Maximalist? No. But they got (at least thus far) what was truly important to them. Crimea and resource rich Russo-sphere Donbass. The icing on the cake would be Odessa but that's too costly.

I said this a few times, people have a nonsensical framing of what winning and losing looks like. I think Russia keeping what they hold is not an all out win but it's certainly not a loss.

This post was edited by ofthevoid on Nov 2 2023 07:21am

Maximalist aims as in "controlling all of Ukraine"? That still seems extremely unlikely to me. Again: Russia has taken exactly one larger population center over the past 17 months.

All Ukraine needs to do is stop throwing away troops and materiel by charging head-first into fortified positions in a failed counteroffensive and instead focus on defending their own (current) territory, then they should be fine even with lower volumes of Western arms supplies.




They already held Crimea and the vast majority of the Donbass before the outbreak of this war.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Nov 2 2023 07:26am

Ukraine's population went from 45 million in 2013 to ~30 million today. Despite it being a state secret, casualties are clearly in the hundreds of thousands. It's the elephant in the room. There's a non-zero percent chance that Ukrainian lines collapse at some point. At the very least, I don't think Russian war goals today are much short of controlling all of Kharkiv, Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhia, Kherson, Mykolaiv and Odessa.

In a WWI slog, things can move slowly, then all at once. The situation in Avdiivka is looking grim. For Ukraine to stop losing men, they'd need to accept that they can't win the war by military means. But at that point, isn't negotiation (and accepting the loss of significant territory) the only outcome?

Avdiivka is located in a salient which is surrounded by Russian territory on 3.5 sides, such a position cannot be defended long-term. Once the front has been straightened, the outlook is better. And yes, I'm aware that the term "straightening the frontline" has historically been an euphemism for "tactical retreat".


You're contradicting yourself with the last sentence. If the Russians are not afraid of further Ukrainian counteroffensives and they also believe that Ukraine will eventually collapse so that they can take Kharkiv, Zaporizhia, Odessa etc., then they have no incentive to negotiate a peace treaty. In this case, keeping the conflict going at low temperature without officially ending it is better for them because it means that the Ukrainian refugees can't return from Western Europe and that Western reconstruction aid can't begin to flow.

Negotiating a peace which Russia intends to actually stick by (and not just use as a tactical relief to replenish their forces for another major offense) under these circumstances would only be possible if Ukraine gives them nearly everything they want. Which Ukraine will obviously never do unless they are 99% sure that a collapse of their lines is imminent.

There are alot of parallels between the conflict in Ukraine and that in Israel

Russians are depicted as "Orc's" while Palestinians are depicted as "animals...less then human" while the US has repeated said of both conflicts "now is not the time to negotiate".

Palestinian leadership doesn't recognize Israel's right to exist, Hamas vows to continue terrorist attacks on Israel whenever and wherever they can, so what is there to negotiate between the two sides?
In Ukraine/Russia, the Russians at least don't want to genocide every last Ukrainian, so some sort of compromise is at least feasible.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Nov 2 2023 08:04am

hang on, Israel's leadership does not recognize Palestine's right to exist (they are bombing concentrated civilian populations, which is a crime against humanity in most people's dictionaries) and has vowed some pretty radical stuff as well.
In Ukraine / Russia, there is no expectation of a peace deal for years to come.

This post was edited by ferdia on Nov 2 2023 08:31am

Parallels ? I thik it's twisted since even World War 1 isn't accurate: the agression of Ukraine is pretty unique. Orcs aren't existing in the real world, but I have a video of them complaining being compared with russians if you want.
Israel far right leadership (nazionalists + religious) is deshumanizing Palestinians, assimilating them all as bloody terrorists, in order to apply their neo-zionist plan (which is for some "self defense" and for some others "secure proxy in middle east") => Here you have a parallel eventually :-)

PLO leadership - (Fatah) - has recognized State of Israel in 1993 and got absolutely humiliated for doing this as West Bank is still being illegally settled against a direct promise NOT to make further settlements in West Bank in Oslo Accords.

https://peacenow.org.il/en/30-years-after-oslo-the-data-that-shows-how-the-settlements-proliferated-following-the-oslo-accords


HAMAS has used the humilation suffered by Arafat to rally people to their cause and take control of Gaza leadership.



Russians offered a ceasefire in April 2022 brokered a.o. by Erdogan and Bennett which was refused as e.g. Johnson reassured Zelensky they should be fighting. For that alone Johnson should burn in hell.

I also see peculiar difference that bombing the shit out of thousands of kids is not considered a war crime, while taking those kids outside of an active war zone is considered a war crime that ICJ should totally prioritise in investigating just like they investigated all the war crimes committed in Iraq and Afghanistan.



It's also peculiar that we don't hear about those millions of Ukranians that decided to flee the war east instead of west. As if they are actually treated with dignity, have been given relocation allowances to settle wherever they wish and are treated like common citizens instead of "human waste and animals".

Remember how your country and France called bullshit on completely made up reasons Brits and Yankees presented to go bomb the shit out Iraq and refused to join in on a gross violation of international law that caused millions of refugees and uncountable suffering? Time to regain some European sovereignty and show Yankees and Brits the door, again and decide your own fate.

This post was edited by Malopox on Nov 2 2023 08:48am