Russia/Ukraine/USA crisis.

[rival38]

As we ponder the motives, strategy and commitment of the waring factions It might be worth remembering the book by Arthur Ponsonby : Falsehood in war time.

In the prologue he stated, truth is the first casualty of war.

Historian Anne Morelli summarises the books take on the way wars are promoted by all combatant nations as follows:

We do not want war.
The opposite party alone is guilty of war.
The enemy is inherently evil and resembles the devil.
We defend a noble cause, not our own interests.
The enemy commits atrocities on purpose; our mishaps are involuntary.
The enemy uses forbidden weapons.
We suffer small losses, those of the enemy are enormous.
Recognized artists and intellectuals back our cause.
Our cause is sacred.
All who doubt our propaganda are traitors.

[GCH]

Derek Smith said:

Puggit said:

DAVEVO9 said:

How bad are things compared to the Cuban missile crisis?

Not even in the same chapter. That was fingers hovering over the button time.

It's similar in some ways. The USA did not want a missile base in Cuba, any more than Putin wants NATO bases in Ukraine. It was possible that the USA would invade Cuba to destroy the sites.

It was reported, after the event, that it came close to war. I see no reason to disbelieve that.

I concur with Derek, that that was similar and was sort of caused by similar soviet fears to now - US nukes missiles parked in Turkey and Italy pointed at moscow, which is what putin fears will happen if Ukraine join NATO and there is no buffer zone.
So, in response, and aided by assisting & protecting Castro following the US' botched bay of pigs invasion, they parked some nukes off the coast of florida aimed in the direction of the US.
It worked too - they were removed from cuba in return for being removed from turkey & italy. That was all they ultimately wanted.

So it is similar, and not quite that bad yet.... but then Khrushchev was nothing like putin, and at the time the soviets only had a few hundred nukes, vs the US' thousands.
The communication is now thankfully better and faster and that incident led to the creation of permanent direct communications lines between superpowers, but the stakes are higher now, and with an unhinged loon who won't back down, who knows what could happen.

[faa77]

Derek Smith said:

At the moment, all the west seems to be doing is using sanctions and supplying arms. That, surely, was to be expected, although perhaps not the current degree. He has the armour, fire power and manpower to defeat Ukraine militarily. The problem is that it might cause even more problems for him. I can't see China turning on Russia, but Putin will be in a weak position when negotiating deals. India depends on the west to a signigicant degree and might possibly join everyone (almost) else.

I can't see an option for Ukraine in the short/mid term. Even a stalemate is beyond all hope.

Who is going to knock Putin from his perch and replace him? They'll be confronted by the same problems. They could not pull out, dust the place down and apologise. Ukraine would want reparations, possibly even Crimea.

I'm of an age where I can remember Russian military equipment being a class leader, or so we were told. Their aircraft were talked of in hushed tones, and everyone knew that if they wanted to take Western Europe, all NATO could do was delay the advance a few days at best. The past four days has convinced me that they are more like Fred Karno's lot. I'm oddly reassured.

But Russia cannot be seen to fail in its invasion of such a weak country. Face is everything, or why else the May Day parade?

I would think that NATO will gain a lot of info, not to mention vicarious experience, during the current war, and more if Russia commits. Benefits on the back of dead children, civilians and army personnel.

My opinion is in the 1970s Russia probably could have taken Europe. However, since the 90s Vlad and his mates have stolen Russia's money, put it in their own pockets and Russia effectively still has a 1979s military which Vlad and co have bank accounts with billions.

[FourWheelDrift]

Volume 2 here - https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

For normal 500 page limit reason.