- Russia plans to increase its troops along its border with NATO, Lithuania’s prime minister said.
- Ingrida Šimonytė said Russia is returning to a Cold War posture and Europe needs to be prepared.
- Estonia also warned that Russia may double its troops along NATO’s border compared to 2022 figures
Surely they are running out of troops. How many people do they have to toss at the grinder?
They drew up draft orders for Moscow. Which they haven’t send out since the start of the war. Shoigu said he wants a army of 10 million… Which is possible and would outnumber all of Nato combined. Now if they can afford it and keep it fed is another issue…
Maybe it is theoretically possible, but that would be 1/4th of their population ages 18-44. They would have to dedicate their entire economy to just supporting the army, no ither industry would be able to survive.
Out of curiosity, how is this ratio relative to some place like North Korea?
That’s a good example actually; it looks like 30% of N Korea is in the military, and their global standing reflects this
They won’t even have enough shovels for 10 million soldiers. Guess we’ll be seeing meat waves of guys with pointy sticks, then.
Bad news is that they still have mosin nagants. There were almost 1/2 a billion of them made. I’m surprised they haven’t pulled them out of storage on a larger scale yet.
they pulled, to sell for alcohol, or it never existed to begin with
Considering how many they shipped here, you might be right…some oligarch told the ussr they made 1/2 a billion but really just made 50million, then sold most of them off for pennies.
Their stock has been slowly dwindling down from people using them as baseball bats, table legs, and firewood
Probably around 80 million, give or take
Here’s my prediction for historical purposes:
- In the next 10 years the three Baltic nations will be invaded
- it’s done via North West Russia, Belarus and Kaliningrad simultaneously
- This leaves only the tiny border with Poland to defend for those states if it’s successful because subs are gonna sub any coastal attempt at a D-Day
- Tactical, low yield nukes will be used to deter future responses because NATO has shown a strategic weakness on their desire to avoid escalation
- It’s coordinated with an invasion of Taiwan to spread the West thin
That’s it. That’s my prediction based on having lived through the cold war and being interested in history.
I really fucking hope I’m wrong.
Here’s where you’re wrong: Finland. It provides easy striking distance for St Petersburg and Murmansk (which is an important naval base). Hit St Petersburg, and the Baltic states are at far less risk of being cut off.
Strike Sevestapol, and Russia is cut off from the Atlantic.
Balarus isn’t guaranteed to stay a Russian ally, either. That’s Lukashenko’s thing, but his grip on power could still slip away.
I hear you but Russia has made it clear that any existential threat will result in nuclear war so that rules out going onto their internationally recognised land without risking that.
Taking back invaded land is a different matter as we’ve seen.
Edit: And I’ve limited understanding on this but I thought Belarus had already agreed to become part of the Russian federation. I hold out hope they’ll move back to democracy and agree that would definitely change things strategically.
Russia has made it clear that any existential threat will result in nuclear war
putin said that, kill him and his generals aren’t going to stay behind to a dead guy
A fucking wrong sneeze on Russian soil is enough for a nuclear threat. If he’s going to do it, we can’t do shit about it anyway, because he’s going to use all excuses left in the book. He’s going to spin some narrative and either Russians will actually grow a spine and refuse the order - or won’t.
The only thing we can hope is, that they didn’t change the plutonium in the warheads so they are all duds.
I agree that’s probably the plan.
The problem with that plan is that nuclear NATO countries have a very clear policy of launching in case of a NATO country being invaded. And nobody expects a nuke not to be met with more nukes.
Russian subs are shit. And won’t be able to stop Western naval power.
Every warm water Russian port is well within bombing range.
The US is setup to fight a two front war. And it’s not even on a war production footing.
We’re under no obligation to strike back in the Baltics. We could easily snap an alliance with Ukraine, and unleash the F-35 and B-21 on that very large front. Russian supplies, and command, will cease to exist over night. And their front lines shortly thereafter. Their Air Force couldn’t get superiority against Ukraine. They aren’t going to last five minutes against the US Air Force and Navy. (The Marine planes will be busy teaching the Chinese the same lesson)
you are puting to much faith in their organizational capability, also logistics, the same argument was made for the 3 days military operation, also putin is going to be dead by them
That’s a pretty reasonable prediction; I’d add that the optimal time would be year 3 of a trump presidency.
I am woundering when russia decides to use tactical nukes in Ukraine. - the way they are gonnna spin the last terrorist attack( assuming its not an inside job…prob is.) sure does not give me warm fuzzy feelings about their desparation…
I feel like it’s an inevitability, personally. They’ll call it territorial defense, given their claims on Donetsk and Luhansk and / or in the opening shots of a NATO war to show they mean business.
I feel they missed the window for this after the Kharkiv withdrawal. At this point the US has made it clear they would respond with conventional strikes on military targets.
russia has proven to be toothless save the one big fang of nuclear weapons.
this idea that troops on the border of nato matters to literally anyone is kinda of comical. clearly optics for ignorant russians.
I mean, it’s easy for someone in the US or Western Europe to say but I’d be far less enthusiastic if I was in the Baltics, they’re the ones in the crosshairs.
that is a good point. just being near human killing devices increases your chance of dying by them.
I get your point though, Russia is in no position to reasonably threaten NATO at the moment. They should be closely monitored to keep it that way
“Is returning”?
“got up from bed and out of it’s slump”, I guess.
That’s a fun idea. I’m guessing they got some kind of guarantee from China that they won’t just walk into Vladivostok?
It doesn’t matter if you’re pro Murica or pro Russia. It’s a bit disingenuous to say Russia is arming the border! When the border has literally moved thanks to the Nordic countries getting into NATO and no longer being neutral.
For example if Russia and Mexico formed an alliance, then the US lined the Mexican border with guards, tanks, anti aircraft, etc… That would make defensive sense. It also would not be fair to be portrayed as “USA returning to Mexican American War of 1848 posture, tripling troop counts on the border”. No it’s a very predictable and publicly shared outcome of a very predictable and publicly occurring series of events.
the border has literally moved thanks to the Nordic countries getting into NATO and no longer being neutral
angrygoose.jpg Why are they now in NATO? It couldn’t possibly be because:
- After decades of ‘status quo’ Nordic neutrality was respected by all sides, Russia upsets that balance by…
- Invading Ukraine in violation of the Minsk treaty, having guaranteed Ukraine’s independence if it gave up the leftover Soviet nukes
- Russian rhetoric from the highest level of government has regularly consisted of nuclear Sabre rattling and talk of ‘reunification’
Given how Putin has gone complete clown show into revanchist ideology and is trying to restore the Russian Empire, it’s completely logical for the Nordics/the world to seek alliances for protection.
When the border has literally moved
The last time that border moved was back at the Winter War, when Russia attacked Finland.
I wonder if Finland is thinking about that now, with such a weakened russian military.
I think not. The areas lost are completely russified, it would cause more trouble than it’s worth. And European nations in general don’t see territorial conquest as a valid and non-divisive political move.
NATO border idiot
NATO is a defensive alliance. Nothing changed with respect to Russian defence, just Russian offence. If Finland attacked Russia, NATO wouldn’t back them up automatically. Maybe some nations, but that was the same before the accession.
Literally the only thing that changed is if those Russian soldiers crossed the border, it wouldn’t be only Finnish artillery pounding on them, and somehow Russia is miffed by it.
maybe if they werent invading neighbouring nations other neighbouring nations wouldnt feel the need to seek NATO protection.
Actually this makes it even worse. These countries joined NATO because they feared Russian aggression. Russia responds by… Putting soldiers on the border. Russia has basically proven the other countries had well-founded reasons to join NATO.
You know what the correct response would have been here? Doing nothing. By taking action, they proved the Baltic states right.
