quote:
I find it both interesting and sad that almost everyone in this massive thread cannot set aside their own biases and emotions and analyze this war from a purely objective and neutral standpoint.

Here is the reality: there are a number of people in this thread that follow the conflict enough to have gained a meta-level view of both the strategic and tactical landscape, though the latter is much more difficult to keep a grasp on. Over the last 10 months many of those people have learned who has the correct info and who produces the correct conclusions from the info. Each of the commentators and OSINT aggregators and general military men have had 100s of times to be right are wrong. It has become clear the pro-Russian information conduits have been wrong far more than they have been right. Most of them even inside Russia have changed their tune to be more in line with what is actually occurring. There are still outliers and of course my favorite band of gypsies on Russian state TV who valiantly go against the grain most of the time. When someone comes in and quotes one of the clear outliers they are met with a cold reception. The primary reason is they aren't attempting to have their finger on the pulse they are just running to quote something that represents Russia in a good light. The wins for Russia have been few and far between.

I get the non-interventionists and I get those that are against foreign aid absolutely that is fine. I think the first is impossible if you are us and want to remain us and the latter probably is also true for the same reasons. We don't pay to sit at the table we pay to own the table and choose where each one sits.

In the end the posters in this thread have been right FAR more than they have been wrong, either by luck or better filtering of information. My point is if an alien came to earth and analyzed this war from a purely objective sense they would have been seen the same things the general timbre of this thread has been espousing. When a cadre continues to be significantly more accurate than those with the counterpoint I think it is smart to give those opinions more deference or you get stuck holding onto the three-day war, Russia will never give up Kherson and the world will starve and freeze to death by the end of November 2022. It is hard to argue this thread has been more accurate than not regarding the ebb and flow of this war, it is either by blind luck or better use of the available information. So, yes, when a drive-by poster comes in and throws out an opinion that is contrary to the current OSINT then they will be treated as an outlier because in the end many here have already filtered through that noise and latched onto a more likely signal. People have been shitting on the ability of this thread to focus through the fog of war from the very first day and time and time again it has proven itself.

Finally, so many times when someone lobs a grenade into the thread that information has already been digested and discussed days before.