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Comment by chrisdbanks | Hacker News Reader

At the point that Russia starts calling normal people to service, that's the point where he starts losing the population. The vast majority of people don't want to fight in a war. They may believe his lies for the sake of an easy life but if their life is suddenly on the line then it becomes a different story. I think a lot of people will now try to leave Russia to avoid the possibility of military service and that will be a tipping point.

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>The vast majority of people don't want to fight in a war.

This has always been true. And yet the human race has had so many.

I think we have reached an inflexion point globally where the scars of WW2 have ceased to have the tempering influence on politicians they did in, e.g. the 90s.

The lack of a living cultural memory of total war makes it a great deal more likely.

> I think a lot of people will now try to leave Russia

Flights out of Russia sell out after Putin orders partial call-up: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/flights-out-russia-sell...

Stalin killed millions and the worst that happened was some hushed grumbling.

Don't underestimate russian apathy and the government's iron grip on the populous.

That's difference between totalitarian and authoritarian regime.

Yes because in the pre-satellite age, control over the spread of information was far easier. It wouldn't be possible now.

If you think about American manufacturing of consent for the war in Iraq (a war motivated by false claims of weapons of mass destruction but that was mostly emotionally accepted by Americans because of a general sense of anger towards the Middle East over the 9/11 attacks and terrorism), then imagine that Iraq was a neighboring country that America had historically controlled, then picture George Bush asking Americans to mobilize to invade in the context of America losing, you can sort of start to picture how people get swept up emotionally and maybe it becomes easier to believe Russians really will fight this war even past general mobilization.

Imagine the most angry Americans after 9/11 being told that they needed to go fight as America was being pushed back by Iraqis military and Iraq was on our border. At some point you have to accept that the emotional climate matters more than the 'facts' as we may see them.

/an explanation of why we might ought to not assume the Russian population might legitimately be swept up emotionally and actually support this war not rebel against it

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