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Forums - Politics Discussion - Russia and Ukraine flashpoint

Ryuu96 said:

"We are giving all of our 155mm howitzers to Ukraine and we want to set a precedent in this way so that other countries don’t have excuses why they can’t give Ukraine the weapons to win the war,” Estonian Ambassador to Ukraine Kaimo Kuusk said.

Estonia Donates All Of Its 155mm Howitzers and Other Weapons to Ukraine

Not sure how this is going to matter when Estonia has the luxury of not sharing a border with Russia, unlike Germany and France who do and therefore have to maintain their own ability to defend themselves.

As usual, the hesitance of the EU comes down to its two biggest member states having disproportionally high control over how things are handled within the EU. Especially Germany with its biggest government party SPD and chancellor Scholz remains very, very, very, very, very ambiguous; no matter how much journalists ask for explanations, there won't be any. Hardly surprising, because it's extremely difficult to explain bullshit.

Yesterday's political talk show brought the usual song and dance from the SPD representative, repeatedly falling back on the defense that his party has already granted various weapon deliveries in the past, conveniently leaving out that every damn time the SPD held out until the point that it couldn't anymore and had to be dragged by everyone else to make the correct decision.

Granted, it was pretty stupid of Poland to imply that Germany is blocking deliveries when Poland had yet to submit a formal request. Then again, we don't know what has been going on behind the scenes, so all the informal talks between the two countries may have gone in the direction of Germany not being to willing to grant permission.

Nevertheless, the EU has values, it insists. Such great values that 11 months after the start of the war it still needs to take its sweet time, because hurting the feelings of fascists may not be morally okay. Sooooo frustrating.



Legend11 correctly predicted that GTA IV will outsell Super Smash Bros. Brawl. I was wrong.

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RolStoppable said:
Ryuu96 said:

"We are giving all of our 155mm howitzers to Ukraine and we want to set a precedent in this way so that other countries don’t have excuses why they can’t give Ukraine the weapons to win the war,” Estonian Ambassador to Ukraine Kaimo Kuusk said.

Estonia Donates All Of Its 155mm Howitzers and Other Weapons to Ukraine

Not sure how this is going to matter when Estonia has the luxury of not sharing a border with Russia, unlike Germany and France who do and therefore have to maintain their own ability to defend themselves.

Where do you think Russia is on the map. If you think it shares a border with Germany and France and not with Estonia. Maybe your confusing Russia with Switzerland. 



FlashmanHarry said:
RolStoppable said:

Not sure how this is going to matter when Estonia has the luxury of not sharing a border with Russia, unlike Germany and France who do and therefore have to maintain their own ability to defend themselves.

Where do you think Russia is on the map. If you think it shares a border with Germany and France and not with Estonia. Maybe your confusing Russia with Switzerland. 

Rol is being sarcastic.

Basically saying Germany and France are a bunch of undeceive scared loonies who act like they border Russia and therefore finding every excuse they can not to send weapons.



 

 

FlashmanHarry said:
RolStoppable said:

Not sure how this is going to matter when Estonia has the luxury of not sharing a border with Russia, unlike Germany and France who do and therefore have to maintain their own ability to defend themselves.

Where do you think Russia is on the map. If you think it shares a border with Germany and France and not with Estonia. Maybe your confusing Russia with Switzerland. 

I've personally found it quite useful to stop and doubt my line of thought when I notice someone act in what seems like an unbelievably stupid manner to me. It often reveals a point of view I missed myself. Sometimes people really are dumb, but it it's not at all rare that it's me that missed some angle on the matter instead.





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Scholz makes me sick and he doesn't even do it to be an asshole. He really believes it's the right thing what he does which makes me even more sick.



crissindahouse said:

Scholz makes me sick and he doesn't even do it to be an asshole. He really believes it's the right thing what he does which makes me even more sick.

It's pretty sad that they aren't sending any themselves (yet) and that they even have to do an audit of their stock (unless that is a lie), I'd have thought any competent military would already know what it stocks and the state it is in, especially for more recent equipment and shouldn't they have done this months or even weeks ago?

I think after this is all over, a few countries are going to be second guessing their military deals with Germany, Scholz has potentially done notable damage to Germany's military industry if other countries are spooked by Germany's actions over the course of this war, and Germany is meant to be a leader of Europe. I'm surprised (or maybe I haven't seen it) that KMW and Rheinmetall aren't more pissed at Scholz.

I'd feel a bit uncertain as a country if I couldn't send my tanks to an ally because of Scholz's scared, feet dragging and seriously start considering switching my Leopard's out for another supplier who fucks around less, I.E. America, UK or South Korea. Of course other things matter though such as who actually has the best tank for the environment...Not an expert in how Leopard compares to Abram, Challenger and K2 Black Panther.

They're heading in a more positive direction by finally not blocking others from sending Leopards, but if it takes longer than a couple of weeks to approve Poland's request (even a couple of weeks is being kind to Scholz), then Scholz can get fucked, Lol. It'll be pretty sad if we end up in a situation where almost everyone is sending MBTs aside from Germany though, I hope once the floodgates are opened that Germany will be alongside us.

Last edited by Ryuu96 - on 24 January 2023

WASHINGTON—The Biden administration is leaning toward sending a significant number of Abrams M1 tanks to Ukraine and an announcement of the deliveries could come this week, U.S. officials said.

The announcement would be part of a broader diplomatic understanding with Germany in which Berlin would agree to send a smaller number of its own Leopard 2 tanks and would also approve the delivery of more of the German-made tanks by Poland and other nations. It would settle a trans-Atlantic disagreement over the tanks that had threatened to open fissures as the war drags into the end of its first year.

U.S. Leans Toward Providing Abrams Tanks to Ukraine - WSJ



Ryuu96 said:

It's pretty sad that they aren't sending any themselves (yet) and that they even have to do an audit of their stock (unless that is a lie), I'd have thought any competent military would already know what it stocks and the state it is in, especially for more recent equipment and shouldn't they have done this months or even weeks ago?

I think after this is all over, a few countries are going to be second guessing their military deals with Germany, Scholz has potentially done notable damage to Germany's military industry if other countries are spooked by Germany's actions over the course of this war, and Germany is meant to be a leader of Europe. I'm surprised (or maybe I haven't seen it) that KMW and Rheinmetall aren't more pissed at Scholz.

I'd feel a bit uncertain as a country if I couldn't send my tanks to an ally because of Scholz's scared, feet dragging and seriously start considering switching my Leopard's out for another supplier who fucks around less, I.E. America, UK or South Korea. Of course other things matter though such as who actually has the best tank for the environment...Not an expert in how Leopard compares to Abram, Challenger and K2 Black Panther.

They're heading in a more positive direction by finally not blocking others from sending Leopards, but if it takes longer than a couple of weeks to approve Poland's request (even a couple of weeks is being kind to Scholz), then Scholz can get fucked, Lol. It'll be pretty sad if we end up in a situation where almost everyone is sending MBTs aside from Germany though, I hope once the floodgates are opened that Germany will be alongside us.

Even if it would take months, since the crews need several months of training and that this will be provided by Poland already, it would still not delay fielding the Leopard tanks - at least not in an effective manner. But the faster the approval comes, the better, and it could also incite others to send their Leopards to Ukraine afterwards.

Scholz is like a relikt of the Cold War, a person who fears nothing more than Soviet Union Russia going nuclear, and thus tries to provoke the Russian bear the least amount possible. But it's too late for that: The bear is angry, but most of it's teeth are missing and it's claws are dulled. Still, it's a big angry bear, and it needs more than that to keep it from attacking, and he should support Ukraine to make it possible.

It could be that Scholz fears less Putin and more his hardline supporters, which Putin so far managed to sideline. It seems like those are much more trigger-happy when it comes to using nukes, and so Scholz possibly doesn't want to give them ammunition in their quest to escalate the war.

Still, that doesn't make it right, or anywhere close to it. I could understand if they just blocked the latest versions (2A6/2A7) to avoid Russia getting their hands on military tech to potentially copy/reverse engineer, but most Leopard 2 are A4 versions or derivates of it, which were build and designed in the 80's and 90's, so they don't offer anything that Russia doesn't know already from a hardware standpoint.

Also, it doesn't make much sense waiting for the US sending tanks to Ukraine unless you specifically want to not send any tanks. The M1 Abrams is very high maintenance (especially on fuel due to it's guzzling gas turbine), too much for an army with the limited engineering capabilities like Ukraine, and Scholz certainly knows that, too.

France at least is working on sending Leclerc Tanks. And this is despite the production lines of the Leclerc being closed already since 2008, so they are pretty much irreplaceable for France. As such, I can understand some degree of hesitance on their side, and why Macron has to work out a more specific option instead of simply sending surplus tanks. But at least He's doing something, not simply stalling like like Scholz

Last edited by Bofferbrauer2 - on 24 January 2023

Awesome.

Next up, Jets and ATACMS.

Last edited by Ryuu96 - on 24 January 2023