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You think Putin would not start nuking things if the Ukranians were advancing across the boarder and throwing conventional cruise missiles at targets in the interior?
Why cruise missiles, why this specific modality of escalation and not any other? I mainly meant more drones for the interior, but even for missiles, what does it matter?
Reminder: Russian interior is being routinely attacked now. Sometimes it's an entire border region being wrecked, sometimes it's a military airfield many hundreds of kilometers from the border, sometimes it's Moscow proper, and not just «a building» but a part of the city's business core, where progressive and corrupt Muskovites exchange crypto for USD under the watchful eye of FSB minders on a direct line to their Seychelles office, a sacred place. Sometimes it's straight up Kremlin. Ukrainians are routinely destroying infrastructure, have assassinated more than one propagandist near the heart of Russia, and in general are acting with complete brazen confidence that Putin is a bluffing bitch ruling a pyramid of treachery, grift and sheer indifference. What is the reason to believe otherwise? Answer me honestly, would you have anticipated two years ago that all this can be done to the Second Strongest Military Superpower without triggering the Judgement Day?
No, I am not 100% sure there is no level of attack which will trigger a nuclear response. But I am mostly confident it's not about Russia. Touch Kabayeva's child, Shoygu or Zolotov, you'll risk a great deal. Leave them alone and you're free to win the war by any means available. Even nuking major cities might not be off limits. Putin does not give a shit about much of anything geopolitical, he's shallower than a right-wing Twitter influencer, has no commitments and values his own life dearly.
@Botond173, do you have any argument except a sneer that looks to be frozen since 26/02/2022, when steel columns of Russian forces were advancing towards Kiev?
And? Where's the punchline that teaches us how they were wrong and you were right?
It was "advancing across the border" and cruise missiles -- with the advancing being the most important part. I do think if American cruise missiles were in frequent use by Ukraine rather than whatever bullshit they have cobbled together at the moment things would be considerably twitchier.
The point being that the fact that nothing so far has happened that approaches (what I imagine to be) Russia's nuclear threshold does not make me feel comfortable that the threshold does not exist somewhere in the near-ish possibility space.
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I recall a quip from an acquaintance or maybe a channel in Telegram that "Ukrainians deliberately struck the Moscow skyscrapers outside of working hours because they were afraid of Retaliation otherwise". I suppose the Red Line is now at "you can drone our capital as long as you don't accidentally kill anyone".
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The cruise missile strikes were accurate enough that no Russian units were hit. We know that. But it was possible for things to go a different way. Thankfully we didn't have to learn if those critics were right or not.
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Yes, this is what ardent supporters of the Ukraine basically believe, unironically. Namely that, in the end, all Ukrainians lands can and will be liberated by force, and that either Putler will not dare to escalate the war so as to avoid complete defeat, or that whoever replaces him after a palace coup, revolution etc. will not dare either. You’d think that basing your entire policy on this assumption is lunacy, but this is where we’re at.
Incidentally I observed the same attitude when Trump ordered missile strikes on Syrian military bases back in 2017 and 2018. There were reasonable people who made the argument that launching cruise missiles at military targets in a country where Russian anti-aircraft and air force units are present might result in rather dangerous escalation if any of those units are hit by mistake. A bunch of people on the net immediately waved these concerns off and trivialized the whole issue, saying “nah, everybody involved is just posturing, it’s just bullshit, if anything happens, they’ll just sort it out in some backroom deal”. But based on their opinions voiced before, it was clear that what they actually mean is “nah, the Moskal will not dare to do anything”. It was clear that yes, they actually believed that the Russkies will not actually respond if their units are “accidentally” smashed by cruise missiles.
Russia isn’t going to nuke Washington DC or New York if the Ukrainians fire some missiles into the interior, and in any case they don’t have the manpower to attempt a land invasion or anything close to it. But I don’t think @DaseindustriesLtd is a particularly ill informed NAFO shill and, in any case, I’d wager he knows more about Russia than you.
You're right, but that's not what I've meant. It's conceivable that the Russians would deploy nuclear weapons against Ukrainian units if the collapse of the Crimean front seems imminent.
I have actually bet money, on terms that seemed favorable, on Russia nuking major bridges over Dnieper (yes, including Kiev), more than a year ago. You can imagine how it went.
Anyway, the most important question is: does the US need to make totally sure that Russia won't nuke Ukraine? Because I think "oh shit, Russians have nuked Ukraine in desperation" is not the worst piece of news for the State Department.
Indeed it isn't, but that's not the point.
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