For all the sentiment that the cavalry is coming to Ukraine's rescue after the passage of the aid bill by the US congress, I feel like the damage from the delays has already been done. The lack of Ukrainian anti-air in recent weeks allowed Russia to inflict long-term damage on Ukraine's infrastructure, and probably also on its morale.

It must also be noted that the $60bn appropriated now only make up for what Ukraine would have needed these past months, they would need another $40-60bn on top of that to recover into a strong position. And since its super unlikely due to political reasons that another bill will be passed before the November election, Ukraine will run into the same predicament again in the fall/early winter. Yes, they will receive a temporary bounce over the summer when the $60bn in weapons arrive, but this aid will run out within a handful of months while it's predictable that no follow-up will come anytime soon. Their biggest hope is that the ramp-up of the Western production of shells and AA missiles will finally be completed and enable them to cut Russia's numbers advantage down to a managable level.

I wonder what the prevailing prognosis is at this point? Do people think Ukraine should surrender? Should Ukraine fight to the death?

I can't speak for others, and I don't claim that my assessment is particularly informed or wise, but here we go:

1.) Ukraine winning back the territories Russia currently controls is extremely unlikely.
2.) Unlike what Russian propaganda wants to make us believe, a stalemate roughly along the current lines is still achievable for Ukraine. By retaining their sovereignty, this outcome would still be a significant "win" for Ukraine.
3.) To hold its own and stop the bleeding, Ukraine desperately needs sufficient amounts of air defense and artillery shells. This is the field in which the West has most clearly failed them. These types of weapons are also quite unsuited for offensive warfare, so there is no good reason or excuse for not providing them to Kyiv.

4.) We have no real idea how resilient or fragile Russia's wartime economy currently is. The hopes for Western sanctions to quickly diminish Russia's military capacities have flopped, quite predictably if I may add. Personally, I have stressed since the get go that the real economic damage from both this war and the Western sanctions will only hit Russia in the medium and long term. Likewise, their soviet-era stockpiles won't last forever. So the way I see it, there is good reason to assume that Russia will eventually run out of steam, but we have no idea how close we are to this point. Similarly, it's hard to predict how robust and lasting China's support for Russia's war is. For the time being, we must imho assume that Russia will be able to keep up the pressure for at least another year or two.

5.) A lot of the costs of starting and waging this war are already baked in from Russia's point of view. They did ruin their reputation in the West; they have permanently alienated their best customers; they have become China's bitch for the foreseeable future; they have showed their hand, technology and propaganda-wise, to NATO; they have exhausted the scarmongering-with-nukes-card; they have lost a six digit number of soldiers; they did burn through a significant chunk of their irreplaceable soviet-era stockpiles. Therefore, Putin/Russia have comparatively little to gain from negotiating a "fair" peace treaty in the near future. Due to this "sunk cost"-dynamic, I see no incentive for Russia to settle for a negotiated peace now, while it has the upper hand - unless the peace gives them everything they want and essentially amounts to an unconditional surrender of Ukraine.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Apr 22 2024 03:24pm

Russia will be fine as long as there is demand for commodities, and that's going to be the case for the foreseeable future as consumption in China, India and other developing countries continues to grow with a growing middle class. The thing is, when countries continue to devalue their own currencies with endless debt, real goods will always continue to appreciate, and they've made that bet and many other countries around the globe are also making that bet, kind of why gold is breaking higher with central banks being net buyers.

A stalemate is realistic if Ukraine continues to get ~100Bn a year for years to come . But that's not a given. The reason they got this money now is Biden+ Dems simply can't afford another political loss on their resume before the election. Between runaway inflation, border, having Ukraine starting to obviously lose right before US election (if additional aid isn't sent) would of been massively negative optically. What this aid does, is give Ukraine another year maybe, and if Trump wins there's ample risk he forces Ukraine to accept concessions and the war's over. But Biden wisely kicks this can to after the election.

There really is no 'winning' for Ukraine, the best they can get now is Russia gets tired because western support doesn't fade. But even then, Ukraine's not getting all it's territory back and there's no way they can fully recover from all of the infrastructure damage and hemorrhaging like a 1/3 of it's youngest and most able bodied population fully to call it a 'win' in any sense of the word.

This post was edited by ofthevoid on Apr 22 2024 04:19pm

they will have to bow down soon and what you described happened why?

because the german nazis fought to the last man

the ukranian nazis are now trying to copy their heroes.....slava ukraini i guess

there is no ukranian sovereignty regardless of outcome

a hyper corrupt shithole with no economy and not enough young men, they will be our bitch or putins bitch

one of the two camps oligarchs will suck the place dry, take the profits, while the taxpayers are on the hook for the destruction

the last time for ukraine to get an actual win was when they repelled russias attack on kiev and had that peace deal in place

the ukraine aid bills are probably the largest money laundering operation in history after covid, ukranian mps have suitcases with millions or drive the newest rolls royce

and have fun europe when after the war all these stockpiles of weapons are truly free for all.......yo ahmed, need some aks and a stinger?

russia is clearly hurt by the war, but then again

ukraine is the last possible battlefield in europe, who cares if they run through their material?

it doesnt matter

about alienating the west, i dont believe this is russias play here, but in the long term thats another "does not matter" and we are still buying

the EU itself said recently that they cant ban russian LNG or europe is cooked

40 per cent more LNG compared to 2021 at a premium price lmao

there are now multiple manufacturer closures per week in germany alone and a good amount of that will be moving to places, where russia has access

The same people saying there is no "winning for Ukraine" are the same ones that said the war was over in 2023.

Quick refresher 2023 was the year Ukraine was going to retake Crimea

Not in my words.

You were the first to post in this topic after the OP's posts and clearly you supported the idea that Ukraine was going to retake Crimea like so many others here that will now say they never thought that was going to happen

Sorry champ

https://forums.d2jsp.org/topic.php?t=100408346&f=119