Quote (Goomshill @ 25 Feb 2024 01:45)
Russia still needs to fight a costly war to gain a relatively meager amount of territory and resources. The main strategic vulnerability of the separatist regions is what, water supply?
Mostly Crimea, but since Russia controls the left bank of the Dnieper River, they can strangle Ukraine's economy by shutting transport along the river down any time Ukraine thinks about shutting down the North Crimean Canal again.
Quote
Putin is still paying a high price for the war now and faces the same questions about the cost vs reward of an operation much of the subordinate structure was drawn into somewhat unaware.
Putin isn't paying the price, the rubes and rabble which make up the rank and file of his military are.
--------------------------------------------------------
Quote
The thing is, Russia was never really proactive about trying to impose its will on Ukraine in the first place.
When Putin's man in Kyiv, Viktor Yanukovich, was losing to the leader of the pro-Western opposition, Viktor Yushchenko, he literally had Yushchenko poisoned. And the pro-Russian side tried to steal the election via fraud, leading to the supreme court of the country ordering a revote which Yushchenko won, sparking the so-called Orange Revolution. Yanukovych then won the next election in 2010 because the other side had proven to be corrupt and inept. As soon as the pro-Western forces in the country wanted to formally align with the West (by signing the association agreement with the EU), Moscow interfered yet again and had their man Yanukovych veto it at the 11th hour, in direct contradiction of a promise he had made on the campaign trail for the 2010 election. When the ensuring outrage got out of control, Russian troops swiftly annexed Crimea and invaded the Donbass.
Long story short, Russia only seems to have given Ukraine a long leash as long as Ukraine didn't dare to exert its sovereignty and challenge its de facto vassal status.
Quote
Putin wasn't some hardcore irredentist trying to rebuild an empire
Putin had literally been talking since the 90s about restoring the empire that Russia had oh-so-tragically lost.
Quote
, the status quo ante was an independent Ukraine only loosely in their sphere of influence.
See above.
Quote
Russia could have tried to twist Ukraine at any point in the post cold war era, they didn't until the US tried to bring it into the west by force.
See above, they already did try to twist Ukraine back in 2004 when there was organic momentum on the pro-Western side. And let's not forget that a big chunk of the pro-Western sentiment and momentum in 2013 and 2014 was organic, too. Furthermore, during the 90s and early 2000s, Russia didn't refrain from pulling and twisting Ukraine out of the goodness of their hearts, they stood back because their own country was in shambles and lacked the power to assert itself. Since the mid-2000s (when a commodity price boom boosted their economy), Russia was acting in aggressive and imperialist fashion against its neighbors again, see also the Russo-Georgian War of 2008.
---------------------------------------------------------------
Quote
Because its simply not worth it for Russia like its not worth it for us. The poorer half of the poorest country in Europe
We've already discussed this point a month ago:
https://forums.d2jsp.org/topic.php?t=92094408&f=119&p=656354817In any case, the claim that the Kyiv-controlled parts of Ukraine are categorically poorer than the Moscow-controlled parts is definitely untrue.
Quote
Hungry mouths to feed that would gladly suckle off the EU welfare state,
You could also phrase it as "Europe got a significant injection of fresh bodies against the backdrop of its crumbling demographic basis". It's mostly Germany where Ukrainian refugees have subpar rates of workforce participation, in the other European countries (like the Netherlands or Poland), they're actually working and contributing just fine. Still a net drain at this point in time, don't get me wrong, but if these people stay, it can be assumed that they will eventually hold their weight, just like the other Eastern European migrants to Western Europe did. Germany handing benefits and entitlements out like candy is a big problem in recent years, but not limited to Ukrainians at all.
In terms of education, socialization and so on and forth, Ukrainians cannot be compared to the types of migrant that Western Europe has been absorbing from the Middle East and Africa over the past decade. A Ukrainian lawyer will find a way to contribute in a Western economy, a goat herder from Eritrea never will. Likewise, even if the Ukrainian lawyer has to work lowly jobs in the West, the generation of her children will be reasonably integrated. Can't say the same about the offspring of Muslim and/or African migrants.
Quote
and it probably serves Russia's longterm geopolitical interests to freely give away everything west of the Dnipro even if they could seize it.
If that were true, then why did Russia try to capture all of Ukraine at the onset of this war? If their initial decapitation move toward Kyiv had succeeded, they would have been stuck with all the oh-so-poor regions of Western Ukraine and all the "hungry mouths to feed".
Quote
The point being, between the costs of attrition and the real lack of reward, Russia has some pretty thin margins to actually make real gains between now and any negotiations. Putin has already manuevered Russia into an advantageous position for peace talks, successfully fought an offensive and taken a good chunk of what he wants. There's still significant lands at risk, and western Ukraine could still try to sue for peace in hopes of retaining the Donbas farmlands, because if the lines continue to collapse that's precisely what Russia is going to seize in coming months or years at this rate. But at heavy cost to Russia. And thus it can be in both the west's interests and Russia's interests to end the war and let Ukraine retain some lands it would lose if the conflict continued.
Fair enough, that's a consistent line of reasoning. (Although I still think that Russia's observable actions contradict this logic, so I'm still inclined to believe in different premises.
)
This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Feb 25 2024 05:39pm