Quote (ofthevoid @ Jan 25 2023 07:42am)
I watched a debate on Russian TV basically between Russian war mongers and their version of liberals (also pretty much pro war). In all of their assessments it was decided that NATO was not going to stop so what is the logical next step. More mobilizations, nukes, targeting 3rd countries where weapons are shipped from, etc. were all proposed and talked about but at the end one guy made a point about how this is also an asymmetric war and there are other ways to respond for the west to get the message that they aren't fucking around.
Blowing up western gas pipelines (i.e. Norway-Poland), cutting the internet sea cable, hacking of western crucial infrastructure and logistics, 'meddling' in our interests. I think what's been happening in Africa is really interesting. You're seeing Wagner gaining huge popularity, you're seeing African countries asking colonizer nations like France to get out i.e. Burkino Faso, Mali, etc. We recently sent troops to Congo. These aren't happening in a vacuum and there's a shadowy war being waged imo. I think before nukes start flying they'll work to undermine our interests abroad in a quiet but meaningful way. If we continue to push don't be surprised if western cargo ships or oil tankers are mysteriously being hit by Somali pirates or some other pirates all of the sudden armed with modern Russian hardware.
To exactly that point, let's remember Obama's response to Russia's response to Euromaidan in the first place, going several steps back in this chain of events. It was in the following year that Obama started funneling weapons to "pro-democracy sunni militias" in Syria, also known as ISIS and Al Qaeda, in an attempt to bleed out Russia on another front. Putin had intervened directly in Ukraine by sending his little green men to the DPR/LPR, and Obama decided
not to provoke war in Ukraine directly but instead try to bleed out the Russian military by dragging them into another conflict in defense of Assad. But that's when Putin employed his jiu jitsu by simply allowing that conflict to escalate without Russian intervention and the EU got burned by the migrant crisis, serving Russia's aim and eventually leading to Obama doing a 180 and arming the kurds to kill the sunnis and deliver it right back to Putin.
So yeah you might be onto something if Russia engages in the typical kind of tit for tat retaliation, especially the whole 'revenge served cold' like the Clinton episode. I think there are more direct means than Somali pirates, we could see a US navy vessel sunk by Houthis magically wielding advanced Russian hardware instead of shitty Iranian handouts.
But another question is which of these methods would actually serve Russia's interests? If they view Ukraine as existential and want to deliver a blow so decisive that America would actually back down, the nuclear option might be the only way. The US would be faced with a choice of whether to wade into a full blown world war 3 nuclear conflict that kills billions and ends civilization as we know it, or to back off. Any half measures less than that, and the US needs only to keep escalating like we've been doing. If another pipeline is blown up or a boat sunk or a plane shot down, it all just winds up being more fodder for a warmongering media and excuses to ramp up their weapons shipments to Ukraine.
So that's why I think we could be heading nuclear far sooner than anyone expects. As soon as Russia views its battlefield operations as a losing proposition, or they actually start taking the kind of losses we pretend they are
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