Obviously. The point the person was making was to say that even if we buy into the bullshit narrative that this was consensual, it still doesn’t make sense. They didn’t use incorrect terms to skirt around it, they were making a specific point about their claims.

Ukraine’s constitution forbids an election during a state of emergency. This isn’t him overriding precedent, this is codified into law.

At risk of misreading, I think they might be parodying the usual IDF line. The ‘runs into shrapnel’ bit is a little over the top.

Yeah that’s a perverse incentive if I’ve ever heard one

Pardon?

Bang on. You don’t make someone your bodyguard without trusting them, so this guy is a good pick from the perspective of maintaining power as an autocrat.

Hilarious for them to act like the Su-57 (Russia’s fifth gen option) is truly comparable to ether F-35 or China’s J-20. To my understanding, the Su-57 is highly optimized for dexterity and maneuverability in dogfighting, but that doesn’t mean shit when you’re dealing with the stealth, sensor, and range capabilities of an F-35 or J-20. It’s for this reason that some have referred to the Su-57 as a ‘4.5th gen’ fighter, as it lacks several of the stealth and sensor integration capabilities of its fifth gen peers.

Anyways, I doubt that the US is really worried about Russia’s offering here, but I’d bet they are very worried about China’s.

Incredible. They’re essentially asking Ukraine to help them give money to the guys they’re fighting a war against and then getting mad and pouty when Ukraine says no.

This isn’t blackmail, it’s just common fucking sense while you’re at war. I feel for the people affected by this, but the leadership in Budapest and Bratislava can go pound sand.

Also worth noting that Russia has not made any real significant territorial advances since the start of the war despite hundreds of thousands of casualties while massively burning down their inheritance of old soviet systems. It’s not just Ukraine who hasn’t been able to change that.

Conflicts like this aren’t just determined by military strength, as there is defender advantage, political will to fight, western aid, etc. to consider that could change the balance. I would agree that Russia has the edge right now, but that’s definitely something that can change.

Damn bro you’re getting mad downvoted for being fully correct. Some of the numbers in this article are relatively credible from what I understand*, but in general it’s bad practice to take Russian or Ukrainian claims at face value. Both have an incentive to lie for the purposes of morale, propaganda, and - especially in Ukraine’s case - international perception. Russia’s lies have been particularly egregious though the war, with claims that are physically impossible (see: Russia’s claim earlier in the war to have destroyed an Abrams tank months before they even arrived in Ukraine.)

*I haven’t checked open source loss data or anything, so take this with a grain of salt.

Yeah. Losses are to be expected from materiel that is in use, and people shouldn’t be surprised when western equipment shows up in loss statistics. It wouldn’t be a problem or even that noteworthy if the US could pull its head out.

The ‘e’ is pronounced more like it’s ‘ay’; vih-VAYK.

Yet another thing that woke moralists took from us smh

Talking about a tank like it’s a weather event lmao

Yeah it seems like everyone here has a perception of Mormons that is significantly more hard line than reality. The shunning they’re talking about is not part of official church policy, and speaking as an ex Mormon myself, nobody in my life cut contact when I left because there’s no doctrine that says they should. Indeed, official doctrine is that you should support that person no matter what with the hopes that they come back into the fold. Jehovah’s Witnesses, by contrast, DO have official policy for how everyone should cut contact when someone is disfellowshipped.

I have a long laundry list of gripes with the LDS church, but this particular issue isn’t one of them (at least from a policy and doctrine perspective). I will note, however, that in times where I have seen this shunning happen, it’s rarely due to the person who left putting strain on their relationships. Instead, it’s typically due to religious fanaticism on an individual level from the LDS people in their lives. That’s unfortunately not unusual for religions, though, and I don’t think Mormons are unique here.