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He could just declare that he won, and spend the next few years arguing that he was robbed of his victory.

It sure would be nice to have a center-left and a center-right party, which could exclude the nut-jobs who seem to dominate these days.

It is September 1939 and the free world is tip-toeing around, afraid that if they upset the Nazis, the war might spread beyond Poland.

As said here many times - Putin has never needed any provocation before, and he won't need any provocation in the future. Bullies will do what they want. To stop them you have to hit back as hard as you can.

Its been published that there are just under 20,000 non citizen volunteers already. The UK government is already concerned that current serving members of UK forces. Are in Ukraine fighting now. The concern being that if they are captured, Russia could argue that NATO is already in Ukraine fighting. Obviously there are untrained non-Ukrainians that are way out of their league. News reporters interviewed a 60 Y/O UK baker with no military training at the Ukrainian border. But they are prepared to fight Russian aggression. Fight to protect a weaker population bullied by Russia. They are the opposite of many today. Who put self interest and let the other guy do it mentality. As the staple of at least a generation since those who served in WW2. Veterans who go, knowing full well what war is. The danger of capture and battle. Are not mercenaries, closer to heroes.

I am backing Jerry Baumchen on the cloud regulations. The problem reared its ugly head back during the 1960s when a bunch of skydivers jumped from a World War 2 surplus B-25 Mitchell bomber. They were over clouds and mistakenly exited over Lake Erie. Most of them drowned after they landed their Para-Commanders in the lake. Part of the blame can be ascribed to crude electronic navigation instruments and part of the blame can be put I on an FAA air traffic controller who followed the wrong airplane (a single-engined Beechcraft Bonanza) on ATC radar. ATC gave the B-25 pilot permission to drop when the Bonanaza was over the DZ. Too bad that the B-25 was many miles to the North. The FAA vowed "never again" and banned all jumps through clouds. Since then electronic navigation instruments have improved vastly, to the point that GPS is far more reliable than human skydiving instructors "spotting" by looking out the door. As far back as the 1980s, I was jumping (not North American airspace) when the pilot told me to exit, based upon his reading of VOR. The worst I ever had to do was walk from the far end of the runway. Ever since then I have cheerfully exited when pilots tell me to. Mind, you, I also back up their judgement with sideways glances at landmarks off to the side of the airport. Quite often I called the spot as "early" or "late" just based on landmarks off to the side of the airport. Modern GPS is far more accurate.

Canada (as one example) had 1.1 million people, more than 10% of its total population, serve in the military during the war. At the start of the war the total military was less than 50,000. During the course of the war Canada built and deployed the 4th largest air force and the 5th largest navy in the world. Just how quickly do you think it would take to accomplish that? Are you saying if troops aren't in theater within 24 hours they don't count? If your position is that those countries that declared war (years before the US was dragged kicking and screaming into the conflict) were "meaningless", then I would say that the 1.1 million Canadians who served, the 55,000 who were wounded, and the 42,000 who were killed would collectively say fuck you!

Or, maybe she never gave it back...

I don't think that's a possible outcome. The only way that could happen if he can spin it as a victory i.e. "I made the Ukraine agree to not join NATO" or something like that. He knows that if he just plain retreats from Ukraine that he is finished as a world power.

Reality is just about always more complicated. Wendy P.

I assumed that oil is oil, and that loss of overseas sources could be compensated for by increasing domestic production, but it turns out reality is more complicated. Back in the '90s and early 2000s a lot of refining capacity was built to process "heavy sour" crude, which is crude with a hydrocarbon composition that is harder to "crack" (refine to make gas) and has a high sulfur content. Since then the US sources that have been developed, such as fracking, produce "light sweet" crude (low sulfur, shorter hydrocarbons) that requires a different process to refine and therefore can't be processed by refineries built to process heavy sour crude. So the problem of gas supply demands not only a supply of crude oil but also building new refineries to handle the specific chemistry of that crude, which is very expensive and takes years. Older refineries can be retrofitted but the process requires them to shut down and basically be rebuilt which is almost as costly and time consuming as building from scratch. The refining industry isn't willing to take the cost of shutting down for a few years when they can import heavy sour crude to process. Also retrofitting the refining capacity of the country would dramatically reduce gas supply for years as the new refineries are built. That is why the US finds itself being a net oil exporter: we import heavy sour while a lot of domestic production is exported to other countries that can process light sweet crude. (link here)

I don’t think the Russians really ‘hire’ the Wagner group. It’s more like a pretend PMC which is actually an extension of Russian special forces which they can use when they really want some deniability.

You're both right. Everyone, with a conscious is disgusted by whats happening and mad as hell. It gets worse and worse. This is a forum for politics and most people don't like the dirty corners of what politics does. Now Putin's politics has morphed into naked aggression. The outright murder of babies, old men, pregnant women and young men. Its right to think that sending your young citizens is a last resort. Even the fresh memories of Afghanistan need not enter the equation. But bullies like Putin only respect a bigger dog. He is afraid of the dog called NATO and the EU. Thats why he played the nuclear bluff. BIGUN is right that bullies need to see the rifling of a .45 1911 before they really open their eyes.

Hi folks, This just about flushes Ukraine down the proverbial drain: U.S. closes door on sending fighter jets to Ukraine - POLITICO A real Chamberlainesk position: any action by the U.S. or NATO allies to provide jets could be seen by Russia as an act of aggression and lead to an escalation of its attack. IMO a gutless position to take. Jerry Baumchen

Yep. Been that way for a long long time. For example, The RAF recognizes seven aircrew personnel who were from the United States as having taken part in the Battle of Britain. American citizens were prohibited from serving under the various U.S. Neutrality Acts: if an American citizen had defied the neutrality laws, there was a risk of losing their citizenship and imprisonment.

Well, no. Putin didn’t invade Ukraine just for a domestic message, he did it for (what he thinks are) legitimate strategic and economic objectives. Now the war is going badly he still doesn’t need a distraction for the populace because he has instead used it as cover for going Full Soviet on state control of the media. On the flip side, as the world turns against him Ukraine is even more strategically valuable as (in his paranoid fantasies) a buffer against invasion, and the huge oil and gas reserves even more crucial to their economy as the only thing left they’re able to sell.

What are you talking about? Belarus has a Russian puppet government. Russia literally invaded Ukraine through Belarus. The convoy attempting to reach Kyiv was staged out of Belarus. To most intents and purposes Belarus is already part of Russia.

Along these lines . . . “No matter how perilous the international landscape, we will maintain our strategic focus and promote the development of a comprehensive China-Russia partnership in the new era,” Wang said. https://thehill.com/policy/international/597136-china-praises-ties-to-russia-sending-aid-to-ukraine My understanding is the "U.S. goods and services trade with China totaled an estimated $615.2 billion." Russia's contribution of goods and services with "China is $146.9 billion. " If we learned nothing from the pandemic; Communist China (or Russia) should not have a firm grasp on our manufacturing and supply chain. If we propped up Latin, Central America and Canada with a blended distribution of manufacturing and supply between the US and them - wouldn't that benefit everyone? More jobs. less illegal immigration, stronger ties in the Americas? Thoughts.

Just keep Ukraine alive for the next few months. Remember all the arguments about how expensive it was for the USA to keep forces in the Middle East for almost 20 years? Resupplying them, getting back troops with PTSD, etc.? That was expensive even for the the biggest economy in the world. And nobody was sanctioning the US then. Russia, with their economy already smaller than Italy before the invasion, will be going bankrupt even without counting the ongoing military expenses. They probably have until June at the latest. They'll run out of ammo, out of money, and out of friends.

Russia has already said that today. They said any nation involved with maintaining any no-fly zone would be seen as an active participant in the war. Which is what I said from the beginning, any no-fly zone will draw NATO into the conflict completely. Any other ideas are naïve.

I don't think the Russians would make a distinction between Polish AA weapons & personnel inside Ukraine, or missiles fired from Poland at Russian aircraft over Ukrainian airspace. If such an engagement occurs, Poland would be in a de-facto state of war with Russia, probably not something they want.

Hi Roland, Those cloud regs are FAA regs. Good luck trying to get rid of them. * Jerry Baumchen * Try pissing into the wind, you will be more successful.