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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   28000 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026

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Everything is possible. Another possibility is Ukrainian infighting. There's a coalition that really wants the war to continue: groups funded by the EU, Dems and GOP neocons, armchair nationalists, Ukrainian MIC. There's a coalition that really wants the war to stop: Trumpists, regular businessmen, populist opposition, closeted pro-Russians.

If the peace talks really reached the point where the purely symbolic (but still incredibly contentious) question of the rest of Donbass was the only remaining one, then Trump successfully pressuring Zelensky to accept the loss of it would be a real possibility. Assassinating a GRU general when his superior was in charge of the talks would be a good way to sabotage them by sowing distrust. Let Budanov lose face and explain whether he's lost control over the various alphabet agencies or is just duplicitous.

Ukraines best fortifications are all in the rest of the Donbas, so it is in no way a purely symbolic issue. Also, their whole strategy is to atrit the Russians by playing defense, so every meter of land is valuable because they can make the Russians pay in blood for it. If there was any reason to trust the Russians not to just resume the war after being given the Donbas, the Ukrainians would probably be willing to do that, but there isn’t, so giving it up without a fight is massively unpopular in Ukraine.

...

I’ve heard the opposite. I can’t understand that video, but other sources I can find all claim half a million Ukrainian casualties not dead. This claims 1.2 million Russian casualties, which would make it a bit over 2 Russian casualties per Ukrainian. https://www.csis.org/analysis/russias-grinding-war-ukraine (and the ratio of those casualties is higher because it’s hard to medivac people on the assault in this war.

There are of course lots of people willing to lie on both sides, so I could be wrong, but it doesn’t really make sense to me that Russians would be taking fewer casualties than the Ukrainians. This is not maneuver warfare. Attacking is brutal under these conditions, and the Russians keep doing it. The side that is deliberately using disposable troops having fewer deaths just doesn’t pass the smell test. Also, the fact that the Ukrainians have been holding the line so long just doesn’t seem plausible if they were taking such bad trades.

You should strongly consider the possibility that you have been consuming propaganda. I know that I have, because all of the information about the war is propaganda. Do a little first principal reasoning about the nature of the war to see what seems reasonable to decide which propaganda to put stock in.

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The Russians aren't storming head on. They are semi surrounding fortresses and then droning the Ukrainian logistics. To make matters worse for Ukraine Russia has a clear advantage in air power and in thermobaric MLRS that allow them to pound these fortifications.

Both sides are droning one another’s logistics. This is much harder on the attacking side because going on the assault requires more resources and manpower.

Are you asserting that the Russians are losing fewer men and the Ukrainians?

thermobaric MLRS

Do you have a link? From what I've heard, it's mostly precision-guided glide bombs these days.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TOS-2

The Russians use it to clear out areas before attack.

It isn't exactly new or sophisticated technology if that is what you're alluding to. The Wehrmacht utilized a rather simplistic launcher system during WW2 already which produced the same devastating effect on enemy infantry.

No, that's not what I'm alluding to. Thermobaric weaponry is well-known, I just don't hear a lot of complaints from the Ukrainians about it.

There's no real reason to storm Ukraine's best fortifications head-on if taking Ukraine is the goal.

I agree. They should sit back and use their glide bomb advantage to just pound away. The Russians keep doing it anyway.

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