2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine (Part 1)

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Probably an accurate assessment, but my thought was more that unless Putin and his inner circle are ‘retired’, things still aren’t going to improve for the Russian people. And as with many movements the last decade or two around the world, it’s likely to be younger people who are more connected with what is really happening, and hopefully less brainwashed. That propaganda broadcast to children a few weeks back was just horrifying.

Galeev’s threads are an amazing window into the complexities of what is happening. His thread on Jubilee made some very interesting points about what is happening at a regional level - and how Putin was controlling the flow of money to keep regions utterly dependent on the centre, and to stop the local governers getting ideas above their station:

(I think you or another BBer may have posted those before)

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Agreed, though I’ve wondered if he overemphasizes the eventual effects on Russia of sanctions. A lot of countries are not participating in that effort.

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If they did, they are stupid. I don’t mean you are stupid, when you worry about this, but I think you’re letting your anxiety run wild.

Anyway, we pretty much know this isn’t what they planned. We have seen exactly what they did plan, in Putin’s speeches and Kremlin propaganda and that leaked article celebrating swift and decisive Russian victory. They planned for a smash-and-grab operation – cripple Ukrainian air force and air defense with overwhelming initial strikes, then grab Kyiv in a combined airborne and land-based operation, capture the Ukrainian government or force them to flee into exile, replace them with pliant pro-Russian puppets, and watch as the Ukrainian defense crumbles and the Ukrainian people resign themselves to the regime change. In this planned scenario, the West would be caught flat-footed, with EU disunited and unable to cooperate with the US, and any international sanctions would be nominal and toothless.

Well, none of that happened.

Russia is definitely losing the war in Ukraine, in the short term. They may eke out some kind of win in the east, if they manage to unfuck their logistics and do something to their morale and leadership problems, but even that is far from certain.

In the medium and long run, Russia is facing severe and continuously increasing economic trouble. And the sanctions are hurting them far, far more than they do Europe, let alone US. This will translate into political trouble, sooner or later – Russian people may be downtrodden, politically apathetic, and historically tenacious, but they aren’t mindlessly obedient or mute. As things get worse for them – and they will get worse, as more and more sectors of Russian economy stagnate or grind to complete halt – they will start to react.

In the long run, Russia is turbofucked unless the West drops the sanctions. And that’s not happening in any plausible short-term scenario.

True. But most of those countries have very little trade with Russia already, and/or have no means of offering Russia all the spare parts and high-tech stuff they are unable to produce domestically, and on which so much of Russia’s economy is dependent. The countries who are enforcing the sanctions make up for most of the world’s economy already. The entire economy of Russia is smaller than that of Italy, who aren’t even the biggest EU country.

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And also to take into account, and following up on @KathyPartdeux’s point about misleading stats

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Definitely, and it is always possible that some government agency has also gained access to whatever system and have been monitoring things quietly or is sitting on a vuln, for when they do need access to a resource.

So one should consider that ongoing intel operations may be disrupted by drawing attention to an overlooked vulnerability.

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A lot of the Russians who are young enough not to depend on state TV for their info but old enough to take effective action again the regime are just leaving. They don’t want to live in a country that has no future and where they might be drafted. This is especially true for educated young people more likely to understand the complex processes and methods of bringing down an autocrat whi imiserates the country.

While they’re happy to let a certain number of what they’d call “malcontents” go, Putin and his coterie know that this brain drain can’t go on. They’ll be shutting the remaining exit doors sometime in the next few weeks.

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And the other end of that is just how limited the Russian economy is to start, along with how it was already hurting well before this.

Russia’s limitations on building tanks, and launching that new tank were already known. Their low capacity and slow pace for producing guided munitions was widely reported around Syria.

That most of their auto factories are foreign owned is just fact. And they’re mostly owned by US, Korean and Japanese companies. The few domestic plants are definitely reliant on foreign made parts, because that’s just how the auto industry works. They can’t exactly reactivate a closed Ford plant that’s reliant on parts made in the US.

Then there’s all the banking and currency targeted stuff. They’re not buying parts for German made oil refining equipment via a proxy like China. If China won’t take Rubles. A lot of what the sanctions are doing is making sure the Ruble isn’t worth taking, and limiting their ability to get or send anything else.

Along with hampering their ability to physically send stuff out of Russia, or carry it in.

It’s not a zero sum situation. It’s not like this doesn’t work unless they’re totally cut off.

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How did they not have that stuff in fire-proof vaults? Or backed up via microfiche or scanning?

That’s a huge loss.

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So Afghans need to claim they are actually dogs…

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No money and probably not enough staff to do scanning and digitisation. Ukraine is not a rich country, and public services have suffered from under-funding and corruption.

Today conspiracy theorists were very excited by a Lviv firefighter wearing a donated Canadian uniform.

Thread:

ETA:

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Here is one reply to his tweet…

There were some good, thoughtful responses, and some typical crap ones, like this…

Give me a break, dipshit. :roll_eyes:

I will note that often when Biden has been talking about sanctions, he doesn’t generally say “the world” but “the West” and NATO…

But I think that what this shows us here in the US and western Europe more generally, is that we still have a long way to go to make amends for decades of imperialism and violence. Much like reparations here, we can’t keep pretending like it’s all in the past. We need to address our actions directly and find ways to make amends that isn’t just more imperialism made to look like “help”…

ETA - this is from the side thread that @anon33932455 posted…

See Jon Ossoff GIF by Election 2020

Immanual Wallerstein had entered the chat…

Honestly, that’s the problem is that it’s complicated, how our global economy is intertwined. And until we realize that all our fates rise and fall together, and WHY that’s the case, we’re going to continue fucking all of us over, beginning with the people who have the least power in our global system.

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They’re starting to run out of things to launder with huh?

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This is exactly the sentiment that was expressed to me by the Russians at the San Diego/Tijuana border who are waiting for political asylum.

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Fuck. That was predicted.

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(SCMP reprint)

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