Sam Lowry said:
whiterock said:
Sam Lowry said:
whiterock said:
Sam Lowry said:
whiterock said:
Sam Lowry said:
trey3216 said:
Sam Lowry said:
trey3216 said:
Redbrickbear said:
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/ukraine-plans-for-world-war-iii/
[The leak of classified documents on the gaming and chat platform Discord continues to be a treasure trove of information about America's proxy war with Russia in Ukraine.
Earlier revelations from the Discord leak suggested Ukraine is a cornered animal. The latest shows it might lash out like one. The Washington Post reported Monday that documents in the leak claimed that the United States had to force Ukraine to back down from a direct attack on Moscow. Time and time again, the United States has had to rein in or express serious concern internally about Ukraine's plans to fight Russia, not just in Ukraine or even within Russia's borders, but in the Middle East and North Africa as well.
A classified report from the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) claimed that Maj. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, who heads the Main Directorate of Intelligence (HUR) for Ukraine's defense ministry, instructed one of his officers on February 13 "to get ready for mass strikes on 24 February." Ukraine was to strike "with everything the HUR had." The NSA report also said Ukrainian officials joked about using TNT to strike Novorossiysk, a Black Sea port city east of the Crimean Peninsula. The Post asserted such an operation would be "largely symbolic," but "would nevertheless demonstrate Ukraine's ability to hit deep inside enemy territory."
Budanov has a reputation for being a loose cannon. Previously, he claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin was terminally ill and employed body doubles for public appearances. He is apparently convinced that Ukraine will overwhelm and repel the Russian invasion, including Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, sometime this summer. Which is why it appears the U.S. intelligence apparatus has taken up monitoring Budanov's moves and communications. And Budanov appears to know it. The Post added that, when it has interviewed Budanov on occasion since the outbreak of the war, reporters have heard white noise or music in the background of the major general's office.
This time, however, it appears the United States prevented the loose cannon from going off. On February 22, the CIA internally circulated a classified report that the HUR "had agreed, at Washington's request, to postpone strikes" on Moscow. Nevertheless, the CIA also said "there is no indication" that the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) had "agreed to postpone its own plans to attack Moscow around the same date."
Ukraine appears to now be reaching further into Russian territory and is less ambiguous about its involvement in these attacks. Earlier on in the conflict, Ukraine often denied playing a role in attacks on Russian installations and infrastructure within its borders, such as the car-bombing incident in August 2022 that killed Daria Dugina, the daughter of Aleksandr Dugin, a Russian nationalist and staunch supporter of Russia's invasion. Despite repeated Ukrainian denials, the U.S. intelligence community believes Ukraine was behind the attack.
In an interview with the Post in January, however, Budanov simultaneously denied Ukraine's involvement in many of these attacks and claimed that they would continue. Such attacks "shattered their illusions of safety," Budanov reportedly claimed. "There are people who plant explosives. There are drones. Until the territorial integrity of Ukraine is restored, there will be problems inside Russia."
Other revelations from the Discord-leaked documents: Ukraine wants to expand the scope of the conflict beyond that of continental Europe and take the Russians to task in the Middle East and North Africa. The NSA report claimed that Budanov's HUR planned to attack the Wagner Groupa Russian military contractor with a reputation for brutality whose members have assisted in the Ukraine offensivein the African country of Mali. The Wagner Group's services are retained by the government of Mali for security and training their own military forces.
The NSA document said, "It is unknown what stage the operations [in Mali] were currently in and whether the HUR has received approval to execute its plans," according to the Post.
At the same time, the HUR was developing plans to strike Russian forces in Syria by partnering with the Kurds. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reportedly put the kibosh on the special operations offensive in the Middle East, but at least one of the documents reviewed by the Post claimed that efforts to attack Russian assets in Syria that avoid Ukrainian culpability may still be on the table for the Ukrainian government.
Are these not plans for a world war? Would the United States not be responsible if the Ukrainian government, which both militarily and financially would be defunct without nearly $100 billion in U.S. aid, decided to go forward with such plans?]
I, for one, have zero s h i t s to give if Ukraine struck Moscow. You attack me, I attack you back. That's how it works.
You're Ukrainian?
No. But, if Mexico launched strikes against Houston, St Louis, Washington and Chicago, do you think we'd sit around and twiddle our thumbs rather than strike Mexico City? Do you think we'd be worried about what Brazil might think about it? Hell no.
It's hard to say what we'd do in the face of an actual threat to actual American interests. I'm not sure our leaders have even contemplated such a thing.
One thing they would most certainly NOT contemplate is to hew strictly to a policy of only attacking Mexican troops stationed in America for fear of inviting more attacks from Mexico. In the Russia/Ukraine context, both nations are fully mobilized, so there is limited escalatory impact to attacks inside Russia.
Looking under the hood is messy. You get to see all sides of the conversations. There are always hawks, and there are always doves. Smart leaders listen to both. Every now & then, one end of the spectrum or the other is completely right (or wrong) on a particular question. Ukraine has made good decisions so far on what & how to attack inside Russia, very restrained decisions. They could do a lot more. And I suspect they will. Because they should. When someone invades your country, you hit them back, only restrained by the productivity of the resources expended. The suggested attack on Russian forces in Syria, for example, does not at all suggest desperation. It's highly expensive and tangential to the fight at hand, symbolic. Deniable asymmetrical attacks inside Russia, on the other hand, are excellent ways to undermine regime stability in addition to any direct impacts on the war effort they may have. Remember: Russia caused all of this. If chickens start coming home to roost.....well....tough. They started it. All they have to do to make it all go away is withdraw their troops from Ukraine.
The primary reason NOT to attack Russia in Moscow is the unpredictability of the effect on Russian morale. It is not entirely certain whether such might strengthen or weaken Putin's support with the Russian people, which is not an insignificant question. Far better to do what Ukraine has done from day one....attack supply lines inside Russia, particularly those to Crimea, like the Kerch Bridge. Those are completely fair game.
The economic data is telling. Russia is running out of reserves. And below the headlines, those numbers do not reflect the redirection of resources to key sectors - energy and defense industries. Most other sectors in the Russian economy are doing much, much worse than the numbers indicate. Russian Central Bank is no longer defending the ruble, and all the trade deals for barter or other currencies are only going to place more downward pressure on the ruble as they do nothing at all to fix the core problem - oversupply of rubles in currency markets.
Sure, there's limited escalatory effect for Ukraine. Not so for the US.
It doesn't matter how much incentive Putin has to negotiate unless we're willing to negotiate too. "You started it, you can end it" isn't the way to do that. It signals unwillingness to make a deal, and for obvious reasons. We don't really want one. A negotiated peace is inconsistent with our actual goal -- as you've put it, fighting Russia to the last Ukrainian.
We've been hearing exaggerated reports of the effectiveness of sanctions all along. No doubt we'll continue to hear them. But Putin spent a long time preparing and is in it for the long haul. Russia is selling oil and gas to other buyers, including some Western ones. They still have around $150 billion in the National Wealth Fund. They're still exporting industrial metals, which we won't sanction because we depend on them. We won't even impose secondary sanctions on countries that continue doing business with Russia. All in all, we're doing a great job of prolonging the war and not much else.
You mean you've never said "see you in court" in order to force an opponent with a weaker hand to come to the table?
A prolonged war costs Russia a lot of money. Nato has 10x the GDP and even more wealth. So the bargaining position of "....to the last Ukrainian...." is a very wise position to take. Eventually, Russia will have to realize that it has neither the wealth nor the income to maintain its own position of trying to outlast Nato. Only then will peace talks get serious.
I expected this response, and yes, it is true that stubbornness can be a negotiating tactic. It might have been understandable early on. When over a year passes with no serious talks, let alone any progress, it looks a lot more like just plain stubbornness. If there were an impartial judge in this case, they wouldn't be happy with us.
Besides, you don't have to take my word for it. You said it yourself a few weeks ago: "The minimum objective is to push Russia back to its pre-war borders. Cannot allow any reward for the invasion."
So as a judge you'd put a 12 month cap on litigation. Interesting.
My position is the correct one, and also the one both USG and Ukraine are taking. Absolutely no reason for our side to be suing for peace when we're in a position of advantage. Press on and make Russia beg for talks.
Not a cap, but certainly an expectation of good faith.
As long as the US and Ukraine take your position, we can't very well say Russia is the obstacle to negotiation.
There are many reasons to end the war now, the most pertinent being that we're in no position to drive Russia from eastern Ukraine. Their army is as big as it was before the war. They've learned from their mistakes. The great bulk of their casualties at Bakhmut are from the Wagner group, which means the Russian army itself is going mostly untouched while pulling in reinforcements. Meanwhile Ukraine is throwing its best and most experienced troops into the grinder. If the delayed spring offensive is ever mounted, their newly conscripted troops will face an armored and entrenched defense with more experience and vastly greater numbers. Ukraine's negotiating strength will end up worse, not better.
I know...I should get better sources. But my sources saw the writing on the wall in Iraqistan while yours were still manning the sunshine pumps. We shall see.
Russia is most assuredly the obstacle for peace, given that their army is occupying sovereign territory of another county.
You might be wrong about the possibility of driving Russia out of substantial parts of Ukraine. We will see, soon. Russia has not learned from its mistakes for centuries. They do the same thing, over and over and over. We knew that and are making them bleed. Very predictable army, unfathomably badly led. Same things I was taught 35 years ago are spot-on applicable today. They' don't need to fix any of their problems, they think, because they are so much bigger and tougher than their potential opponents. Look how that's working out for them now.
another error: Russia did not mobilize 300k troops and give them all to the Wagner Group. And regardless who is the commander of those soldiers, their deaths still reduce the overall labor pool.
You are sorta correct that a Ukrainian spring offensive could change the casualty dynamics to the detriment of Ukraine, as they will be on the offensive instead of the defensive. The difference is, the Ukrainians are better armed, better supplied, better led, and better motivated. If they can pierce the Russian defensive lines, and there's no reason to suspect such is impossible, then they can roll back the Russian lines exactly as they did last fall. The difference this time is, the Russians do not have strategic depth between their lines and the Sea of Azov. The kind of gains made on the Kharkov front will sever Russian supply lines along the Sea of Azov, likely forcing a withdrawal (or encirclement) of Russian troops on the Kherson front.
Most of the Russian defensive deployment maps I've seen suggest Russia is expecting a big push right at Zaporizhzha down toward Melitopol. Perhaps Ukraine will do that. Link could be a diversion, or part of the preparation. Should know soon. From yesterday:
https://news.yahoo.com/explosions-rock-russian-military-headquarters-172828542.htmlThe Russian deployments at Zaporizhzha generally use the Kakhovka Reservoir as a left flank and extend from the lake down to the south east, attempting to force Ukraine to make a wide sweep to the east to turn the flank. I would imagine the Russians have a considerable mobile reserve force, heavy on armor & mechanized infantry defending the open space of that flank. Will Ukraine engage that mobile reserve and attempt to destroy it, then sweep west to cut off the entire Russian army deployed between Kherson and Zaporizhzha? That is the high-risk/high-reward option, as it would be a strategic level defeat for Russia, leaving open the approaches to Crimea, the kind of defeat that would force Russia to the table to stave off the catastrophe of surrender of 6-digit of Russian troops. Or will Ukraine try to punch straight thru the lines at Zaporizhzha?
We will know a lot more in about 60 days. In the meantime, there will be no peace talks, because both sides think they have an advantage. But one of them is likely wrong, possibly badly so. We are about to find out.
