AP: Russian missiles crossed into NATO member Poland, killing two people | Hacker News Reader

AP: Russian missiles crossed into NATO member Poland, killing two people

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122 pointsapp4soft40 comments

It doesn't take much to trigger very bad things from escalating. Luckily comms are much more reliable now than when Arch Duke Ferdinand was assassinated. Also - no one wants to blow up the planet which is what a direct NATO/Russia confrontation would look like.

We can hope China would lean on Russia to keep them from doing anything stupid... On the other hand, they have not been much help in arresting Jung-un Kim's bellicose antics and he's a much smaller player, though tactically smarter.

Why would China do this? NATO expending it’s arms and resources in a conflict with Russia in Europe means that hardware is unavailable for use in the Pacific theater.

Because they would not want this to escalate to a nuclear conflict even if it’s limited to “tactical” nukes. Such a conflict would impact world trade further and would harm their domestic agenda and policies. They want to avoid things which could contribute to internal instability.

In a world where the geostrategic situation can be largely broken down into "the west vs. the rest", Russia is basically China's only ally (in the sense that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend") of any consequence. While it's likely that a conflict between Russia and the West (NATO) would greatly weaken the West, it's also possible that the West could "win" such a conflict without taking serious damage (i.e. via regime change instead of war).

There is no worse outcome for China than the replacement of a neutral/friendly regime in Russia with a pro-western one.

> There is no worse outcome for China than the replacement of a neutral/friendly regime in Russia with a pro-western one.

It's also one of the best outcomes for Russia.

And is also completely unrealistic. Russia will never be "pro-western", no matter who rules it.

Just imagine.

A more likely scenario is a broken up Russia. Russia’s boarders looked very different a few hundred years ago. And many of the countries Russia has taken land from in the past might lay claim to that territory of Russia falters.

Just like russia was America's best friends during WWII, they still let them bleed dry before entering the war ensuring a sufficiently weakened Russia after the war.

In South-East Asia there’s plenty of hardware used by countries around China, many of them US allies. I also doubt that NATO would be seriously involved in conflicts in that region: too big logistical problem.

Probably because the NORTH ATLANTIC Treaty Organization isn't involved in the PACIFIC OCEAN so they don't care what NATO does. But they share a border with Russia so they're impacted by what Russia does.

Full AP news title:

> A senior U.S. intelligence official says Russian missiles crossed into NATO member Poland, killing two people.

> A Polish government spokesman did not immediately confirm the information, but said leaders were meeting[0] on "crisis situation."

Additionally AP said next:

> Polish media reported that two people died Tuesday afternoon after a projectile struck an area where grain was drying in Przewodów, a Polish village near the border with Ukraine.[1]

The Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Latvia already sent condolences:

> My condolences to our Polish brothers in arms. Criminal Russian regime fired missiles which target not only Ukrainian civilians but also landed on NATO territory in Poland. Latvia fully stands with Polish friends and condemns this crime.[2]

[0] https://twitter.com/PiotrMuller/status/1592562744729161730

[1] https://twitter.com/AP/status/1592595649546964992

[2] https://twitter.com/Pabriks/status/1592588505393541122

The remaining Russian embassy staff is probably packing their bags.

One step closer to modern day Cuba missile crisis. I guess it is good news that the world is still standing, all things considered...

Some early speculation suggests it may be the unintended fallout of a missile hit by air defense systems, as opposed to a deliberate or intentional strike.

Time will tell. It is a credible possibility, however, so let's not be too hasty to jump to conclusions in this fairly critical matter.

An off-the-record senior US intelligence official and the Latvian Ministry of Defense is enough for me to tentatively jump to this conclusion for the purpose of idle conversation. Obviously Poland is using a higher bar, but I don't see why a random internet should.

They found S-300 parts, which is a Russian air defense missile, used by the Ukrainians.

If those were Russian missile they are getting sloppy. An accident like this warrants a strong response, but it will be measured and in direct contrast to the picture Russia painted of an oopsie causing a war with NATO should Ukraine have joined.

What happened to the previous discussion?

Still here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33613278

NATO should work with Ukraine to establish an air defense zone in western Ukraine. This would provide a haven for Ukrainians who have had to flee their country due to Russia's terrorism. What Russia is doing is unacceptable, and it is having a material impact on NATO countries.

So you're saying NATO should shoot down Russian planes?

A scary thought: losing a war against Ukraine might be shameful. Losing one against NATO much less - so if you can't win against Ukraine, then escalate until you're defeated by NATO.

Ukraine will be content with restoring its borders to pre-2014. NATO will decapitate the regime, demilitarize the country including its nukes, and install a pro-western autocratic puppet in the Kremlin.

I don’t think you want to lose to NATO.

> install a pro-western autocratic puppet in the Kremlin

Like Erdogan?.. Or Netanyahu? Or Berlusconi? Not sure what would be a good example, can you give some?

Japan in 1945?

they didn't have nukes.

Zelenskyy?

Kosovo criminals

Won't happen. But the US and friends will probably bankrupt Russia and it will all fall apart USSR style. That was the initial plan anyway and it kind of worked until it didn't.

Fall apart how? That’s the least likely scenario.

Breakaway separatist republics (with nukes, which brings us to why it didn't work out that well). Think Daghestan, Bashkortostan where there are already problems because of the disproportionate mobilization effort. Some of them are already unsovereign states with all the necessary institutions. There's a reason they're called republics.

Those republics (Chechnya and Dagestan) have fewer than a million people and Moscow is not afraid of razing them to the ground. Other republics don’t have significant non-Russian population. Russia falling apart is just wishful thinking.

The Kremlin will no longer have the means of razing every one of them to the ground once everybody wants out. They could raize cities, not entire republics.

> But the US and friends will probably bankrupt Russia and it will all fall apart USSR style.

Probably not; certainly, individual republics might be temporary loci of power in a central government collapse, but they’d almost certainly reconstitute the central government, perhaps with a slightly different central/local balance of power. The Russian Federation doesn’t (for the most part) have the same centrifugal forces as the USSR held in by a strong central authoritarianism.

The moment Russia is so weak that it falls apart, China will invade them. No one in the west would want that.

It's exactly what they want. They think that NATO won't attack Russian territory because of nukes. But direct NATO participation in Ukraine will be a victory for Putin's fascists regime in Russia. They will be screaming "we told you so", "NATO aggressive expansion", "bla bla bla", etc. This would be a justification for them to convert Russia into a total shithole like North Korea, but with "gods" at the top of power hierarchy.

The latest news is that this was a Ukrainian SAM missile that unsuccessfully tried to intercept a Russian missile.

So? US missiles hit the Chinese embassy in Beograd in the 90s. Tragic mistake I'm sure.

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