No, Russia's goal is to keep Ukraine in their sphere of influence and prevent democracy from taking hold there, because if that happens in Ukraine people in Russia might start to think it's possible there as well. Also there are geographical reasons regarding border defense which are somewhat understandable, but overruling the will of the people of Ukraine for that is not considered acceptable anymore in this century.
Russia's actions in Bucha, Mariupol and just about everywhere in this war (Cherson during occupation comes to mind) have been horrid, as is its disregard for its own soldiers, many of whom are just used as cannon fodder. Russia is targetting civilians all over the place.
Those other wars are horrible too, but comparing them just by number of casualties is disingenious.
No. Ukraine has a giant border with Poland. Russia do not have the troops to close it down.
They don’t have the troops to counter civilian resistance either. I read an article about hostile army : civilian population ratios in recent conflicts. Russia is off by an order of magnitude and Ukraine has a history almost as bad as Afghanistan. Russia really thought they would be greeted as liberators.
Back in 2008, Putin said how dangerous it was to expand eastward. Ukraine has been preparing to go to war with Russia for years. Since 2014, Ukrainian troops have been bombing Donetsk and Luhansk. Today's situation is not accidental, it is projected. Putin said so. I will also note that the purpose of the operation in Ukraine is to destroy its military power. Russia is not waging war on civilians.
With plain old war there are usually end goals like "gain control of this piece of land/and or resource". Which is what's happening in Ukraine. They want Ukraine's land and resources.
However, it's completely possible to achieve those goals without taking any of the actions listed by the other commenter except maybe a and b, but I can see arguments made that they're referring to noncombatants, and I think most of us can agree that them being wholesale slaughtered by the invading army isn't something that shouldn't be happening in any circumstances.
In this case Russia has made very loud and public statements making it distinctly clear that in addition to obtaining Ukraine's land and resources, they also intend to fully wipe out the national identity of Ukraine by taking most if not all of those actions, and in fact have already done some of them. That would be the difference.
Even Ukraine said they aren’t interested in fighting for the eastern parts of the country because the local population will likely be hostile and make
their jobs much harder.
They are strictly focusing on preventing any greater expansion than what happened prior to the invasion.
There are arguments that Mariupol and maybe even Kherson have a relatively large pro-Russian population compared to other parts but I still believe they want to protect them regardless since they aren’t nearly as large as the more eastern parts and it blocks access to the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea ports.
Realistically, Russia just wants to cause chaos in Western Ukraine whilst rolling over the parts of Ukraine in the East where they have popular support.
Russia doesn't want to take areas it doesn't have popular support in. It just wants to do exactly what it did to Georgia, punish its opponents and annex the friendly bits.
Everyone's doom-mongering, but Russia has a clear strategy.
Excuse me, but this is exactly the naive nonsense I mean.
> And these goals are: "Return of all Ukrainian territory, comprehensive multilateral security guarantees, reparations and war crimes indictments."
Oh, so the goal will be for Ukraine to defeat Russia to the last, Selensky to accept the surrender at the Red Square, and Putin answers to Hague?
The only way to achieve this is to go to Moscow and force the government out of office.
Sounds easy! Just a few more bloody battles in St. Petersburg and Moscow because Putin is not thinking of giving up voluntarily and we are back home by tea time?
Or should the war - as long as it lasts - go on for the next 30 years?
So what is the military strategy now? Throw the Russian forces out of Ukraine and then fight their way to Moscow?
Write Ukraine a blank cheque, blindly provide them with weapons and let them do as they please? And of course, since the Ukrainian army are the good guys and the Russians are the bad guys - did Selensky guaranteed never to take revenge on the Russian population? Is he even capable of giving such a guarantee?
Because war crimes are obviously committed - exclusively - only by the Russians? This is war. So do really think only bad guys do war crimes?
What about reparations then? Will Germany also get a small war profit - after all, the German population suffered from the non-existent economic war and spent a lot of money on artillery?
The point of this war from Russia standpoint is that Ukraine should not exist as nation. The point is to take over Ukraine, change government to puppet one at best and then export their own autocracy there.
Then they may get ready for further expansion, as Russia has already done several times in their history. And Putin is in fact praising that history.
I'm just guessing of course but I would think the goal is to defeat the invading force. Once they're gone there's not necessarily a need to hit back at Russia. My hope would be that Russia wouldn't send another round of attacks because the hotter this gets, the more risk of other countries coming to Ukraine's aid to stop atrocities. In fact that could even be a hope for Ukraine.
This is true, but that was also the case for Russia in Afghanistan, or the US in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq.
It's hard to tell what Russia's goals really are because on one hand they say "we just want the Russians in Donetsk and Luhansk to be free", and on the other hand Putin is also openly saying Ukraine isn't really an independent country. Besides, Kyiv isn't in Donetsk or Luhansk is it? Maybe Putin's map is wrong.
Even if they managed to complete their military goals this week by defeating the Ukrainian armed forces and toppling the Ukrainian government they will either have to retreat and leave Ukraine independent with extremely hostile views towards Russia (and will probably try to join NATO/EU), or they will have to occupy an extremely hostile population who feel their country is invaded by a hostile malevolent power.
It seems to me that Russia already lost, no matter what happens militarily; they dug themselves into a pit that will be very hard to climb out of. The biggest question is how much (more) Ukraine will lose in all of this.
The idea that Russia is looking to conquer all of Ukraine and more is simply war propaganda.
They probably never wanted to permanently hold all of the territory (especially not predominantly Ukrainian-speaking regions in the west).
But it definitely was their stated objective from the very beginning to decapitate the country's current leadership, and install a permanently "friendly" (to Russia) government in its place. Not to simply grab the 4 regions in the east -- which they've still not been able to fully take a hold of, despite explicitly claiming to "annex" them.
The idea that the disastrous initial attempt to encircle Kyiv (and the failed attempt to take Odesa) was some kind of brilliantly executed feint to obscure their "true" current (and ever-shrinking) objectives - that, I'm afraid, it simply "war propaganda".
It makes no geopolitical sense for them to really conquer much more than they already have.
Nothing about what the Russian Federation has done makes any kind of geopolitical sense. It's all just a giant (and incredibly murderous and destructive) fantasy.
As a Ukrainian whose relatives are being bombed and whose friends are currently enlisted - I sure hope they won't consider that at all. The only actions performed outside the internationally recognized borders of Ukraine should be in aid of stopping the invasion of Ukraine. Bombing troops and launch sites - yes. Attacking Russian servicemen wherever they can be reached - yes. Occupying even an inch of Russia - hell no.
Ukraine should even refrain from retaking Crimea militarily if things go well, unless it's virtually bloodless. This war has to end ASAP, and it won't end ASAP if Russians suddenly have a non-absurd reason to defend their land.
Yes. Ukrainian wants a war with Russia. Often people want the results of their actions. Ukrainians are taking actions that result in war. They are shooting at Russians, Russians are shooting at them, that is a war. If one of the sides is not shooting, then it's no longer a war. Ukraine could lay down and simply give up the 'things that don't matter' (from your OP) and war would end. Ukraine could capitulate. Ukraine could end the war by surrendering. Why don't they?
To be clear: War is very low on the list of Ukrainian's wants, but Ukraine wants war more than it wants surrender.
It's really not obvious what Russia's end goal is here. they have some roads, and even if they were some how able to take Kyiv, I'm not sure the Ukrainian people would capitulate.
Isn't it more in the interest of conquering rather than exterminate and destroy? If Ukraine were to surrender, I don't think Russia would continue to kill them all.
Exactly. Many are missing the point that Russia is not trying to annexe Ukraine, but have 2 goals - ideally do a regime change that favours Russia's security concerns or destabilise the country and make it such a shit hole that even the west avoids it. The west on the other hand want to prolong this conflict because it knows that the longer the people are in a state of warfare, the more the people will turn against the Russian invaders (provided ofcourse, their local support and propaganda weakens).
Russia's actions in Bucha, Mariupol and just about everywhere in this war (Cherson during occupation comes to mind) have been horrid, as is its disregard for its own soldiers, many of whom are just used as cannon fodder. Russia is targetting civilians all over the place.
Those other wars are horrible too, but comparing them just by number of casualties is disingenious.
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