[Macros]

How exactly is Putin selling this as a war of liberation?

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

'These [thermobaric] weapons could be particularly devastating when employed against dug-in Ukrainian forces in urban areas.


Russia is moving its TOS-1 launchers into place around cities. These thermobaric artillery systems are extremely nasty and are especially capable of killing people hiding in enclosed areas like subways. They create a powerful pressure wave that does incredible physiological damage and a vacuum that ruptures the lungs. Severe burns are also a part of these weapons' lethal mix. There are fears that these will be unleashed on cities to force capitulation.'


https://www.thedrive...vance-grinds-on


Can any bomb shelters in Ukraine withstand thermobaric ('vacuum') bombs?...

[Malankazooie]

Has there been any analysis made about Putin's state of mind? What's with the large tables for example? He looks more puffy than usual and I'm wondering if he is on a litany of medications.

[Puck]

Malankazooie, on 01 March 2022 - 06:30 PM, said:

Has there been any analysis made about Putin's state of mind? What's with the large tables for example? He looks more puffy than usual and I'm wondering if he is on a litany of medications.

Reportedly, he is pant-shittingly scared of catching Covid.

[QuickTidal]

Everything is fucked, on 01 March 2022 - 08:00 PM, said:

And I haven’t seen a single talking head praising Putin with my own eyes over the course of these 6 days.

T®ucker Carlson was the one that I saw bending the knee to Putin.

I hear he's changed his tune now though?

The original video is easily findable on YouTube. I'm not going to link it and fuck up my algorithm with Fox News BS though.

[Cause]

If there is confirmation of thermobaric weapons use in Ukraine that’s a very bad sign. Since it would mean they have absolutely lost the plot. No justification to use that in anything short of a hardened military target. Dropping one in a city…

Weather Putin thought Russia could weather the sanctions or not I really don’t see what he thought the benefits would be. If he won’t back down which for an autocrat I imagine is very hard to do, short of another autocrat whacking him and taking his place how do we end this.

[Briar King]

Deleted before I saw I was quoted so I will reconstruct the whole thing I guess as best I can from memory.

QuickTidal, on 01 March 2022 - 08:33 PM, said:

Everything is fucked, on 01 March 2022 - 08:00 PM, said:

Considering Putin just was shoring up the Red Pact(my thoughts) in China I say Covid be dammed, he doesn’t want to catch a bullet or a blade. *long empty table

And I haven’t seen a single talking head praising Putin with my own eyes over the course of these 6 days. The banner is even substituting Russia-Russian with Putin like Putin troops for example with increasing frequency.

I can’t speak to Twitter post. I ain’t going there.

Kudos for the standing ovation and walkout today at UN.

T®ucker Carlson was the one that I saw bending the knee to Putin.

I hear he's changed his tune now though?

The original video is easily findable on YouTube. I'm not going to link it and fuck up my algorithm with Fox News BS though.

Idk. I haven’t seen him since just before Olympics ended when he was railing against warmongering over the region.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

QuickTidal, on 01 March 2022 - 01:24 PM, said:

Azath Vitr (D, on 28 February 2022 - 09:10 PM, said:

'[...] Putin might actually use nuclear weapons, particularly tactical (short-range) nuclear weapons, to achieve his military objectives in Ukraine. Again, this is a major reason countries develop such weapons in the first place — to achieve what they think conventional forces cannot.

[...]

Putin might also turn to medium-range nuclear weapons to coerce neighbors in Europe who are seeking to support Ukraine militarily, diplomatically, or politically. Of course, doing the latter against any NATO ally would be extremely escalatory and invoke U.S. commitments to defend its NATO allies [...]

I'll go one further, even though Ukraine is not currently NATO, if Putin uses ANY sort of Nuke against Ukraine or anywhere else...NATO will step up and go "absolutely the fuck not". ANY nuke launched and landed anywhere threatens everyone, and as such Putin would be a dead man walking if he did it. He knows this. He's not stupid. It's just a matter of if he's mad enough to use one....but yeah, it would be the last thing he ever did. The world's hesitation at getting directly involved would evaporate and we'd all be at war.

In fact, the Ukrainian ambassador at the UN said "Putin doesn't need to use Nukes to commit suicide, he should be doing it with a gun to his head in a bunker like Hitler did in 1945".

Would the US be willing to initiate mutually ensured destruction in response to a tactical nuke being used in Ukraine?... Putin would already be hidden away in the best possible bomb shelter deep underground somewhere in Russia's vast expanse, or possibly not even in Russia.... The US already has a plan in place to respond to 'low-yield' (Hiroshima level) use of nuclear weapons by Russia in kind, instead of escalating straight to nuclear annihilation:

'In the past few years, Russian military manuals have outlined a strategy of "escalate to de-escalate." A possible scenario: NATO and Russia are fighting a conventional war; NATO is winning; Russia tries to tip the balance ("escalate") by firing off a small number of low-yield nuclear weapons, probably against concentrations of NATO troops or munitions. ("Low-yield" is a relative term: the smallest nukes in the U.S. and Russian arsenals are about the same size as the A-bomb that leveled Hiroshima at the end of World War II; most of them are thousands of times more powerful.) The hope would be that the U.S. President would halt the war ("de-escalate"), fearing that if he responded by firing off nuclear weapons, Russia would fire off more. (The Pentagon cited this hypothetical several years ago to make the case for buying new low-yield nuclear weapons, so we could respond to this Russian tactic without escalating the fight too much. Some of these warheads are now loaded on the missiles in the Navy's Trident submarines)'

https://slate.com/ne...use-a-nuke.html

'Russia's "Dead Hand" Nuclear Doomsday Weapon is Back [2018]

[...] a Cold War doomsday system that would automatically launch missiles—without the need for a human to push the button—during a nuclear
attack.

[...] "The Perimeter system is functioning, it has even been improved. [...]"

"'Higher authority' would flip the switch if they feared they were under nuclear attack. This was to give the "permission sanction." Duty officers would rush to their deep underground bunkers, the hardened concrete globes, the shariki."'

https://nationalinte...apon-back-38492

'The "Perimeter" system, dubbed in the United States and Europe the "Dead Hand" [...] doesn't only consist of missiles, but also radars alongside the territory of Russia and satellites that gather intel from space. This is a complex computer system that constantly analyses a wide range of parameters - seismic activities, radiation levels, as well as monitors data from the missile warning systems placed alongside the territory.

[...] the Dead Hand's missiles are [article is from December] in the line to receive hypersonic missile blocks.'

https://www.rbth.com...-nuclear-system

But if Putin has enough thermobaric weapons he may not feel the need to risk using nuclear weapons---especially given the nuclear fallout in territories he wants to control, and the proximity to Russia....

IDK if he has anywhere near enough to effectively level a city, as well as its subways and bomb shelters?... Or how effective Ukraine's missile defense systems may remain against widespread thermobaric bombardment.

[amphibian]

Everything is fucked, on 01 March 2022 - 09:33 PM, said:

Idk. I haven’t seen him since just before Olympics ended when he was railing against warmongering over the region.

You didn't see hours of Tucker Carlson carrying water for Putin. Ok. That doesn't mean it didn't happen. You can watch the videos which are easily findable. Or you can read this article: https://www.washingt...-ukraine-putin/

It's embarrassing that he's been doing that and it's very shitty too.

[Tiste Simeon]

Ironic that conservatives, who will call a thing (like say feeding kids in poverty) "communism" and rant for days about beating the commies etc are now trying to frame it that an ex-KGB thug is a hero... Trump himself called Putin a savvy genius. Fascist authoritarians do like to toast each other I suppose.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

'Kremlin TV Tells Ukraine to Listen to Fox News Guest and Kneel to Putin

[...] multiple state media channels broadcast translated video excerpts from Fox News' Sunday night segment with Trey Gowdy. In these clips, Ret. Col. Doug Macgregor suggested that Ukrainian troops lay down their guns, retreat, and let Russian President Vladimir Putin have his way with Ukraine. He also complained that Putin is being "demonized" by the United States and opposed any U.S. involvement in helping Ukraine defend itself from Russian aggression.

[...] Russian state media flooded their programs with translated clips of Macgregor's proclamations, using them in support of their own messaging designed to demoralize the Ukrainians.

Predictably, state TV did not include any clips of Fox News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin's rebuttals that followed Macgregor's appearance, in which she addressed his "distortions" and noted that Macgregor sounded like an "apologist" for Putin.

[...] Host Vladimir Soloviev bitterly added: "They're imposing such sanctions against us, it's a declaration of war. [...] So why should we stop with Ukraine?"

That talking point echoed across multiple government-controlled TV channels. [...] "Biden announced the goal of our special operation: he said that Putin wants to restore the USSR. As though there's anything wrong with that."'

https://www.thedaily...-putin?ref=home

[Maark Abbott]

I think selling the TOS-1 as an artillery piece belies what it's intended to do. The description it bears is "portable flamethrower system"; as my understanding goes, it is designed to burn the air around targets so that they suffocate, if the fire doesn't get them first. Horrific stuff. Very concerning that weapons like that are being used now.

[Macros]

To paraphrase Billy Connolly.

"Oh it's ok they're killing them with nice conventional weapons"

War crime is such a nonsense term, by its actions all war is a crime. It's sanctioned mass murder

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Macros, on 03 March 2022 - 09:08 AM, said:

To paraphrase Billy Connolly.

"Oh it's ok they're killing them with nice conventional weapons"

War crime is such a nonsense term, by its actions all war is a crime. It's sanctioned mass murder

Would you describe killing for self-defense as a crime? For the defense of your nation? Do you then think the Ukrainians defending their country should be considered criminals? Any war of aggression should be a war crime; but the aggressors, especially in modern times, almost always find a way to claim they're 'defending' themselves.

On top of that, some ways to die are much worse---or at least more painful---than others. Would you rather die so fast you barely feel it, or be slowly tortured to death? (That could actually be a difficult question, since a slower death may mean living longer. But an equally swift but more painful death would be preferred by very few.) Granted, conventional bombs can also cause horrific and extraordinarily painful injuries---especially severe burns---that lead to slow death.

Some weapons are much more likely to kill civilians. There is an ethical distinction there as well.

And 'crimes' are fundamentally made up (some perhaps by our evolutionarily selected---or otherwise learned---visceral emotional reactions, though there are certainly complex and ambiguous cultural accretions around the concept). Ethics is a construct; and though there may be empirically grounded utilitarian pseudo-'laws' (game theory and so forth), they are radically dependent on contingent conditions and not universally valid (the empirical arguments for universality of ethical laws are at best crude and suboptimal heuristics).

Back to being more on topic: Russia almost certainly won't use a tactical nuke in Ukraine so long as they have FOAB as an alternative: the thermobaric '"Father of All Bombs" [FOAB ... was designed] to replace several smaller types of nuclear bombs in the Russian arsenal. [...] the bomb's capabilities are comparable to nuclear weapons, but unlike nuclear weaponry [...] does not damage or pollute the environment beyond the blast radius.' (I was mistaken before when I wrote that Russia had allegedly already used FOAB in Ukraine; most thermobaric weapons aren't nearly that powerful.)

OTOH 'The blast radius of the FOAB is 300 meters' whereas a Russian tactical nuke would apparently be at least comparable to Hiroshima, which had a blast radius of about 1 mile = 1609.34 meters.

Father of All Bombs - Wikipedia

'Russia will take a more direct approach in its effort to capture Ukrainian cities after plans to encircle targets such as Kyiv have been frustrated[...]

"We're seeing a change in strategy from the Russian side … They're less focused on encircling cities, more concentrated trying to go in," [...]'

Urban warfare should give the Ukrainian resistance an advantage... however:

'"[Heavier] bombardment is a side effect of that shift,"'

But:

'airspace over Ukraine "remains contested," [...] Ukrainian "air and missile defense systems remain intact" and "remain effective,"'

'40-mile-long convoy of Russian tanks, armored vehicles and towed artillery [...] appears to have stalled some 30 kilometers (about 19 miles) outside Kyiv and has made "little discernible progress" over the past three days'

'"the whole [Russian] logistical chain that is somehow not working [properly]," [...] "So what we've seen is really poor strategy, combined with bad preparation and dwindling morale. [...] They have no food, they lack fuel and also spare parts,"'

https://www.cnn.com/...3-22/index.html

'Kremlin: Putin Won't Back Down From Invasion Until "the End"'

https://www.thedaily...he-end?ref=home

[Macros]

Semantics I guess, no matter what way you cut it, the Russians are criminals here, does that read smoother? Killing is killing, if I bludgeon a man to death with a sock full of rotten potatoes make him any less dead than if I shot him in the face with a 50 cal? Or me any more or less guilty of his murder?

That was my point, people getting outraged that the Russians are going a thermobaric weapon is pointless, be outraged and act the second they made the first move of war, at the first person they killed. So they kill 1000 civilians, but if they kill them with this foab it makes them somehow more reprehensible?

The Russians need to be kicked out and Putin shut down hard, waiting for them to commit more shit before escalating our response just gives them more time to commit more shit. Shut it down, all of it, all banking, all trade, the fucking whole shooting match, North Korea the shit out of them. Will this hurt the average Joseph? Undoubtedly, but it's their buddies, or relatives that are serving in the forces, or working for whatever equates to the KGB and gulag service nowadays. Evil exists when people let it

[QuickTidal]

Russians have martial law on the 4th...that's probably when you'll really start to see the Russian people wake up....when Putin can openly have protestors shot publicly with impunity...

Bloody Sunday (1905) should really be more present in his mind, and him the Tsar (as it were)....but he's too far up his own ass.

The Russian people can stop this, and if he pushes them too far maybe they will. History shows that they don't have a problem with rebuking rulers they feel keep them downtrodden and poor and miserable.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 03 March 2022 - 06:01 PM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Macros, on 03 March 2022 - 05:45 PM, said:

Killing is killing, if I bludgeon a man to death with a sock full of rotten potatoes make him any less dead than if I shot him in the face with a 50 cal? Or me any more or less guilty of his murder?

That was my point, people getting outraged that the Russians are going a thermobaric weapon is pointless, be outraged and act the second they made the first move of war, at the first person they killed. So they kill 1000 civilians, but if they kill them with this foab it makes them somehow more reprehensible?

Even if we disregard what seem like very clear differences in how much the people being killed suffer, most people will perceive the threat of being painfully and gruesomely murdered, with maximal suffering inflicted, as worse than the threat of a 'cleaner' death with less suffering. Being able to credibly threaten a particularly grisly death with maximal suffering without any difference in potential punishment would promote those types of murders and have the practical effect of giving potential murderers more psychological (and consequently socioeconomic and physical) power.

So if we hold that ethics should be based around minimizing suffering or around optimizing societal function, there should be a legal and ethical distinction between different types of ethically unjustified premeditated murder, even if there isn't also a greater risk of civilian casualties or widespread or long-lasting ramifications (for example from biological or nuclear weapons...). These are practical distinctions. To the extent that treating (for example) chemical weapons as fundamentally worse has acted as a deterrent, it has resulted in less suffering and taken away some of the power of killers.

But in the case of Putin, I don't think he gahff....

[Macros]

and therin lies my problem with that thought train.

any use of military force as strong arming, intimidation or outright force of arms invasion is criminal, be it with pointy sticks or nuclear bombs, you are in the wrong.

Fuck dictators, fuck war mongers and fuck anyone who thinks they can justify an invasion of another country with empty rhetoric and lies

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Macros, on 03 March 2022 - 06:33 PM, said:

and therin lies my problem with that thought train.

any use of military force as strong arming, intimidation or outright force of arms invasion is criminal, be it with pointy sticks or nuclear bombs, you are in the wrong.

Fuck dictators, fuck war mongers and fuck anyone who thinks they can justify an invasion of another country with empty rhetoric and lies

To the extent that 'war crimes' implies a war of aggression is not itself a crime, yes, the phrase is problematic and should (probably) be replaced. But the ethical (and legal) distinction should not be erased, at least to the extent it acts as a practical deterrent.

[Chance]

QuickTidal, on 03 March 2022 - 06:00 PM, said:

The Russian people can stop this, and if he pushes them too far maybe they will. History shows that they don't have a problem with rebuking rulers they feel keep them downtrodden and poor and miserable.

Really this is one of the worst possible outcome civil war in russia would be a nightmare. Putin would fight popular uprising and syria would look like a happy misunderstanding compared to that.

Of course pretty much any likely outcome by now looks pretty horrible.

This post has been edited by Chance: 03 March 2022 - 07:11 PM