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by wongarsu10 hours ago |
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upvoteby flohofwoe10 hours ago|
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Ukraine did a spectacular job to stop the full-scale invasion in the initial hours, days and weeks when there wasn't much international help yet though (and I guess from that moment on the war didn't go quite according to plan from the Russian PoV).
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upvoteby ivan_gammel10 hours ago|
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Let‘s not underestimate the corruption within Russian intelligence services, that resulted in invasion without any meaningful military planning. They spent the budgets corrupting Ukrainian elites and brainwashing population of the Eastern Ukraine, probably taking a cut in their own pockets, but they were not expecting to be held accountable for the result. The success of Ukraine in early days was in the element of surprise. Their resistance was not expected by Russian leadership, and the invasion itself was not expected by the middle ranks of Russian military. It did not go according to the plan, but plans change, and this war demonstrated weaknesses of all major powers - in a way, Russia did tick some boxes. As successful Ukrainians were in that moment, NATO has lost the war for them failing to mobilize in time, also taken by the surprise (as if CIA weren’t warning months ahead that this is going to happen). If Patriots, tanks and ammo would start flowing in the first weeks, maybe we would see peace in Istanbul accords in 2022 already.
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upvoteby lukan4 hours ago|
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They did a spectacular job, but there were already quite a few NATO weapons shipped to them since 2014.
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upvoteby scns10 hours ago|
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Ukraine took out a Yandex data center, which made the pro Trump bot traffic drop.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cw0k0g57mk3zo

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upvoteby sillyfluke10 hours ago|
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The article you linked to says nothing about the connection to pro-Trump bot traffic fyi
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upvoteby fr20299 hours ago|
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[dead]
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upvoteby hn_submit8 hours ago|
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Ukraine could've done much better if they'd mobilized and fortified their borders before the invasion. But Zelensky refused to do so (despite warnings from the U.S.) because war with Russia was hugely impopular with voters in Ukraine before the actual attack. They'd much rather stick their heads in the sand.

So a lot of their territorial loss can be attributed to his inaction. If they'd laid several million landmines in the Donbass the Russian attack would've been stumped and the occupied Crimea would've been easy prey.

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upvoteby asdff4 hours ago|
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Did they have capacity to do that at the time? Maybe Russia's first move would simply be elsewhere. there is a lot of border to mine especially when you include belarus.
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upvoteby hn_submit2 hours ago|
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They could've acquired the landmines from the U.S. since Biden was in the White House at the time.

If you mobilize your armed forces and move all your soldiers to the border and dig them in you'll dissuade an attacker from invading.

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upvoteby asdff1 hours ago|
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That's the thing though, between russia and belarus its over a 1000 mile border they would have had to secure.
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upvoteby asdff4 hours ago|
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That is fair to say today, but not when the war began.
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upvoteby torginus4 hours ago|
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Afaik this really isn't true. Most of the drone parts used both by Russia and Ukraine are coming from China, or Soviet surplus.

It used to be much more true. The Biden admin sent a lot more US weapons to fight Russia, Trump used to be much more amenable to send similar weapons provided somebody paid for it.

Nowadays US materiel is either tied up in the middle east or somewhere else (Patriots), or has been neutralized by Russian EW (HIMARS), or the US is just unwilling to part with it for whatever justification.

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upvoteby brookst10 hours ago|
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Standstill with Ukraine looks bad, and authoritarian regimes can survive almost anything except looking bad.

Responding to a NATO “attack” from Estonia, Putin can pivot to a bigger enemy where of course Russia has to employ universal conscription / nuclear weapons / whatever. The country must unite against this unprovoked western attack, etc, etc.

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upvoteby hn_submit8 hours ago|
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Nuclear weapons are no option. Russia would be wiped off the map before they could push that button.

A single Tomahawk missile could obliterate Moscow which would immediately end the war because Russia is extremely centralized. It's the reason almost 80% of all Russian SAM capability is stationed around the city.

Putin is unpredictable but he's not stupid. You don't become president of Russia by being stupid.

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upvoteby wiseowise3 hours ago|
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> A single Tomahawk missile could obliterate Moscow

Do you even know how big Moscow is? And nuclear Tomahawks were discontinued. Even if they weren’t, you’d need dozens to obliterate Moscow.

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upvoteby hn_submit2 hours ago|
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The Kremlin isn't that big you know.
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upvoteby smallstepforman5 hours ago|
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Putin is extremelly predictable, which allows the western warmongers to do nefarious things knowing very well he’ll assess the long term risks and be very cautious and accept limited damage to prevent a larger conflict. Use your grey matter and think logically instead of parroting propaganda.
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upvoteby wiseowise3 hours ago|
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> western warmongers

Who attacked Ukraine, again?

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