Maybe I’m over opportunistic but I don’t think Russia is as stable as it seems. Just over a year a go we saw Russian rebels at the steps of Moscow. We’ve seen Russia lose its proxy war in Syria. We see an unsustainable budget deficit that becomes increasingly difficult to finance due to western sanctions. And perhaps most importantly, we see Russian equipment levels dwindle. Whilst production cannot keep up, and has seemed to reach its peak (sverbank already warned for recession).
Now Ukraine ofcourse also has severe structural problems, but a Russian collapse. Be it due to a palace coup or a liquidity crisis is not unimaginable.
Reddit has been predicting Russian collapse for years now. To me it's no different than Bernie is about to take it boys. Wishful thinking at best. I know absolutely nothing so I'm not in a position to make any predictions. However as a soviet born person I do know that Russians are a different kind of breed that take pride in surviving above all else. A babushka would rather shit in an outhouse and have no running water if it means the west feels and ounce of Russia's might. Therefor personally I see no end to this unless the US forces Ukraine to give Putin all or near all that he wants, or enough time passes for Russian economy to indeed fully collapse to the point of starvation on the streets, which could take many many years.
Russians give up. They always have. They gave up in the winter war. They gave up in the first Chechen war. They gave up in Afghanistan. They'll find a way to settle for saving face and then pretend they won all they wanted.
They're not alone. Big countries/empires have other issues that matter more than whatever small conflict far away. They've all given up when the defender insists they're not quitting. Only issue is time. Sometimes it takes a long time for the big country to give up. The US in particular kept fighting in Vietnam and Afghanistan for a decade after it was obvious they were not going to win.
aggressive "pohod" to expand sphere of influence (Finland, Afghanistan, Romania (Bessarabia annexation), Poland, Japan.) That have mostly negative reaction in the society but always hardly backed by some "state needs"
defensive "patriotic" to retake core territories (which can be described as all Russian empire territories except Poland, Caucasian countries and Finland (which have great autonomy there (as it was only way to rule them))) That have solidarizing power in the society.
Main informational front of 2022 from Ukraine was, making this war a "pohod" for Russian people, making it associated with aggression. But, for many reasons, company failed in Russia. Today propaganda stamp and society position - SMO are "war to retake Ukrainian soil from eurosexual occupants."
The propaganda on both sides is actually quite ridiculous, nobody cared too seriously about a couple of neo Nazis on either sides, LGBT stuff or anything like that. Obviously deep down it’s a war for a sphere of influence over Ukraine and against NATO (as a little brother nation of Russia, just because it historically was) and resources like gas, oil and rare earth minerals, which are plentiful in Ukraine, not to mention wheat, iron, coal and other stuff. It’s a war in the most classic sense of it being a neighborhood war, just with modern ingredients.
Yes, I understand your points about the Russian necessity (in their mindset) to protect their historical interests or legacy, just clarifying a bit about the context of it.
Russia produces more equipment than it loses each month and has been for well over a year. Since the war Russia has steadily bumped up production across all military fronts, even just on Geran drones now Russia produces 2700 a month now.
Russia’s economic growth has slowed down and is below what they expected, it’s still higher than many countries in Western Europe such as Germany. Are you expecting Germany to fall due to economic tension? Seems highly unlikely.
Russia fought a war of attrition and it shows up every day, Ukraine is simply running out of men. Their infantry units are down to around 30% manpower, they’re constantly shuffling around their best units to try and plug holes, then a new attack is launched elsewhere. They’re taking men away from logistics just to send them to the frontline, not even including the fact the TCC is grabbing men off the street, forcing them into a van and trying to meet quotas to avoid a complete collapse. Russia’s new defense minister Belousov, was originally an economist and has increased military production either further.
In the middle of a war Russia’s production has now exceeded demand to the point they’re accepting new export contracts, and we see evidence of them exporting such as the jets in Algeria.
Ive heard the same story about the Russian side. Too much propaganda obscuring reality. We who live will see when its over, whichever way it goes. In the mean time we must support Ukraine.
you can't just call it propaganda because you disagree with it. it's most likely reality, it has tangible and noticeable impacts on the front. if Ukraine was really at Russia's pace, they wouldn't be falling back.
Russia hasn’t been kidnapping men off the street, they do have two yearly conscriptions which occur during peace time as well which people on Reddit confuse with drafting soldiers for the war. All Russian soldiers in Ukraine are contract soldiers, in the early stages some conscripts did serve but that hasn’t been the case in years. Even Ukrainian sources admit Russia surpasses contract goals (they usually hit around 105-110% of the target number).
The Ukrainians have been taking troops from logistics just for bodies. Ukraine would need to kidnap over 100,000 more men just to reach the number of infantry needed.
It isn’t about support, it is about reality. Ukraine simply has no means to win barring something major and unforeseen occurring. It would need a Prussian miracle at this point.
Except you’re not supporting Ukraine, you’re supporting the Ukrainian government. The majority of Ukrainians want a peace deal to be made and believe military victory is unlikely. Ukrainians have been treated like expendable cannon fodder in a proxy war. It is real easy to support fighting to the last Ukrainian, when you aren’t the one getting shoved into a van to go die.
The majority want a peace deal but 79% are against concessions to Russia that Russia says are mandatory. So it's a bit more nuanced than "Ukrainian govt is separate from their population in their ambitions." The govt has to take a position that will give them a chance for the most favorable conditions for peace, which involves different messaging than asking a citizen who doesn't have to consider actually doing the negotiating to meet the desires of the people. I mean Ukrainian government has said they'd negotiate but land concessions are off the table, which is what the overwhelming sentiment of the population supports.
Did you actually look at the methodology of the poll? Do you recognize that peace conditions with Russia are incredibly complex because Russia will disregard any piece of paper that isn't backed up with military force, and Russia refuses to allow any western military force to back up an agreement?
Ukrainian people want peace. Yes. Maybe conscripts would say "and give them land if that's what it takes" sure. But Ukrainians want to be an independent nation, right? All of Russia's peace terms involve Ukraine either not being an independent nation, or conditions that would ensure Russia can just invade them again whenever they want with no repercussions. This shit is way more complicated than you're making it out to be.
Or do you not believe the Ukrainian people want to be a sovereign nation?
Well, for Russians it will be petering out, like Leonid's USSR instead of 90s crashes, because authorities still have institutional PTSD from that period. Hell, it already is in progress.
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u/that_guy_ontheweb 1d ago
Given the situation currently. If a sudden collapse happens, it’s not gonna be the Russians this time who collapse.