Quote (fender @ 7 Mar 2022 12:18)

Quote (Cascadian @ 7 Mar 2022 21:20)

shit sorry, should have said UA government * updated

Quote (fender @ 7 Mar 2022 12:21)

relax, i know. everyone knows, it's blatantly obvious from the context, i just thought it was a good opportunity for some comic relief.

Quote (ofthevoid @ Mar 7 2022 02:58pm)

I don't doubt this is a thing but I just don't think it's indicative what will happen over the long term. It's focusing on the trees rather than the forest. I think Russia expected (like some of us did) that Ukraine's military forces would fold and start running, and this hasn't happened to the extent to which they thought they would.

I also don't think them taking their time to put those troops into place is indicative of anything really important, rather than they wanted to see if simply by display of force and numbers was enough to get the Ukrainians to agree to recognize the eastern region autonomy and not join NATO. Once that didn't work they actually pulled the trigger on the invasion. Right now, 200k is like what 1/5? of Russia's active military personnel, and i think they have a few million in reservists, so don't think a draft is coming.

Who knows how long this will drag out, I think Russia underestimated the cost but at this point they're too dedicated to the cause to pull back.

I also don't really know what's a good gage to consider something a success vs a failure? Like this is a week old war, and they have the capital surrounded? I think success/failure here is relative and of course we in the west would want it to seem like a complete failure, but objectively speaking, to have your forces basically ready to assault the capital in less than a week is a success story in any war that i've read about.

Quote (thesnipa @ Mar 7 2022 08:27pm)

March 20 2003, US/UK/others invade Iraq.

April 9 2003, Baghdad falls and Saddam's regime is toppled.

2011, troops withdraw, war was a failure.

Quote (thesnipa @ Mar 7 2022 03:27pm)

March 20 2003, US/UK/others invade Iraq.

April 9 2003, Baghdad falls and Saddam's regime is toppled.

2011, troops withdraw, war was a failure.

Quote (ferdia @ Mar 7 2022 03:35pm)

what do you mean by failure? did they not destroy all the weapons of mass destruction ? (and if there were no weapons of mass destruction what was the justification for going to war)(and if its "because saddam was a baddy" then why was north korea or the congo not invaded by the US as well?)

Quote (ofthevoid @ Mar 7 2022 03:37pm)

I get what you're saying but failure here is being used in a different sense of the word.

Like was Germany taking Poland in 25 days a success or a failure? If someone in the UK published an article at the time, "It's day 10, Germany still hasn't taken Poland, they are failing at XYZ" , if you take a step back and wait for the chips to fall a rational person would say no it wasn't a failure.

I think we will need at the very least months if not years to kind of judge in my opinion. It's much harder especially today with so much propaganda and objectives really not being spelled out. Like us taking Baghdad was a "success" that doesn't mean the war was a success for the US though, but look how many years it took for that truth to manifest.