Russian invasion of Ukraine

So here you are, ordered to push that button. You know it’s extremely likely that others at other locations have also been ordered to do that. You also know that you will be shot at the spot if you refuse and someone else will take your place anyway. So the choice is between immediate death, or some (admittedly reduced) chance you’ll survive and see your loved ones again and try to make the best of it with them afterwards. I think the majority of men placed in that position will push, being ‘professional’ or not.

Isn’t the whole point of “middle men” here that one dude turning wacko is not enough?

I think the systems are pretty well designed, because the risk of not launching is just as bad as the risk of accidentally launching. I’d say the latter is a much higher risk because you have all the time in the world to accidentally launch, whereas not launching is not really an issue because somebody else on your side probably will, and if you were doing a first strike (which the West would never do, but Russia might) then nothing much happened.

And then you have SSBNs which can take their time. The British ones have various safeguards, one of which is checking if Radio 4 is still broadcasting, and if it is, seriously question an order to launch.

I am sure Putin would not launch. He knows exactly what he is doing. He knows he can take the p1ss, because as his well decomposed old mate would say, the capitalist will sell him the rope with which he will hang him, and he will be buying Putin’s gas while he is still swinging

I think a deal will be done in some weeks’ time because Russia will be running out of resources and the domestic opposition will be growing. It will involve Ukraine agreeing to never join NATO (they have just said so, so they are stuck with it). Putin must be given a “win” of some sort.

The more interesting bit will be how long before W Europe returns to normalising relations, for the sake of €€€€, gas, oil, etc. I hope it doesn’t. I also hope that another long term consequence is a de-normalisation of the cosy relationship with China, which is our enemy, is pretty much a country run by opportunists making a fast buck, yet we continue to sell them the rope.

Peter wrote:

I am sure Putin would not launch. He knows exactly what he is doing.

I think many of us were saying this about invasion a few weeks ago. I will no longer be surprised by what he will do.

Graham wrote:

If entire countries and entire free peoples collectively take the view that their own immediate safety is more important that the principle of freedom and maintaining democracy, pretty soon tyranny will conquer them.

No. But the people SHOULD have a say whether they agree that their representatives put them in mortal danger or not. Clearly the NATO countries know that too. And conquered by tyranny is a nice methaphor together with the freedom most people hold dear which in reality is mostly an illusion even in fully democratic countries.

Your immediate safety vs sure anihilation has the distinct advantage that you can walk away to fight another day whereas martyrs mostly serve to incense others.

Graham wrote:

In any case, you talk as though nuclear devastation is the inevitable consequence of NATO forces engaging Russian forces on any scale. It most certainly is not.

Clearly the NATO commanders have a better assessment of just how big a bluff this is than we do. If they feel they need to be perfectly clear over and over again, I feel no need to second guess it. Their information and threat assessment is definitly better than what we hear on the western or eastern media.

Graham wrote:

What purpose does it serve other than to remove all doubt from Putin’s mind, to reinforce the idea that he can do anything he wants to Ukraine and NATO will never react?

What purpose other than to hasten nuclear escalation would a NATO intervention do, what the economical war waged against Russia on a never before seen front won’t do? The message to Putin is clear, he is economically ruined if he continues his path. So he will run out of money to continue this war fairly soon and will be forced to settle.

Graham wrote:

The downside is all-out nuclear war. I just consider it incredibly unlikely.

This is where our assessment differs and obviously the assessment of the NATO intelligence as well. One may add that the US appear to have REALLY good intelligence within the Kremlin, seeing as they were the ones to cry the alarm way before anyone else believed it and it was true. If they say the risk is too big, I won’t contradict them.

Apart, even limited nuclear war if possible at all is a horrendous risk to take.

Mooney_Driver wrote:

Look at the Yugoslavian war: NATO interfered in a civil war!

You’re totally wrong on this. There was no civil war in Yugoslavia but Serbian aggression to neighbouring countries. In Yugoslavia everything started with Serbia trying to invade Slovenia (they gave up after two weeks because of logistics problems and army not willing to fight) and later on Croatia (1991-1995) and Bosnia (1992-1995). NATO hasn’t been involved in any of these conflicts except establishing no-fly zone over Bosnia and Croatia through UN mandate from April 1993 (almost two years after war broke in Croatia and a year after it started in Bosnia). NATO bombing of Serbia was launched in March 1999 after Serbian army attacked Kosovo in February 1998. Airstrikes came as a consequence of documented war crimes committed by Serbian forces (similar to ones committed in Bosnia and Croatia) and Serbian refusal to stop shelling civilian targets.

arj1 wrote:

Well, Russia insists on the same thing…

It’s pretty much different.

In 2014 Russia invaded parts of Ukraine and then claimed Ukrainians were shelling Donetsk region causing civilian casualties.

Unlike Ukrainian regions, in Yugoslavian case nobody invaded Kosovo and no external force was included in proclaiming their independence after Yugoslavia broke up. Also nobody invaded Serbia and NATO’s objective was only stopping the aggression.

Peter wrote:

The more interesting bit will be how long before W Europe returns to normalising relations, for the sake of €€€€, gas, oil, etc. I hope it doesn’t. I also hope that another long term consequence is a de-normalisation of the cosy relationship with China, which is our enemy, is pretty much a country run by opportunists making a fast buck, yet we continue to sell them the rope.

Someone on here (I forget who) pointed out quite perceptively that they’ll come to a peace deal, and then with the pen hovering over the paper Russia will say “by the way, this is conditional upon all western sanctions being removed”, and of course when Zelenskiy says that is ridiculous and western sanctions are not under his control Putin can just refer back to his narrative that Zelenskiy is a western puppet and the west are making him sign so the west can remove sanctions…

Mooney_Driver wrote:

What purpose other than to hasten nuclear escalation would a NATO intervention do, what the economical war waged against Russia on a never before seen front won’t do? The message to Putin is clear, he is economically ruined if he continues his path. So he will run out of money to continue this war fairly soon and will be forced to settle.

You missed my point. It wasn’t a point in favour of military intervention, it was a point in favour of leaving Putin somewhat uncertain as to whether NATO might intervene rather than making it really clear to him that we never will. In any case, he’s declared sanctions = a declaration of war, and he’s declared arms shipments = legitimate targets (leaving convenient uncertainty as to the location where he might target them).

Mooney_Driver wrote:

This is where our assessment differs and obviously the assessment of the NATO intelligence as well. One may add that the US appear to have REALLY good intelligence within the Kremlin, seeing as they were the ones to cry the alarm way before anyone else believed it and it was true. If they say the risk is too big, I won’t contradict them.

That’s not what they’re saying. No western pronouncement, as far as I’m aware, has said anything about not getting involved because of the risk of nuclear war. They simply talk about not wanting a NATO-Russia war. Of course most people don’t want that war, but different NATO countries don’t want it for different reasons. The Americans don’t want it because they’d do all the heavy lifting and they wish Europe would just sort itself out. Eastern Europe doesn’t want it because the fighting might spill onto their territory. France doesn’t want it because it doesn’t do putting its forces under NATO command. Germany doesn’t want it for historical reasons, and because its been caught with its pants down with minimal defence spending/capability, and because it still needs Russian gas. Britain is the only militarily-significant NATO country that doesn’t have an obvious reason to shy away from NATO action, and perhaps not coincidentally is the only one to have publicly commented on Putin raising his nuclear alert level, saying it was just posturing and had no practical meaning – i.e. nothing in particular to be afraid of.

Peter wrote:

and if you were doing a first strike (which the West would never do, but Russia might)

Actually, the Soviets once declared a no-first-strike policy to the UN – although Russia has since rescinded it. The US, UK or France have never, to my knowledge, declared such a policy.