Sick Boy
Super Moderator
I wouldn’t call these “huge” gains - War in maps: Ukraine widening Russia defences breach - BBC News
I wouldn’t call these “huge” gains - War in maps: Ukraine widening Russia defences breach - BBC NewsWell. That’s just a detachment from reality. Ukraine made huge gains last summer. Russia used winter to dig in defensive positions and turn the front line into the most mined country in the world. Anyone who thought that Ukraine would make the gains this summer that they did last summer is delusional. Despite that Ukraine has made gains and broke through Russian lines. It also looks possible that they might even cut of Crimea before winter. If that happens that is a major gain, both in terms of territory and psychologically. This will be a major embarrassment for Putin and who knows, might be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.
Americans end up pulling their support why would Putin even think about negotiating ( at least until they've taken the entire southern coast which would be catastrophic for Ukraine's future)?Still can’t believe that people ignore their own eyes and feel Putin can be negotiated with in good faith.
Fantastic opportunity for you to educate yourself here so you don't sound like such a clueless muppet.Oh for fuck sake
Utter, utter crank.
If people like this are where you and Grendel are getting your news from suddenly it all makes sense.
"In 2014, after the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation and during a conflict with Ukraine over its eastern parts, Macgregor appeared on Russian state-owned network RT where he called for annexation of Donbas"
"Three days after the 2022 invasion began, he said "The battle in eastern Ukraine is really almost over," and predicted "If [Ukraine] don't surrender in the next 24 hours, I suspect Russia will ultimately annihilate them." Macgregor said he believed Russia should be allowed to seize whatever parts of Ukraine it wanted."
Who on numerous occasions has said that the war will be over in 24 hours with a Russian “victory”. His record on this conflict has been so wrong at every turn he’s made his previous credibility irrelevant. He’s clearly out of touch.Fantastic opportunity for you to educate yourself here so you don't sound like such a clueless muppet.
Or maybe you know more than a UN weapons inspector and military intelligence officer?
Fantastic opportunity for you to educate yourself here so you don't sound like such a clueless muppet.
Or maybe you know more than a UN weapons inspector and military intelligence officer?
In April 2022, he posted a tweet claiming that the National Police of Ukraine was responsible for the Bucha massacre and calling U.S. President Joe Biden a "war criminal" for "seeking to shift blame for the Bucha murders" to Russia. The police only entered the city on April 2, a day after the dead civilians were discovered.[44] Investigators such as Human Rights Watch link the killings to the Russian military
Polygraph.info wrote that he compared Ukraine to “a rabid dog” that needed to be shot.[50] He compared the treatment of Russians under Ukraine law to Nazi Germany's treatment of Jews.
The website DisinfoChronicle[clarification needed] wrote that Ritter was being used by Russia to "promote narratives needed by the Kremlin"
Ritter was the subject of police sting operations for sex crimes in 2001 and 2009, and was convicted of sex crimes involving a minor in 2011.
I never said that they had made huge gains this summer. That ain’t the gotcha you think it is.I wouldn’t call these “huge” gains - War in maps: Ukraine widening Russia defences breach - BBC News
There’s no evidence that Russia is on the verge of losing Crimea. Everything points to it being a stalemate for years to come.I never said that they had made huge gains this summer. That ain’t the gotcha you think it is.
The key point is that Russia hasn’t made any gains and is in danger of losing the land bridge to Crimea. They’re dug in hoping for a “draw” that isn’t going to happen and could lose Crimea before Xmas.
Ukraine is winning. Now let’s finish the job
As the counteroffensive breaks down the Russian lines, Britain must make sure the West stands firm.
Whisper it if you need. Dare to think it. But champion it you must. Ukraine’s counteroffensive is succeeding. Slowly but surely, the Ukrainian armed forces are breaking through the Russian lines. Sometimes yard by yard, sometimes village by village, Ukraine has the momentum and is pressing forward.
The men and women of the Ukrainian army are, once again, proving to us in Nato how much we have underestimated them. First, the Establishment doubted their ability to defend their nation from the initial Russian invasion. Too many states waited to see which way the wind would blow. The groupthinkers, with their computers and “Russia experience”, calculated that they could only hold on for a few weeks.
Having been proved wrong, they switched their pessimism to the counteroffensive. But they failed to grasp the importance of the human factor. They failed to spot in the Ukrainians the same spirit we possessed in 1939. They failed to recall Alan Turing’s quote that “Sometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine.” They failed to understand that, in war, the most precious commodity of all is hope.
Since the summer, Ukraine has again been learning on the job. Its forces are adapting tactics, absorbing lessons, and making the best of the equipment we have all gifted them.
They take UK equipment and achieve success rates far beyond expectations. I remember visiting a secret location abroad, but outside Ukraine, as we prepared Ukrainian soldiers on how to use StarStreak air-defence missiles. They had a week to train on a system we take months to master. A British sergeant pointed to a young Ukrainian, barely out of his teens. “He won’t let go of the simulator, and he won’t stop training until he never misses,” he said. That young man went on to down two Russian attack helicopters.
When hope is combined with the right equipment, there is no stopping Ukraine. It is our duty to keep that hope going and to back it up with funding and equipment until the job is done. That was why the British NLAW anti-tank missiles were so important. They showed that Russian armour could be stopped. And stop them they did, in the hundreds on the road to Kyiv.
We have a chance to help finish this. The Russian army is cracking. Ukraine has learnt new tactics to overcome horrendous minefields, and the Storm Shadow strikes are devastating Russian HQs. We are witnessing the beginnings of the battle for Crimea.
We need to give Ukraine the support it requires to see this war to the end. As defence secretary, I was so often confronted with reasons not to – mainly by people who wouldn’t know the difference between one end of a rifle and the other. Time was wasted having to overcome institutional inertia. We should be proud of our Chief of the Defence Staff and military leaders who demonstrated not just leadership within Whitehall, but internationally.
Before I left office, I asked the PM to match or increase the £2.3 billion pledged to Ukraine this year, to add to the £4.6 billion we have spent already. The UK is no longer the biggest European donor – Germany is.
This war can be won. Vladimir Putin is failing. Just as the human emotion drives Ukraine to success, it is also the inescapable flaw in Putin and his criminal regime. Romance, ego and revenge drove Putin to cross into Ukraine and it will be his undoing. His army has lost more than 2,500 tanks, 6,500 armoured vehicles and nearly 300,000 dead or injured. Not a single commander who led the major Russian units into Ukraine is still in place.
Putin is desperately grasping at the final two things that can save him – time and the splitting of the international community. Britain can do something about both. We must help Ukraine maintain its momentum – and that will require more munitions, ATACMSs and Storm Shadows. And the best way to keep the international community together is the demonstration of success.
Ukraine can also play its part. The average age of the soldiers at the front is over 40. I understand President Zelensky’s desire to preserve the young for the future, but the fact is that Russia is mobilising the whole country by stealth. Putin knows a pause will hand him time to build a new army. So just as Britain did in 1939 and 1941, perhaps it is time to reassess the scale of Ukraine’s mobilisation.
Let us not pause for one day. Let us see this through. The world is watching to see if the West has the resolve to stand up for our values and the rules-based system. What we do now for Ukraine will set the direction for all of our security for years to come.
Lol you literally could not make it up
PVA spends
Not sure quoting Ben Wallace is quite the catch you think it is.Ben Wallace
There’s plenty of evidence that Ukraine is close to cutting off Crimea. Most notably the recent attacks on the Naval base. If Russia can’t resupply its troops there it’s only a matter of time before they capitulate.There’s no evidence that Russia is on the verge of losing Crimea. Everything points to it being a stalemate for years to come.
In countries like Italy where you’ve got entire families in poorer regions surviving on €1,000 a month between them, public opinion is hardly going to sustain to keep funding a war that neither side can win.
Not sure quoting Ben Wallace is quite the catch you think it is.
That said - he’s probably in all the FBPE fantasy cabinets so that makes sense at least.
It wasn't meant to be a 'catch' but it is a far more balanced piece than the alternative served up on this page by a convicted paedophile Russian propagandist.
If they have no military left tony surely we should reduce spend as its all over soon anyway?There’s plenty of evidence that Ukraine is close to cutting off Crimea. Most notably the recent attacks on the Naval base. If Russia can’t resupply its troops there it’s only a matter of time before they capitulate.
Russias military is in disarray. They’re struggling for ammunition, they’re struggling for heavy equipment, they’ve got no modern weapons that are functional for anything past a parade, they’re now trying to recruit from occupied Ukraine. All Russia had was bluff, I think if Putin bought the bluff. He thought he had a modern military, he thought he had the Ukrainian public on side, bought by the influence of a few pro Russian Ukrainian oligarchs and he surrounded himself by yes men who took the money to build a modern army and buy influence in Ukraine who told him what he wanted to hear and not the truth. There is no win for Putin unless the West capitulates and hands him one, which is essentially what you’re suggesting.
This guy supported Liz Truss for PM by the way.Ben Wallace
Isn't he asking sunak for £2billion more support for Ukraine?
This guy supported Liz Truss for PM by the way.
If Ben Wallace is the Minister you are referring to I have to say that he does come across as very unusual, inasmuch as he seems to be a competent and intelligent Government Minister. How he can work with Liz Truss I can't fathom.
You realise this speech was aimed at demanding the extra money and he has stated he will be monitoring the situation from the beck benchesYou do realise he is the former defence secretary?
Both pieces will be propaganda to be fair.It wasn't meant to be a 'catch' but it is a far more balanced piece than the alternative served up on this page by a convicted paedophile Russian propagandist.
You realise this speech was aimed at demanding the extra money and he has stated he will be monitoring the situation from the beck benches
Some people believe he is positioning himself for a leadership run at some point and has support from Truss and her band of lunatics
Both pieces will be propaganda to be fair.
The regular you and I on the street have no real idea how the war is going - but after 2 years there doesn’t appear to be much progress on any side.
Other countries’ people will become tired of seeing money go into an unknown and distant conflict whilst they are suffering domestically. So at what point does there have to be a rethink of strategy?
Which is why the west should send what Ukraine wants and needs now, and speed up the dripfeed.
He's standing down as an MP.
There’s no grey area with you whatsoever.You can keep going with this little gimmick and it’ll probably get a like out of Grendel which you’ll be happy with, but it makes you look a little silly when you’re on the same side of the coin as Putin.
There’s no grey area with you whatsoever.
There is no grey area, you want parts of Ukraine handed to Russia - just like Putin.
Yeah, I mean if you discount the foiled invasion that was going to be a 3 day walkover then yeah, aside from that no progress.Both pieces will be propaganda to be fair.
The regular you and I on the street have no real idea how the war is going - but after 2 years there doesn’t appear to be much progress on any side.
Other countries’ people will become tired of seeing money go into an unknown and distant conflict whilst they are suffering domestically. So at what point does there have to be a rethink of strategy?
An excellent article on the state of the counteroffensive and why it is still being successful, even when the front line is not moving much.
Ukraine Update: Data shows Ukraine is laying down the heaviest firestorm of artillery in the war
Regardless of whether you see the Ukrainian counteroffensive as promising or disheartening, one thing is abundantly clear: Ukraine and Russia are locked in a battle of attrition, drawing comparisons to World War I. If we must compare World War I to the...www.dailykos.com
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