Checks out. Got to capitalise on having his asset installed in the highest office of the US before things risk stabilising.
this post was submitted on 30 Mar 2025
330 points (100.0% liked)
Europe
6 readers
50 users here now
News and information from Europe 🇪🇺
(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)
Rules (2024-08-30)
- This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
- No links to misinformation or commercial advertising. When you post outdated/historic articles, add the year of publication to the post title. Infographics must include a source and a year of creation; if possible, also provide a link to the source.
- Be kind to each other, and argue in good faith. Don't post direct insults nor disrespectful and condescending comments. Don't troll nor incite hatred. Don't look for novel argumentation strategies at Wikipedia's List of fallacies.
- No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism.
- Be the signal, not the noise: Strive to post insightful comments. Add "/s" when you're being sarcastic (and don't use it to break rule no. 3).
- If you link to paywalled information, please provide also a link to a freely available archived version. Alternatively, try to find a different source.
- Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in !yurop@lemm.ee. (They're cool, you should subscribe there too!)
- Don't evade bans. If we notice ban evasion, that will result in a permanent ban for all the accounts we can associate with you.
- No posts linking to speculative reporting about ongoing events with unclear backgrounds. Please wait at least 12 hours. (E.g., do not post breathless reporting on an ongoing terror attack.)
(This list may get expanded when necessary.)
We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.
If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.
If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the mods: @federalreverse@feddit.org, @poVoq@slrpnk.net, or @anzo@programming.dev.
founded 9 months ago
MODERATORS
Russia can't even take over Ukraine and they'll take on entire NATO? Even if we exclude USA from it there is just no chance. Only if dumbass Trump collaborates with Russia to attack NATO together. That would be WW3 then...
They're already quite successful in hybrid warfare against NATO and EU.
Probing NATO's security guarantees doesn't mean taking it on fully. It means testing out how far you can go without them fully committing with military.
There’s this old saying that goes something like: "The European Airforce could beat Russia any day of the week - as long as they don’t have to do it the next week as well."
Meaning, the most pressing problem are our ammunition stockpiles. If you research that you’ll quickly see how bad the situation is in the EU currently. The Bundeswehr could, according to top generals, not stay in a fight for more than one or two weeks before running out of artillery shells, missiles and bombs.
Then there’s also the issue of lacking infrastructure, the absence of a unified command structure in Europe and with the withdrawal of the US, also a lack of strategic capabilities (awacs, satellite data, military intelligence, air tankers, heavy lift helicopters, …).
Russia has the same problem as the same problem has the US, but supercharged it. They made the military the backbone of the economy and main social safety net, so they need to be in a permanent state of conflict to justify it.
That’s not at all comparable to the American economy, wtf dude.
To different scales it is. The US has been using the armed forces as an employer of last resort, and defense factories are the only thing keeping some regions afloat. Of course the US economy is significantly more developed outside of the military, but if the US were to scale back its military there would be transversal cracks all over the economy and society.
Not surprised. The level of European alarm about the Russian threat being real has been greater than what could have been sustained without there being secret direct evidence.
Here's hoping when he does that and immediately starts to lose, he doesn't decide to end the world.
Based on intel from my MI buddies, most of Putin's nukes are probably nonfunctional. They tried to test one not long ago and it blew up, taking out the entire launch facility.
Russia's nukes are more or less a bluff.
This is an incredibly dangerous assumption. According to the Federation of American Scientists Russia has a stockpile of 4489 warheads of which some 1674 strategic warheads are deployed on ballistic missiles.[1] A large part of these warheads might be defective but realistically you only need a handful of working ones. Russia also has the necessary material and infrastructure to keep their warheads in working order.[2] So while their capabilities compared to the USSR are greatly diminished there is no reason to assume that Russias nukes are all in non-working condition.
[1] https://fas.org/publication/nuclear-notebook-russian-nuclear-weapons-2023/
[2] https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2002-10/features/breakdown-breakout-us-and-russian-warhead-production-capabilities
I'm not saying to assume they don't all work. I'm saying to diaregard their threats of using thembecause they likely won't.
Consider this, if only 10% of the warheads work that still leaves over 400 working bombs. Even in the unlikely situation where Russia didn't know which ones where in working condition they could just resort to throwing 10 bombs at a target instead.
We also haven't even defined what not-working means. You could for example classify a hydrogen bomb that doesn't trigger it's fusion stage as non-working. The primary stage of a thermonuclear bomb can still have a yield of a few hundred kilotons of TNT. The bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki where well below that.
For these reasons I consider the "Russian nukes don't work" a nice fantasy at best. The threat is real and only kept in check by western nuclear counterstrike capabilities.
They have >1000. They only need a 1% success rate.
Based on intel from my MI buddies
I really hope you're lying about that.
I was US Army Signal Corp about 20 years ago. We worked closely with MI, and those guys gave me the info.
where are we? the war thunder forums?
Nothing spills military secrets like having to be right on the internet!
Wouldn’t Russia have to suddenly produce a lot more young men who are still alive to invade any more countries?
Men who are still alive
Oh no... Putin found Dunharrow. Being alive isn't needed.
No, it'd have to ensure France. Which means if they struck France could nuke Moscow. If. Anyone in Russia gave a shit, they'd slaughter Putin's family now.
How else do you save those lives
What is the size of the army in men/woman for Russia? Given the last 3 years, their demographic should be impacted overall, isn’t it?
It is definitely impacted but you also need to consider how indoctrinated and thoroughly militarized the younger generations are at this point. Russia might not have good birth rates, but their children are forced to learn marching in formation early on (I think it was at kindergarten level) and practice with wooden rifle mockups.
https://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/europa-krieg-szenarien-bnd-bundeswehr-li.3227229
translation
Germany's supreme soldier is convinced that Russia is preparing for a great war. Even after a possible ceasefire in Ukraine, Germany has no time “to take a deep breath”, says the Inspector General of the Bundeswehr, Carsten Breuer. Russia continues to upgrade and has doubled the number of soldiers compared to pre-war times. The Russian military structure is clearly against the West. Therefore, an end to the war on Ukraine will not lead to “we have peace again on the European continent,” he said in the talk show “Maischberger” recently.
This coincides with the assessment of Jörg Schmitt, the deputy head of the investigative department of the Süddeutsche Zeitung. Together with colleagues from WDR and NDR, he was able to evaluate the situation analyses of the BND and the Bundeswehr. By the end of the decade, Russia could create the conditions for a large-scale conventional war against NATO, regardless of the war in Ukraine.
According to these sources, Moscow could try to test the Nato with various scenarios, says Schmitt. For example, by provocations in the Baltic region or in the Arctic. Vladimir Putin is concerned with exploring the US's responsiveness and assistanceUSA.
I hope Putin dies before that. And in such a personal regime his dead and the consequent fight for power could lead to big changes in Russia.
So let's hope Zelensky was right, and it's sooner than later.
His replacement is going to have to do something big to legitimize their rule