Russia-Ukraine War

[jlehtone]

- VW stops production in russia
- GOG stops selling games in russia & belarus
- EA removes russian teams from EA sports games
- Stalker 2 development stalled due to the war (all the best wishes to them)

..holy moly

- Nike and IKEA close shops/production in russia/belarus https://www.reuters.com/business/japan- ... 022-03-03/
- Russian oil company Lukoil has issued a statement about the tragic events too https://www.reuters.com/article/ukraine ... NR4N2UZ084

The latter is interesting -- money talks?

[burger1]

Russias now attacking the nuclear power plant and are using rpgs and other explosives.

Should be safe unless something goes wrong or someone decides to blow it up.

Safety measures at the nuclear power plant might require it to be in normal operation. The safety measures might not work if stuff gets destryoed.

Russia shooting the firefighters trying to put out the fires probably isn't the best idea.

[burger1]

NATO has called an extraordinary meeting.

[mr.WHO]

Russias now attacking the nuclear power plant and are using rpgs and other explosives.

While this is crazy, the reactor buildings are VERY durable - a stray RPG has no chance to dammage the reactor from outside.

This is only dangerous of any side intentionally decide to destroy it, but this would be absolute insanity, like one step before nuking your own troops.

[Warenwolf]

While this is crazy, the reactor buildings are VERY durable - a stray RPG has no chance to dammage the reactor from outside.

This is only dangerous of any side intentionally decide to destroy it, but this would be absolute insanity, like one step before nuking your own troops.

While maybe containment building and reactor contaminant vessel are strong structures, support and control systems are not. I do not want to overstate dangers, because these typically have backups but there are many ways you can ruin your day by playing tag in a NPP.

That being said, danger of this is being played up too by media. It is not like people working on this places don't take precautions and just passively wait for stuff to go wrong.

As long as they don't push AZ-5 we will all be OK

[mr.WHO]

Excuse me, there might be something wrong with me.

You got Russian army rolling through Chernobyl exclusion zone and have active battle there.
You got Russia casually giving nuclear threads to everyone all around the world.
You got ANOTHER active battle around ACTIVE nuclear plant.

There are like what, 10 more nuclear plants to go for Russia to screw on their road? 10 possibilities to irradiate half the Europe?

And you want me to f*cking care that someone broke a window and gave some insults in Germany?

Definetly something wrong with me.

[fiksal]

Panos's search for "truth" is his own.
Soldiers with his attitude fight in Ukraine now


I will have none of that.


Meanwhile in real Ukraine, 1 million refugees, 1 city appears to be taken. Russian army columns seems to be stuck. Russians are losing the taste for war. Putin doesn't change the tune.


Some news from inside.
Prices change daily, store close daily. Ruble is considered worthless, everyone went to buy dollars until they ran out. People saw the result of UN vote.

[chew-ie]

While we have Putin casually threatening the whole world with nuclear war ("stay out of this or else") as mr.WHO mentions it I really wonder how long there will be no direct intervention by the worlds military. I mean - do we wait until Ukraine is conquered or what is the big plan? The economic warfare alone won't help prevent that I'm afraid ...

And I also wonder why our german chancellor yet again ruled that possibility out (military intervention by NATO). Ruling X out didn't work so well with the global pandemic, my guess the same applies to war. They really should have learned that recap-lesson concerning "dynamic situations" by now.

[Falcrack]

While we have Putin casually threatening the whole world with nuclear war ("stay out of this or else") as mr.WHO mentions it I really wonder how long there will be no direct intervention by the worlds military. I mean - do we wait until Ukraine is conquered or what is the big plan? The economic warfare alone won't help prevent that I'm afraid ...

And I also wonder why our german chancellor yet again ruled that possibility out (military intervention by NATO). Ruling X out didn't work so well with the global pandemic, my guess the same applies to war. They really should have learned that recap-lesson concerning "dynamic situations" by now.

I have advocated for direct US involvement in the form of a no-fly zone previously, but I can see that perhaps, for now, this should be off the table. If a No-fly zone were set up, that would inevitably mean not just war in Ukraine. Strikes on air defense in Belarus and even Russia would become necessary. Naval forces around the world would start shooting at each other. Russia might launch attacks against bases in Poland where NATO forces would be operating out of. At some point, a desperate Putin might launch a tactical nuke to try to reverse his battlefield losses, and to scare NATO into stopping their involvement.

So sad as it may seem for the Ukrainians, I think the best we can do is to continue to provide support in the form of weapons, fuel, and food, and let the Ukrainians do the actual fighting. With enough of this kind of support, and given the Ukrainian's demonstrated skill on the battlefield, and Russia's mistakes, I think the Ukrainians have the potential to turn this around and actually win this thing.

[mr.WHO]

While we have Putin casually threatening the whole world with nuclear war ("stay out of this or else") as mr.WHO mentions it I really wonder how long there will be no direct intervention by the worlds military. I mean - do we wait until Ukraine is conquered or what is the big plan? The economic warfare alone won't help prevent that I'm afraid ...

Well, this is the worst case scenario, but I can see the case where Russia screw up one of the nuclear plants so badly, that entire UN, including China decide to kick Russia out and declare UN intervention to Ukraine.

I think there is one, albeit much different precendent.
Like in the 50s "the China seat" in UN was represented by Taiwan, but then entire world decided that PRC should be the UN representative instead of Taiwan.
I could see removing Russia from Security council and giving it to non-aligned country, like Brasil or India.
This would be actually a positive move, that would make UN a little bit less dysfunctional.

Still, I'd rather not have a nuclear catastrophe to get there.

[Warenwolf]

I mean - do we wait until Ukraine is conquered or what is the big plan? The economic warfare alone won't help prevent that I'm afraid ...

Russian army is paper tiger (which some suspected last 10 years but were hushed down in their expert circles) as we can see from the way they operate in Ukraine with, among many things, logistics, SAM systems being taken out by drones because they are turned off, diverging axis of attack, etc, etc...
Which means that it cannot stop NATO juggernaut going over border in Kalingrad, Baltics, Norway and Ukraine. Not that it would be easy because it will make Russians far more motivated because now they are not conquering foreign people and their land but defending their homeland. NATO would face in Russia hostile populations just at Russians face in Ukraine.

But, even if action is limited to Ukraine (NATO stays put in places), Putin and your average citizen of Russia will feel that fate of their country will be at stake. Which will lower the bar for launching nuclear weapons because they will have nothing to lose.

While I see russian propaganda of their nuclear triage for what it is, unlike some other posters in this thread, I am equally dismissive of NATO's ability to stop nuclear first strike. And Ukraine is not enough important for the west to risk nuclear war. Because making it into Afghanistan for Putin will keep him busy for long, long time. Maybe also some politicians hope that such long drawn out war will lead to Putin being deposed. Which I suspect will just lead to another Putin type of leader.

[chew-ie]

So sad as it may seem for the Ukrainians, I think the best we can do is to continue to provide support in the form of weapons, fuel, and food, and let the Ukrainians do the actual fighting. With enough of this kind of support, and given the Ukrainian's demonstrated skill on the battlefield, and Russia's mistakes, I think the Ukrainians have the potential to turn this around and actually win this thing.

That's exactly the background of my question - in a way we are accepting that a neighbour country gets devastated and destroyed and the only answers are / seem to be mid-to-longterm economic threats. I mean - we had the bosnian war as a slip-up and should be wiser then this to let a conflict go that far. At least Ukraine invasion is reminding me strongly of that - and the repercussions of the bosnian conflict were present decades after. Heck, even 20 years later (back in ~2016) I still had colleagues [who participated in the war] full of hatred for the other conflict party. (and we are talking normal "office chats" here - not an evening in the pub)

I can't understand why everybody is playing for time here.

[Falcrack]

Regarding NATO directly fighting Russia, another important thing to consider is public opinion. Military involvement requires the consent of the entire NATO alliance. A single country such as the US or Poland (or both combined) going it alone in fighting Russia would probably fracture the NATO alliance, because a lot of nations would say "hey, I didn't sign up for this, but your military involvement is now dragging us into it too!"

As the war goes on, and we see Ukrainian cities being reduced to rubble and the citizens being starved, and women in Russian occupied areas being raped, the popular sentiment for direct military confrontation may grow to the point that the leaders of NATO decide that enough finally is enough, and they no longer can stay on the sidelines. But it is important that if such a thing happens, that it has the enthusiastic support of all NATO nations.

[mr.WHO]

That's, why I said it's more likely to have intervention under the flag of UN than NATO, but this would require such catastrophic failure, that I'd rather have this never happen in a first place.

EDIT: Guess what - there is an UN Security Council meeting in regards to today battle at Nuclear Plant.

[greypanther]

I can't understand why everybody is playing for time here.

The comparisons with the former Yugoslavia, are really only valid if the UN had sent peacekeepers in to Ukraine to keep the separatists apart from the rest, in 2014. It is far too late now. It would have been very valid then and with hindsight a very good thing.

Why play for time? Easy, we just cannot risk nuclear war, because it is a fantasy to say we could shoot down all incoming warheads. The systems are unproven and most of the European forces doe not have an effective SAM against ICBM launched warheads, never mind the fact that any defence would be quickly overwhelmed with countermeasures and sheer numbers. For goodness sake as Chips said, the UK does not even have an effective early warning system any more! Our defence, which would be not effective, is mostly being refitted and lacks crew!

Even if you accept the fantasy that NATO defence would work 100%, I would not wish in the slightest the nuclear holocaust that would/could be unleashed on Russia. Why would anyone?

As an aside, I have heard that Putin claimed that there was a coup in 2014, ( ? ) that Petro Poroshenko should still be in charge, well according to an interview on the BBC, the former president says not to fear Putin, not to trust Putin and appears to be in charge of a battalion defending Ukraine against the evil invader!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-europe-60615752

The former president of Ukraine has sent a defiant message to Vladimir Putin, as Russia continues its invasion.

Speaking to BBC Newsnight, Petro Poroshenko called on the West to toughen sanctions on Russia and not to trust, or be afraid of, Putin.

[mr.WHO]

As an aside, I have heard that Putin claimed that there was a coup in 2014, ( ? ) that Petro Poroshenko should still be in charge, well according to an interview on the BBC, the former president says not to fear Putin, not to trust Putin and appears to be in charge of a battalion defending Ukraine against the evil invader!

You mistaken the presidents - Poroshenko, who fight now in streets of Kiyv is from pro-west faction.

You probably mean the Yanukowych, who was ousted in 2014 and fled to Russia.

He is also A PROOF that whole Russian narraive of "Ukraine should stay neutral" is a LOAD OF B*LLSH*T.

The whole 2014 uprising was started, because Yanukowych decided to switch, from pro-EU stance to pro-Russia stance and declared to join Russian economic-military block along Belarus, Kazahstan and a few other post-soviet countries.

Joining pro-Russia block = good
but joining EU block = bad?

Neutrality was never an long term option and every Central Europe country knew it from the start. That's why Poland and few other countries were doing everything they could to join NATO and EU.
Now even Sweden and Finland start to be concerned to the point, they consider joining the NATO.

[notaterran]

Go Ukraine, at least give Putin a black eye!

[mr.WHO]

Good news, the Zaphorozian Nuclear Power Plant has been put to sucessful shut down, so there is no risk of meltdown now.

Still there are more Power plants on the path of r*tarded red bear.

[JSDD]

germany delivers their old "strela" missiles
in germany these are not allowed to be used anymore because of material deficiencies ^^

in other words, germany delivers its trash missiles to the ukranians (and possibly buys new ones for themselves)

in my view, thats a clear "f*ck'em, who cares" ^^

[Panos]

Good news, the Zaphorozian Nuclear Power Plant has been put to sucessful shut down, so there is no risk of meltdown now.

Still there are more Power plants on the path of r*tarded red bear.

The plan was captured last week by Russia without a single opposition. Why they would need to bomb it now?
Think.

Even USA said today the whole incident might be a false flag by Ukraine.

And no reactor was damaged. Just some offices and the fire was put our by the Russians.