Russia’s war in Ukraine is already in its 17th month. In that time, President Vladimir Putin has clearly demonstrated that he is not bothered by losses — whether they be financial, material, or human. His war will go on as long as he needs. And, judging by how the authorities have woven the so-called “special military operation” into Russian life, that will be a long time.

    • SuspiciousUser@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      He can wait to see if Trump becomes president, because we all know how it will end with his BFF in charge.

      • kingthrillgore@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        This is the long game, because if Trump wins, he can get the US out of NATO and that’s a constitutional crisis at home, and a serious flashpoint to drive Europe back into squabbling.

          • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            No, it really isn’t. The rest of eastern Europe’s countries remember what it was like to live under the Russian thumb and they have plenty of modern weapons and well-trained soldiers salivating to ensure Russia is going to be a crippled husk for the next few generations. Western Europe is none to fond of Russia either. And if America stops helping because an obvious Russian puppet president has taken power, that’s only going to make it worse.

            America may be the sole “superpower”, but bear in mind that that means Russia is not a “superpower”. They’re a peer to the various countries of Europe at best, and by this point I would not even call them that. Ukraine has more tanks than Russia does now. America’s already done a lot of the heavy lifting in breaking Russia, if they bowed out now it’s not like everything resets to the way it was in 2021. Russia is still on the ropes.

            • OurToothbrush@lemmy.mlM
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              1 year ago

              The rest of eastern Europe’s countries remember what it was like to live under the Russian thumb

              • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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                1 year ago

                Surveys conducted in 2013.

                Gee, I wonder if anything might have happened from 2014 to present that would have changed those numbers a bit.

                Also, to dig up an old favourite, you forgot Poland. And a bunch of others. More countries were “living under the Russian thumb” than just literal members of the USSR. Here’s 14 former Soviet republics that joined NATO, whose primary purpose is to defend against Russian attack.

                • abraxas@lemmy.ml
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                  1 year ago

                  LOL. Looks like the 2013 study decided not to ask anyone they knew for sure would answer that they were glad they were free from the USSR.

          • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            There’s a vast difference between America ceasing to support Ukraine and America supporting Russia. Simply never going to happen, that’s a loonie scenario.

            NATO is not officially supporting Ukraine. It just so happens that all the various NATO member countries are all individually deciding that it’s in their interests to support Ukraine. If America drops out that’s not going to change whether it’s in the interests of those countries to continue supporting Ukraine. Indeed, it becomes all the more important for many of them to make sure Russia’s strength is broken if they don’t feel they can rely on America to support them.

      • TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        This fucking clownery must end with Trump being Putin’s doggy or whatever you liberal lot conjure up. Trump is an incompetent right wing asswad and simply showed the true nature of American society, which is why Americans/Westerners hate him. Nobody hated him when he was genociding Yemen and going “for the oil” in Syria, just after Obama/NATO bombed the fuck out of spread democracy and liberated Libya.

        Trump is a joke and he has no relation to Putin in any form or shape, besides the fact that Trump happened to lead Republicans, and in the Deep State, Republicans are the China hating publicly racist party while Democrats are the Russia hating institutionally racist centre-right party.

      • jonne@infosec.pub
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        1 year ago

        Russia’s committing way more resources into this conflict than they ever did for previous similar operations though. Ukraine is claiming they killed/wounded over 200000 Russian soldiers. That’s not anywhere near comparable to previous post WWII conflicts.

        • wildbus8979@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          Human resources yeah, but financial? I’m not sure. The Iraq war cost 3 trillion dollars.

          And mind you, you’re talking about the victors (mostly) the Korean war cost the lives of 2 million people. As did the Vietnam war.

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              1 year ago

              The thing about corruption is that it’s very inefficient. Spending a trillion dollars on weapons translates to only a couple of billions in the pockets of profiteers, the rest is used to actually make the weapons, move them in place, and to pay the people using them.

              So with a useless war, you waste far more than you would if you just have the money to the profiteers.

              • WalrusDragonOnABike@kbin.social
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                1 year ago

                The money would be wasted on things like super yachts anyways. At least a good chunk of this waste goes to things like feeding and housing soldiers and contractors and paying those people and all the people who make the food, supplies, etc. Seems less wasteful than just giving it to billionaires. Granted, the weapons, when they actually function at all, can be used to cause harm to many people…

              • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.ml
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                1 year ago

                A lot of western oligarchs are making very good profits off this war. Here’s an undercover interview with a Blackrock recruiter who openly says Blackrock is making money and they want the war to keep going https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOhAgYonAY4

                Anybody who thinks that the west is there to protect Ukraine and defend democracy is brain damaged.

        • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Ukraine claims a lot of things, it’s called war propaganda. We won’t know what the actual losses are on each side until the war is over. It’s certainly absurd to take Ukrainian numbers uncritically. In fact, it doesn’t even match up with Ukraine having done multiple mobilizations now while Russia has only done one. If Russia was losing anywhere close to manpower Ukraine claims, then they would’ve had to do multiple mobilizations by now as well. Also, as many military experts have pointed out, this is primarily an artillery war and Russia has a huge artillery advantage over Ukraine. That’s where vast majority of casualties comes from.

    • TWeaK@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      The plan is to profit from war, and that’s the thing, it never ends.