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Fascinating overview of the situation with Crimea.
If Russia maintains control, then they can use it again as a staging ground for their next attack on Ukraine.
If Ukraine regains control, Russia loses the Sevastopol port for its Black Sea fleet.
An independent Crimea with UN peacekeepers is a halfway measure that might work, but hard to imagine either side being content with that. Russia might if they get to keep Sevastopol.
Ukrainian military will have a difficult time recapturing Crimea, as Crimea is well defended and the area for invasion is limited. Also, they don't have the long range missiles, aircraft, or naval capabilities that would be needed.
Destroying the bridge and cutting off access from the north might work, eventually.
Over the years, Russia has deported hundreds of thousand from Crimea and replaced them with Russians. So that will be a problem. Hard to imagine Ukraine deporting a million "ethnic Russians" from Crimea. But also hard to imagine how they can maintain control if the majority of people oppose being part of Ukraine.
If and when Ukraine regains control of Crimea, perhaps they will resettle a million Ukrainians whose homes have been destroyed in Russia's invasion. Crimeans who maintain strong ties to Russia might self-select to move back to Russia.
If certain Ukrainians hadn't committed treason, Russia would have had a hard time invading from Crimea, just as it will be difficult for Ukraine to take it back. Take out a few bridges and you are limited to one narrow corridor in the west.
Russia defense ministry put out statement denying they brought down the drone. According to their statement, the drone had "a loss of altitude and collided with the water surface."
Did you read my post? I copied it above in case you needed a refresher.
Nuclear weapons would not be needed to destroy Russia's nuclear arsenal. It could be done with conventional weapons. It has been gamed out for years.
Putin clearly did not fully grasp the consequences of his most recent attempt to "annex" Ukraine, but I suspect the picture is becoming clearer by the day.
Obviously, they are not going to sit tight and wait for this to happen.
Russia defense ministry put out statement denying they brought down the drone. According to their statement, the drone had "a loss of altitude and collided with the water surface."
If certain Ukrainians hadn't committed treason, Russia would have had a hard time invading from Crimea, just as it will be difficult for Ukraine to take it back. Take out a few bridges and you are limited to one narrow corridor in the west.
If the Ukrainian military can cut off the northern routes and take out the bridge, they might be able to lay siege to Crimea.
That might be the best plan.
They could still resupply by ship, but hard to imagine them doing this for long time if the Russian economy collapses.
They might just be able to wait them out. Who knows?
"According to National Security Council communications coordinator John Kirby," it was “not uncommon” for Russian aircraft to intercept US aircraft over the Black Sea, and said there had been other intercepts in recent weeks."
"The US has been operating Reaper drones over the Black Sea since before the beginning of the war, using the spy drones to monitor the area. "
Seems the drone downed was a different one than claimed, a more advanced one:
Quote:
It appears that a US surveillance RQ4 Global Hawk drone, callsign “FORTE10” went missing at 8:40:58 CET (Central European Time). The drone flew within 18 nautical miles of the Russian coastline. It was cruising at an altitude of 52k feet.
There are many reasons to suspect that the drone from today's incident was not a Reaper given their rare usage in that area. Hawks have been spotted much more frequently.
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