Quote (dro94 @ 22 Mar 2022 06:12)

Of course it'll work, without reserves how else can you fund a protracted war when your investment grade is junk and you need to retain significant liquidity to prop up the currency?

The long term options are:
1) Fund the war, cannot buy sufficient bonds to support currency, causing hyperinflation and economic collapse (timeline, within a year)
2) Fund the war and buy bonds. Borrow large sums of money from China at a steep interest rate or commercial IOU's in a similar vein to Africa (timeline - long term)
3) Fund the war and buy bonds. Print the rubles required, causing hyperinflation and economic collapse (timeline of a few years)

The more I study the sanction details, the more I think Russia needs to negotiate the removal of them in any peace deal to bear semblance of being a 'major power' in the world

Quote (Hamsterbaby @ 21 Mar 2022 23:27)

When I am talking about someone who is unhinged.
He will just nuke.

Their economy is going to collapse anyway, The Russians if they get out of this war, their economy is going to take a beating which might last for maybe 20 to 30 years.
The common folks will go through unimaginable hardship.

So he might just nuke. Since everything is screwed up , use your trump card and see what happens.

Quote (ferdia @ Mar 21 2022 10:19pm)

or find other trade partners.

Quote (Black XistenZ @ 22 Mar 2022 06:32)

Even if this war ends up being a failure, and there is hyperinflation and hardship for ordinary Russians, Putin could still live the rest of his life in luxury as long as the country stays somewhat stable. If he "casually starts WW3" like you suggest, there is a huge chance that he ends up dead. Dito for all the oligarchs and cronies in his orbit. And for the generals who would have to execute the order to start nuking. No person involved in this process has a personal incentive to cross this line unless the country is under imminent military threat from foreign nukes or a foreign invasion army marching on Moscow.

Quote (Black XistenZ @ Mar 21 2022 11:19pm)

It should be noted though that - at least for the time being - Russia can more easily replace lost equipment than Ukraine. But yeah, the voices who fearmonger about "Russia is gonna march right on toward Poland and Germany after they take Ukraine" are deluded and would be wrong even if we ignore the NATO and/or nukes part of the equation.




This. In particular, the Western sanctions will cripple the Russian economy the longer they are in effect. Russia depends on a fuckton of Western high-tech products that they cannot produce themselves and which will be very hard to substitute through other channels (e.g. from China). For example equipment for their oil and gas extraction.

This is a bit like becoming unemployed and ending up without an income: if you have a well-maintained house and a wardrobe full of new shoes and clothes, then you can cope for quite some time, but you won't be able to replace breaking shoes, a malfunctioning washing machine, a dying fridge or the leaking pipes. The longer the poverty goes on, the worse the situation becomes. Similar story with the Russian economy: for some time, they will be able to keep their businesses and their extractive industry running based on their stock and the factories, pipelines and so on which already exist. But the longer this drags on, the more stuff will become inoperative because they can't get the pieces to repair or replace the ones that break.

Likewise, the Russian central bank won't be able to keep the rouble afloat indefinitely, it will quickly burn through the foreign currency reserves that it still controls (the bulk of its reserves lies on frozen bank accounts in the West).
And last but not least, the longer this goes on, the more serious and final Western efforts to replace Russian gas and oil will become, which will undercut the future funding of Putin's economic model. The pipelines to alternative buyers either don't exist yet (Iran, India) or don't come close to the capacities of those toward Europe (China).

tldr: they dun fucked up

Quote (dro94 @ Mar 21 2022 12:46pm)

This is about the same figure as respected intelligence agencies once you flex the estimated deaths from the last announcement which was 7,000, but DAMN that's a lot of dead soldiers within a month: https://twitter.com/RALee85/status/1505980177402183685

There's less info about dead Ukrainian soldiers, as our intelligence agencies don't want to dampen the morale of Ukrainians, but their figures will be a bit less or the same

Visually confirmed losses of equipment:
Russa - 1663, main categories consisting of: 263 tanks, 174 armoured vehicles, 248 infantry vehicles, 77 armoured personnel carriers, 15 aircraft, 34 helicopters
Ukraine - 500: 71 tanks, 58 armoured vehicles, 54 infantry vehicles, 26 armoured personnel carriers, 11 aircraft, 1 helicopter

Big losses on both sides and in a 3:1 ratio, but note Russia has equipment in a ratio of 10:1 to Ukraine. It will still take the Russian military many years to recover from these losses though

https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html

Quote (Nibthebarb @ 22 Mar 2022 01:10)

One thing to keep in mind is that historically, outside of standouts like Napoleon who could gain territory with equal or lesser numbers given equal tech, invading armies have always needed to be significantly larger than their opponents to account for the fact that the defenders don't need to spend time and resources in the process of occupying land and extending supply lines that the invaders do. Not to mention home field advantage, popular resistance, scorched earth tactics, etc.

I'm surprised at how imbalanced the losses have been, but not because Russia has lost more (given how much territory they've occupied) but I wouldn't have been at all surprised if it was around 2:1 instead.

Ukraine still doesn't have any prayer in actually "winning" in the hollywood sense, but they could very well pull off a massive win by only having to give up Crimea and NATO, which I honestly think they should do, and Putin should accept. I don't favor any particular side here, and neither should the vast majority of Americans. I'm in favor of it not turning into a protracted meat grinder and, god-willing, no more countries involved than the current belligerents.

Quote (Black XistenZ @ Mar 21 2022 04:21pm)

I think the Russians will also insist on Ukraine officially acknowledging the "People's Republics of Donezk and Luhansk". This would give Putin a good argument to save face with his own people. His propaganda machine could spin such an outcome as "we had to intervene in Ukraine to prevent a genocide against the ethnic Russians in Donbass, and we succeeded. Our heroic efforts repelled the aggressors and crushed their nazi hordes. VICTORY!!!!!111"

Quote (Black XistenZ @ 22 Mar 2022 08:21)

I think the Russians will also insist on Ukraine officially acknowledging the "People's Republics of Donezk and Luhansk". This would give Putin a good argument to save face with his own people. His propaganda machine could spin such an outcome as "we had to intervene in Ukraine to prevent a genocide against the ethnic Russians in Donbass, and we succeeded. Our heroic efforts repelled the aggressors and crushed their nazi hordes. VICTORY!!!!!111"