Russia is preparing for a military confrontation with the West within the next decade and could be deterred by a counter buildup of armed forces, Estonia's Foreign Intelligence Service said on February 13.
Financial Times: “Russia intends to double the number of its troops stationed along its border with the Baltic states and Finland as it prepares for a potential military conflict with NATO within the next decade, according to Estonia’s foreign intelligence service.”
If they can't take Ukraine with the US providing the bare minimum amount of aid the Republicans will allow, I'm curious what they think they can accomplish against our best efforts in an actual war.
I'm not curious at all. Let's just stop this shit already.
How unlikley is it they've held back at minimum one airplane and a big ass bomb (atomic, nuclear, etc, I have no idea) for the USA? Best effort or not, if one thing gets through some people are fucked. Some is more then none and that's too much.
On the other hand the United States has been politically gridlocked for the last 15 years because of Russian puppets. For some of us that's been as good as a death sentence.
Imagine Trump being in office and him basically kneecapping any response to Russian aggression in Europe. He could bring the US to its knees by trying to play wannabe dictator and tying us up dealing with all the civil unrest that will follow from that. Meanwhile, Europe is left to its own devices to try to handle Russia on its own (with Trump even likely providing intelligence to Russia or even withholding aid to Europe, as he's already promised to do). All signs are kind of pointing to this eventuality if Trump gets elected, and Republicans are too dumb to understand it (or they don't care, because "F* Europe", right?).
Yeah, let's see... So far Ukraine was able to take down planes deep into Russia's territory, bomb Moscow, sink flagship of the Russian Navy, disable the most protected bridge in the country and bomb HQ of Black Sea fleet. All that with spare European weapons and toys. You really think that Europe would need US help to fight Russia? This war has proven that Russian army is in terrible state. Their weapons are shit and commanders are incompetent. They are struggling with a army 1/5th their size. Russia is once again back to their WWI strategy of sacrificing thousands after thousands of soldiers. At this point one has to be delusional to think Russia could fight Europe.
War isn't won by forces alone, you also need the economy, morale and political wherewithal to endure and survive the destruction.
Neither EU country could stomach a prolonged war, possibly only the Baltics and Finland are at all prepared for a couple years of war, and won't be able to supply their troops for that long without US support.
Case in point, Europe is giving about half of the total aid for Ukraine, but almost none of the armaments even though it would be far more preferable for relations, training, logistics, and defence. Part of it is that they don't keep stockpiles, part is that they don't have the industry to replace ammunition, neither of which bodes well for a prolonged conflict.
I think Putin knows that he can get off five or six nukes on strategic cities to destabilize Europe and America without much additional repercussion, assuming it is already at war with the West.
The West cannot nuke Russia back because their major retaliatory strike package is automatic, under dead hand control, and would surely cause global nuclear winter.
Or, maybe the West retaliated and nukes some Russian cities without triggering the dead hand. Putin absolutely doesn't give a shit if tens of millions of Russian civilians die. It literally will not matter to him in any sense. He will still be a billionaire oligarch living in obscene luxury and will still remain president as a long as he desires.
Your best effort? Nuclear armageddon. Both europe and russia will be wiped off of world map. US might be able to survive but some towns will be Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
That is with your best effort, so save your fucking bullshit.