Comment by sgt101 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by sgt101 | Hacker News Reader

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It took > 19 days to win the conventional phase of GW2. For the non-conventional phase the US / UK lacked the will to do what was required to win that. Exemplary executions, retaliation, assassination.

Putin does not lack that will.

He has longer than 19 days. If the conventional phase of the war takes 40 days then he will see that as fine.

He can see the summer in and wait for the Europeans to return to chasing butterflies and playing with their children. He will wait for another year. All the while the Ukrainian resistance will be being dragged into carparks and playgrounds to be executed. All the while the Russian army will be repairing, refueling and restocking. What comes next is in Putin's hands.

All the wishing for a good outcome in the world does not change this. What could have changed it is if the Dutch, the Belgians and most of all the Germans had acted like adults in the world. Instead they have been dancing on the edge of a disaster. Now they have fallen off into the chasm and we all will have to pay for those happy summer afternoons and heady evenings of dance, drugs and song now.

We are in dark times friends.

>What could have changed it is if the Dutch, the Belgians and most of all the Germans had acted like adults in the world. Instead they have been dancing on the edge of a disaster.

Vague and weird words that could mean almost anything.

Speak plainly.

Ok, how about this.

1. Spending <1.2% of GDP on defence

2. Reducing tanks to 18 (Holland). 18! 1 per million people. 57 howitzers. 40 fighter aircraft.

3. Germany : arming its troops with broomsticks. BROOMSTICKS (https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/germany-s-neglected-soldi...)

4. Belgium : 0 (read it straight) 0 MBT. 0. 1 Self propelled gun I think.

These are rich and powerful countries. They have been utterly delinquent for the last 20 years. When you see unanswered Russian aggression in the east it's because these people who should be the core of European power have pretended that everything will be alright if they let their martial capabilities rot.

It's not only their forces (and foreign policy, particularly Germany's and the EU's in Ukraine and the Balkans). The near evisceration of the European military infrastructure and production capability has screwed everyone. Where is the Tornado replacement? Let alone the Eurofighter replacement? How many F35's has Germany bought (spoiler :0) how much more expensive has that made F35 for everyone else (spoiler : alot).

Now the Germans are going >2% on defence - how many years will it take for that kind of money just to repair the barracks? Where is the Dutch emergency budget? (https://nltimes.nl/2022/03/01/dutch-armed-forces-facing-russ... --- let's grow towards 2%!)

Also the wording is an allusion to the first world war.

But what's happening in the Ukranian theatre validates all of that. The Russian military is being revealed as a paper tiger. It makes no sense to invest heavily in defence when your enemy doesn't have any real forces they can deploy.

Unless you choose to believe that the Russian military, for some reason, is throwing green units and third-tier armor into the field - and holding back battalion after battalion of elite troops equipped with elitely-maintaine vehicles - it seems very hard to criticise European levels of defence spending given the reality of the enemy forces it appears to face.

Tell me the cost of a failed Russian invasion of Poland, or Estonia.

Even if they do get beaten with a broomstick and sent back to Moscow in little bags how much damage would it do?

That's why to spend.

Having a strong defense deters this kind of thing. Having the US divided and Europe impotent has enabled this behavior.

>Having a strong defense deters this kind of thing.

Yes, and it appears to be working. Russia is invading Ukraine, not Poland.

Sober reality.

Social media is making it seem like Russia is losing, when in reality they are just winning more slowly than they expected.

I think that they blinded themselves with their warped world view. More importantly they blinded the military with it - leading to early blunders. If I was an airborne general in Russia I would have a fairly large grudge about what happened in the first three days which I would nurse for a long, long time. I think that they've also had a long history of stealing from defence procurement which has not helped either.

But now the kit that doesn't work is discounted and parked and no one expects cheering flower throwing welcome. The Russian Army will deliver - even if the airforce won't / can't, if boys die doing what they were trained to do then that's expected. The Motherland is grateful.

There will be a reckoning though. They won't forgive or forget this. Unfortunately they all do agree with the war aims, but the set up will not be allowed to happen twice. I expect adults wearing uniforms to grab the reigns when this is over.

They can certainly win militarily. Whether that results in a tenable, stable reality is another matter entirely. Taking over Ukraine won't allow their country to function in economic isolation.

> We are in dark times friends.

Indeed we are, but you're speaking riddle that tells nothing, but sure do looks wise and profound to the unsuspecting mind.

Do they have 40 days? Their economy is crumbling beneath them. I guess if they can convince the Russian people that even more poverty is worth it but I have my doubts. I have my doubts that they can even continue to function at all with the amount of economic isolation their invasion has inspired.

Putin doesn't win when a tank is at a specific place in Kyiv.

Putin doesn't have the economy, the material nor the young men for a prolonged occupation of Ukraine.

Without a prolonged occupation, there is no win for Putin. He may install a puppet regime, but that will fall as soon as Russian forces leave the country.

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