Before you call me a dumbass, reread my comment. I don't think you took away what I intended to get across. That other guy is saying something completely different from what I'm saying so calm down.
Yes, I agree that we would defeat Russia in a conventional ground war that we were directly involved in, mostly due to our overwhelming air p…
Before you call me a dumbass, reread my comment. I don't think you took away what I intended to get across. That other guy is saying something completely different from what I'm saying so calm down.
Yes, I agree that we would defeat Russia in a conventional ground war that we were directly involved in, mostly due to our overwhelming air power. But that fact isn't particularly relevant to the war in Ukraine. When I talk about "projecting power", I'm not just talking about the logistical nightmare that is fielding a large army on a foreign continent, I'm talking about our broader geopolitical ability to commit forces to proxy conflicts around the world. Yes, we could escalate this conflict by introducing more of our forces, but if and when we started pushing the Russian army out of Ukraine (let alone into Russia proper), they will begin deploying tactical nuclear weapons to rescue the situation. Now we're circling the nuclear escalation toilet bowl with Russia for the sake of Ukraine, which frankly is not terribly important to us. That's the real difficulty with projecting power to the backyards of distant great power; Ukraine is terribly important to the Russians, and not terribly important to us. It makes no strategic sense for us to risk nuclear exchange over Ukraine, but it makes sense for Russia to do so. The balance of resolve favors Russia, and this mostly has to do with Ukraine's geographic location relative to Russia and the United States.
Then don't make stupid comments. Not my problem. And your clarification only reveals what an amateur you are. We are not 'circling the nuclear escalation toilet with Russia', that's another moronic throwaway line. What Russia has stated is it's long standing nuclear policy, which isn't that different from ours. The nuclear memes in the media are designed to scare ignorant people into demonizing Russia.
Here's a thought. Why don't you stop typing here and go read some books or documents that discuss actual military strategy, orders of battle, force levels, doctrine etc.? You might then actually have some views that are valid and not based on nonsense and hyperbole. But at this point, your commentary is still laughably ignorant. And you were the one dismissive of "Americans" as though you possess better knowledge, so don't tone police me. But you don't, you are just a BSing poseur.
You are again missing my point. This isn't a question of military practicality, it is of grand strategic practicality. You don't need to get into military minutia (while that is fun) in order to understand that the sum cost (military, political, and economic) of risking open war with Russia far outweighs any benefits. I'm handwaving doctrine and orbat because its not relevant, and bringing it up would be pedantic.
Because you appear to have some knowledge about how a war works, but don't understand why they are fought.
Even if we pretend like your unlikely, to put it mildly, scenario is achieved, then what? Have you ever seen a world map?
Are you and I don't know... every single fit for military service male US citizen very keen on having to spend the rest of their lives in Russia, guarding hundreds of millions of pissed off Russians?
That's not an argument, that's jusy hiding behind condescensions. You do seem knowledgeable, so please share your knowledge with us. I understand that it would be militarily possible, but explain to me how it would be strategically and geopolitically practical for NATO to get into a shooting war with Russia.
I never claimed it would be 'practical', but you miss that in your rush to respond. I merely laid out the likely outcome based on the order of battle. I don't think Russia and the U.S. will ever go to war as Russia knows they would lose that war in short order and we do not want war with Russia. But in any actual conflict, the only trouble we'd have is if we try and take and hold actual Russian territory.
Let's consider Ukraine. Try to imagine we have F15s, F16s, A10s and F18s operating over Ukraine? We don't now (Ukraine is now fielding a handful of F16s, which will not make a strategic difference). Once we suppress Russian SAMs and other anti-aircraft defense, their troops would have to withdraw. Fyi, I'm not even mentioning what our heli gunships and full complement of artillery and tanks can also do without air support. We do overmatch Russia in every major weapons system of this type. While a 'slugfest' on the ground would be incredibly costly, we have real advantages in systems and doctrine and over time the Russians would lose that head to head conflict. Of course we do have supply chain issues but in a war, just as Russia has, we'd increase our capabilities just as they have via our own production and other nations.
I'm not sure what you guys are confused about. Do either of you actually believe Russia could best the U.S. in any war? Nuclear or not? Be clear, that's lunacy. Consider that the 'small wars' we love to fight were never 'total' wars for the U.S. A war with Russia would be a total war for the U.S., and Russia's military simply has no chance on any level of defeating us in an all out war. Ukraine confuses lots of people cuz they assume Ukraine is fighting the same way and with the same weapons systems as the U.S.. Nope.
I don't disagree with anything you just said. No one is arguing that the Russians could beat the US in a total war, although one might argue that no one wins in a nuclear exchange, even if we are able to hit them harder than they hit us.
My original point was that most of the American foreign policy establishment doesn't have a good appreciation of how difficult to project power over long distances. I said that our military power as it currently exists does not translate into winning the proxy war in Ukraine. I think you took my comment about power projection to mean power in the most literal military sense of our capabilities, which is fair because I didn't specify. But, what I was referring to was state power more generally; that is to say, projecting the will of our state onto other states or groups of people via all available means, military or otherwise.
The point I'm driving towards is that it doesn't matter that we have a military that could defeat Russia's. That fact isn't particularly relevant to the war in Ukraine, because strategic descisions are not based on raw military balance of power alone. My original point was that many Americans, even those in high places, seem to think that because we have such overwhelming military force, there's no reason that we should ever have to back down or compromise on the world stage. The result is half-baked policies such as the Ukraine project that cannot be executed within the available means.
Maybe a better way to phrase my point would be this: Russia can strategically afford to project more state power into Ukraine than the United States can.
Ukraine losing or winning against Russia is of almost no strategic import to the U.S. It's significant to us in two other ways though. One, and this is central to the Biden/Bush/Obama types, is projecting the Western led, 'Rules Based Liberal Order' or whatever they are calling it today.
Consider the background in Ukraine. Our foreign policy elite were stunned when Yanukovych backed away from the bullying approach the EU and U.S. were taking to negotiating trade and participating in Western NGOs and programs etc. The West were the bullies, be clear. We were demanding, essentially, that Ukraine turn its back to Russia, it was to choose between the two. Russia took a different approach, wanting equal footing and access. Given the history between the two nations, the large Russian speaking population of Ukraine and the existence of a major Russian naval base in Sevastopol, this doesn't seem an unreasonable ask.
The West responded by throwing a coup. The Brits and Americans, to be precise. Russia responded by recruiting allies and forming proxies in Eastern Ukraine and escalating the separatist war there. The new 'Ukraine' govt (is it really an independent state?) responded brutally, fyi, including empowering the 'Right Sector' political movement, arming them and funding them to fight. At war, they are called The Azov Battalion. Actual Neo-Nazis, no lie. Without them, the coup doesn't succeed. The U.S. bought them off. 'Tory' Nuland delivered them cookies during the Maidan revolt and coup.
Obama pulls his junk back in, he gets scared. He let Hillary and her crowd shove all this around, her friends making a lot of money there. Biden inherited it after her and literally grafts himself into the Ukraine sleaze operation she built, lol. Obama sees all of this and does not want to arm Ukraine and go to war with such a stench around the place.
Trump comes in and simultaneously provides lethal aid to Ukraine and eliminates NATO joining rhetoric while attempting to open a dialog with Putin. Keep in mind that Putin had been repeating the same mantra about Ukraine in the EU or NATO and how it was a 'red line' for them. That they had real interests in Ukraine given it's strategic border region. Trump was at least listening, which calmed the Russians down to some degree.
Biden gets in and begins the NATO drumbeat, announcing Ukraine will join NATO in the near future in Nov 2021. Putin still can't believe it but cannot have a NATO member Ukraine on his border, his own people would hang him or any Russian leader in the street who allowed that. His rapid raid to Kiev was designed to signal his seriousness, not a show of all his capabilities. Sadly, the Zelensky's and NeoCon Westerners saw this as an opportunity to claim Putin was weak and we then escalated the fight.
Three Ukrainian armies later, there is no fight left to have with actual Ukrainian people or weapons. Russia can do what it wants on the battlefield. Putin is still waiting for the West to come to it's senses, but it hasn't.
And now I will finally answer your questions. The Biden admin got exactly the policy they wanted when deciding to back Zelensky. Russians in a 'never ending war', 'bogged down', as we were in say Vietnam or even Korea, more recently Afghanistan and Iraq. They want 'regime change' in Moscow. They believe that the Russian people will tire of this protracted war and eventually Putin will have to step aside or worse.
But of course, our 'elite' are miscalculating. Ukraine isn't a Vietnam to Russia - it's their neighbor and 'cousin', at least. The plains of Ukraine are a crucial point for a military invasion of Russia over history. They have legitimate interests and the right to feel threatened by a nuclear armed NATO nation on their doorstep.
Keep in mind that Americans have an utterly warped sense of all this. We do not realize we have thrown 80 coups since 1950, and get involved in some kind of 'hot conflict' every 2-3 years. We have been throwing 'Color Revolutions' around the world, destabilizing and removing numerous govts., including Ukraine's of course. The Russians and much of the world are concerned that we are some kind of 'lunatic nation', desperately looking for 'villages to burn in order to save them', yes?
So, for Russia, Ukraine isn't losable. They will absolutely use tactical nukes as a last resort, just as we would if Russia was winning a war against Canada and we had no other way to stop them. It's normal. Now, the problem is that in Ukraine, it would poison the battlefield. While you might have heard that modern nukes are hydrogen bombs, in fact that tech isn't great for building the kind of bombs we need. So there is still a lot of radiation from the fission process, poisoning the very battlefield and territory Putin wants to take and hold. It would be the ultimate 'end game' for him.
So we'd better not back him into a corner. The current scenario is beyond tragic. All sane minds new Russia could never lose to Ukraine. They have lost over 500k soldiers, more than 700k tragically wounded or maimed for life. An entire generation of young men has been decimated. And for what? So Joe Biden and the Clinton types can look tough to the world? Using our money and Ukrainians blood? Such people should be held to account...
Before you call me a dumbass, reread my comment. I don't think you took away what I intended to get across. That other guy is saying something completely different from what I'm saying so calm down.
Yes, I agree that we would defeat Russia in a conventional ground war that we were directly involved in, mostly due to our overwhelming air power. But that fact isn't particularly relevant to the war in Ukraine. When I talk about "projecting power", I'm not just talking about the logistical nightmare that is fielding a large army on a foreign continent, I'm talking about our broader geopolitical ability to commit forces to proxy conflicts around the world. Yes, we could escalate this conflict by introducing more of our forces, but if and when we started pushing the Russian army out of Ukraine (let alone into Russia proper), they will begin deploying tactical nuclear weapons to rescue the situation. Now we're circling the nuclear escalation toilet bowl with Russia for the sake of Ukraine, which frankly is not terribly important to us. That's the real difficulty with projecting power to the backyards of distant great power; Ukraine is terribly important to the Russians, and not terribly important to us. It makes no strategic sense for us to risk nuclear exchange over Ukraine, but it makes sense for Russia to do so. The balance of resolve favors Russia, and this mostly has to do with Ukraine's geographic location relative to Russia and the United States.
Then don't make stupid comments. Not my problem. And your clarification only reveals what an amateur you are. We are not 'circling the nuclear escalation toilet with Russia', that's another moronic throwaway line. What Russia has stated is it's long standing nuclear policy, which isn't that different from ours. The nuclear memes in the media are designed to scare ignorant people into demonizing Russia.
Here's a thought. Why don't you stop typing here and go read some books or documents that discuss actual military strategy, orders of battle, force levels, doctrine etc.? You might then actually have some views that are valid and not based on nonsense and hyperbole. But at this point, your commentary is still laughably ignorant. And you were the one dismissive of "Americans" as though you possess better knowledge, so don't tone police me. But you don't, you are just a BSing poseur.
Have a nice day.
You are again missing my point. This isn't a question of military practicality, it is of grand strategic practicality. You don't need to get into military minutia (while that is fun) in order to understand that the sum cost (military, political, and economic) of risking open war with Russia far outweighs any benefits. I'm handwaving doctrine and orbat because its not relevant, and bringing it up would be pedantic.
Explain to me why I'm wrong please.
Because you appear to have some knowledge about how a war works, but don't understand why they are fought.
Even if we pretend like your unlikely, to put it mildly, scenario is achieved, then what? Have you ever seen a world map?
Are you and I don't know... every single fit for military service male US citizen very keen on having to spend the rest of their lives in Russia, guarding hundreds of millions of pissed off Russians?
Think you meant to reply to the other guy, I totally agree
It is truly amusing to see you 'educmacating' others, lol. Youtube scholarship isn't as impressive as you seem to think it is.
That's not an argument, that's jusy hiding behind condescensions. You do seem knowledgeable, so please share your knowledge with us. I understand that it would be militarily possible, but explain to me how it would be strategically and geopolitically practical for NATO to get into a shooting war with Russia.
I never claimed it would be 'practical', but you miss that in your rush to respond. I merely laid out the likely outcome based on the order of battle. I don't think Russia and the U.S. will ever go to war as Russia knows they would lose that war in short order and we do not want war with Russia. But in any actual conflict, the only trouble we'd have is if we try and take and hold actual Russian territory.
Let's consider Ukraine. Try to imagine we have F15s, F16s, A10s and F18s operating over Ukraine? We don't now (Ukraine is now fielding a handful of F16s, which will not make a strategic difference). Once we suppress Russian SAMs and other anti-aircraft defense, their troops would have to withdraw. Fyi, I'm not even mentioning what our heli gunships and full complement of artillery and tanks can also do without air support. We do overmatch Russia in every major weapons system of this type. While a 'slugfest' on the ground would be incredibly costly, we have real advantages in systems and doctrine and over time the Russians would lose that head to head conflict. Of course we do have supply chain issues but in a war, just as Russia has, we'd increase our capabilities just as they have via our own production and other nations.
I'm not sure what you guys are confused about. Do either of you actually believe Russia could best the U.S. in any war? Nuclear or not? Be clear, that's lunacy. Consider that the 'small wars' we love to fight were never 'total' wars for the U.S. A war with Russia would be a total war for the U.S., and Russia's military simply has no chance on any level of defeating us in an all out war. Ukraine confuses lots of people cuz they assume Ukraine is fighting the same way and with the same weapons systems as the U.S.. Nope.
I don't disagree with anything you just said. No one is arguing that the Russians could beat the US in a total war, although one might argue that no one wins in a nuclear exchange, even if we are able to hit them harder than they hit us.
My original point was that most of the American foreign policy establishment doesn't have a good appreciation of how difficult to project power over long distances. I said that our military power as it currently exists does not translate into winning the proxy war in Ukraine. I think you took my comment about power projection to mean power in the most literal military sense of our capabilities, which is fair because I didn't specify. But, what I was referring to was state power more generally; that is to say, projecting the will of our state onto other states or groups of people via all available means, military or otherwise.
The point I'm driving towards is that it doesn't matter that we have a military that could defeat Russia's. That fact isn't particularly relevant to the war in Ukraine, because strategic descisions are not based on raw military balance of power alone. My original point was that many Americans, even those in high places, seem to think that because we have such overwhelming military force, there's no reason that we should ever have to back down or compromise on the world stage. The result is half-baked policies such as the Ukraine project that cannot be executed within the available means.
Maybe a better way to phrase my point would be this: Russia can strategically afford to project more state power into Ukraine than the United States can.
Ukraine losing or winning against Russia is of almost no strategic import to the U.S. It's significant to us in two other ways though. One, and this is central to the Biden/Bush/Obama types, is projecting the Western led, 'Rules Based Liberal Order' or whatever they are calling it today.
Consider the background in Ukraine. Our foreign policy elite were stunned when Yanukovych backed away from the bullying approach the EU and U.S. were taking to negotiating trade and participating in Western NGOs and programs etc. The West were the bullies, be clear. We were demanding, essentially, that Ukraine turn its back to Russia, it was to choose between the two. Russia took a different approach, wanting equal footing and access. Given the history between the two nations, the large Russian speaking population of Ukraine and the existence of a major Russian naval base in Sevastopol, this doesn't seem an unreasonable ask.
The West responded by throwing a coup. The Brits and Americans, to be precise. Russia responded by recruiting allies and forming proxies in Eastern Ukraine and escalating the separatist war there. The new 'Ukraine' govt (is it really an independent state?) responded brutally, fyi, including empowering the 'Right Sector' political movement, arming them and funding them to fight. At war, they are called The Azov Battalion. Actual Neo-Nazis, no lie. Without them, the coup doesn't succeed. The U.S. bought them off. 'Tory' Nuland delivered them cookies during the Maidan revolt and coup.
Obama pulls his junk back in, he gets scared. He let Hillary and her crowd shove all this around, her friends making a lot of money there. Biden inherited it after her and literally grafts himself into the Ukraine sleaze operation she built, lol. Obama sees all of this and does not want to arm Ukraine and go to war with such a stench around the place.
Trump comes in and simultaneously provides lethal aid to Ukraine and eliminates NATO joining rhetoric while attempting to open a dialog with Putin. Keep in mind that Putin had been repeating the same mantra about Ukraine in the EU or NATO and how it was a 'red line' for them. That they had real interests in Ukraine given it's strategic border region. Trump was at least listening, which calmed the Russians down to some degree.
Biden gets in and begins the NATO drumbeat, announcing Ukraine will join NATO in the near future in Nov 2021. Putin still can't believe it but cannot have a NATO member Ukraine on his border, his own people would hang him or any Russian leader in the street who allowed that. His rapid raid to Kiev was designed to signal his seriousness, not a show of all his capabilities. Sadly, the Zelensky's and NeoCon Westerners saw this as an opportunity to claim Putin was weak and we then escalated the fight.
Three Ukrainian armies later, there is no fight left to have with actual Ukrainian people or weapons. Russia can do what it wants on the battlefield. Putin is still waiting for the West to come to it's senses, but it hasn't.
And now I will finally answer your questions. The Biden admin got exactly the policy they wanted when deciding to back Zelensky. Russians in a 'never ending war', 'bogged down', as we were in say Vietnam or even Korea, more recently Afghanistan and Iraq. They want 'regime change' in Moscow. They believe that the Russian people will tire of this protracted war and eventually Putin will have to step aside or worse.
But of course, our 'elite' are miscalculating. Ukraine isn't a Vietnam to Russia - it's their neighbor and 'cousin', at least. The plains of Ukraine are a crucial point for a military invasion of Russia over history. They have legitimate interests and the right to feel threatened by a nuclear armed NATO nation on their doorstep.
Keep in mind that Americans have an utterly warped sense of all this. We do not realize we have thrown 80 coups since 1950, and get involved in some kind of 'hot conflict' every 2-3 years. We have been throwing 'Color Revolutions' around the world, destabilizing and removing numerous govts., including Ukraine's of course. The Russians and much of the world are concerned that we are some kind of 'lunatic nation', desperately looking for 'villages to burn in order to save them', yes?
So, for Russia, Ukraine isn't losable. They will absolutely use tactical nukes as a last resort, just as we would if Russia was winning a war against Canada and we had no other way to stop them. It's normal. Now, the problem is that in Ukraine, it would poison the battlefield. While you might have heard that modern nukes are hydrogen bombs, in fact that tech isn't great for building the kind of bombs we need. So there is still a lot of radiation from the fission process, poisoning the very battlefield and territory Putin wants to take and hold. It would be the ultimate 'end game' for him.
So we'd better not back him into a corner. The current scenario is beyond tragic. All sane minds new Russia could never lose to Ukraine. They have lost over 500k soldiers, more than 700k tragically wounded or maimed for life. An entire generation of young men has been decimated. And for what? So Joe Biden and the Clinton types can look tough to the world? Using our money and Ukrainians blood? Such people should be held to account...
Couldn't agree more with every point.