Thank you for your reply! That’s the thing, I don’t know if they’re wrong. I generally believe fighting for Ukraine is the right thing to do, though maybe not for everyone. I also don’t want to lose them or make them think I don’t care. So I wondered if there is an objective way to evaluate their expected impact, and if it comes out low, I’d make an argument based on that. And if it comes out high, I’d find something else to say. I am not sure if they’re serious, maybe they want me to talk them out of it, but I’m not going to make an argument based on lies.
Setting aside the combat and violence of personal actions, I think that supporting military efforts for Ukraine is bad because Russia will win, and we shouldn’t take actions that prolong the conflict. Prolonging the conflict may add many days of extreme violence.
I think Russia has been incredibly shamed morally and also militarily. Nothing further or learned will be accomplished by Russia using heavy weapons and artillery, which they may do.
There are other issues from prolonging the conflict. Large amounts of western volunteers, shipping large amounts of weapons and further pressures on Putin’s regime could be destabilizing.
The fact that Russia will win (or level Ukrainian cities) is probably the key factor for the “EV” of intervention.
Although you don’t want to use a ploy, I’m not really sure this is helping. This thread you have created would be most valuable if your friends are very serious. However, if they are very serious, breaking out some spreadsheet, explaining the inevitable defeat, or mansplaining suffering to Ukrainians or strong supporters seems bad or counterproductive.
The reality is that there is a huge supply of untrained volunteers, and even if there wasn’t a war, there’s no capacity to make these people into effective units. Even if your friends weren’t Russians, no one would give them a javelin or any responsibility. Most unskilled volunteers will probably be given a rifle and sent to some general area, not trusted to undertake any important operation or even important defense. It’s likely they won’t be allowed to move freely.
Even for regular soldiers, the reality of warfare is extremely boring. Bickering and bureaucracy, mismanagement and waste of resources is common. Like in many businesses, the perception is that most work is useless, corrupt and ineffective. In a losing situation, all the above is many times worse. Food, medicine and clean water will run out and sleeping on the cold ground with poor equipment gets old quickly.
The quality of “managers” or the NCOs in the militia are probably really bad. A militia unit isn’t going to get good “talent”, and leaders will be incompetent or blowhards. If you ever had a bad boss and thought that was oppressive, in this situation that person will now have life and death control over you and your friends and you may not be allowed to leave.
The reality of fighting in any conflict is that regular or even marginal quality troops are much more effective than an average person to a degree that it’s hard to understand or explain. This is true even for very talented, athletic people, who have studied warfare. In the same way that even if you were the best football player, you would completely fail if you tried to play basketball.
The reality of the conflict is that the most likely situation your friends will ever encounter Russian forces they could actually affect is if they are being overrun, and terror and panic in that experience is terrible.
The above doesn’t go into diseases, fragging (which your Russian friends should be pretty worried about), war crimes (often widely committed by both sides in any conflict) and PTSD.
Thank you for your reply! That’s the thing, I don’t know if they’re wrong. I generally believe fighting for Ukraine is the right thing to do, though maybe not for everyone. I also don’t want to lose them or make them think I don’t care. So I wondered if there is an objective way to evaluate their expected impact, and if it comes out low, I’d make an argument based on that. And if it comes out high, I’d find something else to say. I am not sure if they’re serious, maybe they want me to talk them out of it, but I’m not going to make an argument based on lies.
It’s valid and thoughtful for you to think this.
Setting aside the combat and violence of personal actions, I think that supporting military efforts for Ukraine is bad because Russia will win, and we shouldn’t take actions that prolong the conflict. Prolonging the conflict may add many days of extreme violence.
I think Russia has been incredibly shamed morally and also militarily. Nothing further or learned will be accomplished by Russia using heavy weapons and artillery, which they may do.
There are other considerations here.
There are other issues from prolonging the conflict. Large amounts of western volunteers, shipping large amounts of weapons and further pressures on Putin’s regime could be destabilizing.
The fact that Russia will win (or level Ukrainian cities) is probably the key factor for the “EV” of intervention.
Although you don’t want to use a ploy, I’m not really sure this is helping. This thread you have created would be most valuable if your friends are very serious. However, if they are very serious, breaking out some spreadsheet, explaining the inevitable defeat, or mansplaining suffering to Ukrainians or strong supporters seems bad or counterproductive.
Ok, there is more. This is fully truthful:
The reality is that there is a huge supply of untrained volunteers, and even if there wasn’t a war, there’s no capacity to make these people into effective units. Even if your friends weren’t Russians, no one would give them a javelin or any responsibility. Most unskilled volunteers will probably be given a rifle and sent to some general area, not trusted to undertake any important operation or even important defense. It’s likely they won’t be allowed to move freely.
Even for regular soldiers, the reality of warfare is extremely boring. Bickering and bureaucracy, mismanagement and waste of resources is common. Like in many businesses, the perception is that most work is useless, corrupt and ineffective. In a losing situation, all the above is many times worse. Food, medicine and clean water will run out and sleeping on the cold ground with poor equipment gets old quickly.
The quality of “managers” or the NCOs in the militia are probably really bad. A militia unit isn’t going to get good “talent”, and leaders will be incompetent or blowhards. If you ever had a bad boss and thought that was oppressive, in this situation that person will now have life and death control over you and your friends and you may not be allowed to leave.
The reality of fighting in any conflict is that regular or even marginal quality troops are much more effective than an average person to a degree that it’s hard to understand or explain. This is true even for very talented, athletic people, who have studied warfare. In the same way that even if you were the best football player, you would completely fail if you tried to play basketball.
The reality of the conflict is that the most likely situation your friends will ever encounter Russian forces they could actually affect is if they are being overrun, and terror and panic in that experience is terrible.
The above doesn’t go into diseases, fragging (which your Russian friends should be pretty worried about), war crimes (often widely committed by both sides in any conflict) and PTSD.