Quote (Kuggergug @ 24 Jul 2022 04:05)
1. Russia has the power to steamroll Ukraine, the reason they are not is because they have not declared war so they are using a very tiny army compared to what they could potentially use.
Putin isn't declaring war and isn't issuing a general mobilization because he's a coward and knows full well that the support for his war would plummet if the Moscow and St. Petersburg gentry were asked to send their own sons into this meatgrinder. Until now, he's mostly using ethnic minorities from Siberia, Czechnia, Dagestan, mercenaries from the Wagner group, conscripts from "Novorossija" (the occupied regions of Ukraine) and so on. He's recklessly sacrificing the rubes and dregs because he's unsure how the wider public would respond to an all-out war that affects families from the middle of Russian society.
Also note that Russia is running low on precision missiles and modern tanks. They're deploying T-72s and, increasingly, even T-62s for a reason. Anyone thinking that Russia has a huge stockpile of modern armament lying around in warehouses which it is - for whatever reason - not using, is a fool. After the failure of the advance on Kyiv, Kharkiv and Odessa; after the endless siege of Mariupol; after the painfully slow capturing of Sieverodonetsk and Lyssichantsk; after their current struggles in Kherson and so on and forth, there is just no feasible reason to hold back on military equipment.
Also keep in mind that Russia "only" has around 1 million active personnel. That sounds like a lot, but Russia is a HUGEass country, it takes a metric fuckton of soldiers just to defend it's borders. Reports are that their border security is already spread thin and dangerously vulnerable.
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2. Russia is fully aware they cannot defeat NATO in a conventional war. That's why they are loudly rattling their nuclear sabres. In a hypothetical situation where they DID invade Europe, it wouldn't look like WW2. It would be something like Putin issuing an ultimatum like "We want to unite Kaliningrad with the rest of Russia. It is our right and we will march our troops in to acquire land to make this a reality. NATO must lay down its arms and not impede our mission. If NATO fires ONE BULLET to try to stop us, we will nuke New York City, Los Angeles, Paris and London. We are willing to die for our cause."
Would Putin and his cronies really be willing to literally bet their own life on NATO backing down in such a game of chicken? I doubt it.
This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Jul 24 2022 04:04am