I wonder… does medvedev have enough wits left to understand that if Russia has that right… then everyone … has that right?
They’re finding Ukraine difficult enough. Sure we’re sharing some toys (a lot of toys)… but they don’t have carriers or attack subs or missile destroyers…
Threatening nato is not a sane decision to make. We might just take them at their word.
The toys we're sharing are our older toys from the 80s and 90s even. Its not even the more deadly stuff we have...and they're fighting against a force that's getting a few weeks training on these toys and sent out into the field. If russia truly wants a 72 hour war...all it would need to do is attack NATO.
Yeah, Ukraine is excited about maybe getting some F-16s and how much that could help with the air war and meanwhile a couple of F-22s could take down a whole squadron of them.
A squadron of f-22s could take down most air forces.
An air wing of f-22s could probably beat all other air forces combined, with the possible exception of china, though damn they would need to figure out how to keep reloaded.
The USAF is the strongest air force in the world.
The second strongest is the US navy Air wing.
Think the marines are 4.
Edit: this is an old listing, and russia was #3, so I think we actually have the trifecta.
At one point I believe the Navy had more aircraft total than the AF, but they had them beat in specialization.
AF does the heavy lift jobs, stealth, and up until recently, space launches and satellites. I think Navy and Marine F-18's fly more sorties though.
In any case, we’d probably bog down around the same time China and everyone else on that side got involved. I don’t think it would be as clean or as quick. But, yeah. We could definitely screw them pretty harshly without ever landing troops
China and Russia have no military alliance, Xi is just taking advantage of the fantastic business opportunity that opened up for him for cheap Russian imports. If Chinese troops became militarily involved in Russian territory, it would probably be to acquire their claims over eastern Siberia, dating back to the Qing Dynasty. Otherwise he's just be supporting a state that competes with him for the dominant regional position.
The Tsar took that land from them, back in the day though. If you look at their current claimed territories, they never forgot. Maybe if Russia agreed to become a subject state of China, then they'd help militarily, but they're certainly not friends or allies.
Russia does have actual allies, but not many. And China isn't one of them.
That's what everyone wants, we get west russia, China gets parts of Siberia with resources, and with it we buy peace for another 50 years while everyone consolidates.
We don't need to occupy Russia to stop them from continuing a war that they start. We can just destroy their equipment and manufacturing locations so their armed forces surrender.
There isn't anyone really on that side . China and NATO have differences, but China doesn't have anything to gain from helping Russia, and nthey lose a lot is NATO loses. They will sit out. Similar with India, they will stay out . Iran or a few other small counties might consider joining, but I doubt it as most are smart enough to know that is suicide.
Maybe, Xi seems just sane enough not to try, but who knows. China and Russia can't really win against NATO though they make things harder. India likely hates China enough to join NATO as well.
Of course we are talking nuclear armed countries so everyone loses is possible.
Putin made his move because Xi sounded like he was going to go at the same time.
Xi was closing on HK and planned to switch immediately to Taiwan, even started the domestic pivot, then his navy told him they needed at least 5 years (honestly its more like 15, they are just starting carrier flight ops on the Liaoning and their newer ones aren't shaken down yet).
Putin had made his preparations, Xi hinted he might go anyway once the west was distracted.
If daddy z hadn't stayed in kyiv history would look really bad right now.