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Comment by themgt | Hacker News Reader

Always useful to check past predictions from the author, e.g.

So, what would happen to those 6 million barrels a day if the West stopped buying? Russian officials have threatened to send it “elsewhere,” while the media have focused on stories of stepped-up sales to China and India. But this threat of a redirection to Asia is a paper tiger. - Apr 26, 2022

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/04/26/sanction-r...

Once sanctions are fully in place, Russia’s total crude and product exports (seaborne + land) could fall by as much as 3.3 to 3.9 million barrels a day from a baseline of 7.5 million barrels a day - Oct 19, 2022

https://navigatingrussia.substack.com/p/putins-looming-tanke...

Lots of convincing details and analysis about how oil would be stranded in Russia or forced to sell to the west at a deep discount due to the "price cap" strategy. So what are Russian oil exports looking like 2 years later?

Russia continues as a dominant oil exporter in 2023 despite global sanctions, maintaining a yearly export volume of around 7.5 million barrels per day (mb/d), as per analysis by the International Energy Agency.

With EU/UK/US markets turning away, Russia has pivoted towards India, China, Türkiye, and countries in the Middle East, retaining its position as the world’s second largest oil exporter behind the US in 2023.

https://qery.no/russian-oil-exports-pivots-towards-the-east/

According to the [IEA], Russian ... exports have remarkably steady around 7.5 million barrels per day (although there has been a big shift away from supplying the EU directly)

https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/how-make-price-cap-russian-oi...

View on HN

Why compare to 2023 data? there's 2024 data readily available. https://energyandcleanair.org/december-2024-monthly-analysis...

1.) there's no need to focus on barrels per day; fuel export revenue per day is more important. and from the link, we can see that it was around 1B EUR per day in 2022, and now it's around 600M EUR per day in Dec. 2024. Not great, but as we will see, it's mainly propped up by China.

2.) top 4 buyers of Russia fossil fuels in December 2024 are China, Turkey, India, and EU. China being top buyer is not surprising, given they are allied in the war - China is cutting off drones to Ukraine while supplying more to Russia.

3.) fossil fuel shipment departures from Russia has steadily declined from 80% in Jan 2022, to less than 20% in December 2024.

> fossil fuel shipment departures from Russia has steadily declined from 80% in Jan 2022, to less than 20% in December 2024

What does No. 3 mean?

It means official Russian shipment of oil has decreased, but what takes its place is the growth of ‘shadow’ tankers. And that reduces G7+ shipping industry’s leverage over Russia. It's in the article linked above. Most of the shadow tankers have helped Russia's oil trade stay alive https://apnews.com/article/russia-sanctions-shadow-fleet-oil..., mainly due to Chinese entities. But recently EU has put more sanctions on China for that https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-adopts-new-russia-sa...

The co-mingling of Russian and Chinese naval forces is also very evident recently, with the recent cutting of European underwater cable. Are Russia and China conducting undersea sabotage? | DW News https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ObgVV-HJtI

What does “shadow tankers” even mean? These aren’t insured by the monopolies in the City of London so they’re “ghost” or “shadow” tankers?

Doesn’t make their oil carrying capacity any lesser.

> Doesn’t make their oil carrying capacity any lesser

They’re derelicts fond of puking up their contents [1]. More practically, dark crude sells at a 20 to 30% discount. (Granted, I know the Indian numbers more confidently than the Chinese refiners’.)

[1] https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-shadow-fleet-tanker-o...

“shadow tankers” mean pretending not to be Russia's tankers so as to evade sanctions.

> Are Russia and China conducting undersea sabotage?

this is still a question? yes, they are.

When a lot of the oil trade between Russia and China/India and others is done in mutual currencies, revenue predictions are unlikely to be accurate.

From your first link: "However, Russian oil export revenue saw a $4.2 billion decline due to G7 price caps and a fall in global oil prices."

To be fair, China’s oil demand tempered [1] and the IEA projected massive coming surpluses [2] in that time.

[1] https://www.energypolicy.columbia.edu/chinas-slowing-oil-dem...

[2] https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/oil-demand-set-peak-...

At what price are they exporting it right now, remind me?

There is a theme here - these predictions don't account for the existence of Asia. Chinese military planners have probably noticed that after it is done with Russia the US will be focusing on China. It is very favourable to them to fight the US in a proxy war rather than with Chinese troops. The resources the US is using to try to coerce Russia are probably the same that it will use against China, so if the US fails in Russia it may be exhausted of the ability to resist China.

If I were China's (one of the world's largest creditors, I might note) leadership then there is a pretty good chance I would backstop Russia's debt in this case just to see how badly it hurts the US. Bonus points that then there is financial leverage over a resources superpower who's resources are needed for China's industry.

What is your preferred out outcome for the Russian invasion of Ukraine?

Why are you testing loyalties? What roenxi does is the same speculation that is done daily by the U.S. state department and the CIA. It is tiresome in 2025.

Well I suppose the ideal state would be that people conclude war is expensive and brutal then we enter a sort of global pacifist state. But if you want me to get myself in to trouble I'm happy to oblige because someone has to keep saying it:

1) Ukraine shouldn't have been stationing CIA bases and taking military aid from the US before the war. It was stupid strategy and eventually got them invaded.

2) They should have surrendered on day 1. That would have gotten them a bad deal but not so many people dying.

3) They should still surrender on day 1,050. That'd get them a much worse deal and they've suffered who knows how many 100,000s of casualties for nothing. But it'd at least be over.

4) If we extrapolate from the poor quality of the Ukrainian leadership's decisions so far the worst case is the other side of the coin flip on things like:

> The U.S. intelligence pointed to a 50% chance that Putin would use tactical nukes...

~ https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-putin-biden-nu...

and there are a lot of deaths. I mean, hopefully Bob Woodward is a known liar because that is not a can of worms to open over questions like whether Moscow controls Kyiv. Many of us have lived in a world where Moscow controled Kyiv, it isn't that wildly new. While terrible it just isn't that big an issue. We've coped with the US invading multiple random countries in the Middle East, and while it is icky and unpleasant it is not as bad as the tactical nuke taboo breaking or something like the million casualties we're seeing in the Ukraine war from the West's policy of escalation.

" Ukraine shouldn't have been stationing CIA bases and taking military aid from the US before the war. "

Citation please. This sounds exactly like the lies Putin says to justify the invasion.

"They should have surrendered on day 1."

So if your country is invaded you would surrender "day one"?

"If we extrapolate from the poor quality of the Ukrainian leadership's decisions so far "

What decisions would those be? Zelensky has done a very good job in a very difficult situation.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/23/ukraine-cia-...

Or refer to Trump Impeachment 1, the fuss at the time involved sending military aid to Ukraine.

> So if your country is invaded you would surrender "day one"?

Yes. If a bloody loss is inevitable that is explicitly what I'm saying. If we were invaded by the likes of New Zealand, Papua New Guinea then I'd probably be OK with fighting. But we were going to be the site of a proxy war the smart thing to do is fold immediately and ask the majors to go elsewhere. Australia wouldn't survive a China-US proxy war if it has reached the point of an actual invasion, we'd be better off surrendering and making do. Although I'd be pointing that out after having attempted to flee the country for obvious reasons.

The link you provide was AFTER Russia invaded Ukraine. You can't use the actions of a country to defend against and invasion to JUSTIFY the invasion. Well, Russia does, but it doesn't actually make sense to do so.

Ukrainians understand better than anyone just how much you DO NOT want to be under the thumb of Putin. I don't blame them for fighting back.

And this isn't, or at least did not start out as a "Russia-US proxy war". Ukraine is a sovereign country that sensibly wanted to forge strong ties to Europe and the West. For selfish and egotistical reasons Putin hated that idea and his puppet was going to ignore this desire so Ukrainians kicked him out.

You can't justify the war with actions taken before the war either, the technical term for that is "unjustifiable".

But what the Ukrainian politicians then did wasn't sensible. They've been broken. They have some of the poorest political leadership we've seen out of any country so far in the 21st century. They've managed to transition their country from comfortable and improving to a smouldering wreck. At every turn they've managed to find an option that leaves them unambiguously worse off than they were before. It is a case study in diplomatic failure and what not to do when threatened by a larger, more militarily competent neighbour.

" They've managed to transition their country from comfortable and improving to a smouldering wreck."

No that was Russia. What you are doing is blaming a women for being punched in the face because she fought back against a rapist.

Ukraine is a country with army, navy and airforce, therefore not a woman. They are not as big as US or Russia.

Ukranian politicians were extremely corrupted[1][2] and they would rather align with money than maintain a stable relation with both countries.

Now they are fighting a proxy war on life support while their Economy runs to ground.

[1] https://kyivindependent.com/top-10-political-scandals-of-202...

[2] https://www.npr.org/2024/01/28/1227447442/ukraine-says-corru...

An invasion of your own country is not be definition a "proxy war". It is a matter of life and death.

You sound exactly like Putin. How strange.

Putin's moronic invasion of Ukraine has done a huge amount of damage to Russia's economy. Russia's per capita GDP could be double what it is if Putin wasn't such a complete moron.

At this point, it is a proxy war. Ukraine is running on US/EU loans and weapons. Even their targets decided by Washington.

Corruption cases among top ranks of Ukr government isn't helping either.

Hezbollah attacking Israel is acting as a proxy for Iran because they have no other reason to attack Israel (just ask Hassan Nasrallah). Ukraine fighting Russia is not because they don't want Russia in their country.

You make some reasonable points but they are mixed in with extremely typical Russia talking points like "Corruption cases among top ranks of Ukr government isn't helping either." You want corruption? Putin's wealth is impossible to estimate because he can take money directly from the Russian treasure and also force many oligarchs to let him user their yachts and homes.

Israel is taking over Palestine and nearby countries with support from US and EU. They are using hostages as an excuse[1]. So let's not go there.

Ukraine proposed to join NATO and EU about a year before war. Both of which could bring significant money to Ukr.

> extremely typical Russia talking points like... You want corruption? Putin's wealth...

Once again, Ukraine is in debt of EU/US, NOT Russia or Putin. Corruption in Ukraine matters cause it's international debt.

Top level Ukr officials are making billions, purchasing properties in EU and going on vacation while thier soldiers are running out of supplies. And who/how do you think this debt would be paid back? Who is profiting from this war?

[1]https://www.thejc.com/news/israel/ben-gvir-outrage-blocked-h...

Russia should have surrendered on day 1 of the kursk invasion. Dont you agree?

Maybe. I want to agree with the proposition but you've put a negative in the question, so I don't know if that means I say yes or no here.

> They should have surrendered on day 1. That would have gotten them a bad deal but not so many people dying.

No, many more would have died. It's not even a speculation at this point, but a reasonable conclusion that is solidly grounded in facts. Donetsk, Luhansk and Crimea put up little resistance in 2014 and that didn't save them. Their male population was forcibly conscripted to fight against Ukraine and has been decimated by the deliberately wasteful way they were used. Russia hit three bird with one stone: a) physically got rid of Ukrainians, Tatars and other people loyal to Ukraine, b) reduced the number of Russian citizens dying in the war to keep internal dissent down, c) stole the property of deceased conscripts and gave their homes to resettlers from Russia to further russify the occupied territories.

Everyone in Ukraine knows these simple truths and that's why the idea of surrendering to Russia remains out of the question. Horror stories from the occupied territories shatter any illusions about peace under Russian control.

> 2) They should have surrendered on day 1. That would have gotten them a bad deal but not so many people dying.

Well, guess what, they DID surrender on day one. This was back in early 2014. The result? Two more invasions.

> if the US fails in Russia it may be exhausted of the ability to resist China

Russia exposed the West’s military unpreparedness. We’re correcting to the tune of trillions of collective dollars of defence investment.

> then there is financial leverage over a resources superpower who's resources are needed for China's industry

China already practically has this. That said, yes—the article’s analysis fails to account for a likely Chinese bail-out of the Russian banking system.

The US started this war ~$30 trillion in debt, with the worlds largest military budget by a big margin. Colour me sceptical that billions more dollars will help. The US tried that, it didn't work out. Last I saw, the interest on the debt was higher than its military spending; from the peanut gallery it looks more like more spending will get them a classic over-extension and collapse.

The US wants to live in a backwards world where massive debtors can sustain wars indefinitely but creditors will get exhausted. It'd be great for them if that works, but I'd tag that sort of thinking as a big contributing factor in Trump returning to the White House. They don't seem to have the juice to pull a war with Russia off.

Not sure how any of this is relevant to what we were just discussing.

> US wants to live in a backwards world where massive debtors can sustain wars indefinitely but creditors will get exhausted

Weird side street to get lost in while discussing Russia getting financially bailed out by China.

>They don't seem to have the juice to pull a war with Russia off.

My brother in Christ, Russia can’t even pull off a war with its much smaller neighbor who is using NATO’s scraps and hand-me-downs.

I have a tough time seeing it. That requires me to believe that NATO is unhappy about Russia invading Ukraine, capable of turning Russia back and actively choosing not to. But willing to make a mortal enemy of the Russian military by getting a lot of Russians killed. And actively spinning up new military capability because, while obviously they aren't in a hard spot, they need to move to a better place ASAP.

I have a much easier time believing that NATO has given Ukraine all the support it can and it wasn't enough to halt the Russian advance. The Russians are clearly paying a terrible price, but NATO doesn't believe it can charge any more than that.

Russia captured barely more than 4000 sq km of territory in all of 2024. Seems like Ukraine is doing quite well halting the Russian advance and making them pay a terrible price.

Why is no one talking about Ukranian debt? Billions of foreign debt that keeps piling on while their Economy is reliant on EU and US donations/debt to even function.

What is the end goal? What happens when Zelenskys friends are no longer in power? How does Zelensky plan to repay his debts during/after war??? Become a satellite state like Japan and S.Korea??

Nobody’s talking about it because they aren’t the aggressor. They didn’t make this choice. They are fighting for their survival.

Russia on the other hand…

That would make sense if you were a Ukranian gov official trying to get more money.

At the end, it's Ukraine who is dependent on and in debt of EU and US.

As long as the conflict goes on, politicians gets their cut, no one talks about it but once everything cools down there would be lot of questions regarding who pays what.

OK buddy. Cope harder

Japan and South Korea are in no sense satellites. They are strong rich liberal democracies that choose to stay in an alliance with the US because it makes sense for them.

Ukraine may be a flawed liberal democracy but it is a liberal democracy. Ukraine will join the EU after the war. The rebuilding EU subsidies and anti corruption measures that will need to take place to join the EU will significantly grow the economy.

The end goal is the defeat of Russia and then giving up conquering their neighbors. And that Ukraine will remain a liberal democratic state.

Zelensky will be out of office someday, he's not a dictator like Putin. Some of the debt will be forgiven the rest will be repaid someday. A state has a long lifespan and can repay large loans over that lifespan especially if the economy significantly improves. It may take a 100 years

This is a video you should watch:

"Escalation management and Biden’s strategy for Ukraine"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxZ402BMSs8

See it as Ukraine being drip-fed western weapons in just enough quantities to completely tie up Russia.

That is saying the same thing from the US's perspective. They've worked out what they are capable of doing and they're working to it. The US military leadership doesn't believe they can go beyond that. If they thought they could do anything more they would.

Also the gentleman's dismissal of red line escalation seems unsound. From a game theory perspective the argument is full of holes.

You truly did not watch the video?

The point is that the EU and especially the US could do way more, but they are not doing it due to escalation management.

They are perfectly happy to keep Russia occupied bleeding themselves dry. The last thing the west wants is a cornered Russia lashing out with nuclear weapons or suddenly collapsing.

It is a very calculated slow collapse for Russia.

Well, sure. If the US wants to start uncontrolled escalation against a nuclear power there is a lot they can do. But if we take as a fairly obvious truth that they can't do that, we discover that they're at the limit of what they can do. Their command doesn't think they can handle a war with Russia. And they don't have the ability to stabilise the front lines in Ukraine.

Nah, just like Russia slowly boiled its citizens into the current state, we can slowly boil Russia into a complete breakdown. Recent permission to use western weapons on Russian soil is an example.

I don't know if you remember the 2003 invasion of Iraq? That was maybe the last time the US military made much of an effort and it was a scary thing to be on the wrong side of. A bit of video here https://youtu.be/m8KimNtB9HI

Iraq with approx 1.3 million troops and a lot of Russian equipment collapsed in a month or so. The problems there were not that the US side had much problem destroying Iraq so much as they had a tough job rebuilding after. There are probably similar concerns here.

The comparison is certainly relevant, but I disagree with the lessons you want to draw. What we saw in Iraq was just how willing the Americans are to escalate into a major war with no provocation or, indeed, prospect of gain. It is quite significant that they don't feel they are able to pull the same sort of mindless violence against Russia - we've put bounds on what the US military is capable of. It can handle a small naiton like Iraq, it can't manage Russia and given that they seem to be balking at an Iran invasion they are probably anchored somewhere around there before their ability to directly confront a nation runs out.

Also notice that the US was in a much more dominant international position 20 years ago. They had a level of moral and economic leadership that they ceded through the early part of the 21st century - the moral part mainly because of the thuggery in Iraq and Afghanistan. If we had a replay we might discover that they can't even handle Iraq any more, I doubt the Russia & the Asians would take it on the chin quite so willingly.

US soldiers handled the Russians quite easily in Syria, remember Khasham?

There's a difference between not wanting to do a war because it would be very expensive in terms of lives and money and not being capable. The US doesn't want those wars but does have the tech. Russia is of course worry because of nukes and no one really wants NYC and Moscow flattened.

> See it as Ukraine being drip-fed western weapons in just enough quantities to completely tie up Russia.

Been saying this for years now. A quick win, or a quick loss, means Russia has time to recoup losses and rearm for the next engagement, likely Ukraine round 3, etc.

Instead, keep them tied up and burning through the massive Soviet surpluses of hardware, strain the already shaky economy, and accelerate the already-happening demographic collapse. Russian arms trades are already suffering, and several countries have cancelled their orders -- they know they won't get them, or have seen the goods in action and don't want them. And then there is the shot in the arm for NATO funding -- Europe is re-arming -- and has Sweden and Finland in the club as well.

The Russians aren't dumb and are willing to take some hardship, and have thus far been able to get around some of the demographic losses by using prisoners and ethnic minorities. Trade with India and China has thus far kept up, and China, too, is getting a shot in the arm via cheap oil and an imputus to innovate drone tech. Looking like Spanish Civil War 2.0 in a lot of ways...

I don't remember f35 in ukraine, nor the latest anti-air defenses, the only thing there are technology from the 80s

Predictions failed to take into account Bidens cowardice. Not only he didnt deliver lon range weapons in time, but intervened on behalf of russia when Ukraine build their own drones able to reach far away refineries. Even sanctions omitted main russian oil trading banks and shadow fleet until last week.

If you read the WSJ article Biden hasn't been running things since at least 2021. The fault for the Ukraine war is almost entirely Jake Sullivans.

The American foreign policy establishment abandoned trumps deterrence policy which stopped putin invading in 2018.

Could you share a link to the article, please?

https://www.wsj.com/politics/biden-white-house-age-function-...

Russia didn't invade until Trump left office because Trump was doing his best to weaken or destroy NATO.

Putin didn't invade in 2018 because trump threatened to nuke Moscow if he did.

https://kyivindependent.com/trump-suggested-he-would-have-bo...

He also talked about this conversation with Putin in the Joe Rogan interview.

If Trump had weakened NATO it would have made an invasion more likely, not less.

Putin didn't invade in 2018-19 because he was still preparing. There are indications that the invasion was planned for 2020, but obviously COVID happened.

Trumpy tantrums did nothing.

It took a month to prepare. The original plan was to invade in 2018 but Trump said no. Then covid happened and it got delayed again. Then the Chinese asked that Putin wait until the Beijing Olympics were over. This is how it became February 2022.

Further the Biden Afghan withdrawal convinced Putin that Biden wouldn't react.

Bullshit. 2018 was the year when the FIFA World Cup was held in Russia. Putin obviously didn't want to sabotage them.

Trumpy tantrums did nothing, I repeat. Neither is he going to do anything useful once he gets back into the office. Putin will play him off like a sucker he is.

Why would Russia care about some football tournament if they really wanted to invade?

It's makes even less sense than parent comment

Despots care a lot about PR. Otherwise they wouldn't spend so much on international sports.

"Russia" did not really want to invade. _Putin_ wanted to invade. You need to separate these two entities. In 2018, Putin was still riding the high of the successful Crimean annexation.

His plan had clearly been to repeat that exercise to boost his ratings by the next election (in 2024). 2018 was too early for that.

We now can see that the preparation for the war started in 2020-2021. For example, Putin made sure that Russia had a big enough monetary Reserve Fund. And unlike many other countries, Russia did not do state-sponsored economic stimulation during the lockdowns.

he didn't invade in 2018 because he was still preparing -- and because Trump was still a wildcard that could work out for him. If he won the Presidency in 2020 then Putin could slow walk the invasion.

Biden + COVID changed the landscape enough that Putin and the FSB advisors who did the planning were convinced they could (and arguably, had to, since his Trump ace-in-the-hole was not certain) make a move. Thus a 2022 invasion.

I actually think the current approach was a deliberate strategy.

Rather than help Ukraine quickly win the war they prefer to slow bleed Russia to help their aims in Syria, Iran, Taiwan etc.

Blunt russian power yes. It doesn't work though, such weakness has only emboldened the Chinese who have started building landing barges to invade taiwan.

https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2025/01/china-suddenly-...

bro those barges were getting build regardless. already on their road map, they just decided to do em all at once.

And economically strangle the EU, which is now additionally danger of being crushed between whatever is bargained between Trump and Putin.

At this stage it is impossible to say whether Syria and possibly Greenland are part of a bargain to end the Ukraine war (You get the four provinces, we get Syria and take Greenland from the EU, probably by political influence via NGOs and a sort of color revolution that leads to the "independence" of Greenland).

Color revolutions only exist in the paranoid mind of dictators.

Interestingly, Wikipedia is run by dictators:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colour_revolution

But thanks for updating us on the latest forbidden term. I wonder how many words we will have left next year.

As a dictator it's much easier to believe the CIA is trying to overthrow you instead of acknowledging that your economic mismanagement has made you unpopular. Surrounding yourself with yes men keeps you out of touch with popular sentiment.

> The colour revolutions (sometimes coloured revolutions)[1] were a series of often non-violent protests and accompanying (attempted or successful) changes of government and society that took place in post-Soviet states (particularly Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan) and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia during the early 21st century.[2] The aim of the colour revolutions was to establish Western-style liberal democracies. They were primarily triggered by election results widely viewed as falsified. The colour revolutions were marked by the use of the internet as a method of communication,[3] as well as a strong role of non-governmental organizations in the protests.

In the paranoid claims and propaganda of dictators they claim they were something else

If you want to indulge in pointless conspiracies (some of which are heavily pushed by foreign dictators) go ahead

Nah. It's explained by the regular stupidity. The Western governments had to show that they are doing something.

No, worse. They trusted their experts and they trusted what the Ukrainians reported. They smelled blood and giddily thought they had the opportunity to humiliate Russia—without getting their hands too dirty. Culminating in the resounding failure of the 2023 Kontr.

By fall 2023 they knew the score. But they couldn’t get out then and they still can’t.

'Kontr' sounds like an untranslated word no doubt taken verbatim from some low budget propaganda.

>low budget propaganda

That’s really what it boils down to for people like you: the production values. No contest, the US is unbeatable in that department. Anything but to be seen as a sucker.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%BD%D1%82%D1%8...

The more sophisticated the population the higher the production value is. If the population are idiots who will believe anything then why bother overproducing, slop will do. It's cheaper that way.

And yes, your foreign shilling is that obvious.

This directly conflicts with numerous firsthand accounts of the Biden administration, as reported by journalist Bob Woodward in his most recent book War. In his reporting, Biden is hands on and directly involved with foreign policy. In one account, Jake Sullivan's own wife listened in on a daily briefing call with the President and came away from it saying she wished the world could "see this version of the president," because he was so sharp and focused.

Regarding Ukraine, Biden was the one who made the decision not to get the US directly involved in the war. Sullivan even had to play devil's advocate in Biden's decision, because he and the CIA chief thought it was a horrible idea to announce to the world that we were committing to zero troops on the ground. One of Biden's biggest beliefs is that "great powers don't bluff," though, so it was important for Biden to clearly communicate the limits of US engagement in the conflict.

He wanted the Ukrainians to know (according to the reporting in the book) that the US would supply and support them, but the cavalry would not be charging over the hill to save the day. If some horrible event happened in Ukraine, he knew that his generals, the media, and the public would look to him and say "well, don't you think now is the time we should get American boots on the ground? Why aren't you acting?"

Delusional.

The Biden administration slow rolled delivering tanks/jets/ATACMS for years. For ATACMS in Russia they delayed over two years. The options were never just doing nothing or put boots on the ground.

Why are the only accounts that support this Trump strong Biden weak narrative are multiple throwaways with no sources.

I have linked sources in this thread.

Edit: I made the mistake of replying to a "throwaway" that isn't saying something that is secret or potentially harmful to a real person. A fully anonymous account just saying stuff can just argue incorrectly forever and then make a new account no matter any amount of fact checking

I don't know what kind of 'fact checking' you expect. You can just ctrl+f and see the sources I have linked.

It's not delusional, and I agree that it wasn't a binary choice of do nothing (which the Biden admin didn't choose anyway) or boots on the ground. There was a litany of actions Biden's administration took after Russia invaded, all with the goal of arming Ukraine, training Ukrainians to fight the Russians, and convincing Europe at large that Russia was a problem for the whole continent.

Should they have given them more arms, and faster? Maybe, but we have the benefit of hindsight. The Biden admin was constantly worried about Russia's threats of nuclear weapons, which the intelligence agencies were reporting as credible.

This is all detailed in Woodward's book.

You think you, anonymous HN rando, know better than Bob Woodward, an award-winning and massively impactful investigative journalist...? Talk about delusional!

We all saw the debate. If some journalist is willing to lie and delude themselves about Bidens cognitive ability it doesn't change the reality.

Who is to say Bob Woodward is not a employed by federal agencies and paid to favor current government.

His cognitive dissonance was on display on live television multiple times where he struggles to speak or even walk. Unless all that was a deliberate act for media, I see no reason to believe Mr. Bob was being truthful

Woodward's reporting is classic investigative journalism. He's one of the two reporters who broke the original Watergate story. From the books I've read, he avoids speculation and he only reports what he can corroborate based on firsthand accounts. Regarding what you call "cognitive dissonance" – I assume you're referring to President Biden and not Woodward – this is discussed multiple times in War and Woodward doesn't shy away from it.

Woodward writes about a time when Biden had taken a friend on a private tour through the residences of the White House, and when they came upon a picture of his son Beau Biden, the President seemed to become "transfixed" on it (my words, I'm paraphrasing from memory) and couldn't stop talking about his son for what seemed like an uncomfortable amount of time.

He also wrote about another time during Biden's reelection campaign where Biden went to a private fundraising event in Silicon Valley and seemed so "out of it" (again, my words, paraphrasing from memory) that one of the SV bigwigs there called Biden's chief of staff with grave concerns about the President's health and ability to run for reelection.

The book is well worth the read, whether you're a Trump supporter, Biden supporter or just interested in politics and foreign policy in general.

Woodward is the intelligence community type of professional who knows not to ask why 4 of 5 Watergate arrested were CIA.

> Delusional.

That sounds more like mild annoyance than actual criticism. It seems, from your description, that Mr. Bob was a friend of Biden family.

Also We are talking about Biden who introduced Zelensky as __President Putin__ in an event organized for Zelensky. I refuse to believe Mr. Biden was able to commandeer or come with any of the plans Mr. Bob described.

> Also We are talking about Biden who introduced Zelensky as __President Putin__ in an event organized for Zelensky.

That's also covered in the book. Again, if you’re interested in this topic, I’d really recommend giving it a read or borrowing it from the library. You might find some new perspectives on Biden’s presidency — just like I did for some aspects of Trump’s while reading War and his more recent books. Or maybe you'll come away from it totally vindicated in your views. Either way, it's an insightful read with enough nuance in there for both outcomes.

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