If Ukraine proves anything is that Russia is a 3rd rate, at best, military. Не могу тусоваться с большими собаками, оставайся на крыльце. Ne mogu tusovatʹsya s bolʹshimi sobakami, ostavaysya na krylʹtse.
In Ukraine the Russian military just gets rid of its old arsenal to fasten the modernization step... It's all going according to "The Plan"... Russia just needs more UAV combat drones, IMHO.
Russia only card is Nukes, they have nothing else. Very unlikely Putin's inner circle wants to perish in nuclear fire, Putin might but not his cronies. Russians are now bringing 1960s tanks, they have only old shit left, lots of it, but very old. All new things like Armata tanks only exists on paper. All was stolen. Russia would loose the war faster than anyone can imagine. And Putin now knows this. All they can do is bluff and use nuclear scare.
Agree, it is the threat of nuclear war that they have more than anything but the consequences of that are beyond comprehension and i can't imagine that step been taken
Correct, all his inner circle are USD billionaires, I highly doubt they willing to sacrifice it all so Putin can blow up the world because his plan to become Peter The Great blew up in his face. My guess if he orders nuclear strike, they will take him out.
About this nuclear war threat: Russia pretends that they will destroy the West and stay unharmed. On TV they said: after the nuclear war we start again. ROFLMAO. So the West is destroyed and Russia has no damage??? Several Western countries have submarines with nuclear missiles. They can be anywhere. For instance in the Baltic Sea less than 100 miles away from St Petersburg... that's closer than the Russian missiles in Kaliningrad. Russia cannot use nuclear as the reaction from the West can cause fallout very close to, or even across the chinese borders. And China does not want any nuclear garbage in their neighbourhood. Destroying the West would destroy the Chinese economy as China exports 80% to the West, and that's a price the Chinese don't want to pay. The Russians made already countless threats, but till today most of these threats never got realized. Finland and Sweden will be member of Nato, so the Russian threat did not work. The Baltic States that are blocking Russian transports would be attacked in such a way that all people would feel it. It was just a DDOS attack. The elephant gave birth to a mouse. The invincible Russian army, which is the second biggest in the world, has to beg for help in all countries around them for help. They need weapons, and even soldiers as the Russian are no keen to go to war. They can even not beat a mini Ukrainian army. A threat loses all his power when executed. Threats can only be efficient if not executed.
Exactly. Nobody wants to die or kill his own family for the megalomaniac Putin who wants to be more famous then any tsar or President before him. His only merit will be that he destroyed Russia much more than any of his predecessors. That will be mentioned in the history books in Russia later.