re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

quote:

---

A lot of confidence in Putin: 2%

---

quote:

---

Kazakh Crypto Miners Cut Off From Electricity Supply Until End of January
Kazakhstan's energy problem worsened on Tuesday when a major transmission line was disconnected.

---

quote:

---

It is the second month of war in Eastern Europe. Seemingly earnest negotiations are taking place in Turkey, but how can you trust a man who launched his war in the middle of a UN Security Council meeting? You can’t. This is the same man who denied he had intentions of invading Ukraine up to the last hour. The fact that there are negotiations taking place, however, is something worth being hopeful about amid deep pessimism. It means open dialogue… any dialogue. Both sides are far from anything with overlapping interest. And we’re just talking about a cease fire, not a peace treaty. That would in effect just freeze the conflict back to 2014. Zelensky has signaled that he would accept security guarantees in lieu of joining NATO. A security guarantee from Turkey, for example, could state that if either side broke a cease fire, Turkey would close the Straits. Or it could mean that a no fly-zone would be established by a neutral party if the cease fire collapsed. Putin, for his part, is claiming certain redeployments of the Russian Army from Kyiv is a ‘diplomatic withdrawal.’ US officials find this unconvincing, noting that these redeployments are only shifting Russian forces into the Donbas. Ahhh… the Donbas. Where all this started back in 2014.

So what about the Donbas? Besides ample coal reserves there are over 70 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves waiting to be tapped in the region. As time runs out for Putin and his economy, he will seek the best bargain he can by securing as much land he can. That means securing the Donbas and fleshing out the boundaries of the Lughansk and Donetsk breakaway republics. It also means securing a land bridge from the Crimea to the Donbas. Its that second desire that irritates Putin, because as long as Mariupol can hold out, he doesn’t have his land bridge to go to the bargaining table with. Putin seems to have rebuffed French President Macron’s suggestion of evacuating civilians by sea, only replying that he demands that Mariupol surrender. So the siege continues with daily, almost casual violence.

A general cease fire would be welcome, even if it solves nothing but the immediate bloodletting of soldiers and civilians alike. As long as the war continues, the problem of feeding the world becomes more problematic. With Russia and Ukraine some of the world’s largest wheat exporters, African importers will begin to feel the squeeze. This is to say nothing of the obvious crisis in energy markets. What could not be solved by a separately negotiated ceasefire is the problem of sanctions. The British PM has already stated that a ceasefire will not lift the sanctions that are crippling Russia’s economy. With the UN essentially a dead letter, it will take a Congress of Vienna moment to unscrew the world. Commercial links since severed will only atrophy with time as the war continues. Russia has just legalized “parallel imports,” a euphamism for intellectual property piracy. Russia is in the process of nationalizing hundreds of airliners leased from Western companies. These things cannot be easily undone, perhaps in some instances impossible to reverse.

To me I remain convinced that Putin has a sense of agency enough for me to call his war one of grave miscalculation, rather than one outright suggestive of nihilism and paranoia. Evidence can be seen in US reports about serious tensions with his Ministry of Defense, headed by General Sergei Shoigu, over Putin being misled about promised success and ongoing failures. If Putin truly understood the poor state of his army, then he surely would not be stupid enough to invade Poland and the Baltics. Even Belarus shows hints of civil disobedience. Lukashenko ordered a crackdown on Belarussian railway workers who have sabotaged Russian train movements through their country.

What leaves me genuinely concerned in this new phase of the war is whether Putin would prefer to lose to NATO than Ukraine. He could deem it more survivable for his regime to instigate a confrontation with NATO. Putin might find that preferable over freezing the conflict with a ceasefire, accepting a battlefield defeat at the hands of Zelensky and continuing to watch the Russian economy whither on the vine.

---

quote:

---

love tObession

Especially from a poster who still thinks muh Mueller is gonna get Trump for the Russia dossier

Good for Ukraine blowing up Russians which = im a putin puppet from the low iq Team Zalinsky

---

quote:

---

So when will ‘Potato’ hold a Ukrainian military parade in D.C.?

---

quote:

---

May Day sounds about right.

---

quote:

---

What leaves me genuinely concerned in this new phase of the war is whether Putin would prefer to lose to NATO than Ukraine. He could deem it more survivable for his regime to instigate a confrontation with NATO. Putin might find that preferable over freezing the conflict with a ceasefire, accepting a battlefield defeat at the hands of Zelensky and continuing to watch the Russian economy whither on the vine.

---

quote:

---

I believe we could take out every sun within minutes of an order being given

---