700000 O_O

In the other hand, if digging good and settling oil to India were enough, they would not need to raid their savings this hard.

So maybe it’s not that critical to demotivate India from Russian oil…

My impression is that it’s exactly what Ukraine is doing by attacking oil refineries and reserves - make russia decide wether to sell or use themselves for the war.

I would be surprised if it’s not.

russia tried to take control over it for a while, until

On 18 June 2020, the Russian government lifted its ban on Telegram after it agreed to “help with extremism investigations”. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/telegram-russia-ban-lift-messaging-app-encryption-download-a9573181.html

Which means they have access to all messages.

Yes.

On 18 June 2020, the Russian government lifted its ban on Telegram after it agreed to “help with extremism investigations”.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/telegram-russia-ban-lift-messaging-app-encryption-download-a9573181.html

Which means KGB has full access to all messages.

No, I meant an accessory as in:

An accessory is a person who assists, but does not actually participate, in the commission of a crime.

Of course we cannot. I agree with you that nobody is born evil or a criminal (even psychopaths are not guaranteed to become serial killers).

By all means, if not for propaganda, we would live in a very different world.

But the unfortunate fact is that they did consume enough of that propaganda to do nothing, or worse, follow the orders.

Yes, they are not criminals by nature, but what they do is crime or at least they are an accessory. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessory_(legal_term)

the answer is - it doesn’t matter. the biggest learning from the nazi germany was that you don’t need the entire population of a country to be homicidal psychopaths. all you need is a small group of those psychopaths, control or media, propaganda and you get a perfectly functioning system where normal everyday folks go to their normal everyday jobs.

just those jobs are in gestapo. or in maintenance of gas chambers. or making food for the equally confused soldiers.

of course, we should avoid civilian casualties as much as we can (but apparently russian army is not required) but the system needs to be stopped.

russia has cancer. chemoterapy is not a pleasant procedure that affects both ill and healthy cells. the alternative is, unfortunately, to allow that cancer to spread to the entire planet.

I believe the trick to avoid getting encircled is withdrawing before one gets encircled

Ukraine doesn’t need that land. russia cannot afford not defending that land. The moment it gets too “expensive” for Ukraine, they withdraw. But that will only happen after russia invests heavily into actually recovering their territory.

It’s like in chess when a knight is attacking two pieces at the same time. The one on defense can only choose a smaller loss.

Which is a win for Ukraine.

These are fantastic artillery numbers. Iirc, russia is an artillery-first military - e.g. shoot a lot or artillery, pause and check with soldiers, repeat as needed.

So the fewer of those they have, the more they rely on guided bombs (which require planes, which are few, wear off and they are steadily losing too) and meat assaults.

They actually do. 70% of russians support the war.

Likely both as they are long past exhausting their active stock

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GT9cdslXIAAagH5?format=jpg&name=900x900

That’s pretty much the point of banality of evil - you don’t need an extraordinary assembly of psychopaths to run a fascist regime. All it takes is a group of loud populists, generally discontent crowd and, boom, you have “make Germany great again”.

After ww2 finished, both Germanies discovered that they don’t really have enough people without Nazi past that could run the country. So most folks just went back to work to slightly renamed workplaces.

Does that mean they were not complicit? They were and the winners made sure Germans would learn about what they caused.

I guess the only excuse back the was that they didn’t know better. But we do.

Here’s some read for you: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eichmann_in_Jerusalem#Banality_of_evil

Yes, an average russian or Israeli person is not likely to have directly participated in the recent events.

The catch, though, it’s that by not opposing the actions of their governments, they DO contribute to the events indirectly. They pay taxes. They work at factories producing weapons. They make the food that the soldiers eat.

On top of that it’s not russian government who’s currently pulling the triggers and dropping bombs. Just regular folks who just follow orders.

Yes, protesting in russia is not easy, but the war keeps going on because the government sees that people aren’t worried too much about it.

And yes, in both countries there are people who actively oppose, but the majority doesn’t.

And that majority is complicit.

It would be 9 years, if only one linear factor was at play.

I believe it’s multiple factors, though.

One is that every plane taken out had its share of “work”, which is now distributed across the remaining ones. Which means they get worn out a little faster. Similar to how they have to cannibalise parts from one civilian aircraft to repair another.

Then I’m going they cannot maintain the usual production speed because if the sanctions. Add to that an increased need to repair since the plains are more heavily used. And I’d guess that repairs are fine at the same facility that produces them, this also reducing production speed.

In other words, I think it’s about snowballing and at this rate it could be way less than nine years.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukhoi_Su-34

Since 2006 they’ve built 150 units. That’s 8 units a year. Some were sold, some got lost.

As of 20 May 2023, there have been 20 visually confirmed cases of Su-34s being lost, damaged or abandoned by Russian forces since the start of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. 23 now, apparently.

At their price, with sanctions, with wear of the remaining ones, at this rate, they might not have any left very soon.

About 50% of what they had at the beginning two years ago.

Ah, but it’s all about the context.

See, nothing was done and nothing changed, is definitely not an update.

On the other hand, “russia lost 30’000 personell in November alone, but nothing changed” is a significant update.

i speak Ukrainian (and, ugh, the moscovite too), i’ll be happy to help, but i cannot promise a consistent and dedicated commitment.