Russia invades Ukraine

[Falcon1200]

And making the war longer will solve that? Because that's where we are headed it seems.

How can the war be shortened, ie ended ? Either Russia has to cease invading another country and retreat to its own territory, or the Ukrainians have to stop defending their land and let Russia march all over them. The first is unlikely without military defeat and and the second impossible.

 

[Bletchleyite]

How can the war be shortened, ie ended ? Either Russia has to cease invading another country and retreat to its own territory, or the Ukrainians have to stop defending their land and let Russia march all over them. The first is unlikely without military defeat and and the second impossible.

One thing I think might happen (which is very bad, but has precedent) is that Russia drops a tactical nuke on Kyiv, and advises that there will be more if they don't surrender, and so surrender is the only option. I don't think NATO would retaliate in this case provided any attack was only on Ukrainian territory.

It's very bad, but I think the chance of it is remarkably high.

 

[Falcon1200]

It's very bad, but I think the chance of it is remarkably high.

Hopefully even Putin, or more likely those around him, would see the madness in that, but is is a worrying possibility.

 

[uglymonkey]

Problem with that ( apart from the obvious) is that you destroy Ukraine's leadership - so noone around to offer unconditional surrender, never mind about contaminating the land you hope to occupy, your own troops and possibly even your own territory

 

[Chingy]

Russia have sanctioned a whole range of Conservative and Labour MP's today, including ex MP's like Dominic Grieve, Rory Stewart and Charlie Elphicke;

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-europe-61224804

I'm sure all those MP's are gutted they can't visit Moscow in the near future! It would be laughable if the situation wasn't so serious.

The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs says it is sanctioning 287 MPs in the UK Parliament, accusing them of "groundless whipping up of Russophobic hysteria".

It means some 213 Conservative politicians and 74 from Labour will be banned from entering Russia.

The ministry says there could be further "retaliatory counter-measures" - after the UK sanctioned 386 Russian parliamentarians in March - with more names added to the list.

Russia's list of sanctioned MPs includes several who are no longer in the House of Commons, such as former Attorney General Dominic Grieve (who lost his seat in 2019), Rory Stewart (who stood down in the same year) and Charlie Elphicke (who was jailed for a year in 2020 for sexual assault).

It also omits some outspoken critics of Russian President Vladimir Putin, such as Labour's Chris Bryant.

He told the Commons he was "absolutely distressed" not to be on the list, and joked that the Russians must agree with his assessment that their president is a "barbarous villain".

 

[nw1]

Problem with that ( apart from the obvious) is that you destroy Ukraine's leadership - so noone around to offer unconditional surrender, never mind about contaminating the land you hope to occupy, your own troops and possibly even your own territory

Also (aside from the unspeakable evil of the act) would the Russian leadership actually do that, given it would lead to instant pariah status for their government even from semi-apologist governments such as those of Xi and Modi? Essentially they would be utterly isolated even amongst their pseudo-allies.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Also (aside from the unspeakable evil of the act) would the Russian leadership actually do that, given it would lead to instant pariah status for their government even from semi-apologist governments such as those of Xi and Modi? Essentially they would be utterly isolated even amongst their pseudo-allies.

I don't think it's a given that China would condemn. They might even consider saying to Taiwan "look what happened there, you're next if you don't cede to us".

 

[uglymonkey]

Considering the state of the rest of their military, one would wonder whether a Russian SS-20 or whatever would actually detonate ( only computer simulations since the test ban in 1960's) - This is not worth the risk of thinking it would not work however to plan your strategy!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Considering the state of the rest of their military, one would wonder whether a Russian SS-20 or whatever would actually detonate ( only computer simulations since the test ban in 1960's) - This is not worth the risk of thinking it would not work however to plan your strategy!

The Soviet Union didn't stop tests until the 1990s according to this:

List of nuclear weapons tests of the Soviet Union - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[uglymonkey]

Ah... OK, I was thinking above ground - 1990 are underground in tunnels , still pre collapse of the Soviet Union, How many has Russia conducted since?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Ah... OK, I was thinking above ground - 1990 are underground in tunnels , still pre collapse of the Soviet Union, How many has Russia conducted since?

Allegedly none since the treaty in 1990 but I wouldn't be surprised if there had been. To be fair that's 30 years ago...

 

[ainsworth74]

Allegedly none since the treaty in 1990 but I wouldn't be surprised if there had been. To be fair that's 30 years ago...

Fairly unlikely unless they were very very low yield or sub-critical. Part of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty provides for seismic and radionuclide monitoring pretty much worldwide. That's quite apart from it being fairly obvious if someone is making preparations for nuclear testing even underground. We'd have noticed if Russia was testing nukes of any appreciable yield.

 

[yorksrob]

I doubt that, as it's what we did for the first few weeks.

I seem to recall Russia escalating things quite clearly during that period.

I think you're wrong that we should be supplying arms on the quiet as all it would do would allow the Kremlin to control the narrative with its own constant barrage of drivel.

At the moment, Russia is a delusional country which thinks that all it has to do is continue its barrage a bit longer and the West will forget about it and Ukraine will give in. The West is quite rightly being open about what it's doing and why it's doing it, and in doing so is pressing home the point that the West will not forget, and is prepared to support Ukraine in the long run. The more Russia is made to face the reality of what it's let itself into, the more likely it is to come to terms.

 

[ainsworth74]

I think you're wrong that we should be supplying arms on the quiet as all it would do would allow the Kremlin to control the narrative with its own constant barrage of drivel.

Quite. One of the things that's worked very well is that the Kremlin's usual attempts to flood the zone with drivel have failed miserably in face of a flood of information from the West (and Ukraine to be fair). Let's not forget the huge amounts of information that was being released before the invasion calling out the build up of troops, the false flag warnings, etc etc. Things were coming out of intelligence services that would have been unimageable in the past and as a result Russia failed miserably in its attempt to control the narrative outside of anywhere but Russia. It would seem to be unwise to go back to the old way of doing things where we say nothing and cede all that to the Kremlin.

 

[Annetts key]

That's not a choice for the West or NATO. That's a choice for the Ukrainian government and people. While they still have the will and desire to defend their country then it's only right we continue to support them against such blatant aggression.

This.

 

[najaB]

Nor is there any purpose to be gained by saying Ukraine should strike Russia. It makes an increasingly "threatened" regime even more nervous.

To be fair, the Defence Secretary didn't say that Ukraine should or should not strike any particular target. What he said was that a strike against Russian military targets would be legitimate, even if those targets were on the other side of the border.

I think many people don't get the fact that nuclear war is an extinction event. There is by definition nothing worse than it.

It is not. First off, there is such a thing (in theory at least) as a limited nuclear war. A few tactical nukes dropped on the battlefield will be locally catastrophic, but globally a non-issue. Ironically it might actually help with climate change by providing a degree or two of cooling for a short period.

Even all out thermonuclear war would result in the end of the current civilisation, but would be highly unlikely to result in the extinction of the human species. Globally the death toll would be in the high tens to low hundreds of millions in the active phase of the war, and over the course of the decade that follows you could probably expect somewhere between 0.5 and 2 billion people to die of starvation. It would likely set humanity back to a level of technology that wouldn't be far out of place in the late middle ages.

Recovery from the conflict would be likely to take somewhere between 50 and 100 years. It would be bad, yes. But it wouldn't be the end of humanity.

Allegedly none since the treaty in 1990 but I wouldn't be surprised if there had been. To be fair that's 30 years ago...

It's impossible to test a nuke in secret. I mean, even the Buncefield oil depot explosions triggered nuke detector seismographs in America.

 

[Pete_uk]

As others have said, and command to use any kind of nuclear missile will have to go through quite a few people. Those people will know that if they launch those ICBMs the government and military time will be very limited before it all collapses, along with its society.

I'm all for sending as much kit as we can over to Ukraine. The more dead and (even better) injured Russian soldiers go home the better. I hope these mysterious explosions inside Russia carry on and help to slow down their ability to resupply the front line.

 

[Chingy]

As others have said, and command to use any kind of nuclear missile will have to go through quite a few people. Those people will know that if they launch those ICBMs the government and military time will be very limited before it all collapses, along with its society.

Unfortunately there isn't many "layers" of people involved if Putin wanted to launch a nuclear strike, essentially he has full control of his nuclear forces, alongside his General Staff.

The chain of command for potential Russian nuclear strikes

Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the weekend that his nation's nuclear forces should be put on high alert, raising fears that Russia's invasion of Ukraine could lead to nuclear escalation.

www.reuters.com

A small briefcase, known as the Cheget, is kept close to the president at all times, linking him to the command and control network of Russia's strategic nuclear forces. The Cheget does not contain a nuclear launch button but rather transmits launch orders to the central military command - the General Staff.

The Russian General Staff has access to the launch codes and has two methods of launching nuclear warheads. It can send authorisation codes to individual weapons commanders, who would then execute the launch procedures. There is also a back-up system, known as Perimetr, which allows the General Staff to directly initiate the launch of land-based missiles, bypassing all the immediate command posts.

 

[philosopher]

Even all out thermonuclear war would result in the end of the current civilisation, but would be highly unlikely to result in the extinction of the human species. Globally the death toll would be in the high tens to low hundreds of millions in the active phase of the war, and over the course of the decade that follows you could probably expect somewhere between 0.5 and 2 billion people to die of starvation. It would likely set humanity back to a level of technology that wouldn't be far out of place in the late middle ages.

Recovery from the conflict would be likely to take somewhere between 50 and 100 years. It would be bad, yes. But it wouldn't be the end of humanity.

How devasting a global nuclear war would be would depend on whether a nuclear war would trigger a nuclear winter, which from what I understand is a big unknown. Some scientists say there would be no nuclear winter as the nuclear explosions would not loft enough dust into the stratosphere to cause one, others however say it would trigger a nuclear winter that would cause temperatures to drop by 10 to 20 degrees over much of the world.

 

[birchesgreen]

I did read once that the nuclear winter theory was bigged up by the KGB in the cold war to give more fuel to Western anti-nuclear protest groups.

 

[najaB]

How devasting a global nuclear war would be would depend on whether a nuclear war would trigger a nuclear winter, which from what I understand is a big unknown.

Indeed. I think a big factor in that would be the proportion of ground vs air bursts. But as you point out, it's an area of modelling that's very difficult.

 

[Scotrail314209]

Is it right to be getting slightly worried? Especially if the war in Ukraine might reach a stalemate, which simply up the stakes for nuclear weapons being used?

 

[najaB]

Is it right to be getting slightly worried?

Slightly worried, yes. Losing sleep? Nope. It's unlikely to happen, and even if does happen there's absolutely nothing you could do about it.

 

[dakta]

Don't think so as its not likely to happen and if it does there's not a right lot you can do about it

edit: beat me to it

 

[uglymonkey]

Also re nuclear winter, there were literally 100's of nuclear detonations from 1945 until the test ban treaty in the 1960's ( both airburst & ground burst) up to and including the "Tzar " bomb and we are all still here ( no nuclear winter), so how much is a theory on how many detonations, how much dust, how much into the upper atmosphere is mute ( all the tests I guess were in Nevada, Bikini, Christmas Island etc), and I would suppose that a New York or Moscow detonation would generate x times more dust. Didn't the moon or sunlight turn blue after Krakatoa ? and the global temperature dropped?

 

[Annetts key]

This idea of nuclear weapons being used assumes Putin is ready to die and that he is ready to let Russia and it’s people be destroyed or a staggering number of deaths of Russian people. Very likely including his adult children and the woman he apparently has a relationship with.

I don’t think he wants to die. I think he wants to continue to rule as long as possible. And I think he wants to leave a legacy.

If he starts a nuclear shooting war, there will not be much of Russia left to remember him as a good leader.

Hence I think the chances of Putin using ANY nuclear weapons is a very small fraction of a percent.

He has now boxed himself in. It’s now likely that the Russian military will make significant progress before the Russian Victory Day Parade in May.

But as long as he still wants to make gains on the ground, he will continue to keep the Russian military fighting.

The question is, what happens if Ukraine starts pushing the Russians back? Will Putin say that the job is done, and withdraw the troops back to Russian territory? Can he spin it in Russia? If yes, can he stay in power?

 

[najaB]

Also re nuclear winter, there were literally 100's of nuclear detonations from 1945 until the test ban treaty in the 1960's ( both airburst & ground burst) up to and including the "Tzar " bomb and we are all still here ( no nuclear winter), so how much is a theory on how many detonations, how much dust, how much into the upper atmosphere is mute ( all the tests I guess were in Nevada, Bikini, Christmas Island etc), and I would suppose that a New York or Moscow detonation would generate x times more dust

AIUI, the majority of the dust in the nuclear winter scenarios comes not from the bombs themselves but rather from the uncontrolled (and uncontrollable) fires raging through major population centres.

 

[Class 33]

This is an absolute nightmare. As well as the seemingly never ending atrocities that evil Putin is doing to Ukraine, he's now threatening to use nuclear weapons on Britain. There have been some seriously scary worrying headlines in the media today....

Russia war LIVE – Now Vladimir Putin’s evil henchmen threaten to nuke BRITAIN if we continue to help Ukraine

Vladimir Putin hints he'll use nukes with 'lightning fast' response if Russia threatened

Putin claims 'all objectives will be met' in Ukraine war - and warns of 'lightning fast' retaliation if countries interfere​

Russia-Ukraine latest news: Vladimir Putin threatens nuclear strikes if West intervenes​

'One Sarmat missile means minus one Great Britain': Russian journalist urges Putin to wipe out 'boorish' UK with Satan 2 nuke - after Vladimir claimed to have stopped 'Ukrainian plot to assassinate him'​

I believe Putin is evil and mad enough to go ahead with such action. This doesn't bear thinking about. This is just unreal. We in Britain could only have weeks or even days left before we're all nuked and Britain becomes a wasteland. I for one am absolutely a bag of nerves tonight

 

[Scotrail314209]

This is an absolute nightmare. As well as the seemingly never ending atrocities that evil Putin is doing to Ukraine, he's now threatening to use nuclear weapons on Britain. There have been some seriously scary worrying headlines in the media today....

Russia war LIVE – Now Vladimir Putin’s evil henchmen threaten to nuke BRITAIN if we continue to help Ukraine

Vladimir Putin hints he'll use nukes with 'lightning fast' response if Russia threatened

Putin claims 'all objectives will be met' in Ukraine war - and warns of 'lightning fast' retaliation if countries interfere​

Russia-Ukraine latest news: Vladimir Putin threatens nuclear strikes if West intervenes​

'One Sarmat missile means minus one Great Britain': Russian journalist urges Putin to wipe out 'boorish' UK with Satan 2 nuke - after Vladimir claimed to have stopped 'Ukrainian plot to assassinate him'​

I believe Putin is evil and mad enough to go ahead with such action. This doesn't bear thinking about. This is just unreal. We in Britain could only have weeks or even days left before we're all nuked and Britain becomes a wasteland. I for one am absolutely a bag of nerves tonight

Scary sounding, but the Ukraine war in a sense is something the media will scaremonger to try and get clicks and attention.

They've done it with all the COVID stuff, remember.

 

[najaB]

This is an absolute nightmare. As well as the seemingly never ending atrocities that evil Putin is doing to Ukraine, he's now threatening to use nuclear weapons on Britain. There have been some seriously scary worrying headlines in the media today....

That's all they are - headlines. When you realise that you've not seen the heads of government for a while then start worrying.