Putin should be announcing his run for reelection in 10 days. I bet this insanity will continue for at least that long.
Then we will have to see if it continues after that.
I agree, and I think it will. It’s not just the losses, personel in particular, Putin is really crazy, and is planning to mobilize 170000 extra, because of the “aggression” from Nato. And Russia has made a budget for 2024 with increased spending on the war by 70%! https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/putin-approves-big-military-spending-hikes-russias-budget-2023-11-27/
That means Russia will spend 40% of their entire national budget on “security” in 2024, and that’s made possible by an insane projection of 22% increased tax/oil revenue from a smaller economy?! That alone could break the Russian economy.
It actually is even worse for Russia. The oil price has fallen recently as the US has been increasing production like crazy. At the same time it looks like the EU has lowered oil consumption a decent bit. If Chinas oil consumption does not grow a lot, which is very much possible, that means the Russia budget deficit is going to increase.
I’m not putting too much hope into this. People have been saying the Russian economy would collapse soon because X and Y since the beginning of the war, and so far it has resisted all threats. I’m sure they are operating on borrowed time, but I’ll believe in a collapse when it’s actually happening.
Russia currently has 6.5% inflation with 15% interest rate. The only reason the economy is not falling is massive government spending and that is based on oil money. As soon as you remove that Russia has to make really hard economic choices and it seems like they are increasing anti protest units right now. We have seen what happend with Wagner. More armed men in the country and an unhappy population makes Putins collapse more likely. Having problems at the front even more so and Russian losses are very high right now, if Ukranian figures are somewhat accurate.
Thats just what happens with dictatorships. They cover up small problems until there are enough of them and they have a massive crisis. Democracies have small problems talk about them and that avoids massive crisis for the most part. However it is hard to tell what caused the collapse in the end as it always has multiple reasons.
I’ll give that article a read, thanks! In addition to infantry losses, I’ve been really scratching my head about equipment losses. I get that Russia has a colossal amount of old soviet junk which they can throw at Ukrainian defences, but they must be running out. They can only have so many old T-72s in storage that they can get going again. Tanks, APVs, artillary; long term I just don’t see how it will be possible to sustain an 800km long front line without armour or artillery support. Something has to give eventually.
Well, the short answer is that they have a lot more equipment in storage than you might guess. The long answer is that yes, it will eventually run out, even if it seems like eventually is a long ways away. Perun did a really good video about it 2 months ago, including satellite analysis of equipment storage yards. Worth a watch if you’ve got 70 minutes to spare.
Putin should be announcing his run for reelection in 10 days. I bet this insanity will continue for at least that long.
Then we will have to see if it continues after that.
I really hope that this insane tactic will come back to bite him in the near future. There’s no way these losses can be sustainable.
I agree, and I think it will. It’s not just the losses, personel in particular, Putin is really crazy, and is planning to mobilize 170000 extra, because of the “aggression” from Nato. And Russia has made a budget for 2024 with increased spending on the war by 70%!
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/putin-approves-big-military-spending-hikes-russias-budget-2023-11-27/
That means Russia will spend 40% of their entire national budget on “security” in 2024, and that’s made possible by an insane projection of 22% increased tax/oil revenue from a smaller economy?! That alone could break the Russian economy.
It actually is even worse for Russia. The oil price has fallen recently as the US has been increasing production like crazy. At the same time it looks like the EU has lowered oil consumption a decent bit. If Chinas oil consumption does not grow a lot, which is very much possible, that means the Russia budget deficit is going to increase.
Many say China economy is currently a bit slow too. Hopefully that will help Ukraine a little.
I’m not putting too much hope into this. People have been saying the Russian economy would collapse soon because X and Y since the beginning of the war, and so far it has resisted all threats. I’m sure they are operating on borrowed time, but I’ll believe in a collapse when it’s actually happening.
Russia currently has 6.5% inflation with 15% interest rate. The only reason the economy is not falling is massive government spending and that is based on oil money. As soon as you remove that Russia has to make really hard economic choices and it seems like they are increasing anti protest units right now. We have seen what happend with Wagner. More armed men in the country and an unhappy population makes Putins collapse more likely. Having problems at the front even more so and Russian losses are very high right now, if Ukranian figures are somewhat accurate.
Thats just what happens with dictatorships. They cover up small problems until there are enough of them and they have a massive crisis. Democracies have small problems talk about them and that avoids massive crisis for the most part. However it is hard to tell what caused the collapse in the end as it always has multiple reasons.
I’ll give that article a read, thanks! In addition to infantry losses, I’ve been really scratching my head about equipment losses. I get that Russia has a colossal amount of old soviet junk which they can throw at Ukrainian defences, but they must be running out. They can only have so many old T-72s in storage that they can get going again. Tanks, APVs, artillary; long term I just don’t see how it will be possible to sustain an 800km long front line without armour or artillery support. Something has to give eventually.
Well, the short answer is that they have a lot more equipment in storage than you might guess. The long answer is that yes, it will eventually run out, even if it seems like eventually is a long ways away. Perun did a really good video about it 2 months ago, including satellite analysis of equipment storage yards. Worth a watch if you’ve got 70 minutes to spare.