Summary

Vladimir Putin ordered the conscription of 160,000 men—the largest draft since 2011—despite ongoing U.S.-mediated ceasefire talks with Ukraine.

The move raises doubts about Russia’s commitment to diplomacy, with Kyiv accusing Moscow of using talks to buy time for battlefield gains in Sumy, Kharkiv, and Zaporizhzhia.

Ukraine claims Russia intends to escalate the war, citing forced contracts for conscripts. Losses remain high on both sides, with Russia reportedly losing over 100,000 troops in 2024 alone.

    • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works
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      10 hours ago

      I predict an uptick of Rafale, EF2000, and JAS-39 sales in Europe, and that the models offered will be wired for nuclear delivery should the need arise.

      I feel awful that our government is breaking bad over on this side of the pond… but at the same time, I think open violent revolt and civil war would be a believable scenario if orangeboi actually tries to Molotov-Ribbentrop all of fucking Europe with Putin. So I don’t think he’s gonna actually try that.

      • InvertedParallax@lemm.ee
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        10 hours ago

        He 100% will or has done that, remember the secret protocol was secret.

        The other shoe always drops later.

    • Kyrgizion@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      160K isn’t gonna cut that though. He’ll need several hundred K more if he realistically wants to actually have any gains at all.

      • kingofras@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        I think Vladdy knows that the threat of war is much more of a nuisance to Europe than actually fighting and losing soldiers. This is just for threat posturing at borders.

        The real war is being fought with unmarked soldiers, unsuspicious russian cargo vessels, heavily propagandising one country (Hungary), while leaving others virtually alone (France) to saw division, etc.

        Nobody wins a war from the west. They know they have to go asymmetric, and they are, and the longer it takes Europe to realise that, the longer they will suffer. They also know wars are over 50% psychological.

    • Mihies@programming.dev
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      1 day ago

      Attacking Europe with conscripts and depleted hardware storage? I can’t see how that could fail.

      • InvertedParallax@lemm.ee
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        1 day ago

        They’re Russian, stop trying to bring reason into it.

        I’m sure they genuinely think that now the US will attack Europe and they can invade on 2 fronts.

        Russians are just insane morons.

        • Mihies@programming.dev
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          11 hours ago

          They’re Russian, stop trying to bring reason into it.

          Oh, absolutely. However, insanity can help only that much with invasion.

          I’m sure they genuinely think that now the US will attack Europe and they can invade on 2 fronts.

          Red, white and bluelandia wants a word with you. Do you really think it’s impossible? At this point I’m not that sure anymore.

          Russians are just insane morons.

          I’d disagree to some extent. Call Putin what you want (and rightly so), but he is not a moron (as opposite to the Orange one). The common people is that or just don’t have a choice.

          • InvertedParallax@lemm.ee
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            10 hours ago

            Putin was brilliant, his moves until 2008 were a perfection of geopolitical chess.

            After that he completely lost the plot, his terror at the rise of China completely broke his mind, he felt he had to show strength less Russia become a vassal state and resource depot for the CPC.

            And he wasn’t wrong, but his response was stupid, and relied on Europe continuing to follow Merkel’s ‘nice doggy’ policies.

            Now he thinks he can act anyway, because his sponsored right-wing groups will cause enough dissent that nobody will stop him from taking the baltics.

    • omgitsaheadcrab@sh.itjust.works
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      1 day ago

      Poppycock. Russia would never invade the EU or a NATO member, I don’t know why people always raise this silly idea. For starters there’s no gain, for seconds they’d get their ass handed to them.

      • InvertedParallax@lemm.ee
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        1 day ago

        They aren’t rational, otherwise they would have waited to invade Ukraine till 2024 while cashing fuel checks.