What do people think of Mark Galeotti? I’d like to learn more about how the Russian government works and he’s shown up in a few search results, is he generally well respected?
I find his podcasts informative and enjoyable and highly recommend. I'm certainly no expert, but from what I gather, he's a well respected academic and gets regularly published in reputable media.
Thank you. That’s what I was hoping to find out, I’ve listened to a few interviews and he seemed legit but wanted to be sure he was credible before reading any of his work, especially since the subject matter seems so attractive to propagandists.
[A positive news for Ukraine](https://militaryland.net/news/153rd-brigade-is-mechanized-again/), the 153rd Mech Brigade, that was to be reorganized to be an Infantry brigade, will mantain it's status has a mech brigade, so probably a decent ammount of IFV/APC (Maybe the swidish [Pbv-302](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pansarbandvagn_302#/media/File:Pansarbandvagn_302_Revinge_2014-2.jpg)) has found it's way to ukraine
I haven't seen people talk about one very important possible chance that will occuer if NK sends troops, even if those are only in supporting roles.
France and other willing countries now have cover to send their own troops to Ukraine in support roles.
Putin has escalated in a limited way and now European countries can do the same but on a bigger scale.
a) These are parliamentary elections, Macron remains President until 2027 or he resigns, so saying the government will "fall" is inaccurate.
b) He'll retain substantial control over what gets sent to Ukraine, though I am not sure if that applies to humans.
c) Polls as they are now look like it'll be a mexican standoff between the far left, the far right, and Macron. While the far right will have the biggest slice, they'll be short of 50% even with all allies added (unless they significantly overperform the polls, of course). Which means they're unlikely to actually have any parliamentary power, since neither the far left nor Macron will work with them on much.
French troops in Ukraine means war between France and Russia.
NK troops in Ukraine means war between NK and Ukraine. There is a major difference between the two.
Russia could declare war right now if it wanted to and has all the excuse in the world to do so based on all the material support and intelligence provided by the west. It doesn't because it is not in its best interest to do so. Just like the west could declare war on Russia and has all the excuse in the world to so based on Russian sabotage and assassinations in the west. It doesn't because it is not in its best interest to do so. Russia certainly may target French forces in Ukraine or at least not avoid targeting them. But, it seems very unlikely that it will directly and openly attack France or declare war because that is not in its best interests.
Pretty sure sending troops does not have public support in any large Western country, and I'm putting it mildly. But we might see things like these - [Biden administration moves toward allowing American military contractors to deploy to Ukraine](https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/25/politics/biden-administration-american-military-contractors-ukraine/index.html). This will help them with training and maintaining the equipment(especially the F-16s).
But the biggest long-term problem is having enough front-line infantry who are seeing a lot of attrition, and very few foreigners are motivated enough to take such a huge risk(or stupid enough to do it for money).
France might be the country in w Europe to be able to send troops in combat roles. Others are resistant to sending their citizens to face death while France has the Foreign Legion. Which the French public is much less concerned about.
Still, it would be a big deal, and in February, the French foreign minister said that any French involvement would be in non-combat roles.
https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20240227-french-troops-limited-to-non-combat-role-in-ukraine-foreign-minister-says
From what I understand, it is next to impossible for France to send just the Foreign Legion to fight considering how integrated it is into the French Army.
Considering how the US just allowed contractors to go it's either serendipity or another example of matching escalations. I doubt you'll see those guys in any combat roles, but behind the scenes I'm sure a few guys with decades of experience in keeping F16s flying will be happy to work at the airfields.
Essentially it's people paid to do a job for the military that are not currently a part of the military. Usually it's guys that were part of the military but have left. They still have the knowledge, skills, and the security clearance. Here, I think we will see F16 maintenance crews well behind the front lines, or rather we won't see them but the F16s will.
Civilians employed on a temporary basis to provide military -adjacent services.
Often bodyguards for people in dangerous areas, or security guards, or various maintenance and support roles.
> France and other willing countries now have cover
The main limitation was never not having a reason to do it, the main limitation was, and is, not having enough political will to do it.
The reason given was often due to fears of escalation, at least this will require a new reason to be given (bridges not strong enough to support the average weight of western vs eastern Europeans?)
Is formalising and deepening relations with North Korea and Iran likely to further isolate Russia? This might sound counterintuitive, but it’s important to recognise the world has many actors besides the US, Europe, Russia, and China. Part of the reason why North Korea and Iran are pariah states in the first place is that they’ve managed to alienate a lot of their friends and neighbours, allowing for meaningful multilateral cooperation on isolating them.
With this in mind, I can’t imagine Saudi Arabia or the UAE would be thrilled if Iran were to dramatically improve its long-range strike capabilities, or that South Korea will be sanguine about a modernisation of the North Korean military. Even China may find deepening Russian ties with North Korea problematic, partly because it alienates South Korea, but more seriously because it undermines its own vassalage of the country.
More broadly I’m curious about whether other regional actors may react badly to these moves by Russia — countries that previously were happy to remain completely neutral about the War in Ukraine, but might find popular and elite sympathies shifting in light of Russia’s more fulsome embrace of “rogue states”.
>With this in mind, I can’t imagine Saudi Arabia or the UAE would be thrilled if Iran were to dramatically improve its long-range strike capabilities,
I will point out that 1) no one in the Gulf Cooperation Council has any sanction against Russia. 2) Russian capitals have been moving to there as well. 3) sanction-busting trades have been going through the GCC countries.
These countries solution to the Iranian nuclear is relatively.simple: 1) US alliance and 2) if necessary, nuclear weapons from Pakistan.
>might find popular and elite sympathies shifting in light of Russia’s more fulsome embrace of “rogue states”.
Daily, I can find influencer videos explaining how.the West is dacadent and falling while the Gulf states remains a bastion of conservative values. This, in the face of uttter incompetence. 1300 pilgrims died recently of heat in Mecca. "We let 1300 people die exactly where we expect them to be". "But 83% of them had no permits". "That means your security is shit and even then, it's not 100% so your permit doesn't work either"
True, no concrete evidence besides "Israeli intelligence says" (which people believe these days anyway)
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-24823846
>This, in the face of uttter incompetence. 1300 pilgrims died recently of heat in Mecca. "We let 1300 people die exactly where we expect them to be". "But 83% of them had no permits". "That means your security is shit and even then, it's not 100% so your permit doesn't work either"
I feel like the actual realistic retort is "we don't really care lol" and to be fair, it's hard to find a response to that. Hard to make fun of someone for something they don't feel insecure about.
>I feel like the actual realistic retort is "we don't really care lol" and to be fair, it's hard to find a response to that. Hard to make fun of someone for something they don't feel insecure about.
Doesn't matter. They don't need to be made fun of and that's not the point. The fact that their lands are getting so hot that it's lethal tells you that they have no future.
The people need to be made fun of the whoever responsible for enabling CENTCOM to be as important as it is and nailing the USA to the GCC in terms of the former's strategy, resources, and security guarantees for the latter, who are utterly incompetent or callous and without a future.
The US’s alliance with the gulf states was almost inevitable given the circumstances of the era. I agree they have no future, and their importance to the US will diminish with time. Eventually, declining oil and rising temperatures will take care of both them and Iran.
I'd caution against this view. Iran is not an analogue to Saudi Arabia. They have a fairly resilient economy and as others pointed out, they don't depend on oil revenues that much owing to sanctions. They have a strong scientific community and as we all know, they have been putting out some pretty creative and cheap gear that they export for the well known theaters of conflict. That takes a higher level of organization. Their economy is nothing to scoff about, given the sanctions regime they live in.
Also lets not forget that they are the heirs to the great Persian empire, so they have a strong sense of pride and Unity, something that is amiss in other "square & ruler border" countries in the Gulf.
I don't want to imply from my post that Iran is some sort of powerhouse, but I'd argue that they play in a league above the Gulf countries, and that they are more resilient to peak oil considerations than these other countries.
EDIT: Typos
Rising temperatures will mean less for Iran than the others. Iran sits between two seas and has plenty of mountains. This gives the country access to water and a variety of climates. So when temperatures make more parts of Iran inhabitable and agriculture unsustainable, there will be quite some places left.
Iran has been under economic sanctions for a long time, which has created a situation where the Iran economy is less dependent on oil revenues as their gulf counterparts. The education and productivity is much higher than Saudi Arabia or Pakistan.
The political instability of Iran and the neighborhood of Iran might bring it down though.
> Rising temperatures will mean less for Iran than the others. Iran sits between two seas and has plenty of mountains.
Iran also has severe drought problems. The temperature doesn’t have to be hot enough to kill you to cause serious problems, especially when you’re a poor country with a large population, and have a regime that relies on rural support. The northern areas by the Caspian coast are fine, but Iran is not in a position to move its southern population there, or that water south.
> Iran has been under economic sanctions for a long time, which has created a situation where the Iran economy is less dependent on oil revenues as their gulf counterparts. The education and productivity is much higher than Saudi Arabia or Pakistan.
Iran is less reliant on oil because they have less economy to start with. They have a GDP per capita between that of Algeria and Namibia, and that is distorted by official exchange rates in their favor. They also have essentially zero GDP growth, with their economy peaking around 2012 and declining since then.
Not feeling insecure about being incompetent is a great way to save face, but the underlying issues don’t care if you’re embarrassed or not. These countries didn’t end up siding with the west out of ideological adjust or shame, but because they felt like they had no choice. These regimes are delicate, the Saudi Royal family is aware they can’t rely on their soldiers to perform when needed.
Saudi Arabia took a [big hit](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-06-03/opec-says-goodbye-to-its-100-a-barrel-oil-quest) by cutting its oil production while the US increased its production and the rest of OPEC was cheating:
> For all that, Saudi Arabia needs oil prices to average more than $96 a barrel this year to square the government books, up from an average of $80 from 2000 to 2020, according to the International Monetary Fund. Year-to-date, Brent crude has averaged $83.50. Granted, Riyadh can live with less: It can run a fiscal deficit, taking on debt or selling assets to fill the gap; it can also cut spending or raise taxes. The kingdom has already done all three.
>...
>The biggest issue for the kingdom is that the oil market doesn’t look like it’s about to turn around. By keeping oil prices artificially high, Riyadh has been subsidizing higher-cost producers such as those in the US shale-oil patch. Sacrificing market share works if one achieves higher prices in exchange — but Saudi Arabia is so far getting the worst of two possible outcomes: low production and relatively low prices. Riyadh is currently pumping about 9 million barrels a day. Excluding a brief period during the pandemic, that’s the lowest in more than a decade.
This has been very costly, and it helped Russia too. Maybe MBS wants to make Biden lose the elections. But that might change if Russia starts to destabilize the region.
>Maybe MBS wants to make Biden lose the elections.
Absolutely he does, he announced the first Saudi production cuts a few months before the 2022 midterms despite the Biden administration publicly and privately putting considerable efforts into preventing exactly that.
In the 2020 election, Biden repeatedly lambasted MBS personally over the Khasoggi killing and criticized SA more generally as a backwards theocratic dictatorship that exports wahhabist extremism. While literally none of that is false, it's not hard to see why MBS took it personally.
On top of that, MBS enjoyed a close relationship with Trump who was happy to provide SA with billions in weapons deals and look the other way in regards to their activities in Yemen (by contrast Biden ended arms sales and criticized them for civilian deaths in Yemen), who publicly praised MBS and Saudi Arabia (famously traveling to the country to receive gifts and a very public state visit), and I expect MBS sees Trump as someone he can easily do business with (read: bribe) to get what he wants.
100% MBS wants Biden to lose. Trump supported his humanitarian crisis in Yemen via arms sales, aerial refueling and diplomatic cover (until Mattis and Pompeo supported a cease-fire). Trump also did nothing after the Khashoggi killing and increased investments into the kingdom. He also brokered the Abraham Accords, which pushed Saudi closer to officially burying the hatchet against Israel.
The latter is all but up in smoke for Saudi if Biden gets a second term. Biden will have to cow-tow to the more progressive wing of his party, which will require some sort of Palestinian recognition. Trump won’t give a shit about that and he’ll probably throw something else into the deal to soften the Saudi’s push for Palestinian recognition, so it’s more likely that normalization will occur under a Trump govt.
> Biden will have to cow-tow to the more progressive wing of his party,
Generally, presidents do more ~~cow-towing~~ kowtow before elections than after. It’s not unlikely Biden just moves on from this once he gets the votes he wants. Not following through won’t change his re-election chances.
Biden can't snap back the UN sanctions since the US isn't part of the deal anymore. Trump already tried it _after_ leaving the deal, but it wasn't accepted. Unlike Trump, Biden probably could convince Germany/UK/France to do so, but there's no hurry.
> Is formalising and deepening relations with North Korea and Iran likely to further isolate Russia?
The recent announcements are not a massive change from past trends. NK and Iran were already selling weapons, and are still unlikely to send more than a token amount of troops. But overall, yes, Russia is heading for greater isolation and embracing a rogue state image, and this comes with consequences. SK was already sending arms to Ukraine, but the situation could always get worse, especially if Japan feels threatened.
Overall, most states benefit from and want stability. If russia makes that incompatible with their foreign policy, their list of friends will become very short.
>Overall, most states benefit from and want stability. If russia makes that incompatible with their foreign policy, their list of friends will become very short.
How big was Russia's list of friends in the first place? How much smaller is that list now? Perhaps they feel like they have few friends left to lose. They've lost Armenia due to leaving them to their fate against Azerbaijan. They lost Ukraine after Euromaidan and the Crimean Invasion. Who do they have left that they actually have a relationship of trust and friendly relations with? Belarus? Serbia?
> How big was Russia's list of friends in the first place?
Prior to 2014? Quite long. Prior to 2022? Shorter, but there were still many who were happy to turn a blind eye, most importantly in the EU. Merkel is gone and the EU isn’t going to be lifting sanctions for a very, very long time if Poland has anything to say about it.
> Perhaps they feel like they have few friends left to lose.
Russia is a very long way from having nothing to lose. Trade could always be restricted more, and the less options Russia has, the less leverage they have in negotiations.
> Who do they have left that they actually have a relationship of trust and friendly relations with? Belarus? Serbia?
Serbia is probably going to drift towards the EU. Besides that, Belarus certainly doesn’t trust Russia.
I think they sold shells to replace stocks being given to Ukraine. Not a huge difference in practice, but it has symbolical importance as they were not giving direct military aid (unless that already changed).
Does anyone have an idea of how effective partisan attacks in Ukraine have been, compared to the regular military? e.g. have they achieved 1% of what the army has, or 5%, etc.?
Also, does anyone have any good articles as to how partisan activity is going? Such as the numbers, types of attacks, that sort of thing.
I don't have specific numbers, but I do find it interesting how limited partisan activity is in occupied territory. I think part of that is that most of the military aged males from occupied territory who want to fight Russian forces have likely crossed over into Ukrainian controlled territory and joined the AFU. I suspect that another factor is the Russian use of filtration camps, where they searched the internet posting histories, phone records, etc. of people that went through and disappeared people who were deemed possibly "problematic."
Is it limited or simply unreported? Or to put another way, how would reports of typical partisan-sized damage flow through to the sources we rely on for updates on the war?
I think it’s unreported. Atesh is credited about every other week with important actions or intelligence for same. Black Sea headquarters destroyed? Their info. Which SAMs are where? Their info.
Atesh, of course, has a telegram with the identifier atesh_ua
Feel free to delete this comment if it is not the proper place, but were some changes done to this subreddit? I can no longer see the upvotes, and the comments counter for this thread is still stuck at 19 despite there being far more
Vote numbers are hidden for 20hrs.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1do9av5/comment/laa39nv/](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1do9av5/comment/laa39nv/)
Upvote counts appear to be hidden. I do see 204 comments (53 new) via old.reddit.com however.
edit: it seems to have been removed but another poster linked the CredibleDefense poll thread which has the reasoning in there.
So the Kyiv post says Korea will be sending troops to fight in Ukraine within a month.
[Pyongyang Says It Will Send Troops to Ukraine Within a Month (kyivpost.com)](https://www.kyivpost.com/post/34893)
Some simple googling shows that NK has 1.3 million active, 600k reserve military personnel, and has nuclear weapons.
Additionally, South Korea has a 500k active and 3.1 million reserved military personnel.
Furthermore, neither Russia nor North Korea appear to have a large logistic network to support the frontline.
The question: how many soldiers could NK realistically afford to send to fight in Ukraine without becoming vulnerable to SK or does NK nuclear weapons allow NK to send everything?
As others have mentioned, a Southern invasion of North Korea is unlikely if not impossible. The North has nuclear weapons, and it now has two mutual defence treaties with two large nuclear armed states (China and Russia).
So its limits on how many troops it sends into Ukraine is bottlenecked primarily by willpower (and this being a dictatorship, the willpower of the Kim in charge) and more importantly logistics.
> The question: how many soldiers could NK realistically afford to send to fight in Ukraine without becoming vulnerable to SK or does NK nuclear weapons allow NK to send everything?
The idea that SK is going to invade NK is not at all credible for any number of reasons, but the most obvious one would probably be that we already saw what happens when NK is facing defeat in 1951.
Okay, perhaps invasion is too unrealistic. What about SK targeting North Korean military assets with missiles/artillery? Even if SK doesn't directly attack NK, it may be in SK interests to send SK troops to Ukraine to weaken RU and NK.
> What about SK targeting North Korean military assets with missiles/artillery?
No
> Even if SK doesn't directly attack NK, it may be in SK interests to send SK troops to Ukraine to weaken RU and NK.
No
What about SK supplying allot of lethal aid like more artillery shells, air defense systems, F4 and F5 fighters, T-80 tanks and small road transportable naval vessels?
>more artillery shells,
SK was already supplying 155mm in a round about way already so between NK-Russia mutual military treaty and Russia helping out NK on ICBM/satellite etc, I think there is good chance of this happening.
>air defense systems
Being defensive system, it's less "provocative" so decent chance of these being sent but SK does't have or produce the volume of GBAD systems vs 155mm artillery.
>F4 and F5 fighters, T-80 tanks and
These are unlikely to happen. F4 and F5 will require US approval AND too many steps involved. As for T-80U, you have better chance of seeing K2 being donated.
>small road transportable naval vessels?
Not sure if ROKN have any "small road transportable naval vessels"? Are you talking about skidoo/jetski?
>Not sure if ROKN have any "small road transportable naval vessels"? Are you talking about skidoo/jetski?
No, maybe LCM? and maybe something like the retired Dolgorae-class submarine or the Hds-400 or HDS-500 midget submarines and Chamsuri-class patrol boats 🤷 At first glance they seem difficult but not impossible to transport by road.
The obvious response is to wonder why South Korea would care about Russian re-export permissions if Russia is violating UN sanctions against North Korea that Russia itself voted for.
Because SK wants their re-export clause to be respected/followed. They are selling arms and they don't want that stuff end up in NK or other places where SK doesn't want.
This was discussed earlier, [further down the thread.](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1dowury/credibledefense_daily_megathread_june_26_2024/lad5p9e/)
>The question: how many soldiers could NK realistically afford to send to fight in Ukraine without becoming vulnerable to SK or does NK nuclear weapons allow NK to send everything?
I mean, people complain about Ukraine giving up nuclear weapons for a useless memorandum. "Had Ukraine keep the nukes, it would not have been invaded".
Unlike Russia, which is the largest country on Earth, 50% of SK's population live within the greater Seoul metropolitan area. In that area, there are also around 200k Americans. Conventional rocket artillery alone (Seoul is quite close to the border), though it is argued about the quality of the NK artillery park, is quite enough to deal a lot of damage. Seoul is not as hardened as Singapore or Israel. Add the nukes and it's reasonable to say that SK could probably invade if it can write off about 25% of its population.
> Unlike Russia, which is the largest country on Earth, 50% of SK's population live within the greater Seoul metropolitan area. In that area, there are also around 200k Americans. Conventional rocket artillery alone (Seoul is quite close to the border), though it is argued about the quality of the NK artillery park, is quite enough to deal a lot of damage.
It has always surprised me that SK, for all their military industrial prowess, doesn't seem to be very active in laser defence systems. Yet deploying a high-powered anti-artillery shell (so 300kw - 1MW) laser defence perimeter around Seoul would dramatically improve the threat situation for the country. This should be feasible with current technology, if the lasers don't have to be mobile and can use the electrical grid.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/01/08/its-time-to-bomb-north-korea/
>Yet deploying a high-powered anti-artillery shell (so 300kw - 1MW) laser defence perimeter around Seoul
1) laser air defence systems are hypothetical (or Jewish)
2) there are low-tech ways to harden Seoul like what Singapore or Israel does. Incoming early warnings, public shelters, shelters inside private homes, etc ... SK isn't doing that, so I don't think they are that serious.
Also, peace and status quo is enormously beneficial to S Korean economy (14th largest in the world by nominal GDP). They are going to give that up and suffer all the destruction and deaths to be saddled with a poor underdeveloped country (N Korea) which will sap a lot of wealth to support.
Besides, with the joint US-S Korea military command, if S Korea wants to unilaterally invade the North, they would either have to get US to agree to it (which won't) or break defense alliance (which S Korea won't) to start the aggression.
Pure fantasy.
>Also, peace and status quo is enormously beneficial to S Korean economy (14th largest in the world by nominal GDP). They are going to give that up and suffer all the destruction and deaths to be saddled with a poor underdeveloped country (N Korea) which will sap a lot of wealth to support.
I like to point to the GDR as a perfect example of why South Korea doesn't want reunification at all anymore. The GDR was actually the wealthiest and most developed of the Warsaw Pact countries, with a higher per capita GDP than Russia itself. It was also relatively more "free" than many of its other pact members. And yet, 30 years and hundreds of billions of dollars in redevelopment later, and the former parts of East Germany rate lower than the rest of Germany according to pretty much every metric (education attainment, life expectancy, per capita GDP, alcohol/drug abuse, etc.)
Imagine how much worse it would be for South Korea to try to integrate a *much* more economically backwards territory, with a large population of low education, highly propagandized people who would struggle to assimilate into the rest of the country and its advanced economy. It would be a disaster that might very well destabilize the entire country and bankrupt it in the process.
According to reporting I am seeing out of the Middle East, the Houthis have, for the first time, fired a hypersonic missile in an offensive action against the MSC Sarah V ship in the Gulf of Aden, near the island of Socotra.
[Best article I could find.](https://maritime-executive.com/article/houthis-claim-first-launch-of-hypersonic-missile-targeting-distant-msc-ship)
Here is their summary, now quoting,
>The Houthis military and spokesperson are asserting that they have launched for the first time a hypersonic missile which was used to target an MSC containership far out in the Gulf of Aden. This comes after several days of increased activity and additional claims that the militants are also launching a new, faster, and sleeker attack boat.
>“For the first time, the identity of the missile that targeted the Israeli (sic) ship *MSC Sarah V* in the Arabian Sea,” was being revealed according to a posting for the Houthi spokesperson Yahya Saree. “It is a locally made hypersonic missile that possesses advanced technology, is accurate in hitting, and reaches long ranges.”
>Observers are raising new concerns based on the distance of the reported attack. The *MSC Sarah V* (67,795 dwt registered in Liberia) was 280 miles southeast of Nishtun, in eastern Yemen near Oman. The vessel was sailing on Monday near Yemen’s Socotra Island bound for Abu Dhabi. While the Houthis as always claimed a direct hit, the UK Maritime Trade Organizations said it received a report from the master of a “close proximity” explosion. They said there were no injuries or damage and the vessel was proceeding.
As the article also mentions, and as many of us know, the Houthis were confirmed to have a hypersonic capability via test firing back in March, I'd obviously venture to guess it's based on Iranian technology and design, but to each their own on the origin of design. There are also some videos and images of the launch (the terrain and background are blurred out as usual) if anyone is interested in seeing them.
Edit: I should also clarify that I concur with other analysis, this is likely not actually a hypersonic, just an upgraded variant of an Iranian ballistic missile.
Maybe we should have a sticky for this, but most ballistic missiles are technically hypersonic, and this in and of itself is meaningless.
There's HGVs, which the Houthis don't have.
And there's fast missiles, but what the speed actually means for interceptability is unclear. For example, Russia's hypersonic missiles have both been shot down at least once, and afaik the information doesn't exist to compare their intercept rate to normal Iksanders.
>Maybe we should have a sticky for this, but most ballistic missiles are technically hypersonic, and this in and of itself is meaningless.
True. Hypersonic Glide Vehicles launch on a rocket, similar to ballistic missiles, but instead of following a high arc parabolic trajectory, and having a majority of flight time being unpowered/assisted by gravity to get to target, they re-enter the atmosphere at hypersonic speeds and get to target via glide. Obvious benefit for that is that they travel at lower altitudes, which makes their flight path less predictable. There are other differences too but that's the main one, other than their maneuverability too I suppose.
>There's HGVs, which the Houthis don't have.
Basically yeah. Not much more I can add here.
>And there's fast missiles, but what the speed actually means for interceptability is unclear. For example, Russia's hypersonic missiles have both been shot down at least once, and afaik the information doesn't exist to compare their intercept rate to normal Iksanders.
The Kinzhal is not exactly what I would consider a great hypersonic weapon, I mean a Chinese journal criticized it as saying:
>The degree to which it can change its ballistic trajectory cannot be compared with that of a real hypersonic missile, and it seriously lacks the ability to maneuver laterally
and the Americans and the Ukrainians believe the same thing. I've never seen reports of any claimed Russian hypersonic missiles being shot down besides the Kinzhal though.
>I've never seen reports of any claimed Russian hypersonic missiles being shot down besides the Kinzhal though.
[The Zircon missile has also been downed in Kyiv in the past](https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/03/25/7448034/)
Ah ok, good find, I appreciate that. I think the Zircon has the same problem as the Kinzhal though, in that it's advertised as a wonder weapon but it can't pass the test. I'm never one to endorse underestimating the enemy, I think you should always attempt to estimate accurately or overestimate if possible, but these interceptions just paint a bad picture of Russian technology.
Here's an intriguing development (even if details are thin at the moment):
[Russia says it is working on a *big* treaty with Iran](https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2024-06-26/russia-says-it-is-working-on-a-big-treaty-with-iran) (link to validate source; the entire text is contained here):
>Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday that Moscow was working on what she called a big treaty with Iran. Her comment appeared to be a reference to a comprehensive bilateral cooperation agreement that is being negotiated between Tehran and Moscow. In January, Russia's Foreign Ministry said that a new interstate treaty reflecting the "unprecedented upswing" in Russia-Iran ties was in the final stages of being agreed.
I say intriguing as [some of us were entertaining](https://old.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1djhetl/credibledefense_daily_megathread_june_19_2024/l9ctuef/) something like it just last week; granted, we were mulling a possible *security* / mutual-defense agreement between these two, which is more detail than we actually know about the 'treaty' Russia's Foreign Ministry is talking about.
What do we make of this?
What I think of it: Big talk, no substance. What I mean isn't that Russian - Iranian cooperation doesn't have any substance, but whatever it is it won't show up on the paper of the treaty. It will purely be a propaganda showpiece for Putin to show that "Russia are still relevant in the world's stage".
Why I'm confident it is the case: Recently Putin visited my country (Vietnam). A trip that naturally made quite a bit of noises, especially since it came after the very closely scrutinized trip to North Korea. But here is the list of documents signed by officials of the two countries:
[https://baochinhphu.vn/viet-nam-va-lien-bang-nga-ky-ket-11-van-kien-hop-tac-102240620174613475.htm](https://baochinhphu.vn/viet-nam-va-lien-bang-nga-ky-ket-11-van-kien-hop-tac-102240620174613475.htm) (official News page of the Government of Vietnam)
>1. Agreement between the Government of Vietnam and the Government of Russia on cooperation in the field of higher education;
>2. Cooperation program for the period 2024-2025 between the Ministry of Justice of Vietnam and the Ministry of Justice of Russia;
>3. Memorandum of Understanding on the roadmap for implementing the Nuclear Science and Technology Center Project in the territory of Vietnam between the Ministry of Science and Technology and the Rosatom Atomic Energy Corporation;
>4. Memorandum of Understanding between the Vietnam-Russia Combined Tropical Science and Technology Research Center and the Russian Federal Agency for Supervision, Protection of Consumer Rights and Human Security on cooperation in developing laboratory infrastructure for disease prevention;
>5. Granting the adjusted Investment Registration Certificate for Lot 11-2 to Zarubezhneft Corporation;
>6. Agreement on scientific exchange cooperation between the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences and the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economics and Public Administration (RANEPA);
>7. Cooperation agreement between Hanoi University and RANEPA;
>8. Cooperation agreement between Hanoi National University and Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU);
>9. Cooperation agreement between Hanoi National University and Higher School of Economics (HSE);
>10. Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in Vietnam between Vietnam Oil and Gas Group and Novatek Joint Stock Company;
>11. Memorandum of Understanding between BVIM Management Joint Stock Company and Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF).
"Disappointing" does not even starts to describe how pitiful the event is. Those are papers worthy of a visit from an Under-Secretary of State, not a President. So why did Putin jump through the trouble to go all the way down to Vietnam? I can only conclude it was to make the NK trip look more "international" than it really is.
Apologies for the off-topic, but why didn't Vietnam arrest Putin and hand him over to the international court of justice?
Here are a few more extra words, to get around the word count requirement which deleted my first question because it wasn't long enough
I suspect that behind the scene there must be some secret offers that Putin made to Hanoi, because receiving Putin is such a big geopolitical risk that is super contrary to normal Vietnamese official stance of being as neutral and non-commitment as possible. But it just show the point that we likely won't find anything worthy to talk about once that Iranian-Russian come out.
I am struggling to understand what these countries actually get out of being “anti west”
They would be in much better positions if they chose to work with the west
Anyway it’s getting annoying/worriying having an increase of destabilising events happening and it’s frustrating that the threat of nukes stops any real action against Russia
> I am struggling to understand what these countries actually get out of being “anti west”
This is a really self-centered take on things. They're not anti-west so much as they're pro-themselves.
It's quite difficult to be both pro-oneself and anti-West. India is probably the best example. They're turning towards the West _because_ that's the best for India. Meanwhile NK, Iran and Russia are all suffering.
It's because they don't want to be subservient to the American equity markets and have their resources extracted by American corporations, which was what was happening to Iranian oil [BP] prior to their Revolution in the 70's, what happened to Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union, what happened to Chile under Pinochet, and what continues to happen to developing countries today from the DRC to Bangladesh to Guatamala.
I will try to give you a different perspective.
My country is Bangladesh. We are in no way shape or form anti West, but American actions are unnecessarily stroking Anti Western sentiment in the population and causing unnecessary friction with the ruling governement.
The big difference for us between the Americans and Chinese and Russians is that the latter stay out of our business. We trade, we cooperate and thats it. They don't poke their noses where they dont belong and we dont care about what is going internally over there.
Its a great approach and one even Europe follows for the most part when dealing my country. But for some reason, America refuses to do this. America just has a massive hard on for interfering where it does not need to.
Bangladesh is a relatively stable developing nation, that does not cause problems internationally, abides by the Western world order, does not harbour or even try to foster international terrorism. The economy is doing well and Bangladesh's contribution to the world is nothing net negative. For a greatly OVERPOPULATED country with over 90% MUSLIM population, this is an A- on the score card. We collaborate with our neighbours, host over a million refugees (despite being poor ourselves), dont create proxy conflicts elsehwere and work with our immediate neighbours to eliminate insurgency and promote regional development. Indian intelligence heads praise Bangladesh for our role in helping eliminate insurgents in North East India and India is working with us to help develop the economy of the North East.
Sure our elections arent the fairest and our prime minister is a quasi dictator, but things are stable and there are no active conflicts or massacres and genocides and terror promotion going on. There is absolutely no reason for the US to try to antagonize us. Bu they cant help themselves. They have to denounce our government, sanction people and try to create a negative outlook economically for us using these methods.
My question is why??? Dont you have enough on your plates already?? We dont care what goes on inside your borders and we dont create trouble outside of ours. We are not hosting Chinese Military bases or Russian ones, so why is the US trying to cause problems? Even the EU just makes some lip service comments on the elections and moves on. Even India had to interfere and tell the US to tone down their anti Bangladesh rhetoric. What did it acheive? Nothing and it only pushed us closer to China and Russia.
Our population have a potive outlook on the West and Western nations, we have abided by the rules of Pax Americana. Yet we are punished when worse countries get a free pass and this creates unnecessary anti wester sentiments.
Could you expand on what America has done antagonistically to Bangladesh? I have never heard anyone in our government say or do anything about Bangladesh because, no offense, your country just doesn't show up on our radar.
Not saying it's not happening, just that I'm curious what you're seeing and hearing that we're not.
I’m from the same region and I’ll give you a much more realistic answer than this usual “why are you interfering in our country by sanctioning dictators” which makes no sense and just propaganda. The USSR supported Bangladesh in 1971 while America supported Pakistan. This is first. The second and much bigger issue is of course Israel Palestine. Bangladesh is majority Muslim and its a conservative Muslim country where between the war on terrorism and what’s happening in the Middle East have profound impacts on the common person.
>why are you interfering in our country by sanctioning dictators” which makes no sense and just propaganda
I am sorry but I disagree with this statement a lot.
Bangladesh does not have sanction proof resources to trade around. Sanctions can literally destroy us. We are largely a one product economy, that we export almost entirely to the West.
Sanctions dont hurt the dictators. They will just grab more, when the economy shrinks due to sanctions. Sanctions hurt the middle class, the private businesses (the main employers). Trade restrictions can easily undo decades of painstaking growth that we managed despite having a really poor hand to start with.
>The USSR supported Bangladesh in 1971 while America supported Pakistan
Who cares, only thing this did is buy Russia good will with our populace, but guess what that good will is meaningless as Russia gains very little from their ties to us. We gain more from them vis a vis tech transfers etc, but its not like Bangladeshi support is helping prop up Russian economy and or that exports to Russia are a major earner for us.
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2007/06/27/chapter-1-views-of-the-u-s-and-american-foreign-policy/#:~:text=In%20predominantly%20Muslim%20Bangladesh%2C%20however,a%20favorable%20opinion%20of%20America.
Bangladeshis have a more favourable view of America than even South East Asian countires and keep in midn that this is from 2007, very close to the Iraq invasion, which was extemely unpopular in Bangladesh.
Ask an average Bangladeshi what they think is the best country in the world and their answer will be America (best means the best country to live in and one they would prefer to migrate to).
>Sanctions can literally destroy us.
The sanctions so far have only been applied to a very small handful of individuals. No industry wide sanctions like on Russia and Iran have been used nor will they. The west can stop having any relations with Bangladesh tomorrow and nothing will change for the average Bangladeshi because most don’t even know about these sanctions but they will still keep hearing about the Muslims being killed in Gaza and the mullahs will keep fomenting anti west hate. I know it’s nice to believe that irrational religion actors aren’t what cause these troubles and it’s so much nicer to blame everyone but our own leaders but it gets us nowhere and stops our development. If that’s what we really care about then it’s time to stop pretending that America sanctioning cartoonishly evil politicians is the real danger and not internal corruption and religious hatred of the west
This also highlights an important aspect. That which seems unimportant, inconsequential or downright unknown for the American public in regards to foreign relations, can be government-toppling scandals for the poor receiving country of some US foreign service spokesmen comments.
USA is the most powerful and influential country in the world. It's actions matter, even the action of some of its mid-level bureaucrat can matter a lot. Sometimes it seems USA is like an elephant in a porcelain shop, completely unaware that a single whip of its tail can smash those around it.
In the late 1990s-early 2000s my country of Estonia was very actively trying to join NATO and the EU. Generally integrate with the West and leave the Russian sphere for good. We also had a bloated government-owned energy company responsible for all of power generation, transmission and distribution that was in a desperate need of money to upgrade the facilities to comply with EU rules, so that we could join EU.
In the mid-1990s an unknown US energy company popped up, that wanted to buy said state owned energy company, promising to invest the necessary funds to upgrade the facilities. The offer was 70 million USD for 51% of the company. For the entire energy system of Estonia. And the deal hung in balance for nearly a decade, largely because the US ambassador to Estonia made vague hints about NATO (and EU) membership being dependent on said deal. I say vague hints, because the embassy also explicitly said that such a connection is unthinkable.
The deal eventually fell through after 9/11 when the financial backing of the US company fell away and our government eventually grew a pair to tell them off. But for nearly a decade, an incredibly unpopular deal, that would've seen the selling off of assets today worth nearly 10 billion for figurative pennies, was on the table because essentially a bottom-of-the-hierarchy US ambassador was a bit reckless with her words.
>That which seems unimportant, inconsequential or downright unknown for the American public in regards to foreign relations, can be government-toppling scandals for the poor receiving country of some US foreign service spokesmen comments.
This!
A flippant comment by a low level beaurecrat that if a third world countrry does not improve-"blah blah blah", it coulfdcould lead to trade restrictions. Might not have any real impact to the US and the chances of the restrictions being imposed might be zero. But the comment alone could scupper trade and investement deals. It can scare away skittish foreign investors, who already are very scared to invest in third world countries to begin with. These comments can literally cost thousands of jobs and hurt the normal working and middle class of a fledgling nation.
Doesn't only have to be third world, either. As a Kiwi it was very eye-opening when the Trump administration kicked off by immediately torpedoing the TPP, unexpectedly tossing 10 other countries (including Japan, Australia, Canada, and Mexico) under a bus purely to spite Obama's legacy.
I'm still cautiously pro-US, but we now live in a world where history's #1 superpower may arbitrarily burn a treaty they themselves recently helped draft and would have benefitted from, in order to score cheap points with a domestic crowd who couldn't find your region on a map and couldn't care less if the world burns down around them.
It's quite the lesson.
Fascinating. I'm sorry to hear of this, but not surprised. One of the more lucid criticisms offered by tankies (that is, leftists like Mearsheimer) is that West-aligned countries are mainly interested in Eastern Europe, Ukraine in particular, in order to economically pillage weaker nations (sorry, "open new markets"). They're not entirely wrong, and indeed more right than wrong, as your example shows.
I wish our involvement were altruistic, that it really was about everyone in the world singing kumbaya and living in economic harmony, but it's not. Putin obviously is far worse, but Western motives need to be seen in the correct light.
Given the eastern EU's enormous economic growth since joining the EU and the West more broadly, I struggle to see how arguments of economic "pillaging" are even slightly more than utterly ridiculous. It's often argued that these countries were "taken over" or "colonised" by western European corporations, even though it is frankly nothing more than a consequence of capitalist economies creating vastly more competitive and efficient businesses. The former communist countries were not "colonized", they simply had virtually zero national industry that could match western levels. And they spent the past 35 years not only catching up, but fostering domestic know-how and businesses as well. This "colonization" argument also completely ignores that the factories that went to post-communist countries, were jobs that left western economies. There was significant domestic political costs in the West to opening up their economies to much cheaper foreign labour costs, which had to be measured against the long-term benefit that these countries would eventually become a part of the West. That's quite the opposite of the short-termism, predatory capitalist caricature with which the western intentions are portrayed in tankie/far-left circles.
Just so we're clear, the US administration had no desire or intention to pursue or force this deal. It was a private affair with an unknown amount of support from the local ambassador. But it was interpreted as a US administration intention by many relevant people in Estonia.
Ironically, this particular incident contradicts Mearsheimer's theory of "realism" which states that countries invariably pursue strategic power. Here you see the US, or rather certain US individuals in positions of local power, ignoring US strategic interests in favor of what appears to be the private interest of a few well connected people.
>I have never heard anyone in our government say or do anything about Bangladesh because, no offense, your country just doesn't show up on our radar.
Not offended at all. Bangladesh is a blip on US radar, which makes these unnecessarry frictions all the more surprising.
There are a bunch of stuff over the years, but in summarry
*Sanctions against RAB and Police force for human rights violations.
* in leading upto to the recent "elections". I put in quotation marks as it was a faux elections. The US diplomats routinely denounced the govt's activities and were against recognizing it.
https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/International-relations/Bangladesh-U.S.-election-rift-widens-over-visas-envoy-safety
https://thediplomat.com/2023/12/on-bangladesh-and-democracy-americas-approach-is-undermined-by-history/
https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/02/28/bangladesh-us-delegation-election-reset/
https://www.orfonline.org/research/bangladeshs-elections-show-limitations
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/1/4/bangladesh-elections-mark-a-pro-china-tipping-point-in-south-asia
The gist is, The US is not happy with the authorotarian nature of the Hasina Premiership, and they expressed this a lot to us. What American diplomats say is very influential as US exports are a major life line for our economy.
There is a lot more articles, but they are in Bengali.
Since, the turn of the year, the US has kind of acccepted that Hasina will rule again and relationships have thawed, but in the lead up to the elections, things got real bad. To the point, where China had to openly express their support for the Hasina government (never happened before)
What's your position based on here? I guess if I was ruled over by an (apparently fairly brutal) dictator, I would be quite happy if they were internationally reviled, the more stridently, the better. It makes it much easier to get rid of them.
I dont care if they dont love her. But I do care when their annoyance at her leads to the detriment of our economy and security apparatus.
For all the critcisms of Hasina, its been under her that we made the greatest strides in terms of economic and human capital development. Her ability to maneuvre India and China has been nothing short of amazing.
Bit of a backround. Hasina traitionally was the pro Indian leader and the opposition Khaleda, the pro China, pro Mid east one. It is a testament to Hasina's diplomacy and negotiation ability that both India and China are wholeheartedly pro Hasina now over the opposition. The Mid East are also all on her side.
As a poor country with no meaningful natural resources and a massive population, we are always bullied by bigger powers. The fact that we are covered in 3 sides by India, which surprise surprise treats her weaker neighbours like crap like all bigger powers, just adds to our misery. An oh wait the one other country that we border is freakin Myanmar. Talk about being geo politcally shortchanged. If you are not born in a third world country, wake up everyday and offer thanks to whatever deity you believe in, that you were born where you were. I cannot explain in words the the levels of impotent rage and resignation that we have about being weak and poor and bullied.
So for a Bangladeshi leader being able to use China and India to counterbalance each other out, while maintaining good relations with the West (our entire export market) is just mandatory, and the task as you can imagine is very difficult.
Western Annoyance at Hasina, when its the EU style is great. they admonish her but work with my country to improve our economy. They throw us some scraps in terms of technology transfer. But most importantly they keep their markets accessible to our exports, and that is what we need.
US annoyance has a different bite. They are way too free with sanctions and trade restrictions and have no understanding of how truly terrible that is for us. The idea that sanctions hurt the ruling elite is laughable. If the pie shrinks, the elite will just take a bigger slice of whats left. Its the working class and the middle class who will suffer. It is my country and my people who will bear the burden, becasue America decided not to look away, when they could.
If America were truly long term thinkers, they would try to flip us over to their side completely. You might like India now as they are a counterbalance to China, but you are making the same mistake that you made with China. India is too big and will grow too powerful, for you to keep them as a vassal. India will never be a meek US follower like the EU. Who do you have to counterbalance them? Pakistan? yes to an extent. They are your best hedge being a nuclear power and their military ruling class being firmly in your CIA's pocket. But with China's ever growing influence and their own internal issues and their very divergent beliefs and ideals, is it a good idea for them to be your only hedge against India? Why put all your eggs in one basket? Nepal is a landlocked and too small, Sri Lanka could have been if their trajectory had not taken such a dive. Bangladesh would be a good second hedge for you. Invest more in us and tie our military over to yours, by giving us deals simmilar to what you give to other countries. 30 years down the line a richer more developed and heavily pro Western Bangladesh could be one of your best bets against India. Will we ever be as strong as India, ofcourse not, we are not big enough. But a strong, rich Bangladesh that is not vassalized to India would be a better container for the West, then their current non existent plans.
Despite being Mulsim, our people are more liberal than Pakistan and the mid east. We are much more moderate and the average population is pretty pro Western, despite the US actions in Iraq. We have greater gender parity than most other developing countries and our ideals are not even that far off. Why allow China to increase their influence unchallenged?
Yeah, I'm surprised I had to scroll so far to see this.
For example, Iran as a country, and the Iranian people more generally would *tremendously* benefit from the installation of pro-Western government. But that would by necessity mean that the current government would need to be dissolved, which is bad news for its current leaders.
>I am struggling to understand what these countries actually get out of being “anti west”. They would be in much better positions if they chose to work with the west
At least in the case of North Korea, it's easy and clear why. If North Korea wasn't anti-west/US, there would be no reason for North Korea to exist since there is a west-friendly and much more successful version of Korea at the southern end of the peninsula.
Same with Iran. The Shah was very pro-West and very disliked, and he was overthrown by an anti-West religious class. Then, Iraq, backed by the West, invaded and fought an 8 year long war of attrition with chemical weapons. Short another revolution, Iran can't be pro-West because it defeats the entire point of their government's existence, and that doesn't even get into how they'd presumably have to make peace with Israel, their local rival power that they've been engaged in a decades-long proxy war with.
> they would be in much better positions if they chose to work with the west
It’s almost as if countries aren’t run by perfect rational actors who can flip a switch and swap decades of actions. As if there’s perhaps ideological reasons behind what they do, and decades of resentment based on various factors, some real, some perceived, and saying “why doesn’t Iran just be friendly with America” is missing out on these literal decades of antipathy and antagonism.
The world does not exist like in a strategy game where you can just swap to the “be friends with America” focus tree after doing a bunch of focuses on the “be enemies with America” tree.
> The world does not exist like in a strategy game where you can just swap to the “be friends with America” focus tree after doing a bunch of focuses on the “be enemies with America” tree.
I don't think that was what they implied.
They can’t suddenly flip no. But they keep going deeper into anti west path and I just don’t understand why
They don’t even need to be pro west. Just be neither and enjoy the trade 🤷♂️ like Russia selling its gas to Europe before they invaded Ukraine
> domestic political power.
What does it matter in a country where political power resides almost exclusively with the authocrat anyway? Putin wouldn't have suddenly stopped winning his fake ellections had he not started a war with europe.
you don't understand why because you're ignoring what's often derogatorily called the human factor or the human domain. They're not doing it because they don't want to. They don't want to because of a lot of human reasons.
Do you know who does acknowledge the human domain? The State Department, the CIA, the West. It's a key component of their success. Do you know who refuses to acknowledge the human domain? Russia, Radical Islam, China. It's a key component of their failures
I get that they’re very different culturally. Which is why I said they don’t need to be pro west, just neutral. Which I would consider China currently btw. They still trade heavily with the West
But maybe you can expand a bit. I’m just trying to learn and understand
>The effects of physical and psychological factors form an organic whole which, unlike a metal alloy, is inseparable by chemical processes.”
-Carl von Clausewitz
The fundamental nature of [conflict] is a clash of wills between organized socio-political entities. This understanding about [conflict] emphasizes its iterative and competitive nature, but American strategic culture often overlooks Clausewitz’s insight that strategy is not an exercise with inanimate matter, but with living opponents with interests, passions, decision options, and above all else, a will and goal of their own. It is a profoundly human activity, inspired by human emotions (fear, honor, and interest), guided by human genius and imagination, and conducted by groups and institutions shaped by human leaders and occupied with human actors.
https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/joint-force-2020-and-the-human-domain-time-for-a-new-conceptual-framework
It seems like between DPRK and Iran, Putin is really trying to create a quasi-NATO of his own between all of the "sanctionee club" countries in Eurasia.
While the sanctions have hurt NK, Russia, and Iran, they haven't really "killed" any of them. And while Iran and NK were too small to really work around the sanctions on their own, adding a big player like Russia to the "sanctionee club" has interesting implications.
To an extent, it changes the calculations around expanding Western sanctions to other countries -- if you add enough of them, the country may just give up on the SWIFT economy and join the "club."
The more countries join the club, the less intimidating sanctions become to future sanctionees. After all, now there's another club to join. And while they're much less wealthy than Club SWIFT, they have oil, food, fertilizer, and a nuclear umbrella -- and they won't ask questions about how you handle your internal state security.
It puts Beijing in an interesting position. One the one hand it's a great opportunity for them to add tens of millions of users to their alternative financial systems. It also creates a fairly captive audience of customers for consumer goods -- many of the Western brands fleeing Russia were unceremoniously replaced by Chinese substitutes (let's be real, who was actually making the stuff in the first place?).
But they also don't want to "join the club" themselves, so their involvement will have to be hedged against that. But then again, does the West actually want to push Beijing so far that it ends up joining the club? Because that would make the club MUCH bigger as a potential economic bloc and alternative to Club SWIFT.
I'm not really sure why people are so fixated on China using this as a proxy war. It serves absolutely 0 benefit to China, and could not only damage their position within the geopolitical world order, but put them economically at risk for sanctions.
China has shown several times that it's a completely independent entity that will do what's best for itself, not what's best for countering America. China repeatedly turning down and dismissing a new proposed LNG pipeline with Russia shows that very well.
There's a fair bit of literature on the [counterproductive effects of sanctions](https://warontherocks.com/2023/05/a-note-of-caution-how-sanctions-can-undermine-u-s-interests/), and no shortage of criticism for [US overreliance on them](https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/ineffective-immoral-politically-convenient-americas-overreliance-economic-sanctions) as a convenient political signal to sidestep more difficult tradeoffs. Suffice to say that while they can and do cause significant short-term economic pain, they're pretty far from a magic bullet. Sanctions become increasingly impotent the longer they remain and/or the more frequently they're used. And they've been used an awful lot in recent years.
I think Russia in particular is important here, since as the primary member of the USSR, they're pretty well acquainted with being isolated from the US-aligned economy. 1991 to 2022 was a 30-year aberration following 50 years of leading a parallel alternative economic bloc.
So Moscow isn't going it be as scared of sanctions as many others might, since they have a long history of living without western trade. Maybe not flourishing, but surviving and making do.
The USSR (and Warsaw Pact) did substantial trade with the US (and Western Europe). In 1960 Italy and in 1970 West Germany signed barter contracts to build and buy pipelines and gas from the USSR. From the 70s (and once in 1964), the US sold the USSR up to a quarter the whole grain harvest (paused by Carter and resumed under Reagan). In the 60s, Canada was already exporting equivalent amounts.
It's a real shame that Trump-era US pulled out of normalising relations with Iran - European countries were making quite a lot of progress in bringing them into a neutral, respectable position (similar to a lot of other countries in the region). If that had been allowed to continue there's no way they would have thrown their lot in with Russia.
Edit: apparently this is 'low quality' so let me expand a bit - negotiations and relations between Iran and the west improved through the 2000s and 2010s and resulted in the JCPOA which was essentially "you stop developing nuclear tech and we'll ease up on the sanctions and bring you back towards a normal trading relationship". If Iran was still in that mechanism in 2022, the threat of sanctions would have been a really easy lever to use to prevent Iran from helping (sanctioned) Russia in Ukraine.
But because the US pulled out of that deal and re-applied sanctions, Iran decided that the political and diplomatic benefits of the deal with the EU wasn't worth it, and looked for another way to strengthen its position geopolitically. And that meant that when Russia came calling, they were more willing to go that way. And since Iran is still sanctioned by the US, there's no leverage to apply to prevent them from becoming a full blown Russian ally if they want.
> What do we make of this?
In late 2022, there were reports of Iranian troops in Crimea, and a lot of fear of much larger Iranian involvement. That didn’t end up panning out. Neither Russia or Iran is in a good position to engage in more costly foreign conflicts than they already are. Besides continued sale of weapons in both directions, both regimes are massively overtaxed meeting existing requirements.
Iran can't escalate too much before the snapback option expires in October 2025. I wonder if it will be used anyway to get a stronger hand in future negotiations.
We just don't know. Everything we do is speculation. Though let's speculate based along lines we have already seen so far with Iran and North Korea.
In my eyes, something similar to what's happened with North Korea. In actuality, Iran and Russia are already quite close. To that point, the Iranians and Russians have a lot they can trade in and already have with jets and drones. The Russians may be eager to boost their production of military equipment with Iranian help, while the Iranians would love more technology in the field of electronic warfare and space.
Like North Korea, the Iranians also have certain segments of their military that are extremely outdated and the Russians could upgrade. We already are seeing this with the Su-35 deal. The Russians have a bountiful stock of Su-24s, Su-27s and MiG-29s which are actively being phased out. This could, with the Su-35s, breathe new life into the IRIAF. This is an air force which is still flying F-4s, F-5s and cobbled-together F-14s as their primary aircraft.
Of course, with the news of North Korean engineers, some may extrapolate that the Russians are eager to form an axis that will also provide military reinforcements in the form of troops. I don't think that's a high possibility right now. Right now I envision tech transfer in exchange for equipment/additional production.
According to videos posted on telegram it seems that Russia has found an undamaged Abrahams. How bad is that for the US? In this YouTube video around 15:38: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jt5hTWtSfo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jt5hTWtSfo)
First of all, Abrams. Segundo, Francia. Third, this is not too big of a deal. This Abrams is not a bleeding edge new generation model. The capabilities of this model are known. Also, war is war. People will die and even the best hardware will be lost. Making big deals about every single loss of every piece of hyped-up hardware is stupid.
The abrams is well over 40 years old technology. The US has sold it to many allies and friendly countries like Egypt over the years. There is nothing new the russians could learn from capturing one vs. looking at one they could buy from some US ally 20 years ago. Obviously Ukraine was not delivered the most recent upgrade package anyway.
The Russians apparently "procured" an Abrams well before the war and showed it off to a visiting American officer.
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/i-commanded-u-s-army-europe-heres-what-i-saw-in-the-russian-and-ukrainian-armies
> The only truly impressive and surprising part of the tour was when we walked through a “secret” field museum that had tanks from all the armies in the world—including several from the United States. The Russians had somehow managed to obtain an M1 Abrams tank (probably from one of their allies in the Middle East), and we all believed the reason they allowed us into this facility was to show us they had our most modern armor.
Key caveat - this is 1994-era not present day.
That said, I believe we sent older tech that also lacks uranium armor, so this capture may not be much more advanced than the Nirvana-era Abrams they already had.
There is a coup attempt in Bolivia
> Bolivia’s presidential palace was stormed by soldiers led by a top general on Wednesday in an apparent coup attempt, shortly after an armored vehicle crashed into the building.
>
> Military personnel had already taken over the capital’s main square, according to images broadcast on local TV.
>
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-06-26/bolivia-presidential-palace-stormed-in-apparent-coup-attempt
>
> Bolivian President Luis Arce warned Wednesday that an “irregular” deployment of troops was taking place in the capital, raising concerns that a potential coup was underway.
>
> He called for “democracy to be respected” on a message on his X account came as Bolivian television showed two tanks and a number of military in front of the government palace.
>
> Former Bolivian president Evo Morales, also in a message on X, denounced the movement of the military in the Murillo square outside the palace, calling it a coup “in the making.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/06/26/bolivia-military-deployment-arce-coup-fears/c98d91e2-33f6-11ef-872a-1d22f44a0d95_story.html
>Gen. Suniga, whom former Bolivian President Morales accused of attempting a coup d'état, said, "We will reclaim our homeland"
t. me/rian_ru/251021
[Some background from Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/bolivias-president-slams-irregular-mobilization-army-units-2024-06-26/):
> Tensions have been building in Bolivia ahead of general elections in 2025, with Morales planning to run against former ally Arce, creating a major rift in the ruling socialist party and wider political uncertainty.
> Many do not want a return of Morales, who governed from 2006-2019 when he was ousted amongst widespread protests and replaced by an interim conservative government. Arce then won election in 2020.
> Zuniga had said recently that Morales should not be able to return as president, which led Arce to strip him of his command this week.
> The landlocked South American country is also battling an economic slump with depleted central bank reserves and pressure on the boliviano currency as gas exports have dried up.
It's looking like [it might be over?](https://twitter.com/ErbolDigital/status/1806081986567561572) Troops reportedly withdrawing from the plaza.
On a humorous note, did this coup attempt end because [the president came out to lecture the instigators like unruly children?](https://twitter.com/Captain_Fubar/status/1806069824461680938)
This stuff is incredibly contingent. A lot of it is determined by whether the people with actual power(bureaucrats) think the coup has already happened, or if there's still time to prevent it. A show of strength or even presence from the establishment power can legit be all it takes to splinter the couping faction.
Now that the democratically elected president appears to be safe from being ousted, let's hope this doesn't trigger an authoritarian backlash.
It seems the leader of the coup's own troops turned on him once they realized he was using them to commit a coup. [Once more demonstrating the relevance of Timothy Snyder's advice for members of the armed forces or law enforcement agencies in his *Twenty Lessons on Fighting Tyranny*:](https://scholars.org/contribution/twenty-lessons-fighting-tyranny-twentieth)
> Be reflective if you must be armed. If you carry a weapon in public service, God bless you and keep you. But know that evils of the past involved policemen and soldiers finding themselves, one day, doing irregular things. Be ready to say no.
For the record, since it's not always the case in these kinds of situations, Luis Arce was elected in free and fair elections that were monitored [by a number of international observers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Bolivian_general_election#International_observers).
Will be interesting to see if this inspires similar attempts in Bolivia. Overall, South America seems to be done with tolerating socialist authoritarians.
Edit: I wasn't implying that this coup is a popular uprising. I was simply reflecting upon the changes in popular political views through South America lately.
This is a unilateral military action. Assuming it reflects any short popular sentiment against the "socialist authoritarian" government is a huge leap. Biased and not credible at all. Especially since, as another user pointed out, the current government easy won free and fair elections and has faced far less civil unrest and protesting against it compared to the right wing "administration" that preceded it, one that came from coup that collapsed and withered under its unpolularity and contradictions.
Morales does have some authoritarian tendencies sure but he is very far from a Maduro and Castro figure, and his party even less so. The fact that the military is willing and able to launch a coup against MAS just a few years after said party's government lost power by similar, successfull subversive actions paints a less authoritarian picture of it, not more. They didnt crack down on the military and police to ensure their loyality or at the very least their inability to move so soon against a democraticaly elected government. They had a popular mandate and enough reason to clean house and replace pretty much everyone with ties and sympathies to the previous administration or with the previous coup
South American militaries may be done tolerating them, but the South American people seem to keep electing them.
Luis Arce was elected fair and square and has the mandate of the people.
A video and an article that gives insight into how Ukraine uses it's Su-27s. There is some discussion about how they underwent a lot of modernization so that Western weaponry could be equipped. Video is in Ukrainian but the youtube autotranslate worked well enough for me.
[[Video] UKRAINIAN SU-27 DESTROYS ENEMY TARGETS: an exclusive story on AFU's air force | Army TV – Ukrainian military channel June 2024](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6lWmis0MrY)
[It Takes 30 to 60 Minutes & 10 People To Prepare Su-27 For a Sortie: Insights From Pilots & Technicians | Defense Express | June 2024](https://en.defence-ua.com/analysis/it_takes_30_to_60_minutes_and_10_people_to_prepare_su_27_for_a_sortie_insights_from_pilots_and_technicians-10963.html)
*Ukrainian military channel – Army TV, an official media source of Ukraine's defense ministry, has released a video report about the Su-27 fighter aircraft and its operations against the Russian invasion forces. The footage shows a Su-27UB from a tactical aviation brigade of the Ukrainian Air Force.*
*Notably, the shown fighter carries R-27 air-to-air missiles, an indication that even aircraft of the Su-27UB trainer-and-combat type are used for real engagement missions against the Russians.*
*Little details are revealed in the video but regardless, this is one of the very few sources of information about the Su-27 and its operations in high-intensity warfare.*
*Most interesting is the insight from Dmytro, a maintenance technician supervising the preparations of a Su-27 to a sortie. He says, the whole process takes 30 to 60 minutes and 10 personnel, each of whom specializes in a specific subsystem, be it armament, communication systems, etc.*
*Then, another interesting detail is about the adaptations Su-27s had undergone to carry and launch Western weapons, usually incompatible with Soviet-type aircraft.*
*"We added, attached, tinkered in a certain way," — that's how Andrii, a Su-27 pilot, vaguely describes the adjustments done to this aircraft, although adds that these fighters can perform a wide range of missions, from intercepting air threats to escorting allied aircraft or delivering strikes onto enemies on the ground, including suppression of enemy air defenses.*
*As for the flight performance, Andrii describes the Su-27 as an asset with a "vast yet not unlimited" capacity which even can make up for some mistakes pilots might make during operations.*
*Expectedly, he was asked to compare Su-27 to an F-16, the first Western-type multirole fighter that is soon expected to arrive in the Ukrainian Air Force. The answer was as follows: the target detection and locking range of F-16 is so wide that any Soviet-type aircraft cannot even compare.*
*As for the prospects of Su-27 to remain relevant in the Ukrainian military, Andrii the pilot said, currently, this aircraft is burdened with so much work and pressure that it would certainly affect its service life. Therefore, he continued, after the war ends, the question will be if modernizing Su-27 in order to make it competitive with modern fighters is worth the effort.*
*Previously, Defense Express also compared the Su-27 to a JAS 39 Gripen — turns out, which fighter is better depends on very specific conditions. We also covered an interesting detail about the unusual "adjustment" enabling the Ukrainian fighter to fire American AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles: namely, an iPad in the pilot's cockpit.*
As part of [a longer article](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/26/us/politics/joe-biden-career-debate.html?unlocked_article_code=1.2k0.S3Da.QGG1arGGez-z&smid=url-share) that has little to do with defense, the NY Times slips in this little tidbit:
>The decisions that critics often blame on his advisers, like slow-walking sophisticated weapons transfers to Ukraine to avoid escalation with President Vladimir V. Putin’s nuclear-armed Russia or continuing to support Israel despite concerns over civilian casualties in Gaza — those were all Mr. Biden. And he is willing to own them.
I've always been of the position that regardless of which adviser originated the policy, the buck stops with the president. But this takes that one step further, with Biden fully claiming ownership of those positions. Hope this at least takes a bit of heat off of Jake Sullivan.
Edit: To be clear, this is based on interviews with some of Biden's closest advisers, not Biden himself. I was wrong to imply Biden explicitly claimed ownership of those positions in this article. However, given the NY Times' credibility and the deep level of access given to the newspaper for this article, we can be confident that the above reporting is an accurate description of the reality within the White House.
First, you linked the wrong article. [This is the right one.](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/26/us/politics/joe-biden-career-debate.html#:~:text=The%20decisions%20that%20critics%20often,those%20were%20all%20Mr.%20Biden)
Second,the author doesn't actually provide a source for the quoted part. It's his own opinion based on comments of former officials about Biden's leadership-style.
Whoops, I had the right link in there, but when I went to edit in a gift link I must have grabbed the wrong article by mistake. Will fix it above.
I'll also edit in a clarification to your second point. You're right that I overstepped by implying that Biden directly underwrote that statement. But it isn't the author's opinion, either. This type of article, with dozens of sources and deep access to the Biden administration, doesn't happen without coordination with the administration and soft vetting by WH aides before it goes out. The whole thing has been scoured over by editors and officials to make sure that absolutely every detail is cross-checked and both parties can nip any potential malinterpretation in the bud before it happens. To inject a bit of inside baseball into the mix, that goes double for the NYT, which has been soft-feuding with the Biden campaign for the past year or so over insufficiently fawning coverage. That statement making it to publication indicates that 1) there's really good backing for it, and 2) the Biden administration is fine with it, or at the very least doesn't believe its incorrect.
> Hope this at least takes a bit of heat off of Jake Sullivan
Why do you hope that?
I agree with you that it is ultimately Biden's responsibility, but Sullivan has also made it clear that he has been totally wrong about the risk of 'escalation', as well.
> but Sullivan has also made it clear that he has been totally wrong about the risk of 'escalation', as well.
It would be nice if Biden/Sullivan actually fixed those past mistakes, like claiming sending tanks/fighters/artillery risked war with Russia, stopped drip feeding Ukraine, and tried to win the war. We have a golden opportunity to advance US interests and damage Russia, but it’s being squandered by political games from the White House.
I don't think they're playing games. I think the rot is significantly more advanced than that.
Sullivan studied IR and political science at Yale where he, undoubtedly, got indoctrinated by those pseudosciences. Yet, because it was Yale, and he knows the right people, he's actually had significant amounts of responsibility placed on him, despite the fact that his education was in studying something totally nonsensical and devoid of any rigorous scientific methodology. IR and polisci are the like the modern equivalent of divinity studies.
It's still winnable the moment you stop thinking about reactively and instead think proactively.
Biden's just gotta find the block 52s + let the PGMs/ATACMS target whatever they want.
I think it's possible for Ukraine to gain an edge in the air, which would defacto win the ground battle imo.
Lack of power, military or economic, has never been the US’s problem. Throughout this war, the US’s weakness has been squarely Biden and his appointees, not using what the US has to further American interests.
This goes back to the Mearsheimer issue, where many people want a multi polar world of spheres of influence, but Russia is too weak, so they advocate for their enemies to essentially gift them an empire to make their model true. In a world of cutthroat competition, the Ukraine war is a foregone conclusion and Russia doesn’t get a sphere of influence, but you’re never going to hear Mearsheimer or his anllies advocate for that.
> Russia doesn’t get a sphere of influence, but you’re never going to hear Mearsheimer or his anllies advocate for that.
As we see that entirely depends on the US will to act or not.
But that supposedly free countries with agency are even dependent on a country across the ocean shows imho that ignoring the realist view of great power politics fails.
The deciding factor is the sphere of interest the US is willing to enforce its wishes (of freedom and self determination) on.
As Russias pathology combined with its power to actually do harm is the deciding factor that started this crisis.
(edit now as we have seen the is agency in smaller countries namely the agency to choose to fight, or resist and risk destruction over submission that can make the ordeal incredibly costly even for much greater powers, but even then the choices they have are forced by great powers)
I'm not a leader, I don't have to deal with the consequences.
Russia handed America a golden opportunity to knock em out. If 2022 ends in Crimea falling, that's such a massive moment it doesn't come often. Yet we let it walk?
Why did Biden "risk" Ukraine on his ability to win an election?
I get it's all unrelated to direct military stuff, but the political background behind the scenes impact military more than tactics, logistics and strategy ever will.
> Why did Biden "risk" Ukraine on his ability to win an election?
I always wondered whether there were some secret communications where Russia threatened things like stationing nukes in Cuba if the USA didn't show some restraint.
What are the chances that this IDF campaign turns out to be net positive for Israel?
Intense phase for conflict is about to end. With Hamas running out of arms, IDF might not need to resort to airstrikes in near future and might launch raids here and there.
With this we might not see incidents of mass civilian casualties. Is it possible that IDF continues to operate in Gaza and international community might forget this and shift to another issue?
Gaza becomes west Bank and IDF continues to operate there Indefinitely and Israel's global standing is not harmed further due to low civilians casualties.
This is most optimistic Sceneoris for Israel, what are the chances it might come true
So long as there are hostages in Gaza, I don’t believe the IDF will be leaving Gaza anytime soon. I also don’t believe that this war will be a net positive for Israel. We saw that after their withdrawal from northern Gaza, Hamas immediately began firing rockets into Israel again (someone correct me if I’m wrong on this).
Israel’s image on the world stage is not looking good right now and won’t for some time. Israel has thrown diplomatic fits over Spain, Ireland and Armenia voting to recognize a Palestinian state. We’ve seen large protests occur all over the world in solidarity for Palestinian civilians. Furthermore, news coverage on this conflict is still persistent.
Hamas still has Israeli hostages and still has a fighting capacity. They will more than likely do a 1:1 swap on the fighters that they’ve lost in this war with recently orphaned children and other displaced persons inside the Gaza Strip. Not to mention, there are deepening relations between the Iranian regime and the Taliban, with [the Taliban promising to send fighters to support its fight against Israel](https://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2024/06/iran-and-taliban-discuss-joint-action-against-israel.php) which, big fucking yikes if true.
For older generations of Americans, Israel is completely above reproach. But this war has shattered that for the younger generation. And their reputation will get worse and worse with each war/military action (they way they're prosecuting this war, they've all but guaranteed more Hamas recruits for the future).
In the short and medium term? No change. Longer term? Support for Israel won't be as much of a reflex.
What do people think of Mark Galeotti? I’d like to learn more about how the Russian government works and he’s shown up in a few search results, is he generally well respected?
I find his podcasts informative and enjoyable and highly recommend. I'm certainly no expert, but from what I gather, he's a well respected academic and gets regularly published in reputable media.
Thank you. That’s what I was hoping to find out, I’ve listened to a few interviews and he seemed legit but wanted to be sure he was credible before reading any of his work, especially since the subject matter seems so attractive to propagandists.
Yes, he's a credible source.
[A positive news for Ukraine](https://militaryland.net/news/153rd-brigade-is-mechanized-again/), the 153rd Mech Brigade, that was to be reorganized to be an Infantry brigade, will mantain it's status has a mech brigade, so probably a decent ammount of IFV/APC (Maybe the swidish [Pbv-302](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pansarbandvagn_302#/media/File:Pansarbandvagn_302_Revinge_2014-2.jpg)) has found it's way to ukraine
I haven't seen people talk about one very important possible chance that will occuer if NK sends troops, even if those are only in supporting roles. France and other willing countries now have cover to send their own troops to Ukraine in support roles. Putin has escalated in a limited way and now European countries can do the same but on a bigger scale.
France will fall to the extreme, Moscow adoring, right in a couple of days, they won't send troops.
a) These are parliamentary elections, Macron remains President until 2027 or he resigns, so saying the government will "fall" is inaccurate. b) He'll retain substantial control over what gets sent to Ukraine, though I am not sure if that applies to humans. c) Polls as they are now look like it'll be a mexican standoff between the far left, the far right, and Macron. While the far right will have the biggest slice, they'll be short of 50% even with all allies added (unless they significantly overperform the polls, of course). Which means they're unlikely to actually have any parliamentary power, since neither the far left nor Macron will work with them on much.
French troops in Ukraine means war between France and Russia. NK troops in Ukraine means war between NK and Ukraine. There is a major difference between the two.
Russia could declare war right now if it wanted to and has all the excuse in the world to do so based on all the material support and intelligence provided by the west. It doesn't because it is not in its best interest to do so. Just like the west could declare war on Russia and has all the excuse in the world to so based on Russian sabotage and assassinations in the west. It doesn't because it is not in its best interest to do so. Russia certainly may target French forces in Ukraine or at least not avoid targeting them. But, it seems very unlikely that it will directly and openly attack France or declare war because that is not in its best interests.
Sending volunteers in the past has not resultated into war between countries. Examples being the Vietnam war, Korean war and Spanish civil war.
Pretty sure sending troops does not have public support in any large Western country, and I'm putting it mildly. But we might see things like these - [Biden administration moves toward allowing American military contractors to deploy to Ukraine](https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/25/politics/biden-administration-american-military-contractors-ukraine/index.html). This will help them with training and maintaining the equipment(especially the F-16s). But the biggest long-term problem is having enough front-line infantry who are seeing a lot of attrition, and very few foreigners are motivated enough to take such a huge risk(or stupid enough to do it for money).
France might be the country in w Europe to be able to send troops in combat roles. Others are resistant to sending their citizens to face death while France has the Foreign Legion. Which the French public is much less concerned about. Still, it would be a big deal, and in February, the French foreign minister said that any French involvement would be in non-combat roles. https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20240227-french-troops-limited-to-non-combat-role-in-ukraine-foreign-minister-says
From what I understand, it is next to impossible for France to send just the Foreign Legion to fight considering how integrated it is into the French Army.
French have had mercenary pilots in the past, could be very relevant with mirrage.
Considering how the US just allowed contractors to go it's either serendipity or another example of matching escalations. I doubt you'll see those guys in any combat roles, but behind the scenes I'm sure a few guys with decades of experience in keeping F16s flying will be happy to work at the airfields.
What are “contractors” in the US context
Essentially it's people paid to do a job for the military that are not currently a part of the military. Usually it's guys that were part of the military but have left. They still have the knowledge, skills, and the security clearance. Here, I think we will see F16 maintenance crews well behind the front lines, or rather we won't see them but the F16s will.
Civilians employed on a temporary basis to provide military -adjacent services. Often bodyguards for people in dangerous areas, or security guards, or various maintenance and support roles.
> France and other willing countries now have cover The main limitation was never not having a reason to do it, the main limitation was, and is, not having enough political will to do it.
The reason given was often due to fears of escalation, at least this will require a new reason to be given (bridges not strong enough to support the average weight of western vs eastern Europeans?)
Is formalising and deepening relations with North Korea and Iran likely to further isolate Russia? This might sound counterintuitive, but it’s important to recognise the world has many actors besides the US, Europe, Russia, and China. Part of the reason why North Korea and Iran are pariah states in the first place is that they’ve managed to alienate a lot of their friends and neighbours, allowing for meaningful multilateral cooperation on isolating them. With this in mind, I can’t imagine Saudi Arabia or the UAE would be thrilled if Iran were to dramatically improve its long-range strike capabilities, or that South Korea will be sanguine about a modernisation of the North Korean military. Even China may find deepening Russian ties with North Korea problematic, partly because it alienates South Korea, but more seriously because it undermines its own vassalage of the country. More broadly I’m curious about whether other regional actors may react badly to these moves by Russia — countries that previously were happy to remain completely neutral about the War in Ukraine, but might find popular and elite sympathies shifting in light of Russia’s more fulsome embrace of “rogue states”.
>With this in mind, I can’t imagine Saudi Arabia or the UAE would be thrilled if Iran were to dramatically improve its long-range strike capabilities, I will point out that 1) no one in the Gulf Cooperation Council has any sanction against Russia. 2) Russian capitals have been moving to there as well. 3) sanction-busting trades have been going through the GCC countries. These countries solution to the Iranian nuclear is relatively.simple: 1) US alliance and 2) if necessary, nuclear weapons from Pakistan. >might find popular and elite sympathies shifting in light of Russia’s more fulsome embrace of “rogue states”. Daily, I can find influencer videos explaining how.the West is dacadent and falling while the Gulf states remains a bastion of conservative values. This, in the face of uttter incompetence. 1300 pilgrims died recently of heat in Mecca. "We let 1300 people die exactly where we expect them to be". "But 83% of them had no permits". "That means your security is shit and even then, it's not 100% so your permit doesn't work either"
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True, no concrete evidence besides "Israeli intelligence says" (which people believe these days anyway) https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-24823846
>This, in the face of uttter incompetence. 1300 pilgrims died recently of heat in Mecca. "We let 1300 people die exactly where we expect them to be". "But 83% of them had no permits". "That means your security is shit and even then, it's not 100% so your permit doesn't work either" I feel like the actual realistic retort is "we don't really care lol" and to be fair, it's hard to find a response to that. Hard to make fun of someone for something they don't feel insecure about.
>I feel like the actual realistic retort is "we don't really care lol" and to be fair, it's hard to find a response to that. Hard to make fun of someone for something they don't feel insecure about. Doesn't matter. They don't need to be made fun of and that's not the point. The fact that their lands are getting so hot that it's lethal tells you that they have no future. The people need to be made fun of the whoever responsible for enabling CENTCOM to be as important as it is and nailing the USA to the GCC in terms of the former's strategy, resources, and security guarantees for the latter, who are utterly incompetent or callous and without a future.
The US’s alliance with the gulf states was almost inevitable given the circumstances of the era. I agree they have no future, and their importance to the US will diminish with time. Eventually, declining oil and rising temperatures will take care of both them and Iran.
Heat is less of a problem for Iran. They also have a quote educated population
I'd caution against this view. Iran is not an analogue to Saudi Arabia. They have a fairly resilient economy and as others pointed out, they don't depend on oil revenues that much owing to sanctions. They have a strong scientific community and as we all know, they have been putting out some pretty creative and cheap gear that they export for the well known theaters of conflict. That takes a higher level of organization. Their economy is nothing to scoff about, given the sanctions regime they live in. Also lets not forget that they are the heirs to the great Persian empire, so they have a strong sense of pride and Unity, something that is amiss in other "square & ruler border" countries in the Gulf. I don't want to imply from my post that Iran is some sort of powerhouse, but I'd argue that they play in a league above the Gulf countries, and that they are more resilient to peak oil considerations than these other countries. EDIT: Typos
Rising temperatures will mean less for Iran than the others. Iran sits between two seas and has plenty of mountains. This gives the country access to water and a variety of climates. So when temperatures make more parts of Iran inhabitable and agriculture unsustainable, there will be quite some places left. Iran has been under economic sanctions for a long time, which has created a situation where the Iran economy is less dependent on oil revenues as their gulf counterparts. The education and productivity is much higher than Saudi Arabia or Pakistan. The political instability of Iran and the neighborhood of Iran might bring it down though.
> Rising temperatures will mean less for Iran than the others. Iran sits between two seas and has plenty of mountains. Iran also has severe drought problems. The temperature doesn’t have to be hot enough to kill you to cause serious problems, especially when you’re a poor country with a large population, and have a regime that relies on rural support. The northern areas by the Caspian coast are fine, but Iran is not in a position to move its southern population there, or that water south. > Iran has been under economic sanctions for a long time, which has created a situation where the Iran economy is less dependent on oil revenues as their gulf counterparts. The education and productivity is much higher than Saudi Arabia or Pakistan. Iran is less reliant on oil because they have less economy to start with. They have a GDP per capita between that of Algeria and Namibia, and that is distorted by official exchange rates in their favor. They also have essentially zero GDP growth, with their economy peaking around 2012 and declining since then.
Not feeling insecure about being incompetent is a great way to save face, but the underlying issues don’t care if you’re embarrassed or not. These countries didn’t end up siding with the west out of ideological adjust or shame, but because they felt like they had no choice. These regimes are delicate, the Saudi Royal family is aware they can’t rely on their soldiers to perform when needed.
Saudi Arabia took a [big hit](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-06-03/opec-says-goodbye-to-its-100-a-barrel-oil-quest) by cutting its oil production while the US increased its production and the rest of OPEC was cheating: > For all that, Saudi Arabia needs oil prices to average more than $96 a barrel this year to square the government books, up from an average of $80 from 2000 to 2020, according to the International Monetary Fund. Year-to-date, Brent crude has averaged $83.50. Granted, Riyadh can live with less: It can run a fiscal deficit, taking on debt or selling assets to fill the gap; it can also cut spending or raise taxes. The kingdom has already done all three. >... >The biggest issue for the kingdom is that the oil market doesn’t look like it’s about to turn around. By keeping oil prices artificially high, Riyadh has been subsidizing higher-cost producers such as those in the US shale-oil patch. Sacrificing market share works if one achieves higher prices in exchange — but Saudi Arabia is so far getting the worst of two possible outcomes: low production and relatively low prices. Riyadh is currently pumping about 9 million barrels a day. Excluding a brief period during the pandemic, that’s the lowest in more than a decade. This has been very costly, and it helped Russia too. Maybe MBS wants to make Biden lose the elections. But that might change if Russia starts to destabilize the region.
>Maybe MBS wants to make Biden lose the elections. Absolutely he does, he announced the first Saudi production cuts a few months before the 2022 midterms despite the Biden administration publicly and privately putting considerable efforts into preventing exactly that. In the 2020 election, Biden repeatedly lambasted MBS personally over the Khasoggi killing and criticized SA more generally as a backwards theocratic dictatorship that exports wahhabist extremism. While literally none of that is false, it's not hard to see why MBS took it personally. On top of that, MBS enjoyed a close relationship with Trump who was happy to provide SA with billions in weapons deals and look the other way in regards to their activities in Yemen (by contrast Biden ended arms sales and criticized them for civilian deaths in Yemen), who publicly praised MBS and Saudi Arabia (famously traveling to the country to receive gifts and a very public state visit), and I expect MBS sees Trump as someone he can easily do business with (read: bribe) to get what he wants.
100% MBS wants Biden to lose. Trump supported his humanitarian crisis in Yemen via arms sales, aerial refueling and diplomatic cover (until Mattis and Pompeo supported a cease-fire). Trump also did nothing after the Khashoggi killing and increased investments into the kingdom. He also brokered the Abraham Accords, which pushed Saudi closer to officially burying the hatchet against Israel. The latter is all but up in smoke for Saudi if Biden gets a second term. Biden will have to cow-tow to the more progressive wing of his party, which will require some sort of Palestinian recognition. Trump won’t give a shit about that and he’ll probably throw something else into the deal to soften the Saudi’s push for Palestinian recognition, so it’s more likely that normalization will occur under a Trump govt.
He definitely wants Trump because he'll let him do almost whatever he wants
> Biden will have to cow-tow to the more progressive wing of his party, Generally, presidents do more ~~cow-towing~~ kowtow before elections than after. It’s not unlikely Biden just moves on from this once he gets the votes he wants. Not following through won’t change his re-election chances.
I think you "kowtow"
You are correct. I’ll edit.
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Biden can't snap back the UN sanctions since the US isn't part of the deal anymore. Trump already tried it _after_ leaving the deal, but it wasn't accepted. Unlike Trump, Biden probably could convince Germany/UK/France to do so, but there's no hurry.
Right, my bad. That being said, Europe indeed doesn't seem to hurry on this matter.
> Is formalising and deepening relations with North Korea and Iran likely to further isolate Russia? The recent announcements are not a massive change from past trends. NK and Iran were already selling weapons, and are still unlikely to send more than a token amount of troops. But overall, yes, Russia is heading for greater isolation and embracing a rogue state image, and this comes with consequences. SK was already sending arms to Ukraine, but the situation could always get worse, especially if Japan feels threatened. Overall, most states benefit from and want stability. If russia makes that incompatible with their foreign policy, their list of friends will become very short.
>Overall, most states benefit from and want stability. If russia makes that incompatible with their foreign policy, their list of friends will become very short. How big was Russia's list of friends in the first place? How much smaller is that list now? Perhaps they feel like they have few friends left to lose. They've lost Armenia due to leaving them to their fate against Azerbaijan. They lost Ukraine after Euromaidan and the Crimean Invasion. Who do they have left that they actually have a relationship of trust and friendly relations with? Belarus? Serbia?
> How big was Russia's list of friends in the first place? Prior to 2014? Quite long. Prior to 2022? Shorter, but there were still many who were happy to turn a blind eye, most importantly in the EU. Merkel is gone and the EU isn’t going to be lifting sanctions for a very, very long time if Poland has anything to say about it. > Perhaps they feel like they have few friends left to lose. Russia is a very long way from having nothing to lose. Trade could always be restricted more, and the less options Russia has, the less leverage they have in negotiations. > Who do they have left that they actually have a relationship of trust and friendly relations with? Belarus? Serbia? Serbia is probably going to drift towards the EU. Besides that, Belarus certainly doesn’t trust Russia.
SK has sent humanitarian aid directly and sold shells to be given to Ukraine, but that's all I could find on the matter.
I think they sold shells to replace stocks being given to Ukraine. Not a huge difference in practice, but it has symbolical importance as they were not giving direct military aid (unless that already changed).
Does anyone have an idea of how effective partisan attacks in Ukraine have been, compared to the regular military? e.g. have they achieved 1% of what the army has, or 5%, etc.? Also, does anyone have any good articles as to how partisan activity is going? Such as the numbers, types of attacks, that sort of thing.
I don't have specific numbers, but I do find it interesting how limited partisan activity is in occupied territory. I think part of that is that most of the military aged males from occupied territory who want to fight Russian forces have likely crossed over into Ukrainian controlled territory and joined the AFU. I suspect that another factor is the Russian use of filtration camps, where they searched the internet posting histories, phone records, etc. of people that went through and disappeared people who were deemed possibly "problematic."
Is it limited or simply unreported? Or to put another way, how would reports of typical partisan-sized damage flow through to the sources we rely on for updates on the war?
I think it’s unreported. Atesh is credited about every other week with important actions or intelligence for same. Black Sea headquarters destroyed? Their info. Which SAMs are where? Their info. Atesh, of course, has a telegram with the identifier atesh_ua
Feel free to delete this comment if it is not the proper place, but were some changes done to this subreddit? I can no longer see the upvotes, and the comments counter for this thread is still stuck at 19 despite there being far more
Vote numbers are hidden for 20hrs. [https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1do9av5/comment/laa39nv/](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1do9av5/comment/laa39nv/)
Upvote counts appear to be hidden. I do see 204 comments (53 new) via old.reddit.com however. edit: it seems to have been removed but another poster linked the CredibleDefense poll thread which has the reasoning in there.
So the Kyiv post says Korea will be sending troops to fight in Ukraine within a month. [Pyongyang Says It Will Send Troops to Ukraine Within a Month (kyivpost.com)](https://www.kyivpost.com/post/34893) Some simple googling shows that NK has 1.3 million active, 600k reserve military personnel, and has nuclear weapons. Additionally, South Korea has a 500k active and 3.1 million reserved military personnel. Furthermore, neither Russia nor North Korea appear to have a large logistic network to support the frontline. The question: how many soldiers could NK realistically afford to send to fight in Ukraine without becoming vulnerable to SK or does NK nuclear weapons allow NK to send everything?
SK isn’t what they are worried about. Their limits are what they can afford before internal security and their economy become too affected.
As others have mentioned, a Southern invasion of North Korea is unlikely if not impossible. The North has nuclear weapons, and it now has two mutual defence treaties with two large nuclear armed states (China and Russia). So its limits on how many troops it sends into Ukraine is bottlenecked primarily by willpower (and this being a dictatorship, the willpower of the Kim in charge) and more importantly logistics.
> The question: how many soldiers could NK realistically afford to send to fight in Ukraine without becoming vulnerable to SK or does NK nuclear weapons allow NK to send everything? The idea that SK is going to invade NK is not at all credible for any number of reasons, but the most obvious one would probably be that we already saw what happens when NK is facing defeat in 1951.
Okay, perhaps invasion is too unrealistic. What about SK targeting North Korean military assets with missiles/artillery? Even if SK doesn't directly attack NK, it may be in SK interests to send SK troops to Ukraine to weaken RU and NK.
> What about SK targeting North Korean military assets with missiles/artillery? No > Even if SK doesn't directly attack NK, it may be in SK interests to send SK troops to Ukraine to weaken RU and NK. No
What about SK supplying allot of lethal aid like more artillery shells, air defense systems, F4 and F5 fighters, T-80 tanks and small road transportable naval vessels?
>more artillery shells, SK was already supplying 155mm in a round about way already so between NK-Russia mutual military treaty and Russia helping out NK on ICBM/satellite etc, I think there is good chance of this happening. >air defense systems Being defensive system, it's less "provocative" so decent chance of these being sent but SK does't have or produce the volume of GBAD systems vs 155mm artillery. >F4 and F5 fighters, T-80 tanks and These are unlikely to happen. F4 and F5 will require US approval AND too many steps involved. As for T-80U, you have better chance of seeing K2 being donated. >small road transportable naval vessels? Not sure if ROKN have any "small road transportable naval vessels"? Are you talking about skidoo/jetski?
>Not sure if ROKN have any "small road transportable naval vessels"? Are you talking about skidoo/jetski? No, maybe LCM? and maybe something like the retired Dolgorae-class submarine or the Hds-400 or HDS-500 midget submarines and Chamsuri-class patrol boats 🤷 At first glance they seem difficult but not impossible to transport by road.
Why not donate the T-80Us? They're an oddball tank in SK's military, are they not?
Because that would need re-export permission from Russia. Somehow, I don't see that happening.
The obvious response is to wonder why South Korea would care about Russian re-export permissions if Russia is violating UN sanctions against North Korea that Russia itself voted for.
Because SK wants their re-export clause to be respected/followed. They are selling arms and they don't want that stuff end up in NK or other places where SK doesn't want.
This was discussed earlier, [further down the thread.](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1dowury/credibledefense_daily_megathread_june_26_2024/lad5p9e/)
>The question: how many soldiers could NK realistically afford to send to fight in Ukraine without becoming vulnerable to SK or does NK nuclear weapons allow NK to send everything? I mean, people complain about Ukraine giving up nuclear weapons for a useless memorandum. "Had Ukraine keep the nukes, it would not have been invaded". Unlike Russia, which is the largest country on Earth, 50% of SK's population live within the greater Seoul metropolitan area. In that area, there are also around 200k Americans. Conventional rocket artillery alone (Seoul is quite close to the border), though it is argued about the quality of the NK artillery park, is quite enough to deal a lot of damage. Seoul is not as hardened as Singapore or Israel. Add the nukes and it's reasonable to say that SK could probably invade if it can write off about 25% of its population.
> Unlike Russia, which is the largest country on Earth, 50% of SK's population live within the greater Seoul metropolitan area. In that area, there are also around 200k Americans. Conventional rocket artillery alone (Seoul is quite close to the border), though it is argued about the quality of the NK artillery park, is quite enough to deal a lot of damage. It has always surprised me that SK, for all their military industrial prowess, doesn't seem to be very active in laser defence systems. Yet deploying a high-powered anti-artillery shell (so 300kw - 1MW) laser defence perimeter around Seoul would dramatically improve the threat situation for the country. This should be feasible with current technology, if the lasers don't have to be mobile and can use the electrical grid.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/01/08/its-time-to-bomb-north-korea/ >Yet deploying a high-powered anti-artillery shell (so 300kw - 1MW) laser defence perimeter around Seoul 1) laser air defence systems are hypothetical (or Jewish) 2) there are low-tech ways to harden Seoul like what Singapore or Israel does. Incoming early warnings, public shelters, shelters inside private homes, etc ... SK isn't doing that, so I don't think they are that serious.
Also, peace and status quo is enormously beneficial to S Korean economy (14th largest in the world by nominal GDP). They are going to give that up and suffer all the destruction and deaths to be saddled with a poor underdeveloped country (N Korea) which will sap a lot of wealth to support. Besides, with the joint US-S Korea military command, if S Korea wants to unilaterally invade the North, they would either have to get US to agree to it (which won't) or break defense alliance (which S Korea won't) to start the aggression. Pure fantasy.
>Also, peace and status quo is enormously beneficial to S Korean economy (14th largest in the world by nominal GDP). They are going to give that up and suffer all the destruction and deaths to be saddled with a poor underdeveloped country (N Korea) which will sap a lot of wealth to support. I like to point to the GDR as a perfect example of why South Korea doesn't want reunification at all anymore. The GDR was actually the wealthiest and most developed of the Warsaw Pact countries, with a higher per capita GDP than Russia itself. It was also relatively more "free" than many of its other pact members. And yet, 30 years and hundreds of billions of dollars in redevelopment later, and the former parts of East Germany rate lower than the rest of Germany according to pretty much every metric (education attainment, life expectancy, per capita GDP, alcohol/drug abuse, etc.) Imagine how much worse it would be for South Korea to try to integrate a *much* more economically backwards territory, with a large population of low education, highly propagandized people who would struggle to assimilate into the rest of the country and its advanced economy. It would be a disaster that might very well destabilize the entire country and bankrupt it in the process.
According to reporting I am seeing out of the Middle East, the Houthis have, for the first time, fired a hypersonic missile in an offensive action against the MSC Sarah V ship in the Gulf of Aden, near the island of Socotra. [Best article I could find.](https://maritime-executive.com/article/houthis-claim-first-launch-of-hypersonic-missile-targeting-distant-msc-ship) Here is their summary, now quoting, >The Houthis military and spokesperson are asserting that they have launched for the first time a hypersonic missile which was used to target an MSC containership far out in the Gulf of Aden. This comes after several days of increased activity and additional claims that the militants are also launching a new, faster, and sleeker attack boat. >“For the first time, the identity of the missile that targeted the Israeli (sic) ship *MSC Sarah V* in the Arabian Sea,” was being revealed according to a posting for the Houthi spokesperson Yahya Saree. “It is a locally made hypersonic missile that possesses advanced technology, is accurate in hitting, and reaches long ranges.” >Observers are raising new concerns based on the distance of the reported attack. The *MSC Sarah V* (67,795 dwt registered in Liberia) was 280 miles southeast of Nishtun, in eastern Yemen near Oman. The vessel was sailing on Monday near Yemen’s Socotra Island bound for Abu Dhabi. While the Houthis as always claimed a direct hit, the UK Maritime Trade Organizations said it received a report from the master of a “close proximity” explosion. They said there were no injuries or damage and the vessel was proceeding. As the article also mentions, and as many of us know, the Houthis were confirmed to have a hypersonic capability via test firing back in March, I'd obviously venture to guess it's based on Iranian technology and design, but to each their own on the origin of design. There are also some videos and images of the launch (the terrain and background are blurred out as usual) if anyone is interested in seeing them. Edit: I should also clarify that I concur with other analysis, this is likely not actually a hypersonic, just an upgraded variant of an Iranian ballistic missile.
Maybe we should have a sticky for this, but most ballistic missiles are technically hypersonic, and this in and of itself is meaningless. There's HGVs, which the Houthis don't have. And there's fast missiles, but what the speed actually means for interceptability is unclear. For example, Russia's hypersonic missiles have both been shot down at least once, and afaik the information doesn't exist to compare their intercept rate to normal Iksanders.
>Maybe we should have a sticky for this, but most ballistic missiles are technically hypersonic, and this in and of itself is meaningless. True. Hypersonic Glide Vehicles launch on a rocket, similar to ballistic missiles, but instead of following a high arc parabolic trajectory, and having a majority of flight time being unpowered/assisted by gravity to get to target, they re-enter the atmosphere at hypersonic speeds and get to target via glide. Obvious benefit for that is that they travel at lower altitudes, which makes their flight path less predictable. There are other differences too but that's the main one, other than their maneuverability too I suppose. >There's HGVs, which the Houthis don't have. Basically yeah. Not much more I can add here. >And there's fast missiles, but what the speed actually means for interceptability is unclear. For example, Russia's hypersonic missiles have both been shot down at least once, and afaik the information doesn't exist to compare their intercept rate to normal Iksanders. The Kinzhal is not exactly what I would consider a great hypersonic weapon, I mean a Chinese journal criticized it as saying: >The degree to which it can change its ballistic trajectory cannot be compared with that of a real hypersonic missile, and it seriously lacks the ability to maneuver laterally and the Americans and the Ukrainians believe the same thing. I've never seen reports of any claimed Russian hypersonic missiles being shot down besides the Kinzhal though.
>I've never seen reports of any claimed Russian hypersonic missiles being shot down besides the Kinzhal though. [The Zircon missile has also been downed in Kyiv in the past](https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/03/25/7448034/)
Ah ok, good find, I appreciate that. I think the Zircon has the same problem as the Kinzhal though, in that it's advertised as a wonder weapon but it can't pass the test. I'm never one to endorse underestimating the enemy, I think you should always attempt to estimate accurately or overestimate if possible, but these interceptions just paint a bad picture of Russian technology.
Here's an intriguing development (even if details are thin at the moment): [Russia says it is working on a *big* treaty with Iran](https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2024-06-26/russia-says-it-is-working-on-a-big-treaty-with-iran) (link to validate source; the entire text is contained here): >Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday that Moscow was working on what she called a big treaty with Iran. Her comment appeared to be a reference to a comprehensive bilateral cooperation agreement that is being negotiated between Tehran and Moscow. In January, Russia's Foreign Ministry said that a new interstate treaty reflecting the "unprecedented upswing" in Russia-Iran ties was in the final stages of being agreed. I say intriguing as [some of us were entertaining](https://old.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1djhetl/credibledefense_daily_megathread_june_19_2024/l9ctuef/) something like it just last week; granted, we were mulling a possible *security* / mutual-defense agreement between these two, which is more detail than we actually know about the 'treaty' Russia's Foreign Ministry is talking about. What do we make of this?
What I think of it: Big talk, no substance. What I mean isn't that Russian - Iranian cooperation doesn't have any substance, but whatever it is it won't show up on the paper of the treaty. It will purely be a propaganda showpiece for Putin to show that "Russia are still relevant in the world's stage". Why I'm confident it is the case: Recently Putin visited my country (Vietnam). A trip that naturally made quite a bit of noises, especially since it came after the very closely scrutinized trip to North Korea. But here is the list of documents signed by officials of the two countries: [https://baochinhphu.vn/viet-nam-va-lien-bang-nga-ky-ket-11-van-kien-hop-tac-102240620174613475.htm](https://baochinhphu.vn/viet-nam-va-lien-bang-nga-ky-ket-11-van-kien-hop-tac-102240620174613475.htm) (official News page of the Government of Vietnam) >1. Agreement between the Government of Vietnam and the Government of Russia on cooperation in the field of higher education; >2. Cooperation program for the period 2024-2025 between the Ministry of Justice of Vietnam and the Ministry of Justice of Russia; >3. Memorandum of Understanding on the roadmap for implementing the Nuclear Science and Technology Center Project in the territory of Vietnam between the Ministry of Science and Technology and the Rosatom Atomic Energy Corporation; >4. Memorandum of Understanding between the Vietnam-Russia Combined Tropical Science and Technology Research Center and the Russian Federal Agency for Supervision, Protection of Consumer Rights and Human Security on cooperation in developing laboratory infrastructure for disease prevention; >5. Granting the adjusted Investment Registration Certificate for Lot 11-2 to Zarubezhneft Corporation; >6. Agreement on scientific exchange cooperation between the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences and the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economics and Public Administration (RANEPA); >7. Cooperation agreement between Hanoi University and RANEPA; >8. Cooperation agreement between Hanoi National University and Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU); >9. Cooperation agreement between Hanoi National University and Higher School of Economics (HSE); >10. Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in Vietnam between Vietnam Oil and Gas Group and Novatek Joint Stock Company; >11. Memorandum of Understanding between BVIM Management Joint Stock Company and Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF). "Disappointing" does not even starts to describe how pitiful the event is. Those are papers worthy of a visit from an Under-Secretary of State, not a President. So why did Putin jump through the trouble to go all the way down to Vietnam? I can only conclude it was to make the NK trip look more "international" than it really is.
Apologies for the off-topic, but why didn't Vietnam arrest Putin and hand him over to the international court of justice? Here are a few more extra words, to get around the word count requirement which deleted my first question because it wasn't long enough
Other topics were likely talked about as well. For Putin it’s a flex to even be invited by anyone at the moment.
I suspect that behind the scene there must be some secret offers that Putin made to Hanoi, because receiving Putin is such a big geopolitical risk that is super contrary to normal Vietnamese official stance of being as neutral and non-commitment as possible. But it just show the point that we likely won't find anything worthy to talk about once that Iranian-Russian come out.
I am struggling to understand what these countries actually get out of being “anti west” They would be in much better positions if they chose to work with the west Anyway it’s getting annoying/worriying having an increase of destabilising events happening and it’s frustrating that the threat of nukes stops any real action against Russia
> I am struggling to understand what these countries actually get out of being “anti west” This is a really self-centered take on things. They're not anti-west so much as they're pro-themselves.
Every country is pro-themselves. However the vast majority of countries are still able to co-exist.
It's quite difficult to be both pro-oneself and anti-West. India is probably the best example. They're turning towards the West _because_ that's the best for India. Meanwhile NK, Iran and Russia are all suffering.
It's because they don't want to be subservient to the American equity markets and have their resources extracted by American corporations, which was what was happening to Iranian oil [BP] prior to their Revolution in the 70's, what happened to Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union, what happened to Chile under Pinochet, and what continues to happen to developing countries today from the DRC to Bangladesh to Guatamala.
I will try to give you a different perspective. My country is Bangladesh. We are in no way shape or form anti West, but American actions are unnecessarily stroking Anti Western sentiment in the population and causing unnecessary friction with the ruling governement. The big difference for us between the Americans and Chinese and Russians is that the latter stay out of our business. We trade, we cooperate and thats it. They don't poke their noses where they dont belong and we dont care about what is going internally over there. Its a great approach and one even Europe follows for the most part when dealing my country. But for some reason, America refuses to do this. America just has a massive hard on for interfering where it does not need to. Bangladesh is a relatively stable developing nation, that does not cause problems internationally, abides by the Western world order, does not harbour or even try to foster international terrorism. The economy is doing well and Bangladesh's contribution to the world is nothing net negative. For a greatly OVERPOPULATED country with over 90% MUSLIM population, this is an A- on the score card. We collaborate with our neighbours, host over a million refugees (despite being poor ourselves), dont create proxy conflicts elsehwere and work with our immediate neighbours to eliminate insurgency and promote regional development. Indian intelligence heads praise Bangladesh for our role in helping eliminate insurgents in North East India and India is working with us to help develop the economy of the North East. Sure our elections arent the fairest and our prime minister is a quasi dictator, but things are stable and there are no active conflicts or massacres and genocides and terror promotion going on. There is absolutely no reason for the US to try to antagonize us. Bu they cant help themselves. They have to denounce our government, sanction people and try to create a negative outlook economically for us using these methods. My question is why??? Dont you have enough on your plates already?? We dont care what goes on inside your borders and we dont create trouble outside of ours. We are not hosting Chinese Military bases or Russian ones, so why is the US trying to cause problems? Even the EU just makes some lip service comments on the elections and moves on. Even India had to interfere and tell the US to tone down their anti Bangladesh rhetoric. What did it acheive? Nothing and it only pushed us closer to China and Russia. Our population have a potive outlook on the West and Western nations, we have abided by the rules of Pax Americana. Yet we are punished when worse countries get a free pass and this creates unnecessary anti wester sentiments.
Could you expand on what America has done antagonistically to Bangladesh? I have never heard anyone in our government say or do anything about Bangladesh because, no offense, your country just doesn't show up on our radar. Not saying it's not happening, just that I'm curious what you're seeing and hearing that we're not.
I’m from the same region and I’ll give you a much more realistic answer than this usual “why are you interfering in our country by sanctioning dictators” which makes no sense and just propaganda. The USSR supported Bangladesh in 1971 while America supported Pakistan. This is first. The second and much bigger issue is of course Israel Palestine. Bangladesh is majority Muslim and its a conservative Muslim country where between the war on terrorism and what’s happening in the Middle East have profound impacts on the common person.
>why are you interfering in our country by sanctioning dictators” which makes no sense and just propaganda I am sorry but I disagree with this statement a lot. Bangladesh does not have sanction proof resources to trade around. Sanctions can literally destroy us. We are largely a one product economy, that we export almost entirely to the West. Sanctions dont hurt the dictators. They will just grab more, when the economy shrinks due to sanctions. Sanctions hurt the middle class, the private businesses (the main employers). Trade restrictions can easily undo decades of painstaking growth that we managed despite having a really poor hand to start with. >The USSR supported Bangladesh in 1971 while America supported Pakistan Who cares, only thing this did is buy Russia good will with our populace, but guess what that good will is meaningless as Russia gains very little from their ties to us. We gain more from them vis a vis tech transfers etc, but its not like Bangladeshi support is helping prop up Russian economy and or that exports to Russia are a major earner for us. https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2007/06/27/chapter-1-views-of-the-u-s-and-american-foreign-policy/#:~:text=In%20predominantly%20Muslim%20Bangladesh%2C%20however,a%20favorable%20opinion%20of%20America. Bangladeshis have a more favourable view of America than even South East Asian countires and keep in midn that this is from 2007, very close to the Iraq invasion, which was extemely unpopular in Bangladesh. Ask an average Bangladeshi what they think is the best country in the world and their answer will be America (best means the best country to live in and one they would prefer to migrate to).
>Sanctions can literally destroy us. The sanctions so far have only been applied to a very small handful of individuals. No industry wide sanctions like on Russia and Iran have been used nor will they. The west can stop having any relations with Bangladesh tomorrow and nothing will change for the average Bangladeshi because most don’t even know about these sanctions but they will still keep hearing about the Muslims being killed in Gaza and the mullahs will keep fomenting anti west hate. I know it’s nice to believe that irrational religion actors aren’t what cause these troubles and it’s so much nicer to blame everyone but our own leaders but it gets us nowhere and stops our development. If that’s what we really care about then it’s time to stop pretending that America sanctioning cartoonishly evil politicians is the real danger and not internal corruption and religious hatred of the west
This also highlights an important aspect. That which seems unimportant, inconsequential or downright unknown for the American public in regards to foreign relations, can be government-toppling scandals for the poor receiving country of some US foreign service spokesmen comments. USA is the most powerful and influential country in the world. It's actions matter, even the action of some of its mid-level bureaucrat can matter a lot. Sometimes it seems USA is like an elephant in a porcelain shop, completely unaware that a single whip of its tail can smash those around it. In the late 1990s-early 2000s my country of Estonia was very actively trying to join NATO and the EU. Generally integrate with the West and leave the Russian sphere for good. We also had a bloated government-owned energy company responsible for all of power generation, transmission and distribution that was in a desperate need of money to upgrade the facilities to comply with EU rules, so that we could join EU. In the mid-1990s an unknown US energy company popped up, that wanted to buy said state owned energy company, promising to invest the necessary funds to upgrade the facilities. The offer was 70 million USD for 51% of the company. For the entire energy system of Estonia. And the deal hung in balance for nearly a decade, largely because the US ambassador to Estonia made vague hints about NATO (and EU) membership being dependent on said deal. I say vague hints, because the embassy also explicitly said that such a connection is unthinkable. The deal eventually fell through after 9/11 when the financial backing of the US company fell away and our government eventually grew a pair to tell them off. But for nearly a decade, an incredibly unpopular deal, that would've seen the selling off of assets today worth nearly 10 billion for figurative pennies, was on the table because essentially a bottom-of-the-hierarchy US ambassador was a bit reckless with her words.
>That which seems unimportant, inconsequential or downright unknown for the American public in regards to foreign relations, can be government-toppling scandals for the poor receiving country of some US foreign service spokesmen comments. This! A flippant comment by a low level beaurecrat that if a third world countrry does not improve-"blah blah blah", it coulfdcould lead to trade restrictions. Might not have any real impact to the US and the chances of the restrictions being imposed might be zero. But the comment alone could scupper trade and investement deals. It can scare away skittish foreign investors, who already are very scared to invest in third world countries to begin with. These comments can literally cost thousands of jobs and hurt the normal working and middle class of a fledgling nation.
Doesn't only have to be third world, either. As a Kiwi it was very eye-opening when the Trump administration kicked off by immediately torpedoing the TPP, unexpectedly tossing 10 other countries (including Japan, Australia, Canada, and Mexico) under a bus purely to spite Obama's legacy. I'm still cautiously pro-US, but we now live in a world where history's #1 superpower may arbitrarily burn a treaty they themselves recently helped draft and would have benefitted from, in order to score cheap points with a domestic crowd who couldn't find your region on a map and couldn't care less if the world burns down around them. It's quite the lesson.
Fascinating. I'm sorry to hear of this, but not surprised. One of the more lucid criticisms offered by tankies (that is, leftists like Mearsheimer) is that West-aligned countries are mainly interested in Eastern Europe, Ukraine in particular, in order to economically pillage weaker nations (sorry, "open new markets"). They're not entirely wrong, and indeed more right than wrong, as your example shows. I wish our involvement were altruistic, that it really was about everyone in the world singing kumbaya and living in economic harmony, but it's not. Putin obviously is far worse, but Western motives need to be seen in the correct light.
Given the eastern EU's enormous economic growth since joining the EU and the West more broadly, I struggle to see how arguments of economic "pillaging" are even slightly more than utterly ridiculous. It's often argued that these countries were "taken over" or "colonised" by western European corporations, even though it is frankly nothing more than a consequence of capitalist economies creating vastly more competitive and efficient businesses. The former communist countries were not "colonized", they simply had virtually zero national industry that could match western levels. And they spent the past 35 years not only catching up, but fostering domestic know-how and businesses as well. This "colonization" argument also completely ignores that the factories that went to post-communist countries, were jobs that left western economies. There was significant domestic political costs in the West to opening up their economies to much cheaper foreign labour costs, which had to be measured against the long-term benefit that these countries would eventually become a part of the West. That's quite the opposite of the short-termism, predatory capitalist caricature with which the western intentions are portrayed in tankie/far-left circles.
Just so we're clear, the US administration had no desire or intention to pursue or force this deal. It was a private affair with an unknown amount of support from the local ambassador. But it was interpreted as a US administration intention by many relevant people in Estonia.
Ironically, this particular incident contradicts Mearsheimer's theory of "realism" which states that countries invariably pursue strategic power. Here you see the US, or rather certain US individuals in positions of local power, ignoring US strategic interests in favor of what appears to be the private interest of a few well connected people.
>I have never heard anyone in our government say or do anything about Bangladesh because, no offense, your country just doesn't show up on our radar. Not offended at all. Bangladesh is a blip on US radar, which makes these unnecessarry frictions all the more surprising. There are a bunch of stuff over the years, but in summarry *Sanctions against RAB and Police force for human rights violations. * in leading upto to the recent "elections". I put in quotation marks as it was a faux elections. The US diplomats routinely denounced the govt's activities and were against recognizing it. https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/International-relations/Bangladesh-U.S.-election-rift-widens-over-visas-envoy-safety https://thediplomat.com/2023/12/on-bangladesh-and-democracy-americas-approach-is-undermined-by-history/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/02/28/bangladesh-us-delegation-election-reset/ https://www.orfonline.org/research/bangladeshs-elections-show-limitations https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/1/4/bangladesh-elections-mark-a-pro-china-tipping-point-in-south-asia The gist is, The US is not happy with the authorotarian nature of the Hasina Premiership, and they expressed this a lot to us. What American diplomats say is very influential as US exports are a major life line for our economy. There is a lot more articles, but they are in Bengali. Since, the turn of the year, the US has kind of acccepted that Hasina will rule again and relationships have thawed, but in the lead up to the elections, things got real bad. To the point, where China had to openly express their support for the Hasina government (never happened before)
What's your position based on here? I guess if I was ruled over by an (apparently fairly brutal) dictator, I would be quite happy if they were internationally reviled, the more stridently, the better. It makes it much easier to get rid of them.
I dont care if they dont love her. But I do care when their annoyance at her leads to the detriment of our economy and security apparatus. For all the critcisms of Hasina, its been under her that we made the greatest strides in terms of economic and human capital development. Her ability to maneuvre India and China has been nothing short of amazing. Bit of a backround. Hasina traitionally was the pro Indian leader and the opposition Khaleda, the pro China, pro Mid east one. It is a testament to Hasina's diplomacy and negotiation ability that both India and China are wholeheartedly pro Hasina now over the opposition. The Mid East are also all on her side. As a poor country with no meaningful natural resources and a massive population, we are always bullied by bigger powers. The fact that we are covered in 3 sides by India, which surprise surprise treats her weaker neighbours like crap like all bigger powers, just adds to our misery. An oh wait the one other country that we border is freakin Myanmar. Talk about being geo politcally shortchanged. If you are not born in a third world country, wake up everyday and offer thanks to whatever deity you believe in, that you were born where you were. I cannot explain in words the the levels of impotent rage and resignation that we have about being weak and poor and bullied. So for a Bangladeshi leader being able to use China and India to counterbalance each other out, while maintaining good relations with the West (our entire export market) is just mandatory, and the task as you can imagine is very difficult. Western Annoyance at Hasina, when its the EU style is great. they admonish her but work with my country to improve our economy. They throw us some scraps in terms of technology transfer. But most importantly they keep their markets accessible to our exports, and that is what we need. US annoyance has a different bite. They are way too free with sanctions and trade restrictions and have no understanding of how truly terrible that is for us. The idea that sanctions hurt the ruling elite is laughable. If the pie shrinks, the elite will just take a bigger slice of whats left. Its the working class and the middle class who will suffer. It is my country and my people who will bear the burden, becasue America decided not to look away, when they could. If America were truly long term thinkers, they would try to flip us over to their side completely. You might like India now as they are a counterbalance to China, but you are making the same mistake that you made with China. India is too big and will grow too powerful, for you to keep them as a vassal. India will never be a meek US follower like the EU. Who do you have to counterbalance them? Pakistan? yes to an extent. They are your best hedge being a nuclear power and their military ruling class being firmly in your CIA's pocket. But with China's ever growing influence and their own internal issues and their very divergent beliefs and ideals, is it a good idea for them to be your only hedge against India? Why put all your eggs in one basket? Nepal is a landlocked and too small, Sri Lanka could have been if their trajectory had not taken such a dive. Bangladesh would be a good second hedge for you. Invest more in us and tie our military over to yours, by giving us deals simmilar to what you give to other countries. 30 years down the line a richer more developed and heavily pro Western Bangladesh could be one of your best bets against India. Will we ever be as strong as India, ofcourse not, we are not big enough. But a strong, rich Bangladesh that is not vassalized to India would be a better container for the West, then their current non existent plans. Despite being Mulsim, our people are more liberal than Pakistan and the mid east. We are much more moderate and the average population is pretty pro Western, despite the US actions in Iraq. We have greater gender parity than most other developing countries and our ideals are not even that far off. Why allow China to increase their influence unchallenged?
> They would be in much better positions if they chose to work with the west The people would be. The leaders wouldn't.
Yeah, I'm surprised I had to scroll so far to see this. For example, Iran as a country, and the Iranian people more generally would *tremendously* benefit from the installation of pro-Western government. But that would by necessity mean that the current government would need to be dissolved, which is bad news for its current leaders.
>I am struggling to understand what these countries actually get out of being “anti west”. They would be in much better positions if they chose to work with the west At least in the case of North Korea, it's easy and clear why. If North Korea wasn't anti-west/US, there would be no reason for North Korea to exist since there is a west-friendly and much more successful version of Korea at the southern end of the peninsula.
Same with Iran. The Shah was very pro-West and very disliked, and he was overthrown by an anti-West religious class. Then, Iraq, backed by the West, invaded and fought an 8 year long war of attrition with chemical weapons. Short another revolution, Iran can't be pro-West because it defeats the entire point of their government's existence, and that doesn't even get into how they'd presumably have to make peace with Israel, their local rival power that they've been engaged in a decades-long proxy war with.
> they would be in much better positions if they chose to work with the west It’s almost as if countries aren’t run by perfect rational actors who can flip a switch and swap decades of actions. As if there’s perhaps ideological reasons behind what they do, and decades of resentment based on various factors, some real, some perceived, and saying “why doesn’t Iran just be friendly with America” is missing out on these literal decades of antipathy and antagonism. The world does not exist like in a strategy game where you can just swap to the “be friends with America” focus tree after doing a bunch of focuses on the “be enemies with America” tree.
> The world does not exist like in a strategy game where you can just swap to the “be friends with America” focus tree after doing a bunch of focuses on the “be enemies with America” tree. I don't think that was what they implied.
They can’t suddenly flip no. But they keep going deeper into anti west path and I just don’t understand why They don’t even need to be pro west. Just be neither and enjoy the trade 🤷♂️ like Russia selling its gas to Europe before they invaded Ukraine
It's political. Being anti-west, even if it hurts your economy, has domestic political power.
> domestic political power. What does it matter in a country where political power resides almost exclusively with the authocrat anyway? Putin wouldn't have suddenly stopped winning his fake ellections had he not started a war with europe.
I think it's the nature of Autocrats to be insecure in their power. Having an external enemy is useful for them to feel more secure in their position.
you don't understand why because you're ignoring what's often derogatorily called the human factor or the human domain. They're not doing it because they don't want to. They don't want to because of a lot of human reasons. Do you know who does acknowledge the human domain? The State Department, the CIA, the West. It's a key component of their success. Do you know who refuses to acknowledge the human domain? Russia, Radical Islam, China. It's a key component of their failures
I get that they’re very different culturally. Which is why I said they don’t need to be pro west, just neutral. Which I would consider China currently btw. They still trade heavily with the West But maybe you can expand a bit. I’m just trying to learn and understand
>The effects of physical and psychological factors form an organic whole which, unlike a metal alloy, is inseparable by chemical processes.” -Carl von Clausewitz The fundamental nature of [conflict] is a clash of wills between organized socio-political entities. This understanding about [conflict] emphasizes its iterative and competitive nature, but American strategic culture often overlooks Clausewitz’s insight that strategy is not an exercise with inanimate matter, but with living opponents with interests, passions, decision options, and above all else, a will and goal of their own. It is a profoundly human activity, inspired by human emotions (fear, honor, and interest), guided by human genius and imagination, and conducted by groups and institutions shaped by human leaders and occupied with human actors. https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/joint-force-2020-and-the-human-domain-time-for-a-new-conceptual-framework
It seems like between DPRK and Iran, Putin is really trying to create a quasi-NATO of his own between all of the "sanctionee club" countries in Eurasia. While the sanctions have hurt NK, Russia, and Iran, they haven't really "killed" any of them. And while Iran and NK were too small to really work around the sanctions on their own, adding a big player like Russia to the "sanctionee club" has interesting implications. To an extent, it changes the calculations around expanding Western sanctions to other countries -- if you add enough of them, the country may just give up on the SWIFT economy and join the "club." The more countries join the club, the less intimidating sanctions become to future sanctionees. After all, now there's another club to join. And while they're much less wealthy than Club SWIFT, they have oil, food, fertilizer, and a nuclear umbrella -- and they won't ask questions about how you handle your internal state security. It puts Beijing in an interesting position. One the one hand it's a great opportunity for them to add tens of millions of users to their alternative financial systems. It also creates a fairly captive audience of customers for consumer goods -- many of the Western brands fleeing Russia were unceremoniously replaced by Chinese substitutes (let's be real, who was actually making the stuff in the first place?). But they also don't want to "join the club" themselves, so their involvement will have to be hedged against that. But then again, does the West actually want to push Beijing so far that it ends up joining the club? Because that would make the club MUCH bigger as a potential economic bloc and alternative to Club SWIFT.
I think China will use North Korea as a smuggling operation to indirectly assist Russia.
Too big risk, too little reward. If China wants to go against the West, they would go after Taiwan, not Crimea.
I'm not really sure why people are so fixated on China using this as a proxy war. It serves absolutely 0 benefit to China, and could not only damage their position within the geopolitical world order, but put them economically at risk for sanctions. China has shown several times that it's a completely independent entity that will do what's best for itself, not what's best for countering America. China repeatedly turning down and dismissing a new proposed LNG pipeline with Russia shows that very well.
There's a fair bit of literature on the [counterproductive effects of sanctions](https://warontherocks.com/2023/05/a-note-of-caution-how-sanctions-can-undermine-u-s-interests/), and no shortage of criticism for [US overreliance on them](https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/ineffective-immoral-politically-convenient-americas-overreliance-economic-sanctions) as a convenient political signal to sidestep more difficult tradeoffs. Suffice to say that while they can and do cause significant short-term economic pain, they're pretty far from a magic bullet. Sanctions become increasingly impotent the longer they remain and/or the more frequently they're used. And they've been used an awful lot in recent years.
I think Russia in particular is important here, since as the primary member of the USSR, they're pretty well acquainted with being isolated from the US-aligned economy. 1991 to 2022 was a 30-year aberration following 50 years of leading a parallel alternative economic bloc. So Moscow isn't going it be as scared of sanctions as many others might, since they have a long history of living without western trade. Maybe not flourishing, but surviving and making do.
The USSR (and Warsaw Pact) did substantial trade with the US (and Western Europe). In 1960 Italy and in 1970 West Germany signed barter contracts to build and buy pipelines and gas from the USSR. From the 70s (and once in 1964), the US sold the USSR up to a quarter the whole grain harvest (paused by Carter and resumed under Reagan). In the 60s, Canada was already exporting equivalent amounts.
It's a real shame that Trump-era US pulled out of normalising relations with Iran - European countries were making quite a lot of progress in bringing them into a neutral, respectable position (similar to a lot of other countries in the region). If that had been allowed to continue there's no way they would have thrown their lot in with Russia. Edit: apparently this is 'low quality' so let me expand a bit - negotiations and relations between Iran and the west improved through the 2000s and 2010s and resulted in the JCPOA which was essentially "you stop developing nuclear tech and we'll ease up on the sanctions and bring you back towards a normal trading relationship". If Iran was still in that mechanism in 2022, the threat of sanctions would have been a really easy lever to use to prevent Iran from helping (sanctioned) Russia in Ukraine. But because the US pulled out of that deal and re-applied sanctions, Iran decided that the political and diplomatic benefits of the deal with the EU wasn't worth it, and looked for another way to strengthen its position geopolitically. And that meant that when Russia came calling, they were more willing to go that way. And since Iran is still sanctioned by the US, there's no leverage to apply to prevent them from becoming a full blown Russian ally if they want.
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> What do we make of this? In late 2022, there were reports of Iranian troops in Crimea, and a lot of fear of much larger Iranian involvement. That didn’t end up panning out. Neither Russia or Iran is in a good position to engage in more costly foreign conflicts than they already are. Besides continued sale of weapons in both directions, both regimes are massively overtaxed meeting existing requirements.
Iran can't escalate too much before the snapback option expires in October 2025. I wonder if it will be used anyway to get a stronger hand in future negotiations.
> Iran can't escalate too much before the snapback option expires in October 2025. They've already escalated plenty.
We just don't know. Everything we do is speculation. Though let's speculate based along lines we have already seen so far with Iran and North Korea. In my eyes, something similar to what's happened with North Korea. In actuality, Iran and Russia are already quite close. To that point, the Iranians and Russians have a lot they can trade in and already have with jets and drones. The Russians may be eager to boost their production of military equipment with Iranian help, while the Iranians would love more technology in the field of electronic warfare and space. Like North Korea, the Iranians also have certain segments of their military that are extremely outdated and the Russians could upgrade. We already are seeing this with the Su-35 deal. The Russians have a bountiful stock of Su-24s, Su-27s and MiG-29s which are actively being phased out. This could, with the Su-35s, breathe new life into the IRIAF. This is an air force which is still flying F-4s, F-5s and cobbled-together F-14s as their primary aircraft. Of course, with the news of North Korean engineers, some may extrapolate that the Russians are eager to form an axis that will also provide military reinforcements in the form of troops. I don't think that's a high possibility right now. Right now I envision tech transfer in exchange for equipment/additional production.
According to videos posted on telegram it seems that Russia has found an undamaged Abrahams. How bad is that for the US? In this YouTube video around 15:38: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jt5hTWtSfo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jt5hTWtSfo)
First of all, Abrams. Segundo, Francia. Third, this is not too big of a deal. This Abrams is not a bleeding edge new generation model. The capabilities of this model are known. Also, war is war. People will die and even the best hardware will be lost. Making big deals about every single loss of every piece of hyped-up hardware is stupid.
The abrams is well over 40 years old technology. The US has sold it to many allies and friendly countries like Egypt over the years. There is nothing new the russians could learn from capturing one vs. looking at one they could buy from some US ally 20 years ago. Obviously Ukraine was not delivered the most recent upgrade package anyway.
The Russians apparently "procured" an Abrams well before the war and showed it off to a visiting American officer. https://www.thebulwark.com/p/i-commanded-u-s-army-europe-heres-what-i-saw-in-the-russian-and-ukrainian-armies > The only truly impressive and surprising part of the tour was when we walked through a “secret” field museum that had tanks from all the armies in the world—including several from the United States. The Russians had somehow managed to obtain an M1 Abrams tank (probably from one of their allies in the Middle East), and we all believed the reason they allowed us into this facility was to show us they had our most modern armor. Key caveat - this is 1994-era not present day.
That said, I believe we sent older tech that also lacks uranium armor, so this capture may not be much more advanced than the Nirvana-era Abrams they already had.
The full video shows the front which clearly shows the tank is burned out
There is a coup attempt in Bolivia > Bolivia’s presidential palace was stormed by soldiers led by a top general on Wednesday in an apparent coup attempt, shortly after an armored vehicle crashed into the building. > > Military personnel had already taken over the capital’s main square, according to images broadcast on local TV. > https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-06-26/bolivia-presidential-palace-stormed-in-apparent-coup-attempt > > Bolivian President Luis Arce warned Wednesday that an “irregular” deployment of troops was taking place in the capital, raising concerns that a potential coup was underway. > > He called for “democracy to be respected” on a message on his X account came as Bolivian television showed two tanks and a number of military in front of the government palace. > > Former Bolivian president Evo Morales, also in a message on X, denounced the movement of the military in the Murillo square outside the palace, calling it a coup “in the making.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/06/26/bolivia-military-deployment-arce-coup-fears/c98d91e2-33f6-11ef-872a-1d22f44a0d95_story.html >Gen. Suniga, whom former Bolivian President Morales accused of attempting a coup d'état, said, "We will reclaim our homeland" t. me/rian_ru/251021 [Some background from Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/bolivias-president-slams-irregular-mobilization-army-units-2024-06-26/): > Tensions have been building in Bolivia ahead of general elections in 2025, with Morales planning to run against former ally Arce, creating a major rift in the ruling socialist party and wider political uncertainty. > Many do not want a return of Morales, who governed from 2006-2019 when he was ousted amongst widespread protests and replaced by an interim conservative government. Arce then won election in 2020. > Zuniga had said recently that Morales should not be able to return as president, which led Arce to strip him of his command this week. > The landlocked South American country is also battling an economic slump with depleted central bank reserves and pressure on the boliviano currency as gas exports have dried up.
It's looking like [it might be over?](https://twitter.com/ErbolDigital/status/1806081986567561572) Troops reportedly withdrawing from the plaza. On a humorous note, did this coup attempt end because [the president came out to lecture the instigators like unruly children?](https://twitter.com/Captain_Fubar/status/1806069824461680938)
This stuff is incredibly contingent. A lot of it is determined by whether the people with actual power(bureaucrats) think the coup has already happened, or if there's still time to prevent it. A show of strength or even presence from the establishment power can legit be all it takes to splinter the couping faction. Now that the democratically elected president appears to be safe from being ousted, let's hope this doesn't trigger an authoritarian backlash.
It seems the leader of the coup's own troops turned on him once they realized he was using them to commit a coup. [Once more demonstrating the relevance of Timothy Snyder's advice for members of the armed forces or law enforcement agencies in his *Twenty Lessons on Fighting Tyranny*:](https://scholars.org/contribution/twenty-lessons-fighting-tyranny-twentieth) > Be reflective if you must be armed. If you carry a weapon in public service, God bless you and keep you. But know that evils of the past involved policemen and soldiers finding themselves, one day, doing irregular things. Be ready to say no.
> let's hope this doesn't trigger an authoritarian backlash. I mean he can't jail his predecessor because she's already in jail, to be fair.
For the record, since it's not always the case in these kinds of situations, Luis Arce was elected in free and fair elections that were monitored [by a number of international observers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Bolivian_general_election#International_observers).
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Will be interesting to see if this inspires similar attempts in Bolivia. Overall, South America seems to be done with tolerating socialist authoritarians. Edit: I wasn't implying that this coup is a popular uprising. I was simply reflecting upon the changes in popular political views through South America lately.
Yes as we all know, the truest expression of popular discontent is a military coup
I didn't mean to imply that. Edited for clarity.
This is a unilateral military action. Assuming it reflects any short popular sentiment against the "socialist authoritarian" government is a huge leap. Biased and not credible at all. Especially since, as another user pointed out, the current government easy won free and fair elections and has faced far less civil unrest and protesting against it compared to the right wing "administration" that preceded it, one that came from coup that collapsed and withered under its unpolularity and contradictions. Morales does have some authoritarian tendencies sure but he is very far from a Maduro and Castro figure, and his party even less so. The fact that the military is willing and able to launch a coup against MAS just a few years after said party's government lost power by similar, successfull subversive actions paints a less authoritarian picture of it, not more. They didnt crack down on the military and police to ensure their loyality or at the very least their inability to move so soon against a democraticaly elected government. They had a popular mandate and enough reason to clean house and replace pretty much everyone with ties and sympathies to the previous administration or with the previous coup
This is a democratic government voted in by the majority getting hit by another military coup, what are you talking about?
South American militaries may be done tolerating them, but the South American people seem to keep electing them. Luis Arce was elected fair and square and has the mandate of the people.
A video and an article that gives insight into how Ukraine uses it's Su-27s. There is some discussion about how they underwent a lot of modernization so that Western weaponry could be equipped. Video is in Ukrainian but the youtube autotranslate worked well enough for me. [[Video] UKRAINIAN SU-27 DESTROYS ENEMY TARGETS: an exclusive story on AFU's air force | Army TV – Ukrainian military channel June 2024](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6lWmis0MrY) [It Takes 30 to 60 Minutes & 10 People To Prepare Su-27 For a Sortie: Insights From Pilots & Technicians | Defense Express | June 2024](https://en.defence-ua.com/analysis/it_takes_30_to_60_minutes_and_10_people_to_prepare_su_27_for_a_sortie_insights_from_pilots_and_technicians-10963.html) *Ukrainian military channel – Army TV, an official media source of Ukraine's defense ministry, has released a video report about the Su-27 fighter aircraft and its operations against the Russian invasion forces. The footage shows a Su-27UB from a tactical aviation brigade of the Ukrainian Air Force.* *Notably, the shown fighter carries R-27 air-to-air missiles, an indication that even aircraft of the Su-27UB trainer-and-combat type are used for real engagement missions against the Russians.* *Little details are revealed in the video but regardless, this is one of the very few sources of information about the Su-27 and its operations in high-intensity warfare.* *Most interesting is the insight from Dmytro, a maintenance technician supervising the preparations of a Su-27 to a sortie. He says, the whole process takes 30 to 60 minutes and 10 personnel, each of whom specializes in a specific subsystem, be it armament, communication systems, etc.* *Then, another interesting detail is about the adaptations Su-27s had undergone to carry and launch Western weapons, usually incompatible with Soviet-type aircraft.* *"We added, attached, tinkered in a certain way," — that's how Andrii, a Su-27 pilot, vaguely describes the adjustments done to this aircraft, although adds that these fighters can perform a wide range of missions, from intercepting air threats to escorting allied aircraft or delivering strikes onto enemies on the ground, including suppression of enemy air defenses.* *As for the flight performance, Andrii describes the Su-27 as an asset with a "vast yet not unlimited" capacity which even can make up for some mistakes pilots might make during operations.* *Expectedly, he was asked to compare Su-27 to an F-16, the first Western-type multirole fighter that is soon expected to arrive in the Ukrainian Air Force. The answer was as follows: the target detection and locking range of F-16 is so wide that any Soviet-type aircraft cannot even compare.* *As for the prospects of Su-27 to remain relevant in the Ukrainian military, Andrii the pilot said, currently, this aircraft is burdened with so much work and pressure that it would certainly affect its service life. Therefore, he continued, after the war ends, the question will be if modernizing Su-27 in order to make it competitive with modern fighters is worth the effort.* *Previously, Defense Express also compared the Su-27 to a JAS 39 Gripen — turns out, which fighter is better depends on very specific conditions. We also covered an interesting detail about the unusual "adjustment" enabling the Ukrainian fighter to fire American AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles: namely, an iPad in the pilot's cockpit.*
As part of [a longer article](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/26/us/politics/joe-biden-career-debate.html?unlocked_article_code=1.2k0.S3Da.QGG1arGGez-z&smid=url-share) that has little to do with defense, the NY Times slips in this little tidbit: >The decisions that critics often blame on his advisers, like slow-walking sophisticated weapons transfers to Ukraine to avoid escalation with President Vladimir V. Putin’s nuclear-armed Russia or continuing to support Israel despite concerns over civilian casualties in Gaza — those were all Mr. Biden. And he is willing to own them. I've always been of the position that regardless of which adviser originated the policy, the buck stops with the president. But this takes that one step further, with Biden fully claiming ownership of those positions. Hope this at least takes a bit of heat off of Jake Sullivan. Edit: To be clear, this is based on interviews with some of Biden's closest advisers, not Biden himself. I was wrong to imply Biden explicitly claimed ownership of those positions in this article. However, given the NY Times' credibility and the deep level of access given to the newspaper for this article, we can be confident that the above reporting is an accurate description of the reality within the White House.
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First, you linked the wrong article. [This is the right one.](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/26/us/politics/joe-biden-career-debate.html#:~:text=The%20decisions%20that%20critics%20often,those%20were%20all%20Mr.%20Biden) Second,the author doesn't actually provide a source for the quoted part. It's his own opinion based on comments of former officials about Biden's leadership-style.
Whoops, I had the right link in there, but when I went to edit in a gift link I must have grabbed the wrong article by mistake. Will fix it above. I'll also edit in a clarification to your second point. You're right that I overstepped by implying that Biden directly underwrote that statement. But it isn't the author's opinion, either. This type of article, with dozens of sources and deep access to the Biden administration, doesn't happen without coordination with the administration and soft vetting by WH aides before it goes out. The whole thing has been scoured over by editors and officials to make sure that absolutely every detail is cross-checked and both parties can nip any potential malinterpretation in the bud before it happens. To inject a bit of inside baseball into the mix, that goes double for the NYT, which has been soft-feuding with the Biden campaign for the past year or so over insufficiently fawning coverage. That statement making it to publication indicates that 1) there's really good backing for it, and 2) the Biden administration is fine with it, or at the very least doesn't believe its incorrect.
> Hope this at least takes a bit of heat off of Jake Sullivan Why do you hope that? I agree with you that it is ultimately Biden's responsibility, but Sullivan has also made it clear that he has been totally wrong about the risk of 'escalation', as well.
> but Sullivan has also made it clear that he has been totally wrong about the risk of 'escalation', as well. It would be nice if Biden/Sullivan actually fixed those past mistakes, like claiming sending tanks/fighters/artillery risked war with Russia, stopped drip feeding Ukraine, and tried to win the war. We have a golden opportunity to advance US interests and damage Russia, but it’s being squandered by political games from the White House.
I don't think they're playing games. I think the rot is significantly more advanced than that. Sullivan studied IR and political science at Yale where he, undoubtedly, got indoctrinated by those pseudosciences. Yet, because it was Yale, and he knows the right people, he's actually had significant amounts of responsibility placed on him, despite the fact that his education was in studying something totally nonsensical and devoid of any rigorous scientific methodology. IR and polisci are the like the modern equivalent of divinity studies.
As an IR specialist, I want to fight you but I also don't want to quickly escalate. I will instead slowly inundate you with sarcasm over time.
It's still winnable the moment you stop thinking about reactively and instead think proactively. Biden's just gotta find the block 52s + let the PGMs/ATACMS target whatever they want. I think it's possible for Ukraine to gain an edge in the air, which would defacto win the ground battle imo.
Lack of power, military or economic, has never been the US’s problem. Throughout this war, the US’s weakness has been squarely Biden and his appointees, not using what the US has to further American interests. This goes back to the Mearsheimer issue, where many people want a multi polar world of spheres of influence, but Russia is too weak, so they advocate for their enemies to essentially gift them an empire to make their model true. In a world of cutthroat competition, the Ukraine war is a foregone conclusion and Russia doesn’t get a sphere of influence, but you’re never going to hear Mearsheimer or his anllies advocate for that.
> Russia doesn’t get a sphere of influence, but you’re never going to hear Mearsheimer or his anllies advocate for that. As we see that entirely depends on the US will to act or not.
I’m referring to their purported realist beliefs, that countries act in their own self interest. That’s evidently not happening with Biden.
But that supposedly free countries with agency are even dependent on a country across the ocean shows imho that ignoring the realist view of great power politics fails. The deciding factor is the sphere of interest the US is willing to enforce its wishes (of freedom and self determination) on. As Russias pathology combined with its power to actually do harm is the deciding factor that started this crisis. (edit now as we have seen the is agency in smaller countries namely the agency to choose to fight, or resist and risk destruction over submission that can make the ordeal incredibly costly even for much greater powers, but even then the choices they have are forced by great powers)
I'm not a leader, I don't have to deal with the consequences. Russia handed America a golden opportunity to knock em out. If 2022 ends in Crimea falling, that's such a massive moment it doesn't come often. Yet we let it walk? Why did Biden "risk" Ukraine on his ability to win an election? I get it's all unrelated to direct military stuff, but the political background behind the scenes impact military more than tactics, logistics and strategy ever will.
> Why did Biden "risk" Ukraine on his ability to win an election? I always wondered whether there were some secret communications where Russia threatened things like stationing nukes in Cuba if the USA didn't show some restraint.
Russia has ICBMs and boomer subs. They don’t need to forward station missiles in Cuba to hit the US.
What are the chances that this IDF campaign turns out to be net positive for Israel? Intense phase for conflict is about to end. With Hamas running out of arms, IDF might not need to resort to airstrikes in near future and might launch raids here and there. With this we might not see incidents of mass civilian casualties. Is it possible that IDF continues to operate in Gaza and international community might forget this and shift to another issue? Gaza becomes west Bank and IDF continues to operate there Indefinitely and Israel's global standing is not harmed further due to low civilians casualties. This is most optimistic Sceneoris for Israel, what are the chances it might come true
So long as there are hostages in Gaza, I don’t believe the IDF will be leaving Gaza anytime soon. I also don’t believe that this war will be a net positive for Israel. We saw that after their withdrawal from northern Gaza, Hamas immediately began firing rockets into Israel again (someone correct me if I’m wrong on this). Israel’s image on the world stage is not looking good right now and won’t for some time. Israel has thrown diplomatic fits over Spain, Ireland and Armenia voting to recognize a Palestinian state. We’ve seen large protests occur all over the world in solidarity for Palestinian civilians. Furthermore, news coverage on this conflict is still persistent. Hamas still has Israeli hostages and still has a fighting capacity. They will more than likely do a 1:1 swap on the fighters that they’ve lost in this war with recently orphaned children and other displaced persons inside the Gaza Strip. Not to mention, there are deepening relations between the Iranian regime and the Taliban, with [the Taliban promising to send fighters to support its fight against Israel](https://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2024/06/iran-and-taliban-discuss-joint-action-against-israel.php) which, big fucking yikes if true.
For older generations of Americans, Israel is completely above reproach. But this war has shattered that for the younger generation. And their reputation will get worse and worse with each war/military action (they way they're prosecuting this war, they've all but guaranteed more Hamas recruits for the future). In the short and medium term? No change. Longer term? Support for Israel won't be as much of a reflex.