Russia-Ukraine War

[fiksal]

it does have this feeling

well, a step in the right direction for Russia, more people fighting for something they want to avoid thinking about

[mr.WHO]

Anyone read the 28-point peace plan?

While it's not perfect, it's first Trumps brainlet, that is somewhat good starting point towards workable solution.


1. Ukraine's sovereignty will be confirmed.
Russian L - no more Russian talking point about Ukraine state or goverment illegitimacy.

2. A comprehensive non-aggression agreement will be concluded between Russia, Ukraine and Europe. All ambiguities of the last 30 years will be considered settled.
Russian L - no more Russian talking point about how evil NATO encroaches on poor Russia.

3. It is expected that Russia will not invade neighboring countries and NATO will not expand further.
Russia BIG L - neighbouring contries mean broad, not only NATO Baltics, but Moldova, Georgia, Kazahstan.

4. A dialogue will be held between Russia and NATO, mediated by the United States, to resolve all security issues and create conditions for de-escalation in order to ensure global security and increase opportunities for cooperation and future economic development.
Neutral - diplomatic word salad

5. Ukraine will receive reliable security guarantees.
Russia L - resurgent Europe and US military industry will have reliable client.

6. The size of the Ukrainian Armed Forces will be limited to 600,000 personnel.
Russian L - pre-war Ukraine force was around 500-600k and Ukraine can easily bypass it by having 600k standing army plus big rotation for trained but decomissioned reservist (just like pre-war, Ukraine had a lot of ATO veterans).
Basically no real limitation for Ukraine.

7. Ukraine agrees to enshrine in its constitution that it will not join NATO, and NATO agrees to include in its statutes a provision that Ukraine will not be admitted in the future.
On paper Russian W, but in reality L - Ukraine is already on NATO standard, training and equipment and this will only increase more - remember Sweden and Finland? They were "NATO-adjacent" before they became NATO.

8. NATO agrees not to station troops in Ukraine.
Neutral - other points make that boots on the ground are not required.

9. European fighter jets will be stationed in Poland.
Russian L - big stick securing Ukraine Logistic line, plus air cover for Baltics.

10. The U.S. guarantee:
-- The U.S. will receive compensation for the guarantee;
-- If Ukraine invades Russia, it will lose the guarantee;
-- If Russia invades Ukraine, in addition to a decisive coordinated military response, all global sanctions will be reinstated, recognition of the new territory and all other benefits of this deal will be revoked;
-- If Ukraine launches a missile at Moscow or St. Petersburg without cause, the security guarantee will be deemed invalid.

US W, but the last sub point is Russian W - if remain, Russia might use it for false flag operation, or Rogue Ukrainian asset could actually launch missile/drone to start new war - this is the biggest weak ponit of this 28 point plan.

11. Ukraine is eligible for EU membership and will receive short-term preferential access to the European market while this issue is being considered.
Russia Big L - Ukraine will integrate with EU, while Russia will struggle to recover (and Donbas will become Europe poorest region).

12. A powerful global package of measures to rebuild Ukraine, including but not limited to:
-- The creation of a Ukraine Development Fund to invest in fast-growing industries, including technology, data centers, and artificial intelligence.
-- The United States will cooperate with Ukraine to jointly rebuild, develop, modernize, and operate Ukraine's gas infrastructure, including pipelines and storage facilities.
-- Joint efforts to rehabilitate war-affected areas for the restoration, reconstruction and modernization of cities and residential areas.
-- Infrastructure development.
-- Extraction of minerals and natural resources.
-- The World Bank will develop a special financing package to accelerate these efforts.

Russian big L - the more western investment and assets in Ukraine, the higher chance the West will actually physically protect them.

13. Russia will be reintegrated into the global economy:

-- The lifting of sanctions will be discussed and agreed upon in stages and on a case-by-case basis.
-- The United States will enter into a long-term economic cooperation agreement for mutual development in the areas of energy, natural resources, infrastructure, artificial intelligence, data centers, rare earth metal extraction projects in the Arctic, and other mutually beneficial corporate opportunities.
-- Russia will be invited to rejoin the G8.

Russia HUGE L - basically the sanctions will be lifted only when Russia will play a good boy for some time - time which Russia don't have.

14. Frozen funds will be used as follows:

-- $100 billion in frozen Russian assets will be invested in US-led efforts to rebuild and invest in Ukraine;
-- The US will receive 50% of the profits from this venture. Europe will add $100 billion to increase the amount of investment available for Ukraine's reconstruction. Frozen European funds will be unfrozen. The remainder of the frozen Russian funds will be invested in a separate US-Russian investment vehicle that will implement joint projects in specific areas. This fund will be aimed at strengthening relations and increasing common interests to create a strong incentive not to return to conflict.

Russia L - no time as from above, but also no money.

15. A joint American-Russian working group on security issues will be established to promote and ensure compliance with all provisions of this agreement.
Neutral - diplomatic word salad

16. Russia will enshrine in law its policy of non-aggression towards Europe and Ukraine.
Small Russia L - nothing major, but small rubbing the sh*t on Russia face.

17. The United States and Russia will agree to extend the validity of treaties on the non-proliferation and control of nuclear weapons, including the START I Treaty.
Everyone W - looking at the state of Russia, I highly doubt they are even capable to compete in nuclear race, so they might just agreee to it to keep aperances.

18. Ukraine agrees to be a non-nuclear state in accordance with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
Russian L - Ukraine still can invest in drones and ballistic missiles

19. The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant will be launched under the supervision of the IAEA, and the electricity produced will be distributed equally between Russia and Ukraine -- 50:50.
Russian L - 50% is less than 100%, while it's Russia who will have to pay 100% maintenence.

20. Both countries undertake to implement educational programs in schools and society aimed at promoting understanding and tolerance of different cultures and eliminating racism and prejudice:

-- Ukraine will adopt EU rules on religious tolerance and the protection of linguistic minorities.
-- Both countries will agree to abolish all discriminatory measures and guarantee the rights of Ukrainian and Russian media and education.
-- All Nazi ideology and activities must be rejected and prohibited.

Russia L on paper, but I have doubts this will have any impact on Russian education system. This doesn't affect Ukraine much since those were still to be implemented on the path to EU.

21. Territories:

-- Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk will be recognized as de facto Russian, including by the United States.
-- Kherson and Zaporizhzhia will be frozen along the line of contact, which will mean de facto recognition along the line of contact.
-- Russia will relinquish other agreed territories it controls outside the five regions.
-- Ukrainian forces will withdraw from the part of Donetsk Oblast that they currently control, and this withdrawal zone will be considered a neutral demilitarized buffer zone, internationally recognized as territory belonging to the Russian Federation. Russian forces will not enter this demilitarized zone.

This one is the only solid Russia W - especially the remaining Donetsk part that contain important part of Ukraine defense line - this would be major L for Ukraine, but not fatal one, if they actually started to build 2nd and 3rd defense line already.

22. After agreeing on future territorial arrangements, both the Russian Federation and Ukraine undertake not to change these arrangements by force. Any security guarantees will not apply in the event of a breach of this commitment.
Russia L - with all factors combine, Ukraine will have better environment to recover than Russia.

23. Russia will not prevent Ukraine from using the Dnieper River for commercial activities, and agreements will be reached on the free transport of grain across the Black Sea.
Neutral - I assume trading and transit activities would resume after cessation of hostilities as this isn't Kerch bridge situation where Russia control whole passage.

24. A humanitarian committee will be established to resolve outstanding issues:

-- All remaining prisoners and bodies will be exchanged on an 'all for all' basis.
-- All civilian detainees and hostages will be returned, including children.
-- A family reunification program will be implemented.
-- Measures will be taken to alleviate the suffering of the victims of the conflict.

This one will be tricky, especially children. I assume Russia will try to obstruct this and might have success in the end.

25. Ukraine will hold elections in 100 days.
Russian L - dobtful that Ukraine would elect anyone remotely pro-Russian in near future...albeit one would thought Georgia would be the same.
Short term it's clear Russia L and long term it's anybodys guess.

26. All parties involved in this conflict will receive full amnesty for their actions during the war and agree not to make any claims or consider any complaints in the future.
On paper, Russia W, but in reality - all war criminals will eventually have an accident, or fall of the window. It's even better to keep this out of court.

27. This agreement will be legally binding. Its implementation will be monitored and guaranteed by the Peace Council, headed by President Donald J. Trump. Sanctions will be imposed for violations.
Orange d*ck massage

28. Once all parties agree to this memorandum, the ceasefire will take effect immediately after both sides retreat to agreed points to begin implementation of the agreement.
Final protection clause in case one side chicken out or lag in bad faith.



Overall, not bad, not great - I guess the ball is now on diplomats and leaders.
I have feeling Russia is more likely to crash out of this agreement than Ukraine.

[notaterran]

The United States had threatened to cut off intelligence sharing and weapons supplies for Ukraine if it does not accept the deal, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity to disclose the contents of private meetings. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Link

Donald Trump is an absolute piece of trash, I hope that Europeans will continue to support Ukraine. Russia needs to go through a defeat worse than the failed Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Russians are never going to be reasonable about Ukraine so, the West needs to support Ukraine and let the Russian Federation implode. Russia is weakened now; they couldn't help Syria, they couldn't help Iran and they can't help Venezuela. All the West needs to do is help Ukraine and Russia will fall!

[Chips]

A lot of claimed Russian "L" are in your opinion; e.g. Money frozen / seized from Russia is written off. Meanwhile, they've apparently gained $350 billion worth of rare earth deposits in the occupied Ukraine lands. The US gets 50% profit from $100 billion of Russian assets frozen and $100 billion of EU money. US literally does nothing but makes money from the proposal.

Ukraine is a legitimate country and has been since inception. I actually cba to go through and dismantle the claims of "L" or "W". Russia saying "it's not legitimate" didn't make one iota of difference to what's legal or not in "international law", so them going "oh it is..." - seriously? That's an "L"? Because by them saying it wasn't they were entitled to invade?

Meanwhile lets gloss over the entire point of "there's no war crimes!" statement with regards to massacring civilians. Or forcibly removing people from their lands. Or forcibly annexing lands.

What even is this. Then again, what's the point of the UN anymore, so it's not against you - just think a lot of claims of "L" or "W" are incredibly short sighted.

Doesn't mean it isn't a starting point to negotiate. Doesn't mean it's not good that there's some form of starting point to negotiate. But it's current form is to be as unpalatable as possible to everyone except the US and Russia in order that "oh look, we've made concession now agree..." without letting the victim have any say. At all. If Trump had more spine than fake tan, this'd be radically different.

Instead, he really needs a great distraction from Epstein at home. This is it. It needs to be headlines, fast, and sustained. This is *literally* it.

He's bullying Ukraine into being defeated to try and deflect from him being associated (and buddies) with a human trafficking paedophile. Smoke and mirrors, at Ukraine's expense.

What a guy.

[mr.WHO]

A lot of claimed Russian "L" are in your opinion; e.g. Money frozen / seized from Russia is written off. Meanwhile, they've apparently gained $350 billion worth of rare earth deposits in the occupied Ukraine lands. The US gets 50% profit from $100 billion of Russian assets frozen and $100 billion of EU money. US literally does nothing but makes money from the proposal.

Those are not even virtual money, just money hallucination.
Russia don't have capabilities to even maintain it's core oil industry on it's own, which is their crown jewel.
Then, almost entire Donbas population who knew how to mine anything is either dead, conscripted or displaced.

It's even worse if you throw "Rare Earths" into the mix - they are rare not particulary because they are rare (there are multiple deposits on every continent), but because to get them, you need to do the most hellish and toxic trip mining and industrial scale ore processing.
It turns huge swaths of land and water extremely toxic (imagine everyting you heard about fracking, but at least 10-20 times worse).

That's the problem with rare earth - everyone needs it, but you don't want mining operation next door, next region, same country code, even same continent!
There is currently Rare Earth mining project beign done in Serbia that if completed, with any sort of industrial incident, could turn lower 1/3 of Danube river dead, polluting Serbia, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova and Ukraine.

That's why China hold 90% of production - only they are insane enough to trade short term financial benefits over the insanely dangerous pollution.

Turning Donbas into Mordor...literally - doesn't count as a W in my book, no matter the amounts of money.

[fiksal]

where's in that plan a security guarantee again? From NATO, from Europe, from US? Nothing.

Russia promises not to attack vs Ukraine reduces army?

And when Russia attacks, old sanctions that it already have would be back? I am sure Putin would be super upset and would never attack a weakened nearby country that by agreement will be isolated from any help.

Did you see a point about reducing Russian army?



Let's quote smart people versus those that follow Kremlin's script, we read that one on the State tv already.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/ukraine-z ... -9.6987695

"Russia's war against Ukraine is an existential threat to Europe. We all want this war to end. But how it ends matters," EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said in Brussels. "Russia has no legal right whatsoever to any concessions from the country it invaded. Ultimately, the terms of any agreement are for Ukraine to decide."

[mr.WHO]

where's in that plan a security guarantee again? From NATO, from Europe, from US? Nothing.

Aparently, there is aseparate 3 point document about security guarantees, but I don't have english version.

In short:
1. If Ukraine get attacked, they get help, if Ukraine attacks, they get nothing.
2. Guarantee by US and NATO (entire NATO, but in document, France, Germany, UK, Poland and Finland are highlighted in name).
3. timeline at least 10 years from singnatory, but can be extended, if Ukraine, US and NATO agree.

[ExE22]

read the 28-point peace plan?

1. Ukraine's sovereignty will be confirmed.
Russian L - no more Russian talking point about Ukraine state or goverment illegitimacy.

It doesn't say anything about how or who will be doing that confirmation, so premature to believe it'll do anything about Russian talking points.

read the 28-point peace plan?
2. A comprehensive non-aggression agreement will be concluded between Russia, Ukraine and Europe. All ambiguities of the last 30 years will be considered settled.
Russian L - no more Russian talking point about how evil NATO encroaches on poor Russia.

Considering that the talking points Russia would be conceding here is mostly stuff they've been ginning up from thin air while the west / Ukraine would have to accept the legitimacy of Crimea, Donbas etc. I'm not sure I'd file this one under "Russian L".

read the 28-point peace plan?
3. It is expected that Russia will not invade neighboring countries and NATO will not expand further.
Russia BIG L - neighbouring contries mean broad, not only NATO Baltics, but Moldova, Georgia, Kazahstan.

A blanket ban on adding further NATO member states is so far outside the "Russian L" column

read the 28-point peace plan?
5. Ukraine will receive reliable security guarantees.
Russia L - resurgent Europe and US military industry will have reliable client.

Without knowing the details of these security guarantees, and considering how "reliable" the U.S. (and to a lesser extent Europe) is these days I'd hesitate to consider this a "Russian L". Ukraine has already received security guarantees in the past that hasn't been worth much of anything.

6. The size of the Ukrainian Armed Forces will be limited to 600,000 personnel.
Russian L - pre-war Ukraine force was around 500-600k and Ukraine can easily bypass it by having 600k standing army plus big rotation for trained but decomissioned reservist (just like pre-war, Ukraine had a lot of ATO veterans).
Basically no real limitation for Ukraine.

Considering this is a one-sided restriction on just Ukraine's armed forces I don't see how it can be considered a "Russian L", at best its a slightly smaller "Russian W" than it could have been

7. Ukraine agrees to enshrine in its constitution that it will not join NATO, and NATO agrees to include in its statutes a provision that Ukraine will not be admitted in the future.
On paper Russian W, but in reality L - Ukraine is already on NATO standard, training and equipment and this will only increase more - remember Sweden and Finland? They were "NATO-adjacent" before they became NATO.

Entirely disregarding the primary motivation for joining NATO, its security guarantees.

8. NATO agrees not to station troops in Ukraine.
Neutral - other points make that boots on the ground are not required.

Boots on the ground is one of the few things that could make a security-guarantee credible

9. European fighter jets will be stationed in Poland.
Russian L - big stick securing Ukraine Logistic line, plus air cover for Baltics.

I don't even know how to parse this part. The idea that Poland or other EU/NATO member states' ability to station fighters wherever they want in their territory is somehow a subject for this deal is ludicrous. The only interpretation I can come up with is that its a demand for any Ukrainian owned fighters of European origin to be withdrawn to Poland. Either way its most definitely not a "Russian L" (at best they'd be "conceding" something they have no ability to influence anyway, at worst it takes away the most modern parts of the Ukrainian Air Force)

13. Russia will be reintegrated into the global economy:

-- The lifting of sanctions will be discussed and agreed upon in stages and on a case-by-case basis.
-- The United States will enter into a long-term economic cooperation agreement for mutual development in the areas of energy, natural resources, infrastructure, artificial intelligence, data centers, rare earth metal extraction projects in the Arctic, and other mutually beneficial corporate opportunities.
-- Russia will be invited to rejoin the G8.

Russia HUGE L - basically the sanctions will be lifted only when Russia will play a good boy for some time - time which Russia don't have.

The devil lies in the details on this one. Given Trump's past performances I would not be surprised in the slightest to see him speedrun sanction-lifting in the hunt for an economic boost.

15. A joint American-Russian working group on security issues will be established to promote and ensure compliance with all provisions of this agreement.
Neutral - diplomatic word salad

Given the complete lack of Ukrainian / European representation here i'd file this one under "Ukrainian L"

16. Russia will enshrine in law its policy of non-aggression towards Europe and Ukraine.
Small Russia L - nothing major, but small rubbing the sh*t on Russia face.

Russian laws are of....limited worth

22. After agreeing on future territorial arrangements, both the Russian Federation and Ukraine undertake not to change these arrangements by force. Any security guarantees will not apply in the event of a breach of this commitment.
Russia L - with all factors combine, Ukraine will have better environment to recover than Russia.

Russia have already committed once (back in 1994) to respect Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity. Any more promises on paper will be worth little

[clakclak]

If this deal goes through, Russia will advance within the next 12 months in Georgia. The Russian backed government is under increased pressure from the population. There have been a few major shifts in the country and we only see the surface level tension from the outside.

Before anyone say "but Russia guarantees...", if you trust anything the russian government says I have a condo on mars to sell you.

[mr.WHO]

If this deal goes through, Russia will advance within the next 12 months in Georgia. The Russian backed government is under increased pressure from the population. There have been a few major shifts in the country and we only see the surface level tension from the outside.

Before anyone say "but Russia guarantees...", if you trust anything the russian government says I have a condo on mars to sell you.

Depends what they pick as "advancement" - if they limit just to support pro-russian goverment behind the curtain then yes.
Open military intervention or even just "little green men" would infringement of point 3 of 28p plan.
This would be bad for Georgia, but good for Ukraine.

For the records, I don't exclude the possibility that Russia might be so stupid to do this anyway.

Still, most of the Putins stupidity started with Georgia in 2008, so who knows - maybe we go full circle and now Georgia will be his end.

[fiksal]

It was mentioned somewhere that Ukraine will write proposals to each point.

There are thinking people there

where's in that plan a security guarantee again? From NATO, from Europe, from US? Nothing.

Aparently, there is aseparate 3 point document about security guarantees, but I don't have english version.

In short:
1. If Ukraine get attacked, they get help, if Ukraine attacks, they get nothing.
2. Guarantee by US and NATO (entire NATO, but in document, France, Germany, UK, Poland and Finland are highlighted in name).
3. timeline at least 10 years from singnatory, but can be extended, if Ukraine, US and NATO agree.

A NATO defense guarantee similar to Article 5? That would be the only real guarantee that NATO can do. If the guarantee caps at supplying weapons, that's no guarantee. Is it?

Again, if we ask to cap Ukraine army, Russian army must be capped to same number

[chew-ie]

Giving russia any part of Ukraine is pure nonsense. Lifting sanctions immediately equals instant gratification and shouldn't be done before reparations are paid. Otherwise everyone with russian ties would just behave as nothing ever happened, which would also strengthen the far-right even further. And there is no guarantee for europe that the hybrid warfare stops. EU leaders - even when forced by US to agree to that ridiculous peace plan - should not allow this.

About that NATO stuff - I'd say days of NATO are over. Since US is already backing off to make america small again europe should just take the extra steps and create their own defense coalition. What russia has to understand is that no matter if NATO or something else - the days of marching west for russia is over. And all their former vassal states wish to be independent, not re-integrated in the "Reich". Well, maybe Hungary wants to join Russia, but that's about it I'd say.

[mr.WHO]

Again, if we ask to cap Ukraine army, Russian army must be capped to same number

I really wouldn't be so fixated on this troop cap.
Post war, like any sane country Ukraine will have to downsize its standing army, otherwise it will be too big drain on economy.
600k is still more that pre-war army - having a million reservist/veterans doesn't count towards the cap, doesn't drain budget so much, but still counts towards defensive capabilities.

600k + reservist, would mean that Russia would have to mobilize and deploy 2, 3 or 4 million army - something they failed before war started and still failed after 3 years of war.
Russia might be systematically incapable to maintain and operate army that is bigger that 1-2 million.
If they try, this will drain their economy even more (North Korea style), will take time and won't be unnoticed (you can't mask 1+ million soldiers as "military excercise").


For me this cap on Ukraine is more a cap for Russia that needs minimum 3:1 advantage to begin any schenanigans.
For Ukraine would simply means going quality over quantity (600k army would still be stronger than any NATO army apart from US).

[Chips]

Again, if we ask to cap Ukraine army, Russian army must be capped to same number

I really wouldn't be so fixated on this troop cap.
Post war, like any sane country Ukraine will have to downsize its standing army, otherwise it will be too big drain on economy.
600k is still more that pre-war army - having a million reservist/veterans doesn't count towards the cap, doesn't drain budget so much, but still counts towards defensive capabilities.

600k + reservist, would mean that Russia would have to mobilize and deploy 2, 3 or 4 million army - something they failed before war started and still failed after 3 years of war.
Russia might be systematically incapable to maintain and operate army that is bigger that 1-2 million.
If they try, this will drain their economy even more (North Korea style), will take time and won't be unnoticed (you can't mask 1+ million soldiers as "military excercise").


For me this cap on Ukraine is more a cap for Russia that needs minimum 3:1 advantage to begin any schenanigans.
For Ukraine would simply means going quality over quantity (600k army would still be stronger than any NATO army apart from US).

Again, this is incredibly short sighted opinion.

The border with Russia for Ukraine is *vast*. If, as per 2022 before the invasion, Russia starts building up troop numbers... sorry, starts doing some exercises with 1 million troops on the border, what can Ukraine do? Field it's 600,000 across all armed forces? That's about 200 men per k/m. Sounds okay... but... hang on. That means ALL available - everyone - in all the forces. And without any potential for rotation, rest, logistics, training, or anything else. So literally *everyone* standing per km of border. So in reality, they'd be able to put approx 1/10th of that? Otherwise, they violate the rules and... what, Russia can invade?

Does Russia, if it wants to invade, spread it's forces across the entire border? They didn't last time.

So in your opinion this is somehow worse for Russia? So given your opinion, this must mean that as Russia is currently "winning" (they are gaining ground and making progress) they must have more than 3:1 over Ukraines current 900,000 armed forces right?

So how the hell is 600,000 limitation going to be *BETTER* for Ukraine if it's currently losing with 50% more than that?

In my opinion you're so ill informed to pass comment that it's ridiculous. Of course, you may be qualified with exceptional military service and I'm just Joe Nobody on the internet. That's the problems of opinions!


However, some of those points are Russia gets to enforce who can/cannot join NATO going forward (which means, no-one can) - and if that's broken... they can invade Ukraine? Russia gets territory and weakens Ukraine (yes, it may already be destroyed territory). Russia gets to avoid any war crimes for their conduct. Russia gets to not pay repatriation costs for waging a war. Russia gets to return as soon as US deems it acceptable, back to the political and economic table.

I've yet to see a single, actual, logical "L" from the proposal for Russia.
Did see a comment elsewhere which basically summed it up as:
Russia gets all it wanted.
US gets to profit from the war Russia waged.
Ukraine gets nothing worth while.
Europe gets to pay for it all.

That's not surprising, after all, Trumps prior administration heavy hitters absolutely wanted to weaken *Europe* as it's seen as a direct economic competitor and preventing US from exploiting EU markets.
There's no parallel to Czech pre world war 2, but it sort of feels like it. They were willing to fight Nazi Germany but were left high and dry by France and UK and got eaten up without a fight.
Seeing as Ukraine has witnessed guarantees over its sovereignty as it too was willing to fight but found it's guarantors (UK and USA) to be unwilling to actually guarantee it's security, they, and the rest of the world, would be forgiven for finding *any* vague, imprecise, "guarantee" after capitulation to be worth anything. At all.

Anyway, you've shared your opinion, I've probably overly exuberantly disagreed with it. If you still think Russia's gaining some L's in all this, then that's fine. It's all a bit irrelevant as we're just silent-behind-glasses-shouting-observers. Have to wait and see what actually comes out, and as some would say, if it's saving lives then what matters the cost. I wouldn't want to have ever been in their position so cannot judge whatever deal is reached.

[mr.WHO]

Again, this is incredibly short sighted opinion.

The border with Russia for Ukraine is *vast*. If, as per 2022 before the invasion, Russia starts building up troop numbers... sorry, starts doing some exercises with 1 million troops on the border, what can Ukraine do? Field it's 600,000 across all armed forces? That's about 200 men per k/m. Sounds okay... but... hang on. That means ALL available - everyone - in all the forces. And without any potential for rotation, rest, logistics, training, or anything else. So literally *everyone* standing per km of border. So in reality, they'd be able to put approx 1/10th of that? Otherwise, they violate the rules and... what, Russia can invade?

Does Russia, if it wants to invade, spread it's forces across the entire border? They didn't last time.

So in your opinion this is somehow worse for Russia? So given your opinion, this must mean that as Russia is currently "winning" (they are gaining ground and making progress) they must have more than 3:1 over Ukraines current 900,000 armed forces right?

So how the hell is 600,000 limitation going to be *BETTER* for Ukraine if it's currently losing with 50% more than that?

In my opinion you're so ill informed to pass comment that it's ridiculous. Of course, you may be qualified with exceptional military service and I'm just Joe Nobody on the internet. That's the problems of opinions!

South Korea has active army of 365k.
North Korea has army 1.3 mil + 500k reservist, most of those station near the border.

That's with South Korea much richer, but with most of Seul in artillery range.
Yet, through compulsory service, South Korea has a pool of reservist to quickly expand the army if needed.

Russia will always have number advantage - you shouldn't build an army to match Russia, you should build an army to make Russia go broke when preparing to invade you.
Remember that Ukraine will have to operate on much tighter budget, economy and demographic pool than South Korea.
Keeping army at 600k will be a challenge, anything more will be just mimicking Russian stupidity.

[felter]

The North Korean army isn't really military, they do have some, but most of its army are used to dig fields and ditches and do other manual labour as they do not have the machinery or equipment like tractors that the rest of the world has to do those types of work. Not to mention that most of them are unfit and malnourished, we know this because of the soldiers they have sent to Russia were in a terrible state when they arrived. Also, most of the military equipment that North Korea has is pretty much outdated compared to, well, pretty much everywhere else.

[fiksal]

speaking of NATO irrelevancy, I hope some countries in EU sign up for mutual military defense with Ukraine

Latvia, Finland, can make all the difference here.

I didn't see the joint Russian American security force last time, it is indeed funny.

Btw, I have a very real feeling these points are inspired by Russian points.

Russians proposed Russian security force in Ukraine before

[mr.WHO]

Latvia, Finland, can make all the difference here.

FInland might be even better template for Ukraine, than South Korea.
While Finland is richer than Ukraine, it's much smaller demographically.

Their active army is tiny (28k), but can be quickly expanded tenfold (280k wartime size) from decent pool of reservist (870k).
They have very big and open border with Russia and untill recent joining NATO, on paper they stood alone.

Refitting this for Ukraine bigger population, but smaller economy it would be something like that:
600k active army with capability to expand to 2 mil quickly, out of pool of 6 mil reservist.

That would make Ukraine literally in top 5 armies on the planet (behind only US, China, India and Russia) - doesn't looks like surrender to me.

[fiksal]

still any agreement should have pretty strong security agreement, signed up by other countries, preferably Europe.

Russian signatures mean nothing

And agreement shouldn't absolve Russia from the death and destruction, nor from kidnapped children. You may recall Russians equate International court with sanctions.

Nor there's need for Ukraine to give territory, Ukraine can if it wants to only admit that the territory was conquered, not that it's Russian forever. And again, more important are people who live there who are not Russian, and homes they own, that do not belong to Russia. Nor their language or lives, also do not belong to Russia.

[clakclak]

So where do we go from here?

Ukraine will not accept to surrender under these conditions and I am not sure Europe is to happy with the deal either.

Will the war continue without American support?