Russia's invasion of Ukraine: Part 5

David Torres2 said:Americans

At first glance—maybe they do win. But if the pipeline is shut down and no gas is flowing through it anyway, what’s the actual payoff? Their corporations poured massive capital into that infrastructure, and now they’re sitting there taking a massive hit to the bottom line.
On the other hand, a false-flag operation wouldn't be an unprecedented move. For Putin, the pipeline is effectively dead regardless; there's zero chance gas flows toward the West again during his lifetime. Besides, he’s been working to drive a wedge between Western allies for years, and this fits perfectly into that established pattern of behavior.

James Chavez91 said:Maybe time will tell if the explosion wasn't actually tied to the gas leak—could be more related to what hollowdriver13 just became, I guess. 😁

Just look at what the Swedes intercepted mid-air—transponder turned off and all—while being escorted by the Danes, right as the Americans were buzzing around the pipeline with their Poseidon and Hawk aircraft.

https://twitter.com/Ongaunited/statu...88074948288513

Russian Ilyushin Il-20

Edit:

Looks like my previous post got nuked, probably because that massive image I linked was too much for the server, so I'll just drop the links to the tweet everyone's talking about here.

Links showing US Navy activity in the blast zone over the last couple of days:

https://twitter.com/GDarkconrad/stat...95015941197824
P-8 Poseidon

https://twitter.com/kardinal691/stat...73523625119746
MH-60R Strike Hawk

Both of these are sub-hunting types.

Who dropped the bomb?

Is this about to escalate into a full-blown crisis?

I'm bracing for impact.

electricsurfer47 said:Just think about it.

If Russia actually managed to occupy Ukraine, would that really give them better leverage to sell their own resources?

Europe is going to be buying whatever they can from Ukraine now because of this war. It's pretty much impossible to go back to how things used to be.

You just proved my point.
And no, they wouldn't have better conditions. At best, it would stay the same—but let's be real, even Putin isn't stupid enough to think his bargaining power would be anything but significantly weaker, even if everything had gone exactly according to his plan.

So, you're telling me the Russians pulled a total false flag and trashed the pipeline themselves?

These two pipelines connect two corrupt regimes—each busy pointing fingers at the other—where gas flows one way and cash flows the other. Once they settle on a price for their mutual greed, there's bound to be some skimming involved...

quietcobra21 said:I’ll throw my two cents in too.
This is a war over resources. That Russian excuse about wanting a buffer zone between NATO and the Russian Federation is nonsense. Just look at the map. Why aren't the Russians making an effort to seize territory along the eastern and northeastern borders? Like around Sumy, for example.
The most valuable things Ukraine possesses are the oil and gas deposits in the Black Sea (allegedly a bit less than what Norway has) and the mineral wealth in the Donbas mines. Basically, exactly what the Russians have already seized and are currently holding.
Nobody cares about sunflower fields—not one side or the other. You really think ExxonMobil or Chevron is going to come knocking for concessions on sunflower patches? Americans and Englishmen have burned through a few dozen billion dollars so far. What's that compared to hundreds or thousands of billions in oil and gas? Nothing. The Russians know it too. If they let the Americans and the European Union take those deposits, they can kiss their gas sales to Europe goodbye. There isn't a theoretical chance the Americans and Englishmen will just let Russia annex everything they're holding right now. It means they've raised the stakes and they aren't folding now that they have much stronger hands. They'll keep raising the ante until the Russians fold and try to negotiate a peace treaty just to salvage something. Just look at the weapons being sent to the Ukrainians. About twenty HIMARS batteries changed the entire battlefield. Now imagine if they send three times that amount plus ATACMS missiles. It's not like they don't have them. Anyone who plays poker knows you raise the stakes when you're holding a winning hand...
So... watching how this ends will be interesting. The stakes have been bumped up for now, but there's plenty of room to go higher. Whoever's bluffing is the one who's going to lose.
My take is that the Russians lost this war the moment they sent that first soldier into Ukraine. Putin didn't just bite the bait; he swallowed the whole bucket, and he realized that on the second day of the invasion. But hey, no turning back now...
The Chinese are staying quiet and wise. India is doing the same. Iran sent drones, and in return, they got a partial revolution in the form of women's rights protests. I doubt they'll be sending many more drones. Americans don't make threats; only the person with the weaker hand does that.
Putin might be a decent chess player, but he's a lousy poker player. And this is a game of poker, not chess.

My respects, sir.

I'm signing off on this, tomascat hit the mark on Wednesday

Bryan Taylor6 said:I'm signing off on this, tomascat hit the mark on Wednesday

He completely whiffed on this football game. Just total nonsense. ☕

Anthony Perez9 said:He completely whiffed on this football game. Just total nonsense. ☕

Just a few minor things, otherwise it's fine.

Solid review.

Christian Torres3 said:Just a few minor things, otherwise it's fine.

Exactly.
I can't help but recall that one American senator quoting at the start of the invasion: "Putin has just made the mistake of his career."
It was an incredibly stupid move, not to mention a criminal one. I get the impression he was looking at some catastrophically wrong intel and assessments. When you consider that the CIA practically knew the exact day the invasion would kick off, suggesting leaks are everywhere... yeah, that explains it.

It’s funny watching the Western media play dumb and refuse to even hint that the US might have been behind the Nord Stream sabotage—which is clearly the most logical explanation.
Everyone is acting like they don't see what's right in front of them.

Most likely, this was just a message to Russia and Europe that things will never go back to normal with Moscow.

dustyfalcon122 said:You just proved my point.
And no, they wouldn't have better conditions. At best, it would stay the same—but let's be real, even Putin isn't stupid enough to think his bargaining power would be anything but significantly weaker, even if everything had gone exactly according to his plan.

I think you misunderstood what I was getting at.

Even if Russia occupies territory, it doesn't mean Ukraine can't tap into its own resources—Russia could choose to drain those assets, or they might not bother at all since they still have their own supplies to export.

If this war hadn't happened... Ukraine would probably have leaned much harder into using its own resources. That's what would have actually bothered Russia. They wouldn't be able to dictate terms anymore because they'd finally have some real competition on the field.

Linda Collins3 said:It’s funny watching the Western media play dumb and refuse to even hint that the US might have been behind the Nord Stream sabotage—which is clearly the most logical explanation.
Everyone is acting like they don't see what's right in front of them.

Most likely, this was just a message to Russia and Europe that things will never go back to normal with Moscow.

Can anyone give me one single reason why the US would actually do something like that? If they really wanted to stop the flow, they could have just sent someone to the valve and turned it off. Problem solved.

If it weren't for Putin, he wouldn't even know that Tbilisi has a subway system; the place is absolutely crawling with Russians these days.

There’s damage to the pipeline at three different spots, and they're all out in international waters
hm

dodging the draft +18 😲
https://twitter.com/auto_glam/status...64886000914436

electricsurfer47 said:I think you misunderstood what I was getting at.

Even if Russia occupies territory, it doesn't mean Ukraine can't tap into its own resources—Russia could choose to drain those assets, or they might not bother at all since they still have their own supplies to export.

If this war hadn't happened... Ukraine would probably have leaned much harder into using its own resources. That's what would have actually bothered Russia. They wouldn't be able to dictate terms anymore because they'd finally have some real competition on the field.

I mean, "resource depletion" requires at least 100 billion dollars in infrastructure alone. Who in their right mind is going to invest that kind of cash into such an unstable region? Absolutely nobody.
Afghanistan sits on mineral wealth worth thousands of times more than that, yet nobody is digging there either. And honestly? Russia already has plenty of its own stuff; they don't really need to go digging for the same things elsewhere.