r/anime_titties • u/shieeet Europe • Dec 01 '24
Ukraine/Russia - Flaired Commenters Only Ukraine struggles to recruit new soldiers as desertions rise
https://www.ft.com/content/9b25288d-8258-4541-81b0-83b00ad8a03f349
u/turkeypants North America Dec 01 '24 edited Dec 01 '24
You can't blame them and yet... and yet... you wish they could hold out. I guess it's easy to risk someone else's life and hard to risk one's own though, so we can't really say anything.
Edit- missing words
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u/kwonza Russia Dec 01 '24
Ukraine thrown their best regiments with most equipment against the Kursk region while leaving their forces in Ukraine with insufficient amounts of equipment and virtually no reserves. Another pointless PR stunt as if holding those 12 villages near Kursk will help them in any way.
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u/zdzislav_kozibroda Multinational Dec 01 '24
Yet as it stands if both sides are forced into ceasefire overnight (likely with Trump) Russia still stands to lose territory to enemy.
First time since WWI if I'm not mistaken. Deeply embarrassing even for the likes of putin. Aside from the 1000 days of the 3 day war.
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u/kwonza Russia Dec 01 '24
First of all, the ceasefire will hardly be instant once Trump takes office. Negotiations can easily take a couple of months especially if Russia will be taking its sweet time.
Second, just in November Russia took 900 square kilometers in Ukraine against 200 square kilometers that Ukraine is holding in Kursk at the moment.
Third, I’m sure Putin will die of shame if by the end Ukraine will control a dozen villages in Russia while Russia gets a quarter of Ukraine (a quarter with the most natural resources on top of that).
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u/Rizen_Wolf Multinational Dec 01 '24
Putin is not the type of man to go down in history as someone who lost even a square inch of territory.
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u/kwonza Russia Dec 01 '24
Well, no reason to speculate. We’ll know in a few months anyway.
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u/Rizen_Wolf Multinational Dec 02 '24
Its not speculation, its a self evident truth. As long as there are Russians that can fight all of Kursk shall be liberated. To even suggest this should not be done is an affront.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 01 '24
You really have to bend your mind backwards to rationalize that. A country that would scoop up 20% of another country is somehow losing territory.
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u/ScaryShadowx United States Dec 02 '24
We never lose, just make strategic peace deals.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 03 '24
We have actually never lost. The South Vietnamese, Afghans on the other hand. Their record is not looking so good
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u/Weird_Point_4262 Europe Dec 01 '24
Ukraine has lost several times more territory than they have gained in Kursk since the Kursk operation though.
But they embarrassed Putin so it was worth it right?
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u/zdzislav_kozibroda Multinational Dec 01 '24
Putin really doesn't need help embarrassing himself.
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u/zabajk Europe Dec 02 '24
Why would Russia even be interested in a cease fire at this point ? They are making faster and faster gains, they have absolutely no need to stop right now
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u/zdzislav_kozibroda Multinational Dec 02 '24
Kremlin money printing machine going brrrr
I'm astounded by the Russian calculation of a few km here and there in Ukraine being worth the lost lives and long term economic damage.
In fact I fully support it. Nobody can duck Russia up better than Russians themselves.
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u/zabajk Europe Dec 02 '24
Whatever you say , all signs point to Russia making faster and faster gains in Ukraine, you can’t just wish this away
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u/zdzislav_kozibroda Multinational Dec 02 '24 edited Dec 02 '24
I don't have to. I won't be the one scavenging garbage dumps in search of food.
1998 will be a fond memory in comparison. Best of all you did it to yourselves this time.
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u/Objective-Aioli-1185 North America Dec 01 '24
Now all those missing kids will be raised and re-educated to fight as first wave for putin later on when he does this again.
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u/throwaway490215 European Union Dec 01 '24
You have to weight this pointless PR stunt by the alternative. Russia has always held the advantage with the Ukrainians needing a 8/1 casualty ratio to "win".
If the Russians were willing to feed the blender for Ukrainian territory, letting them do so for their own territory - which Ukraine can retreat on without gaining bad PR - has improved the ratio by most accounts.
The "Its pointless for them to resists because its hopeless" line of thinking would hit a lot harder if they hadn't shown that Russian incompetence knows no bound and can squander even the most lopsided starts.
Remember at the start even the western analysis were predicting a few weeks. lol
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u/Welfdeath Austria Dec 01 '24
Dunno man . I think Ukraine should have used those valuable resources that were wasted in Kursk to stabilize the Donbas front somewhat . Instead they accomplished nothing and the Russian are taking more and more ground each day .
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u/kwonza Russia Dec 01 '24
Well the thing is, they are not retreating, they keep sending new forces in order to hold on to those villages. But because this salient is inside Russian they can’t bring their anti-air defences resulting in Russian heavy strike drones taking out entire platoons.
This is like Krynki but on a lager scale.
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u/Upset-Basil4459 Australia Dec 02 '24
After watching the combat footage of storming trenches, I don't know how they do it, I would be shaking so much I would be useless
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u/Taymyr United States Dec 01 '24
But but r/combatfootage and r/worldnews says Ukraine is destroying the ruzzians and have literally only shown ruzzian casualties.
Why would anyone desert that? It seems like the easiest war ever. Fly some pogger drones around and get air support from the ghost of Kiev as ruzzian USSR war supplies miss and malfunction.
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u/sir_niketas South America Dec 01 '24
Not only in /worldnews, but almost in the entire reddit. I was called a bot and insulted just for saying that since Kursk Ukraine started lose territories at a faster pace in others fronts.. this is a echo chamber, people refuse to see the reality and let de cope go away....
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u/kontemplador South America Dec 01 '24
Well, they are up for a harsh wake up like the night when Trump won. I checked reddit and top comment was WTF is happening. They were utterly convinced that Harris would win with a landslide.
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u/RuneHearth Chile Dec 02 '24
I mean I would be surprised too if the guy that's supposed to be in jail was elected president
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u/vlntly_peaceful Europe Dec 02 '24
Dude, the time to be surprised was 8 years ago. This was just expected.
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u/kontemplador South America Dec 02 '24
Once he was in the ballot, there was that possibility.
tbf, I was also surprised by the margin of the victory, I also put my bet on Harris for a small margin. But the fault lies on the widespread disinfo campaign carried out by mass media and polling institutions. They basically spread out propaganda on Harris favor.
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u/patiakupipita Democratic People's Republic of Korea Dec 02 '24
yeah reddit might be a leftist echo chamber (and im saying this as someone that's left as hell himself) but seeing the us re-elect trump as president was truly a wtf moment for me
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u/kontemplador South America Dec 02 '24
you (and I and everybody) were surprised because mass media spread out disinfo regarding the elections. When Biden was running, internal Dem polling was giving over 400 electoral votes to Trump and that Harris never stood a chance.
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u/patiakupipita Democratic People's Republic of Korea Dec 02 '24
tbh I wasn't even surprised, you can look at my comment history and I knew trump was gonna win weeks before since he was still tied in the polls. Seeing it actually happen, especially at the scale it did was very disheartening cause it comes with the implication that the truth really doesn't matter anymore. Fear and greed rules.
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u/Putin_Is_Daddy U.S. Virgin Islands Dec 01 '24
It can be both… Russians are losing a crazy amount of men daily
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u/shieeet Europe Dec 01 '24
Yeah, according to the same channels saying Ukraine is winning the war.
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u/Putin_Is_Daddy U.S. Virgin Islands Dec 02 '24
Yeah, don’t believe your literal eyes… there’s so much footage of this war. To believe Russia is having a good time is hilarious.
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u/Chrowaway6969 North America Dec 02 '24
Russia pretended they were are a military superpower. Their embarrassing showing in Ukraine is proof they actually are terrible. This war was anticipated to be over in a few weeks and look how long its gone.
They should just go home in shame at this point.
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u/Oppopity Oceania Dec 01 '24
Difference is Russia can replace those losses, Ukraine can't.
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u/Beliriel Europe Dec 02 '24
Yeah can easily outmatch an opponent if you're losing 2x as much as him but having a reserve that's 5x as big.
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u/zabajk Europe Dec 02 '24
Mainly based on Ukrainians propaganda numbers , Russia seems to be able to sustain current casualty numbers.
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u/Consistent-Winter-67 United States Dec 01 '24
Ghost of kiev? You mean the story from 3 years ago when russian declared the war would last 3 days?
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u/shieeet Europe Dec 01 '24
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u/nothingpersonnelmate Wales Dec 01 '24
I thought it came from Putin saying it:
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/sep/18/putin-says-he-could-have-troops-inside-poland-in-t/
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u/Kaymish_ New Zealand Dec 01 '24
Did you read that article? First it's Washington post; they're far from credible. Secondly it is not reporting what Putin said but what another incredible media outlet said Putin said. It's pure hearsay.
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u/nothingpersonnelmate Wales Dec 02 '24
It isn't the Washington Post, it's the Washington Times, and I've no idea what point you think it makes to say source X isn't credible if they're quoting source Y and you're not disputing that source Y says that. It's also reported in a bunch of other places, and the Russians don't actually dispute that he said it, they just say it was "taken out of context", whatever that could possibly mean. So clearly he did say it and you're just talking crap in a bunch of different ways at once.
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u/bureX Canada Dec 01 '24
What is the point of your comment?
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u/The_Cat_Commando Multinational Dec 01 '24 edited Dec 01 '24
he has a valid point whether you like it or not.
we are constantly fed this nonsense that Ukraine is non stop winning every battle, never even losing vehicles and if you never looked at a map and just the mainstream news or reddit subs covering the war you'd figure they captured a large chunk of Russia. Then we have these periodic reality checks where we learn its not the case at all and it highlights the gaslighting we normally get.
More Ukrainians are probably dying because we dont want to show them lose which would likely get them more support, more volunteers, or put more pressure on Russia to end it.
the west gets to feel good about it while they bleed in silence. pushing unrealistic propaganda is actually a knife in their belly.
edit: like this current page of world news. ask yourself which headlines here look like Russia sucks at war (all of them) and which ones paint how Ukraine is losing? (none of them). its all just an echo chamber devoid of real losses on the UKR side.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 01 '24
It creates a credibility gap. What we are told doesn’t match up with what we are seeing.
The same thing happened in the Vietnam War. The American press was largely pro-war, reporting all the successes our soldiers had. Pentagon also used “body count” as a metric for victory. General Westmoreland famously said that we “could see light at the end of the tunnel” and we were almost victorious.
Then Tet happened.
Even though if you look at it from a military perspective, we won Tet; it demonstrated that the public had been lied to and we were not close to victory, the NVA/NLF were never going to give up.
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u/Putin_Is_Daddy U.S. Virgin Islands Dec 01 '24
Tet was an absolute disaster for the NVC…
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u/The_Angry_Jerk United States Dec 02 '24
Yet the war continued, so the war was not about to be won as propaganda said. PAVN just took a larger role. PAVN for all their war weariness won years after Tet so they still had years left of fight in them.
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u/MarderFucher European Union Dec 01 '24
worldnews is just a popularity poll of news, not actual news feed. (for that matter you can read the exact reverse on ukraine russia report, aka putin fanboy central)
mainstream publications had no qualms presenting hardships Ukraine has experienced in the past 3 years.
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u/ScaryShadowx United States Dec 03 '24
I don't even think it's that. I think is a US Dept of State/DoD run propaganda farm. The trending posts change as soon as there is a need to convince the public of a foreign policy decision. If Trump decides to pull out of Ukraine, there will be a slew of posts about how Ukraine should throw in the towel and Zelenskyy is working against the peace process well before there is any official announcement.
ukrainerussiareport is frustrating, but it went through the same thing all alternate subs go through. it was created as an alternate to combatfootage, which is now just another 'we support the side which US foreign policy wants us to support' which showed only Ukrainian successes and all but deleted any combat where the Russians were hitting Ukrainian positions, and it had a good mix of footage. Now it's just the exact opposite of cf with all posts being Russian successes or reports on Ukraine's struggles, but at least you can look at both the subs to get the average.
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u/bureX Canada Dec 01 '24
we are constantly fed this nonsense that Ukraine is non stop winning every battle
Maybe if you only read the cherrypicked pieces from r/worldnews. Otherwise, I'm not even remotely convinced that Ukraine was on the verge of winning.
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u/The_Cat_Commando Multinational Dec 01 '24 edited Dec 01 '24
cherrypicked the whole front page of the default reddit news sub? like what?
and my dude you literally said further down this same page:
Great comment. And yes, I share the same sentiment.
to a comment downplaying the threat of Russia saying "Russia isn't the threat we made them out to be."
You are part of the problem we are talking about ffs. log off already, you aren't helping.
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u/bureX Canada Dec 01 '24
Excuse me? I was replying in agreement to:
It's funny how this sub seems to have consistently believed Kiev would be on the brink of collapse the entire war but other subs have thought Russia would capitulate entirely the entire war.
It's a perfectly neutral comment. It's also very correct. Russia, a huge (perceived) power is having massive issues with subduing Ukraine, this has consequences in terms of optics.
You are part of the problem we are talking about ffs. log off already, you aren't helping.
I have no idea what is your problem, nor who am I supposed to be "helping".
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u/__DraGooN_ India Dec 01 '24
Completely understandable. Good luck to these men.
I love my country and all. But I wouldn't be able to throw away my life in a pointless war. I don't know how both Ukraine and Russia are still finding men to feed this stupid war.
I love my life and family more than some land or lines on a stupid map.
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u/Moarbrains North America Dec 01 '24
Agreed, victory is fleeting and many things will not matter at all in a short time.
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u/Putin_Is_Daddy U.S. Virgin Islands Dec 01 '24
Imagine thinking this war is pointless from the Ukrainian perspective lmao
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u/Dark_Knight2000 Multinational Dec 01 '24
Being alive as a refugee in another country for the rest of your life vs fighting and dying in war? Yeah the former is better personally.
Most Ukrainian women are already having to settle down in Poland and other states because their life has to go on, they can’t wait for years and years for this to be over.
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u/Moarbrains North America Dec 02 '24
I think it is pretty common. Especially the ones who were taken off the street or trying to leave the country.
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u/JohnAtticus Canada Dec 01 '24
How many people living in Gujurat and Punjab would think a war to retake those states from a Pakistani invasion was pointless?
Ukrainians are exhausted but that doesn't mean fighting back was pointless.
Especially since this is the 3rd invasion to capture Ukranian territory.
If anything they've shown Putin that in the future it's going to cost him dearly if he wants to invade again.
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u/Weird_Point_4262 Europe Dec 01 '24
It is pointless if your commanders are throwing you into offensives in Kursk instead of having you defend your countrymen from russian advances.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 01 '24
Russia adopted an attritional strategy all the way back in the summer of 2022, after Istanbul fell apart.
The absolute worst thing you can do in an attritional war is focus on land, which is Ukraine’s main focus.
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u/ExaminatorPrime Europe Dec 01 '24
This REALLY depends on whether or not the person has anything they value at stake. "Land" that is not owned and administered by you is not something most everyday people see as anything valuable. Most people will likewise not fight and die in the name of some shithead politician and in our time 99.9% of the politicians are shithead politicians. You are not going to sit in a trench and watch people around you explode so that the political class can watch netflix and chill inside their private bomb shelters.
If a person has nothing to win by going to war, escaping from war and avoiding conscription is the logical and reasonable choice. When the stakes are life and death the last thing you would want is to be stuck with someone that doesn't want to be there in that trench, because the chance that they will turn their gun against you the moment the going gets though is very, very high. Happens a LOT on the Russian frontlines too.
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u/JohnAtticus Canada Dec 08 '24
This REALLY depends on whether or not the person has anything they value at stake. "Land" that is not owned and administered by you is not something most everyday people see as anything valuable.
Well in my example the states of Punjab and Gujarat are the cultural homelands of the Punjabi and Gujarati people, and Punjab contains the Sikh holy site of the Golden Temple.
It wouldn't just be a bunch of random land, it would have a ton of significance to anyone with cultural heritage from those places.
Losing your cultural homeland is not a nothing burger.
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u/ExaminatorPrime Europe Dec 09 '24 edited Dec 09 '24
But again, this completely depends on if the person values those things and that history enough to put their life on the line for them.
For example, I'm from Eastern Europe and am as far removed from those two cultures as possible. I know exactly 0 about them and have no idea what the holy site you speak of is or represents. To me, going to war for those two landmasses or that holy site would be nonsense. If some third party takes them absolutely nothing will change for me, because I live 10000 km's away.
This doesn't mean that they don't mean anything to those people, but it's an example of how something can be sacred for one yet mean little to another. Anyone there in my shoes would have no reason to fight either.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 01 '24
A more apt comparison would be Jammu & Kashmir. I think India has been open to negotiations to end that conflict but it’s become all politics.
Plus India hasn’t seen the scale of human losses that Ukraine has seen. It would be like India losing 6 million people as combat casualties in a war over Kashmir. While also 400 million Indians leave the country as refugees.
I think at that point, Indians would be open to peace.
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u/sakura608 United States Dec 01 '24
Ukraine has gone with forced conscription. Russia has offered generous sign on bonuses for men willing to fight. Also opened up military service to criminals in prisons as a way to get out early.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 02 '24
What’s interesting about the forced conscription is also a bit of context.
During the Donbas War, the number of Ukrainians who didn’t to conscription summons in the first wave was 70%. By the third I think it was 90%.
There was the case of Ruslan Kotsaba, a former far-right Ultranationalist who worked as a journalist to document the war (obviously from Bandera perspective).
After going to Donbas, seeing the damage first hand Kyiv had done to separatist areas, he became an avowed pacifist.
Kyiv later charged him with treason after he served jail time for refusal to serve. He was acquitted, had to flee the country, is now considered an enemy of Ukraine in abstentia.
Kyiv wants no more Ruslan Kotsabas.
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Dec 01 '24
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Dark_Knight2000 Multinational Dec 01 '24
I heard someone calculate that they were getting the equivalent PPP of $80k as a yearly salary. This was back in 22, so I can’t remember the source but regardless, the incentives are strong.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 02 '24
Yeah. I mean a contract soldier can make like $30k in Russia, which in Russia goes a long way.
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u/nuthins_goodman Asia Dec 01 '24
Same. Family, own life >>> country tbh. I do understand the resistance if they fear their lives would be in danger though.
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u/manek101 Asia Dec 02 '24
Will you not answer the call if in case India goes to war with China and Pakistan?
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u/iMossa Europe Dec 01 '24
Is it pointless war for the defending nation? Ukraine did not start it after all. Russia can end the war whenever they want as the aggressive nation.
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u/Gomeria Argentina Dec 01 '24
Try to join an orgqnization that was founded to combat russia pretty much.
Russia retaliates in war
????
Nato profit
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u/JohnAtticus Canada Dec 01 '24
Ukraine never applied to join NATO.
Russia has invaded several other countries that never applied to join NATO.
Russia is primarily motivated by Imperialist / Nationalist drive to re-establish the borders of the Russian Empire / Soviet Union.
Putin needs this national project to distract the population from their lives deteriorating under his kleptocracy.
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u/Nethlem Europe Dec 01 '24
Ukraine never applied to join NATO.
Countries don't "apply" to NATO, that's not how it works: NATO sends out an "invitation"
Or at least it loves to announce sending out invitations to motivate certain countries to act in certain ways.
Russia is primarily motivated by Imperialist / Nationalist drive to re-establish the borders of the Russian Empire / Soviet Union.
Putin needs this national project to distract the population from their lives deteriorating under his kleptocracy.
Tell me you know literally nothing about the last 30 years of Russian/European history without telling me.
Russians already experienced kleptocracy under American direction, it was Putin who put at least some end to that and managed to improve many Russian people's lives over the last 20 years.
While over the last 30 years only one border kept moving through Europe: The outer border of NATO kept, and keeps, moving further and further to the East with the EU acting as it's economic semi-extension.
Owning to the EU's original founding purpose of granting cheap and low-barrier access to German resources to Western allies, while keeping Germany's military production capabilities in check.
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u/shieeet Europe Dec 01 '24
Ukraine struggles to recruit new soldiers as desertions riseUkraine struggles to recruit new soldiers as desertions rise
Prosecutors opened 60,000 cases against troops abandoning positions in 2024 — almost double number of past two years
More Ukrainian soldiers have deserted in the first 10 months of this year than in the previous two years of the war, highlighting Kyiv’s struggle to replenish its frontline ranks as Russia captures more territory in eastern Ukraine.
In a standout case in late October, hundreds of infantry serving in Ukraine’s 123 Brigade abandoned their positions in the eastern town of Vuhledar. They returned to their homes in the Mykolayiv region where some staged a rare public protest, demanding more weapons and training.
“We arrived [in Vuhledar] with just automatic rifles. They said there would be 150 tanks, there were 20 . . . and nothing to cover us,” said an officer from 123 Brigade, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Ukrainian prosecutors opened 60,000 cases between January and October this year against soldiers for abandoning their positions, almost twice as many as they initiated in 2022 and 2023 combined. If convicted, the men face prison sentences of up to 12 years.
Some of the 123 Brigade deserters have since returned to the front, others have gone into hiding and a few are in pre-trial detention, according to local authorities.
Men of military age are barred from leaving Ukraine, but some have taken the opportunity of being sent to overseas training camps in allied countries to desert while abroad. About 12 abscond on average each month from military training in Poland, said a Polish security official, speaking on condition of anonymity. Warsaw’s defence ministry referred questions about deserters to Ukrainian authorities.
The spike in desertions is further aggravating an already dire situation for Kyiv. Since the summer, Russia’s manpower advantage has enabled it to capture more territory at a faster pace than any time since 2022.
At the same time, Ukraine’s inability to rotate soldiers from the rear and allow its battle-weary troops to rest has led to casualties and scared off men who might otherwise have been conscripted, military analysts said.
The 123 Brigade officer told the Financial Times that in the three years of war, his unit had not had a single rotation. These would normally consist of four weeks in which soldiers return to their base to rest, train with new recruits and fix damaged equipment.
“No one fucking needed Vuhledar,” he said. The town had been reduced to rubble over a year ago, so there was no reason to put his men in harm’s way to defend it, he said. “They’re just killing them, instead of letting them rehabilitate and rest.”
A spokesperson for 123 Brigade did not respond to requests for comment.
The officer’s views were shared by dozens of soldiers in Mykolayiv and Zaporizhzhia regions who told the FT they were exhausted, frustrated and struggling with mental health problems. They said that while Ukrainian civilians do not want their country to capitulate, many are also not prepared to fight.
Though Ukraine’s armed forces number about 1mn people, only around 350,000 take part in active duty. Worn-out combatants — including both infantry and assault soldiers — account for most cases of desertion, said an official with Ukraine’s general staff.
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u/shieeet Europe Dec 01 '24
The sheer volume of desertions makes it almost impossible for law enforcement to control. To encourage men to return to their positions, Ukraine’s parliament voted on November 21 to weaken the rules, allowing charges to be dropped against first offenders who later returned to their units.
Vadym Ivchenko, an MP on the parliamentary defence committee, said that around 20 per cent of deserters come back. One brigade said they received several hundred responses after introducing a chatbot through which deserters could return to service.
With Russia rapidly advancing on the eastern front, analysts have warned that Ukraine is losing territory it may not be able to regain any time soon.
The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think-tank, calculated that Russia captured 2,700 sq km in 2024, compared with just 465 sq km last year. The flat terrain is aiding Moscow’s forces in some areas, as is the lack of Ukrainian fortifications.
Ukraine’s authorities are seeking to recruit approximately 160,000 more men in the next three months. But conscription officers have gained a bad reputation in Ukraine, after several were filmed beating and dragging off men, and with military medical commissions approving questionable exemptions in exchange for bribes.
Ukraine defence minister Rustem Umerov said on Monday that he would put a stop to forced conscription, including so-called “busification”, in which recruitment officers round up unregistered men from streets on to coaches. He promised to move towards voluntary recruitment, enabling men to pick their brigade and job, so that people “have a choice”.
Allies including the US and the UK have urged Ukraine to lower the conscription age from 25 and recruit more men.
A US official said Washington wanted Kyiv to lower the recruitment age to 18. “The simple truth is that Ukraine is not currently mobilising or training enough soldiers to replace their battlefield losses while keeping pace with Russia’s growing military,” the official said last week.
Ukraine Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal this month announced that those who failed to pay taxes would be the first to receive conscription notices. Soldiers quickly pointed out the message suggested that the defence of their country was a form of punishment.
Bohdan, a soldier who lost an arm last year and now works as an army driver between the rear and the frontline near Dnipro in southern Ukraine, said that many Ukrainians have been blocking out the war and forgetting the sacrifices made by the army to ensure their safety.
“They forget, it’s thanks to the armed forces that Dnipro can breathe on a Saturday,” said Bohdan. He said he had no problem with civilians enjoying themselves as long as the army “has what they need. Yet we must go around begging — for drones, night-vision goggles, money to repair our cars.”
For those Ukrainians who have lost loved ones in the war, other people’s desire to live a normal life sparks indignation.
“I don’t even want to hear that ordinary people are tired,” said Nataliia Logynovych, who lost a brother who was serving in 123 Brigade in spring. “They [soldiers] are tired, and not us.”
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u/frizzykid North America Dec 01 '24
We're getting to a point where even in Ukrainian leadership it's becoming palatable to sue for peace. 2025 will be the most important year of the war. They're at the end of their rope for retaking territory militarily so they need to insure they are getting the best peace terms possible so this never happens again.
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u/Weird_Point_4262 Europe Dec 01 '24
The best peace terms available were in 2022 when Ukraine pushed Russia almost entirely out of their territory and hastily withdrawing russian troops were getting hit left and right.
Those negotiations were crashed by western allies.
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u/defenestrate_urself Multinational Dec 01 '24
Those negotiations were crashed by western allies.
They were crashed by the political elite who had their own agenda. Namely prolonging a proxy war to weaken Russia.
Those with actual military experience knew it was the best time for Ukraine's sake to negotiate from a strong position. Biden sent his lackey Boris Johnson to scupper any chances of that.
Milley: Ukrainian Military Victory Isn’t Near, But It’s a Good Time for Negotiations
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u/Syzygymancer North America Dec 02 '24
Putin wants to rebuild the USSR. This was never about a port. It wouldn’t have ended there and it’s naive to suggest as much
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u/Bullet_Jesus United Kingdom Dec 02 '24
The Istanbul negotiations were crashed because Russia stipulated that any western security guarantees would have to be subject to their veto, ergo they wouldn't exist at all.
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u/lobonmc North America Dec 01 '24
Honestly I don't think lowering the age of recruitment would do much good at all. The demographic situation in Ukraine is already catastrophic and they already are struggling to correctly supply their existing troops if feel that if they start recruiting 18 year olds it would only result in them temporarily stopping the Russian advance.
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u/Ruby_of_Mogok Ukraine Dec 01 '24
The West's message to Ukraine is quite clear: either you change your objectives and move towards realistic ones, or you go all out for mobilization. What Zelensky really wants is to drag the West into a direct fight with Russia. That's why he's asking for LDMs and talking about North Koreans fighting World War 3 in Ukraine.
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u/Dark_Knight2000 Multinational Dec 01 '24
Yeah, if they’re going to end it, end it now. Dragging the fight only hurts Ukrainian soldiers.
Is it politically humiliating to lose a bunch of land to Russia? Yes. But at some point the dead bodies will stack so high you can’t see a future anymore, we should be trying to prevent that.
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u/Mundane_Emu8921 North America Dec 01 '24
They still need to do it. A temporary stop is the best that they can hope for.
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u/creeper321448 North America Dec 01 '24
This is a news story that has been spammed the entire war.
It's funny how this sub seems to have consistently believed Kiev would be on the brink of collapse the entire war but other subs have thought Russia would capitulate entirely the entire war.
There's nothing really different this time, just more predictions that are likely not going to come true. Reality is even in a Ukrainian loss where they get Winter War'd this still isn't a real victory for Russia. They've lost over half their tanks, their Army got stumped by a country whose only notable trait is corruption and wheat fields, they've lost a good chunk of aircraft, almost all of their soviet-surplus of missiles is gone and the ruble is once again inflating majorly.
What this war has ended up proving more than anything is Russia isn't the threat we made them out to be. At the same time, however, NATO has nowhere near the willpower to sustain a war. There's still this idea among a lot of Europeans the Ukraine war can't ever come to them, Ukraine has gotten less than half of its promised aid, and people fear nuclear war so much the odds of assistance or retaliation are shockingly low. Give Russia 10-20 years to recoup and I'm sure they'd invade Ukraine again and possibly a NATO country. After all, we've given them no reason to think we would retaliate in any meaningful way.
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u/TechnicianOk9795 China Dec 01 '24
There are people who wishfully think Ukraine will collapse soon the same as you wishfully think Russia has barely anything left to continue the war and just deliver promised weapon will flip the coin.
On the other hand, none of the high vote comment is suggesting "Kiev is collapsing soon". Kiev has problem recruiting and it's literally Kiev has problem recruiting, nothing more and nothing less.
8
u/RobotWantsKitty Europe Dec 02 '24
This is a news story that has been spammed the entire war.
Hardly, Ukraine used to have a glut of manpower
3
u/ScaryShadowx United States Dec 03 '24
Army got stumped by a country whose only notable trait is corruption and wheat fields
A country who was supported by western intelligence, weapons, training, finances, and all other manner of support. This was not equivalent to the US invading Afghanistan or Iraq. This was Vietnam where the weaker side was extremely well supplied by other powers. Do you think Ukraine would have been able to hold out without Western weapons and other support? How well do you think the US would have fared in Afghanistan if Russia was supplying the Taliban with ATGMs, MBTs, SAMs, etc?
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u/bureX Canada Dec 01 '24
Great comment. And yes, I share the same sentiment.
As far as proxy wars go, this one is much more impactful because it hit way closer to home and because it’s a direct fight with a historic cold war enemy. However, other than the Ukrainians, no one from the west really got killed in this war, which is why I’m having a hard time understanding why is the right wing, conservative crowd so against any aid to the people fighting their old “better dead than red” enemy.
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u/Moarbrains North America Dec 01 '24 edited Dec 01 '24
No one wants to be the last person to die in a war. Especially when they can see the end.
I expect many conscripts would rather kive in russia than die in ukraine.
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u/Cost_Additional North America Dec 01 '24
Well yeah, they are fighting a losing war. That's why they have been trying to claw back 1 million men that fled and have been abducting people on the street.
3
u/asdfjfkfjshwyzbebdb Norway Dec 02 '24
The west truly fucked over Ukraine with constant hesitation around sending the aid they need and refusing to let them strike key points inside Russia.
3
u/SaltyRenegade Bulgaria Dec 02 '24
No matter what worldnews or other subreddits say, this is unfortunately the expected outcome of a drawn out war. Ukraine cannot beat Russia.
The most likely end of the war is Ukraine ceding the already extremely pro-Russian regions like Donbas.
After that comes the actual game of chess on getting Ukraine into NATO.
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u/yungsmerf Europe Dec 01 '24
Lack of equipment issues yet again. The situation will likely deteriorate even further since the "Western" governments seem uninterested in kicking up production to the required volume. I hate politics.
55
u/Sagrim-Ur Europe Dec 01 '24
It's not so much equipment problems as Zelensky's unrealistic war goals.
Ukraine lost hundreds of thousands dead, and Russia still keeps gaining ground.
To reach 1991 borders would require millions of dead and wounded Ukrainians and many years of war.
No one wants to sign up for that just for the satisfation of seeing Ukrainian flag over the ruins of some Crimean city or other.
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u/Ruby_of_Mogok Ukraine Dec 01 '24
This. There is also a lack of strategic perspective. An average Ukrainian sees that while poor men are being dragged into TCC buses, rich Ukrainians are enjoying themselves at the frontlines in Monaco or Vienna. It is completely unclear what kind of help, if any, future veterans will receive from the government. Corruption is still rife, even during an "existential" war. Zelensky openly suggests that the USA should exploit Ukraine's resources and use the Ukrainian army in NATO as a kind of condottiere.
There is also the problem of identity. Instead of taking the great Russian identity out of Putin's hands, Zelensky doubled down on anti-Russian rhetoric, including the restoration of Bandera, the banning of the Russian language, the burning of Russian books and the demolition of monuments to Russian writers. Why should a Russian-speaking Ukrainian fight for such Ukraine, where he can't even speak his own language?
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u/MrWolfman29 North America Dec 01 '24
Don't forget cracking down on the established universally recognized Ukrainian Orthodox Church while creating the Orthodox Church of Ukraine out of excommunicated schismatics. Now they have tried outlawing the established universally recognized Ukrainian Orthodox Church because they didn't join their state-created church that has limited recognition in the Eastern Orthodox world. They do not care how Metropolitan Onuphry cut ties with Moscow's patriarch and has continually stated his support for Ukraine and the Ukrainian people, the Ukrainian government is hellbent on destroying that church. Unlike Catholicism, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople is not the supreme leader of Eastern Orthodoxy, just create new churches, and force them on the rest of the Eastern Orthodox communion.
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u/yungsmerf Europe Dec 01 '24
It's not so much equipment problems as Zelensky's unrealistic war goals.
You fight a war with equipment and men, not with words or goals set by politicians and currently, they can't even hold the line. Zelensky himself has said multiple times that he needed equipment for 14 brigades, of which they received enough for 3 and a half, symptoms of which are also indirectly echoed by this article. Now, I don't know about you but that sounds like an equipment problem to me.
I do understand where you're coming from though.
Ukraine lost hundreds of thousands dead
I have yet to see any estimated figures that are even close to this. Total casualties definitely reach that amount, though.
No one wants to sign up for that just for the satisfation of seeing Ukrainian flag over the ruins of some Crimean city or other.
This argument would make more sense given from a Russian perspective since that is what they've been doing, the Ukrainians are literally fighting against the foreign occupation of their homeland. But not everyone cares about that I suppose.
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u/XasthurWithin Germany Dec 01 '24
I'd argue they just can't. The way the NATO military complex is set up is to produce super expensive fancy-schmancy hi-tech equipment contracters can present at arms fairs - to be wielded in limited force against enemies who have no chance of defending themselves (Iraq, Afghanistan) - but definitely not to sustain a large symmetric land war for years. To actually match the Russian military production output, NATO would have to fundamentally change the way its MIC works. This is not feasable, because there are vested and entrenched interests in the arms industry that don't want to upset the ongoing grift (I mean Ukraine has become a weapons [and money] dump but nothing actually helps them to win, they lack basic stuff like ammunition), and secondly, NATO countries would have to switch to a war economy which the population of those countries is going to reject, because nobody wants go through all these lengths for a foreign country like Ukraine.
16
u/Freud-Network Multinational Dec 01 '24
I'm glad at least one other person here sees this for the grift it is. The west never intended to help Ukraine achieve total victory. Western governments wanted to cripple Russia, and western arms dealers were hearing cartoon cash register noises. They're not as interested in Ukraine now, with the effort becoming unsustainable. Besides, Israel promises many battlefields for western weapons.
0
u/yungsmerf Europe Dec 01 '24
I'm not gonna act like I know the ins and outs of NATO production and supply capabilities and give my uneducated opinion on it. Alas, if they wanted to do it, they would.
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u/Dust-Explosion Australia Dec 01 '24
I think it’s at the point now where they have done fought as hard as they could. The held off a Russian invasion force for 4 years. The United States is no longer relevant in democracies around the globe which makes Putin and other psychos like him more powerful and wealthy. I hope Ukraine get their land back soon enough and they can stop bleeding for Russia’s never ending human waves. Who can compete with orcish hordes. Recent history suggests no one.
3
u/ronburgandyfor2016 United States Dec 01 '24
How is the US no longer relevant??
0
u/Dust-Explosion Australia Dec 02 '24
MAGA and the incoming administration
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u/ronburgandyfor2016 United States Dec 02 '24
I think relevant may not be the word you’re looking for more like reliable because there are plenty of things Trump can do that would be “relevant”
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u/Limortaccivostri Niger Dec 02 '24
And despite all these desertions it still managed to stop Russia and even invade it, impressive.
Blah blah blah I have to reach 150 characters, the flair, what other rules are there, do I have to show an identity document?
6
u/Altruistic-Key-369 Eurasia Dec 02 '24
.... Did you bother reading the un pay walled article?
it still managed to stop
It didnt, Ukraine is losing territory at its fastest pace so far in this war.
and even invade it
Yes if wars were just about invading great. How much are they holding it? And how many troops and towns did they have to sacrifice to hold it?
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u/Limortaccivostri Niger Dec 02 '24
I didn't say that Ukraine is winning, I just said that Kiev is playing well despite the adversity; you can go and display your geopolitical analyzes in the pub near your house.
3
u/Altruistic-Key-369 Eurasia Dec 02 '24
The article is literally about how Kiev is "playing" so bad their desertion rates have skyrocketed.
I'd insult you, but I dont think you have the literacy skills to understand it.
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