Quote (ofthevoid @ Feb 25 2022 10:55am)
I mean these are romanticized notions you often hear as war propaganda or in movies/stories that rational and pragmatic people shouldn't hold.
By living on their knees, it just means they would have gone to some pow prison for a week, a month, who knows exactly how long, until Ukraine either loses or choses to make concessions . Most of them were probably in their 20's and basically sacrificed their lives for badass brownie points. If I was one of their loved ones I would have wanted them to chose being a pragmatic 10/10 times
stories like these may be the only chance Ukraine has in an extended guerilla warfare strategy vs the conventional arms of Russia. the more heartbreaking losses the country suffers the closer they inch to surrendering.
men ages 18-60 are already being kept from fleeing, we're likely looking at a fairly drawn out insurgency effort after the initial rush of tanks, bombing, etc.
the Klitchko's are fighting, and as silly as it sounds if/when Putin announces their death it could ripple outward and ruin troop morale.
it could be that hundreds of thousands of men die in the coming months or years, a few dozen going out in style for their country won't change the tides of war.
honestly it doesnt look like Ukraine has any chance unless we see sanctions so drastically terrible against Russia, as well as threats of Nukes on every single side of him as well as a major increase of NATO sites, that Putin balks. pretty hard to see him doing that however with already going this far. he's almost better off in isolation selling fuel to china, north korea, iran, and whoever else will take it. even if he gets NATO to back down from escalation sanctions are all but guaranteed. whether this was caused by NATO aggressions, russian greed for land and ports, or literally anything else. it doesnt change the drastic escalation of tensions that now all but guarantees a cold war renewal, sadly with likely china/russian allied against all of the west. who tf knows what that means for chinese manufactured goods in the supply chain, if anything. china will sit on the fence and get cheap fuels while still offshoring cheap products and components and just keep chugging.