders begin negotiations to surrender
-- Russia has decided not to send any additional units into Ukraine, even those fully formed (according to UAF)
-- Russians have run so far from Kharkiv that they ran back into Russia
-- Mass surrender of Russians on front lines near Kherson
-- Ukraine has captured more than one Russian general
Now, any or all of those might be true, but they might all be false rumors as well. Rumors intended to further break Russian morale. Historically, wars aren't won by killing the enemy, but by crushing the morale of the opposing army. Suffice to say that Russian morale is low, and with untrained recruits being sent in with no bonds of brotherhood with their units, morale has a pretty low upper bound here. If I was going to start rumors to drain morale, ones that suggest your country has abandoned you and everyone else is surrendering are the kinds of things I'd say. But I'm no Dnipro Rose.
-- A month or less until mud season starts. Hopefully gains will continue for Ukraine until then.
-- New Rector of Kherson State University is hospitalized after a bomb explodes in her house. Students opposed to collaborative learning. All as foretold by Alice Cooper.
-- Interviews with POWs have been interesting:
-- -- Russian seaman got a week of tank training, sent to the field.
-- -- Russian tanker explains how some of the tanks could move but not shoot, while other tanks could shoot but not move. Is this how combined arms works?
-- Ukraine has regained 6000 km² of territory in the past two weeks.
-- Ukraine finds stockpiles of ammunition and equipment in Kharkiv oblast. We assume the high tech stuff is heading back to NATO-land to be analyzed, while the older, common stuff will be fixed and used. And the soviet shells will go in the soviet artillery.
When this war ends, the old Eastern Bloc war equipment will be essentially worn out. Eastern Europe gave it to Ukraine as a way of getting rid of it while helping those who trained on the equipment. They are already upgrading to new and NATO-standard equipment; Ukraine will upgrade after the war. For now, it's nice to get free ammunition from Russians, but it would be even better to rely on American logistics to deliver massive stockpiles in the same time it takes to get an order from Amazon Prime. NATO membership and EU membership will absolutely come after this war, barring the low, low chance of nuclear winter.
It's hard to say what outcome I really want from the war. Ukraine should go back to its pre-2014 boundaries, that's for sure. Russia should return all citizens of Ukraine, including the ones "filtered" into the ground. I don't much believe in war reparations, doubly so because the only way Russia could pay for them is fossil fuels. Of course the Kurils should return to Japan. I wouldn't mind Karelia being returned to Finland, but I doubt they want all of the Russians who live there now. Oh, and of course, war crimes trials in The Hague.
As a person, I'd like to see the Russian Empire broken up. It's not a monolithic evil empire. And not just obvious places like Chechnya. There are Bashkir, Nogai, Circassians, Tatars, Ainu, Tuvans... there are over a hundred ethnicities in Russia, and you can tell from this war how they are still subjugated by the Muscovites. Imagine if these peoples could have their own country back after so long? It would be nice... but also open things up to Chinese influence. Europe has survived with smaller states, but these are developed and densely populated, and now unified. Could it work out there as a confederation rather than a Muscovite-controlled empire? I suppose these arguments against are much like pro-colonialist arguments -- better to decolonize Asia and see what happens.
Quote:Supporting Effort #1- Kharkiv City (Russian objective: Prevent Ukrainian forces from reaching the Russian border)
Note: The successful Ukrainian counter-offensive in Kharkiv Oblast has rendered this section unnecessary. It will not appear in future updates
Most of the "news" today has been highly unconfirmed, and I would not be surprised if a lot of it was Ukraine psy-ops. A quick sample of these questionable takes:
-- Kherson army leaders begin negotiations to surrender
-- Russia has decided not to send any additional units into Ukraine, even those fully formed (according to UAF)
-- Russians have run so far from Kharkiv that they ran back into Russia
-- Mass surrender of Russians on front lines near Kherson
-- Ukraine has captured more than one Russian general
Now, any or all of those might be true, but they might all be false rumors as well. Rumors intended to further break Russian morale. Historically, wars aren't won by killing the enemy, but by crushing the morale of the opposing army. Suffice to say that Russian morale is low, and with untrained recruits being sent in with no bonds of brotherhood with their units, morale has a pretty low upper bound here. If I was going to start rumors to drain morale, ones that suggest your country has abandoned you and everyone else is surrendering are the kinds of things I'd say. But I'm no Dnipro Rose.
-- A month or less until mud season starts. Hopefully gains will continue for Ukraine until then.
-- New Rector of Kherson State University is hospitalized after a bomb explodes in her house. Students opposed to collaborative learning. All as foretold by Alice Cooper.
-- Interviews with POWs have been interesting:
-- -- Russian seaman got a week of tank training, sent to the field.
-- -- Russian tanker explains how some of the tanks could move but not shoot, while other tanks could shoot but not move. Is this how combined arms works?
-- Ukraine has regained 6000 km² of territory in the past two weeks.
-- Ukraine finds stockpiles of ammunition and equipment in Kharkiv oblast. We assume the high tech stuff is heading back to NATO-land to be analyzed, while the older, common stuff will be fixed and used. And the soviet shells will go in the soviet artillery.
When this war ends, the old Eastern Bloc war equipment will be essentially worn out. Eastern Europe gave it to Ukraine as a way of getting rid of it while helping those who trained on the equipment. They are already upgrading to new and NATO-standard equipment; Ukraine will upgrade after the war. For now, it's nice to get free ammunition from Russians, but it would be even better to rely on American logistics to deliver massive stockpiles in the same time it takes to get an order from Amazon Prime. NATO membership and EU membership will absolutely come after this war, barring the low, low chance of nuclear winter.
It's hard to say what outcome I really want from the war. Ukraine should go back to its pre-2014 boundaries, that's for sure. Russia should return all citizens of Ukraine, including the ones "filtered" into the ground. I don't much believe in war reparations, doubly so because the only way Russia could pay for them is fossil fuels. Of course the Kurils should return to Japan. I wouldn't mind Karelia being returned to Finland, but I doubt they want all of the Russians who live there now. Oh, and of course, war crimes trials in The Hague.
As a person, I'd like to see the Russian Empire broken up. It's not a monolithic evil empire. And not just obvious places like Chechnya. There are Bashkir, Nogai, Circassians, Tatars, Ainu, Tuvans... there are over a hundred ethnicities in Russia, and you can tell from this war how they are still subjugated by the Muscovites. Imagine if these peoples could have their own country back after so long? It would be nice... but also open things up to Chinese influence. Europe has survived with smaller states, but these are developed and densely populated, and now unified. Could it work out there as a confederation rather than a Muscovite-controlled empire? I suppose these arguments against are much like pro-colonialist arguments -- better to decolonize Asia and see what happens.
"Kitto daijoubu da yo." - Sakura Kinomoto