Lukashenko chose the final way of idiocy today but I guess nothing else was to expect. Putin may be evil and everything but at least he does what he wants. Lukashenko is just his little stupid puppet.

Wishing Germany would stop quibbling and get those Marder tanks out of storage and retrofitted asap to send to Ukraine. Ok, sure they will take some time to refurb and train Ukrainians to use but all the more reason to get on with it.

Also think its high time the US and Poland worked a deal to get those warplanes over to Ukraine as well.

As long as Russia doesn't actually declare war to Ukraine, I think Ukraine will be safe, and will even push the Russians back from where they came. This is because Russia needs to be at war to legally send conscripts to the front. Ukraine did mobilize it's population and has now two to three times as many soldiers at the front as Russia does, and while they're not that well trained, they're still a strong obstacle and just will win more experience the longer the conflict goes on.

And this is the dilemma of Putin. Not declaring war will result in losing the war in Ukraine, while declaring war would mean that his entire propaganda house of cards will fall apart, as it would negate most of the stuff they were saying since the beginning of the conflict.

Worse, the longer he waits to declare war, the more time Ukraine has to dig themselves in and fortify their positions, making it increasingly difficult for Russia to advance without heavy losses, and the higher the losses, the more difficult it will become to hide them under the rug. This will spike dissent, no matter how well-oiled their propaganda machine works, especially among the elderly, who are Putin's biggest supporters, if they get news that their sons died in the conflict.

If you add to this all the Russians who left the country and those who died already and consider that the country has a very aging population already, you can see that the conflict is bleeding Russia dry. Ukrainian refugees will return to Ukraine after the conflict (unless Russia occupies the entire country or tries to create a puppet state under his command), but Russians who fled his regime, which are mostly young and well educated, will not. Their population was already shrinking, and without enough young people to bear children, this will only accelerate further, plus the conflict will discourage any immigration to make up for those losses. By trying to assert his imperial ambitions in Russia, Putin is actually killing his own country.

A few pages back (maybe 30 or so now) was a tweet about Poland also having lots of tanks in storage russian ones (like 1000 or so) in exchange the US would give up some of their Abraham M1As in storage to Poland at a later date. I thought they would have gone across already but US must still be negotiating what to do with them too.

@Bold guessing they don't teach any history classes in France about France and WW2?

Maybe he meant to say oil instead of soil :P

Most probably has to do with the elections, his opponent was until the war one of Putin's biggest supporters in the west, and she has a real shot at winning despite this. If he wins in 2 weeks, the tone against Putin would probably get much more harsh again. If Le Pen wins, then we probably have a France who gladly pays for the gas in roubles.

 Boy, it’s almost like this so-called ‘liberation’ is actually an occupation with major colonial overtones.

With an intent to destroy a national group and their identity by killing them, causing physical & mental harm, kidnapping their children, impregnating the women by raping, destroying their homes, livelihood everything... if only there was a word to describe this.. what do you say Macron?

How is a cruiser class ship the flagship of the Black Sea Russian fleet. Do they not have aircraft carriers or battleships in that fleet?

I'm having my original noob question up even though I found the answer before posting, due to having learned something. Apparently nobody uses battleships anymore. And I guess the black sea fleet wouldn't need aircraft carriers since the sea is located very near Russian land.

Me being right - 0
Me having learned something - 1