Surprisingly, I am also. However, I don’t think it is a particularly useful exercise to talk about what a country, but rather what the leaders would do.
If the Russian had invaded Estonia while Trump was in office, would have Trump ordered troops in? Hell no, all the screams from Democrats and a handful of Republicans wouldn’t have made any difference.
Would President John McCain defended Estonia, you betcha and would have argued with Secret Service to be in the first wave. I feel confident that Joe Biden and Angela Merkel would have done the same as would Boris Johnson. I don’t have nearly enough knowledge to make a prediction of the new crew in Germany or Macron. I only have vague stereotypes to go on for the rest of EU. Poland, Romania, the Batltic states will defend their fellow NATO members, the other I just don’t know.
I do know that an internationalist leader is far more likely to fulfill their NATO obligation than a nationalist one
BJ only does what makes him look good. In his opinion. Macron seems a lot more like a serious hombre.
Dejin
3268
Yes. There are a variety of videos out on this.
Looks like Millerovo Airbase is right on the border with Ukraine.
They really don’t want a repeat of Grozny. And I guess maybe their experience of helping Assad in Syria has demonstrated that as long as you don’t give a shit, destroying civilian infrastructure is a great way to hasten the end of a modern siege without having to send troops to fight through every street.
And of course Russia won’t be rebuilding that plant. That’ll be the job of the newly installed legitimate, democratic and denazified Ukrainian government. Who, after all, will have plenty of money for that sort of thing as they won’t be allowed to have a defense budget.
Anything related to a takeover is a tomorrow problem, and it’s still an open question whether Russia are opting for occupation.
Things will be harder for the defenders without a power grid. Now they can’t charge their 3DS’s when they run out of juice. Huge morale hit.
(They’ll also need fuel and generators to run hospitals, communications etc.)
I don’t think he has been a particularly wise leader. (President of the country should not be an entry level position in politics) But, he is an effective communicator, and he is brave no doubt.
Dejin
3273
Additional UK Troops and Equipment being moved to the Baltic States. [MOD (Ministry of Defense) announcement from last week. Video from today.]
https://www.army.mod.uk/news-and-events/news/2022/02/exercise-iron-surge-bolsters-nato/
Thrag
3274
UK directly sanctions Putin and Lavrov. Freezing assets.
US likely to follow.
Like, why aren’t we at war yet? (spoken from a depressed person ready to die)
…this somehow feels way different than Iraq, Afghanistan, or 9/11
Hmmm. British tanks in Estonia. Not terribly far from Moscow.
Don’t panic man. It’s rough, and you’re right to be upset. But it’s “just” the invasion of Ukraine, it’s not World War 3. (I don’t mean to downplay it, but in anxiety terms… It’s not the big one)
When stuff like this happens one of the things I do to cope is go back to stuff that’s happened before. It’s not the first time Ukraine burns. It’s not the first time Russia marches on Europe. It’s not the first time we have to deal with an asshole like Putin.
People dealt with it before, which means we can deal with it today. Does that mean everything is going to be okay? No, but it does mean we can face this if we give it what we’ve got.
This is a shitty timeline, and it does feel like the hits keep on coming, but nothing’s gonna get better from anyone losing their heads over it. Quite the opposite. That’s what happened after 9/11, and look where that got us.
CraigM
3279
That’ll clench your butthole.
Fortunately for them the blast range on those was fairly constrained, so short of a direct. or very nearly direct hit?
Still their breathing says it all.
Yeah, very little shrapnel or blast radius from those explosions. Doesn’t even seem like anything was hitting his windhsield. Not sure what was going on there.
Saw this and practically gave a salute
Scotten
3283
I’m pretty sure that move is totally against the Geneva Pornvention, amiright
Yeah. Not very explodey explosions. That don’t bang very much either.
They could be signal shells to get the civilians out of the area before a real bombardment. I have no idea if the Russians use those though.
