"You don't know squat. War isn't really rational behavior."

War is actually pretty much all I know. My job is figuring out what tactical tasks need to be completed in order to achieve a military objective. And I'm very good at it.

"The military objectives of the first world war made no sense either, eight million combatants still died."

They made about as much sense as the current Russian military objectives in Ukraine.

"#35 "Regime change" comes to mind as a military objective."

That's a political objective. Not a military objective. Military objectives would be all the things that the military would need to do in order to achieve a political objective.

"Dude refute any of it."

Sure.

Walk me through how Putin "installed" a puppet.

And then walk me through how he killed half a million people.

"it got ugly when putin installed a puppet president who killed a half million americans and tried to overthrow our democracy."

Dude, your head is more ------ up than Effete's

"But by late summer it will be Open, not proxy war."

I've heard many say that...but it doesn't make any sense. It's something people say who don't understand war.

In any war, both sides will establish military objectives. Normally one belligerent in response to the actions of another. What sort of military objectives do you seen NATO pursuing relative to Russia? What sort or Russian objectives do you see the Russians setting relative to NATO?

You may think NATO wants to attack Russia, but it's simply not the case. I can't think of a single offensive military objective the alliance would choose to pursue. Similarly, what does Russia gain in attacking NATO? I can't see anything there either.

And as simple and obvious as it may seem, you can't have war when belligerents have nothing to gain from attacking one another.

Thomas Friedman recently penned an article saying much of the same. And I can't follow his logic either.

#1 I don't know how old you are, you may be really young, but I had a HS classmate whose father was a big part of opening up the first McDonald's in Moscow.

If you're old enough, you may remember this?

"Talk of a coup in Russia is wishful thinking and I don't believe it. Putin is entrenched."

I think Putin's Russia is more like a drug cartel than a western government. Fear keeps the apparatchiks in line. But if he shows any weakness or if they smell blood in the water, they will attack.

"If he's nuts he may not care."

He doesn't really seem to care. He's abandoned any hope of taking anything west of the river. Russia just pulled out of Kharkiv. They're making incremental gains in the east, but the IC doesn't think they are going to be able to maintain what momentum they have for long.

#43

Putin won't use nukes. Doing so would put him in a far worse position than he is already in.

"You win the dumbest post of the year award."

That would only be possible if Speaksoftly hadn't posted anything this year.

"And that's exactly what it amounted to, sniffles and fatigue... Not even a fever."

You had fatigue?

That sucks.

"According to doctors and the test, I had it. And that's exactly what it amounted to, sniffles and fatigue... Not even a fever."

I had it a few weeks back. I basically played XBox and day drank for two weeks.

The problem with North Korea is that I don't know about thier access to booze, and I doubt any of them have an XBox.

I did have a cough, but I had a cough before I tested positive. And I still have a cough.

"After Gorbachev we got Yeltsin."

Who did we get after Yeltsin?

One of the more interesting things we've seen is revival in Soviet nostalgia.

Imagine if a sizeable percentage of the population of Germany started flying Nazi flags and praising Hitler.

"NATO isn't making anyone safer."

Finland disagrees.

"But the smoldering war in the Donbass and constant NATO drills and exercises on the borders of Russia obviously provoked them."

Watch the video I posted, where Tony Blair takes us back to a time when the EU was considering allowing Russia to become a member. There was actually a time when Russia wanted to be a NATO member, if you can believe that. Actually, I think it may have happened several times.

"Do you feel the same way about Iraq?"

I certainly did.

I was about three months away from commissioning as a Second Lieutenant when the coalition invaded Iraq. One of my last papers as a business major was on how the coalition was going to need to find another Saddam if they got rid of Saddam.

I don't normally post videos because I think they are a pain in the ass to sit through, but I think this one needs to be seen. It's Tony Blair discussing Putin from the time he first met him in 2000 until now.

"Yeah, the OK sign may be used in a racist manner. It was hijacked."

I've not heard this.

Is the OK sign like the new secret handshake for some sort of right-wing organization?

This is cool. Finland's military are winter fighters. They excel in capabilities that no current NATO countries can really touch. Hopefully they'll teach the alliance a thing or two.

"They are able to inflict significant damage to a country."

They are able to inflict significant damage on Ukraine. Maybe do the same to Georgia.

The minute they attack a NATO country, they will be slaughtered.

"If the Russians are so weak, why is everyone so afraid?"

I don't know that anyone is afraid.

In fact I think a lot of people in Europe are less afraid now than at any point in history. Russia has demonstrated that it lacks the capability, and more importantly the national will to invade western Europe.

"Did US pressure in the early part of this year make invasion more likely?"

What pressure was that?

As I've said many times, the bulk of the pro-UKR effort is being led by those countries who lived under Russian dominance.

Finland isn't joining NATO because the US, NATO, or anyone else pressured them to do so, they did it because they fear they may be next.

Of course if RUS can't get through UKR, a war against Finland would he hopeless.

"I also don't think Putin's death would necessarily stop the war."

I highly doubt it would. Something like 80% of Russians support the war in Ukraine. Even if you cut that number in half it's still a huge number.

Like I said, I suspect that Putin's replacement will be worse than Putin himself. Until very recently, Putin was a pretty good president and contributor to global stability. We had a pool going on in my office back in February on when or if Putin would invade. Even with access to the full breadth of the US IC, most of us still didn't think he would invade. It didn't fit with what he had done in the past.

"Yawn. More -------- from the Ukrainian's."

This has actually been drifting around the US intelligence community for months. In fact this is the first time I heard UKR make mention of Putin's health.