ok what the fuck is happening in ukraine

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/chernobyl-power-plant-captured-by-russian-forces-ukrainian-official-2022-02-24/

i believe this will be bad for russia, soon and eventually. it makes no sense, why they're doing this, other than just empire building. so, in other words, shades of 2003 iraq invasion, which also made no sense for the united states, but happened anyway

i know nothing about war other than reading about them and playing videogames, but i would guess the significance of capturing a power plant is that the aggressor immediately gains the ability to cut off power or otherwise affect the regional grid (?), and also that the military can use the newly captured power plant as a forward base of operations?

xpost Well, they also had the Chechnya fiasco, and that didn't end well either

I assume Chernobyl has been offline for decades..?

That NY Times (the bit quoted) seems like nonsense.

Thus thread from December was a sober analysis, and pretty accurate, so far.

Quoting it from where he thinks it will go, and where it ends for Putin

He is unlikely to invade Western Ukraine but can relatively easily split the country in half along the Dnieper and establish a permanent buffer zone between Europe and Russia, as well as a land bridge to Crimea

— Dmitri Alperovitch (@DAlperovitch) December 21, 2021

The most rational explanation I’ve heard is that it’s a shorter route to Kyiv and if the Russians set up a base there you can guarantee no one will fuck with it

xp full disclosure this is from a quora question from 5 years ago, but it seems the nuclear reactors were decommissioned back in 2000, but that also...

...However, parts of the plant remain operational to this day. The massive electrical switchyard is still live, and continues to be operated from the Phase I electrical control room located in the deaerator building between Reactors 1 and 2 (in below photograph). The switchyard handles some of the highest voltages in the European distribution system, 750 kV. Chernobyl is a major distribution hub in northern Ukraine for electricity originating at the Khmelnytskyi Nuclear Power Plant to the southwest.

iirc correctly there was internationally funded containment work and obv the exclusion zone is radioactive. it’s directly in the line to kyev from the north.

good nyt article i read earlier in the year here.

xpost to andy the g

I'm thru with thinking of "he is unlikely"s.

I don’t have anything to say about Ukraine and Russia despite my Russophillia. My friends who’ve asked me are, for whatever reason, surprised that I know about Russian rock bands or computers but don’t know anything about Ukrainian and Russian politics. I will say, as a Russian speaker, the translations I’ve read or heard are strange. Either the translations are good and my ability to understand Russian is now terrible, or the translations are bad and that’s surprising because I was under the impression many of the world’s news services had plenty of Russian speakers on staff. Maybe they’ve been replaced with Persian or Mandarin speakers.

I don’t know anything about politics or the military but I will say this about the attacks in Chornobyl. I feel like it’s mostly politics to whip up fear. Vyshhorod is where many of the electrical services for Kyiv operate from. I imagine they are more interested in the operating power plants rather than the sarcophagus!

biden's speaking now

Ah, I see someone beat me to it. This:

> ...However, parts of the plant remain operational to this day. The massive electrical switchyard is still live, and continues to be operated from the Phase I electrical control room located in the deaerator building between Reactors 1 and 2 (in below photograph). The switchyard handles some of the highest voltages in the European distribution system, 750 kV. Chernobyl is a major distribution hub in northern Ukraine for electricity originating at the Khmelnytskyi Nuclear Power Plant to the southwest.

is absolutely correct. For perspective, Chornobyl is as far away to Kyiv as Springfield is to Boston.

Well, Ukraine seems to be putting up a hell of fight so far... I imagine they're a bit more motivated than the invaders

And this:

At least 735 people have been arrested at anti-war protests across Russia today following the invasion of Ukraine, an independent monitor says.

Demonstrators were detained in 40 cities, according to OVD-Info, which tracks arrests at opposition rallies.

More than 330 people have been detained in Moscow, it says.

Maybe "post-reality" would be a more accurate term. People choose to pretend aspects of the real world do not exist because acknowledging them would create too much cognitive dissonance.

Hmmm maybe I'm missing something but that describes most societies through the ages, I think?

Just in terms of predictors screwing up by assuming an excessive level of rationality we have the example of the belief in Balance of Power pre-WWI.

I guess I also get suspicious of the use of postmodern with an EU flag next to it because it reminds me of ppl who use postmodern and multicultural as synonyms.

Weird to have this conversation on a thread while events happen tho, might revive a postmodernism thread or something.

This presser is the most raucous I've heard in awhile

"I've read everything he's written. Have you read--ehh, I'm not gonna be a wiseguy."

"C'mon, man!"

Biden indicating they will bolster number of troops in Germany, what a timeline.

This presser is the most raucous I've heard in awhile

― Andy the Grasshopper

I hate to use "they" but they want American troops sent.

It felt like Biden was about to say, "Jesus Christ, do you really think we're going to fight this motherfucker?"

I'd guess there will be quite a few troops sent, and even more contractors and military-industrial complex sent in. as someone pointed out here (and elsewhere), i think, an occupation is very good for business. on the more formal us military troops, if russia takes all of ukraine, the pledge to defend "every inch of NATO" suddenly becomes much more intense, as that brings them right up the borders of Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Hungary.

Baltic states as well, which i would think are most at risk after Moldova

i think this is also the kind of thing that has a more or less bipartisan apathetic meh-consensus on, from the american public (to the degree which that has ever mattered). a hot war with american troops directly fighting? i don't think either party has the stomach for that right now, though they often do. but a reboot of the cold war, with military deployment seemingly limited to border patrol and tech, while the contractors make bank all along the way, on both sides of the conflict? that's pretty much the american way imo

xpost well, didn't Hitler start by 'rescuing' a bunch of german speakers in Czechoslovakia?

This may be a superpower standoff but it lacks the ideological nature of the high Cold War. Like does anyone think pro-Putin revolutions are going to start happening in the Americas?

Other than Trump and his sycophants eyeing their portfolios.

I hate to use "they" but they want American troops sent.

I felt the same energy, though of course no one came out and said it. But many of the press questions seemed to imply a certain contempt for sanctions as a weak-willed response.

it lacks the ideological nature of the high Cold War

The USSR was able to add republics and satellite states because of a dense, effective network of communist party operatives.. that won't work here obv

I dunno about effective -- Stalin couldn't get Yugoslavia and Greece in line and fussed over Italy, a rare example of #bothsides because his missions were often as poorly researched as the CIA's.

what do people here think the US should do? Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons under the pretense that we'd protect them in a case like this. Is it not our obligation to help? What can we do that would not risk a nuclear war?

Isn’t it about nationalist autocracies vs democratic nations?

which is which

Biden indicating they will bolster number of troops in Germany, what a timeline.

― Van Horn Street, Thursday, 24 February 2022 bookmarkflaglink

You seem excited by the prospect.

damn give it a fucking break

(xyzzzz if you wouldn't characterize yourself as anti-war / pacifist just let me know, not trying to pigeonhole you)

i'm just curious, what is the anti-war position on this conflict right now? i was a pacifist for a short while, and it was a while back, because i would think about situations like these and what i would want. would the correct thing be to just let russia take ukraine, and also to do nothing in response? or are of you of the putin view, i guess, that the US and ukraine provoked russia and this is the only way it could be? or am i way off on thinking that's what you're thinking?

i mean shit, not like i know what is best. this likely to be a situation where in 10 years everyone's damn, this thing is still burning hot with no end in sight, but i feel like after the next election cycle there could some changes ....

this is the first war i’ve paid proper attention to where the amount of OSINT available is crazy. so much available info. obv like most i’ve followed bellingcat, but seeing real time analysis unfold on the timeline with video footage and analysis, and verification is - to get a bit baudrillard - a complete new way to construct our understanding of war.

I am not excited by a surge of troops in Germany, I just never thought it would happen and at the same time, if it can deter further imperalist adventures from the Russian military, yes it reassures me.

would the correct thing be to just let russia take ukraine, and also to do nothing in response? or are of you of the putin view, i guess, that the US and ukraine provoked russia and this is the only way it could be? or am i way off on thinking that's what you're thinking?

― dig your way out of the shit with a gold magic shovel! (Karl Malone), Thursday, 24 February 2022 bookmarkflaglink

So...you'd like to risk a conflict between countries that have nuclear weapons? Are you ok?

Putin's a fucking monster for this

Biden's a fucking monster for what he did to Afghanistan

I'm so sick of this shit

Yes what Karl wants the most, the artist making loopy gifs who loves baseball, is an all out nuclear war. Great reading.

xp of course i'm not ok xyzzzz, i've been on the ilx slack, everyone there knows what my problems are

i know this is a fucking crazy hypothetical question, but, here me out. if i'm not ok because it's so incredibly ridiculous to risk a conflict with a nuclear weapon-wielding country, what was your stance when the US invaded iraq?

anyways, whatever, i know i'm not going to get any explanation. as fucking terrible as i am, as longwinded and all the bullshit, at least i fucking make a point in the end

*showing myself door, i know*

It’s a fair question to ask, how to answer to an agression without escalating violence? Anyone who think they know exactly what needs to be done and how is kidding themselves. It’s an impossible situation.

fwiw Karl I'm not xyzz and I guess not totally a "pacifist" but would prob define myself as "anti war" and I have zero idea what a correct position here would be, it fucking sucks, but also still feel strongly that a military intervention is not it, and that it's not something we can go to as "welp, we've no better ideas".

xxpost

one thing we could do is try to help the countries accepting refugees