Oddbean

#politics #russia I think Russia retaliating by attacking a US military base overseas, or even a carrier strike group, won't be effective. The only way to send a message America understands, a message so strong that everybody will 'wake up' and start thinking rationally and thinking twice about attacking Russia, is for Russia to attack the American homeland with a conventional strike.

Of course it must be well signalled that this is tit-for-tat (homeland strike for homeland strike) not an escalation, just a retaliation under international law, and that the attack is not nuclear (that has to be signalled in a provable way).

You think 100 words is suffice to cover this gravest of topics, Sir🤔. We are used, to a much more detailed and nuisanced discourse, Mike. Come on man, pull your fucking finger out🤷🏻‍♂️.

Simply put: it is not in Russia's best interest to start a direct war with the U.S., any more than it is for Iran to start a direct conflict with Israel. Both parties know what it means to wake the Big Dogs. It's war via proxy from here on out.

The U.S. started a direct war (in all but name) with Russia. If Russia doesn't respond to that, it sends a signal back to the US that they can escalate it further. Those escalations will not stop until the American people push back. The question is whether they would push for descalation or they would push for revenge. History shows us that most people push for revenge... and so yes it would probably just escalate further. But how then does Russia defend itself? Must it lay down in defeat and let Anthony Blinken fly in and take over the Kremlin? My thinking here isn't advice to Russia. I'm trying to suss out what they might do by putting myself in their shoes. And I don't have a good prediction at this point, but this discussion does help.

They started a proxy war the minute they started flying refueling loops. This is a progression, sure, but it doesn’t really mean anything. I could see Russia pulling an Iran, maybe, as a response: flinging some missiles in the general direction of an American installation and then saying, “This matter is concluded.” But that’s about it. I’ve been of the personal opinion that the US’s plan is just to continue to keep this going for as long as possible, with Uncle Sam providing the goodies. I don’t think there’s a Russian regime change on the horizon, either. Nobody really wants peace, and Russian ineptitude guarantees there will be no real victory. And I think the powers that be are fine with that.

I think that "US interests" want to spend all the allocated money while they can, because they clip that ticket and want to be paid as much as they can be paid. But there are other ways to embezzle and cheat the American taxpayer without also escalating a conflict against a nuclear power. I don't think a Russian regime change makes any sense at all for the West. Putin is one of the doves. A regime change would escalate the war significantly. Okay, now that I typed that out, now I understand why they want a regime change. They want a bigger war.

Don’t think that’s in Put’s favor. Europe seems ready to negotiate and direct military strike would unify many corners of the world against him. Now he can try and wait it out until Biden kicks or Trump gets in. Still a land/resource/access grab and re-unifying Europe with US would be counter.

You'd be right if he used nukes. But I think a limited well-signaled conventional military strike under Article 51 would unify many corners of the world WITH Russia not against. Most countries in the world secretly resent the USA but play along with them because they know who has the power. Once BRICS showed up and Russia-China relations warmed, we started to see many nations that seemed like Western allies turn away from strict allegence to the West, either to hedge their bets and play both sides, or to join the other side economically, or policy wise, or sometimes even militarily. Negotiation is the best path if all sides want it. Maybe some European countries want to negotiate. Does the UK? Does the US? Does Ukraine? Are they signalling this by launching ATACMS and Storm Shadows deeper into Russia?

Agree with some of your thinking - still think a strike on US soil is a bridge too far - may just be hopeful thinking. the quasi-axis of US- UK-Ukraine seem to feel the heat of the incoming admin and are like - WTF, if we just escalate the fuck out of it the Trump admin will have to clean up, even if they want to negotiate… the darker side takes that to the extreme with Biden out of it and his cabal going out scorched earth. Just think a strike on US regardless would unleash the hawks rather than send us to the negotiating table.

I'm not suggesting Russia should take this action. When I wrote this I was literally thinking that any lesser action would fail to wake American's up to what is going on... not that Russia necessarily *should* wake American's up to what is going on.

Nah. They'd probably be better off striking the UK than the US for a lot of reasons if they did feel the need to strike directly at a NATO member and risk article 5 being triggered. That said, the war is still asymmetric enough that the grinding war of attrition does seem to be a channel the Kremlin would be wise to stay in, with any directed retaliation for the long range missiles carefully calculated. Strangling the energy supply to the EU during the winter may well be a solid enough method -- their likelihood of dodging a bullet on weather with a mild winter two years in a row is pretty low -- buy the strategy right now seems to be to pry the EU away from America, rather than galvanize the alliance. Truth be told if I were Putin I'd likely be looking for a very symbolic response that won't force Trump's hand to escalate. Giving Ukraine long range missiles and the authorization to use them to strike Russia was Biden's way of flipping the checkerboard, and poisoning the well that Trump just won from him. Putin does have to save face, but he doesn't have to walk right into Biden's trap.

hitting a factory that makes these Storm Shadow cruise missiles in UK would probably make sense of course the UK media would say it was not a weapons factory but some kindergarten that was hit by Putin and show pictures of dead children from Gaza as proof

Lol, people are so delusional. Interesting how should some topics be categorized. Some topics like accounting or emergent dental services are topics people who dgaf don’t try to seem experts But there are topics where the less people know the more experts they try to be. How should those topics clusters be called?