Moscow Times Op-Ed: Russia Is Entering a Long and Pointless War

[pampango]

Immediately after the U.S. head of state reluctantly shook hands with and spoke to Putin, Moscow launched a bombing campaign in Syria. The Federation Council quickly authorized the president to start the new war. I suspect that the elected officials had to act quickly because Putin had probably already ordered the bombing of Syrian territory.

And while the Kremlin at least made a pretense of requesting authorization from the Federation Council, it flagrantly disregarded its obligations to the United States. Russia began its air strikes without any consultation between the U.S. and Russian militaries — a step that the defense ministers and presidents of both countries had only just agreed to observe.

As for the military question, deploying a single air squadron to Latakia will hardly turn the tables in the hostilities. Those three dozen aircraft can make only 20-40 sorties per day. By comparison, the 7,200 sorties that the Washington-led coalition has carried out since it began operations have not stopped the Islamic State militants. Under such circumstances, it is unlikely that the Russian aircraft enjoy some advantage that would give them victory on the battlefield. (Of course, Moscow leaders do enjoy one advantage: They can use state-controlled television to boast to the Russian people about the number of "terrorists" killed each day in Syria and to avoid a discussion of civilian casualties.)

It is already clear that Russia has become drawn into a useless war, one with no definite military objectives and which is impossible to win. The forces that Moscow has deployed are obviously insufficient to achieve even the tactical objectives in this struggle. In fact, it has every indication of becoming a long and pointless war.

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/opinion/article/russia-is-entering-a-long-and-pointless-war-op-ed/537215.html

[LittleBlue]

1. Not quite pointless when women are being sold at public slave auctions and

raped in the streets for sport.

[pampango]

4. You make good case that bombing ISIS by the US, Russia, France and the UK is not pointless.

Indeed, Putin has argued for a grand coalition to defeat ISIS

I agree with what I think it your point that defeating ISIS should be the world's #1 goal in Syria. If and when that is accomplished, the Syrian people can decide whom they want as their leader and what type of government it should be. In the meantime, I don't support any foreign power bombing Assad's forces or the non-ISIS opposition to Assad in order to maneuver for position in the (hopefully) post-ISIS Syria.

It seems to me that the OpEd's point was not that the enemy is not real and nasty but that the force is too small to make a difference which will either lead to failure or to mission creep.

As for the military question, deploying a single air squadron to Latakia will hardly turn the tables in the hostilities.

If Russia plans to intensify its air strikes, the military will have to deliver many tons of ammunition to Latakia.

Worse, the base is located several dozen kilometers from the combat zone and it is entirely possible that the anti-Assad forces will stage an offensive to capture the base and destroy the aircraft.

There is no guarantee that the single Russian battalion deployed to protect the base could repel such an attack. If not, Moscow would have to either quickly evacuate those troops or send in reinforcements.

[NobodyHere]

8. Then the question becomes

Are you willing to put up with collateral damage and air strikes accidentally hitting sites like hospitals? Some of the people you are trying to save will get killed.


Now I'm what is right or wrong here as I myself am quite conflicted. If we do get rid of ISIS then who comes to power next?

[malthaussen]

2. I seem to recall another war long ago...

... where a superpower wanted to prop up its pet dictator in the midst of a civil war... now, where was that? Ah, the mind becomes fuzzy after awhile...

And for the best of humanitarian reasons, too.

-- Mal

[geek tragedy]

5. you'll have to be more specific than that, unfortunately . . . nt

[malthaussen]

6. In fact, all you need to do is blindfold yourself and throw a dart at the map...

... unfortunately.

-- Mal

[GGJohn]

10. Could it be....................................................Vietnam? eom.

[KamaAina]

3. The buzzword over there is "Afghanistan".

Their equivalent of Vietnam. It has been speculated that the USSR's failure in Afghanistan led to its collapse.

[ieoeja]

9. Détente led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Rank and file Russians knew they had it bad, but honestly believed the West was in far worse condition. Détente showed them otherwise.

Some power Elites did, or rather those one step down the rung, saw an opportunity. They convinced the Politburo to let them conduct an experiment with Pizza Hut. Everyone seems to have forgotten the nearly universal response to Pizza Hut opening up on Red Square. “Communism is dead.” “Lenin is turning over in his glass coffin.” Those were two of the actual lead-ins to the evening news broadcasts that day.

But the Pizza Hut deal had a problem. Rubles were not traded on the global market. How could they bring their profits home. They ended up using Rubles to buy Vodka, selling the Vodka in Western Europe, then converting that money to USD. However, this is effectively a barter system. And you can not operate too much global enterprise on the barter system. The Soviet powers involved with Pizza Hut were doing great, and other powerful Soviets wanted in on the action.

The Politburo finally relented and the Ruble was put on the market. Five seconds later the Soviet Union was broke.

As for Afghanistan’s role, it is kind of hard to bankrupt a county through warfare when that country has conscripted soldiers using weapons and ammunition being made by slave labor from raw materials mined by slave labor out of mines owned by the country in question. The big question never asked about that bankruptcy theory is, “how do you bankrupt a country that trades with nobody?” Until they joined the global market their credit was a non-issue.

And that theory was a long time coming. And it does not appear to have come from our national intelligence apparatus which was caught completely off guard at the Soviet collapse (notably: Western businesses DID see it coming as they began flooding into the former union a couple years earlier). Gingrich came up with the idea to explain how, “Reagan did it.” And people’s desire to support our troops and ascribe it to the all powerful military made a rather farcical theory acceptable.

The Pizza Hut *did* open on Red Square during Reagan's administration. However, Reagan's involvement was numerous attempts to prevent it. They challenged it all the way to the US Supreme Court. After losing there, they tried using the Interational Courts to overrule the USSC ruling.

That last paragraph is, of course, patently impossible. Reagan tried to prevent the spread of capitalism to Russia? Impossible! Reagan tried making our sovereign courts subservient to International Courts? Impossible! It all happens to be true. But no evidence to that effect will ever be accepted by 90+% of Americans.

[malthaussen]

11. Interesting

I never knew that about Pizza Hut.

-- Mal

[ieoeja]

12. Thing is, what I wrote fits Rightist ideology better than their Reagan myth.

They wanted it to be a military victory so badly, and for Reagan to get the credit so badly, that they came up with a truly implausible theory to tie it altogether. Then they add some more logic to say that it was our military "spending" that did it which extends it to an ideological victory for capitalism.

But that still leaves them stuck with "big government spending" defeating the Soviet Union.

What I wrote explains how it was capitalism all by itself that pretty much brought down the Soviet Union. But there is no politicial victory for them. Nixon may have been a Republican, but his defeat of communism was using diplomacy, a technique rejected by Rightwingers.

[GreatGazoo]

7. "Drawn into" ? No. Russia stole our war on ISIS / Assad.

With the key difference being that Russia backs Assad staying and the US wanted him out.

The US war was to be on ISIS + Assad using "moderate rebels" and air strikes.

Nine months into an effort to train and equip moderate Syrian rebels to fight against Islamic State militants, U.S. defense officials acknowledged that they have only "four or five" on the battlefield now and only a few dozen more on the way. The statement drew gasps and laughs of horror from members of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Wednesday.

http://www.militarytimes.com/story/military/capitol-hill/2015/09/16/isis-fight-sasc-concerns/32499119/