Russian invasion of Ukraine

Sadly that was my first thought too - apparently an ex-pupil accourding to BBC, wonder how they'll spin this

Someone else who was just mobilised walked into a bus station with a container of petrol and set himself on fire.

Up until now many have had the opinion of we try not to think about it and just get on with our lives, especially the younger generation. All of a sudden shit starts to get real for them........

My mate's brother did national service back in the early 2000s. A guy who enrolled with him snapped within weeks, shot up the TV room and barricaded himself with a machine gun and tons of ammo. They had to call in professional negotiators to talk him out of it etc.
What they found out later was that the guy had dropped out of school in his early teens and had for several years been in and out of mental health institutions. However, there was no overlap between those health records and the lists the army used. Basically, the army just went by birth records and called in absolutely every male born in a certain year.

One could imagine something similar happening in Russia right now. They are massively interfering in the lives of some very vulnerable people who, up until now, have only managed to cope thanks to little or no interaction with the outside world.

Yeh can't imagine the treatment of PTSD or any other issues is going to be great for the conscripts either when they return from the front, basically destroy a generation of men and all those around them

My dad’s best friend did that in a mess tent during ww2. Dad said it was the worst thing that happened to him in his life.
He served with him until spring 45, the war was basically over, and his friend just lost his mind over a really trivial thing.

Just as a counterpoint, my uncle and cousin both were conscripted and thought it had made their lives better overall. For my uncle he spent a year scuba diving mostly (he was a gendarme search diver) and for my cousin he learned a trade which has supported him and then his family after being spectacularly unsuccessful at school.

That said, France wasn't sending conscripts to fight in wars at either time (although my other, older uncle served on a submarine during the Algerian war and classed it as the worst part of his entire life) so their experience wasn't the same as those thinking they're off to fight.

Being pressganged into the army to fight in a war you probably know is bullshit being "managed" by politicians living thousands of km away is, I am sure, a hugely different experience.

Well my dad was Scots, so there was an immediate threat from Germany right across the Channel.
His buddy had a fight with an officer who wouldn’t let him keep a foam pad they used to sleep on and that was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Dad was working in a radio van
and someone came running and said get to the officers’ mess tent right now. His buddy had a tommy gun and lined up some officers to shoot them. Somehow dad talked him down and got the gun away from him. Then he had to go back to UK for a court martial and the guy ended up in mental hospital.

"You take care of yourselves on your own please"

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/xov88y/russian_mobilized_men_are_asked_to_buy_pads_and/

How to drop morale in 3 easy steps

Also, Snowden got Russian citizenship, maybe he’s lol be sent to the front as well

Apparently the draft officer that got shot didn't die. The guy that shot him will now get sentenced to 6 years for attempted murder rather than 10 years for draft dodging.

Has Russia declared war yet?

Or are we still in special operation mode?

If they do declare war, does that mean that they can use more of the air force, navy, etc? Throwing thousands of untrained men at it seems pointless but if they can mobilise heavier weapons that might change the game?

Maybe.
Suppose the Ukrainian regions subject to referenda are declared to have voted 'Yes',
and the armed forces of Ukraine continue their liberation.
Putin might then (publicly) reluctantly declare a war.

Aren't they drafting prisoners to the front line? Seems fucked either way.

Something occurred to me regarding that vid I linked to above where the sergeant (?) is telling the men to bring their own sleeping bags and med kits.

This brings us back to the 19th and earlier centuries where it was your civic duty to turn up for service with a full kit sourced by your family. The upside was that the expense could pay for itself by taking loot with you back home. In War and Peace there's a brief mention of a German castle being plucked clean by the Russian army. So I am thinking that each Russian soldier told to bring their own sleeping bag will feel A LOT more entitled to loot, rape, treat civilians like slaves etc.

My parents still have stuff in the loft that my grandfather "confiscated from Nazis" at the end of WW2. I don't think there's ever been a war where soldiers haven't looted to some extent, except perhaps where there's nothing worth stealing.

use more of the air force, navy, etc?

I think if they had the resources to use more, then they would already have done so to avoid the embarassment they're currently seeing ... unless everything over the last 6 months has been a huge 50k dead rope-a-dope

How does sabotaging Nord Stream fit in in this war thing? Who benefits from sabotaging it?

Less gas in Europe = higher energy prices = more pressure on EU leaders to drop sanctions?

I thought it would mean Russia couldn't sell gas if they can't transport it.

Yeah it doesn't make sense for them to sabotage it, when they can just turn off the tap

There as been this strange back and forth between russia and Germany about how much gas they send down the pipeline, the russians still want to appear as legitimate business partners so they reduce deliveries for technical reasons or go down for "maintenance" but never openly say they will stop it.
I wonder if they damaged it using submarines and if that is an attack on Nato territory.

Also Germany has nationalized some parts of russian gas businesses.

I can't find a link right now, but I recall a discussion where they argue that they can't "repair" the pipeline because the sanctions prevent them from getting hold of the exact spare parts needed.

It's dumb as fuck, but it seems to me that FSB types consider this sort of thing to be the height of brilliance. Recall how their supposed reason to meet with Donald Trump Jr. was to discuss lifting the ban on foreign adoptions. At the time, regulating adoptions was the Russian counter move to the sanctions heaped upon them after the 2014 annexation of Crimea.

Also Germany has nationalized some parts of russian gas businesses

I mean... Russia nationalized some part of Western oil businesses.

For example TNK-BP was "acquired" by Rosneft. BP could only do business in Russia via the joint venture, and once BP had laid down enough technology and ability to extract oil from the fields Russia moved to ensure that Rusia Petroleum and Rosneft were the only ones who could then earn from those fields. BP were "paid", but really the payment was for the fields in Venezuela they already couldn't access.

It's complicated, as is the way of doing this stuff in a plausibly deniable way... but in essence, Russia nationalised Western interests in Russia.