Yes, and from the videos all over the Internet, a lot of what those weapons do is kill people. If just blowing up machines won the war, Ukraine would have declared victory in the first year.
There are lots of potential limiting factors, population's just one where Ukraine started at a big disadvantage and that can't really be made up for by foreign aid, unlike munitions or food or what have you (short of other countries outright sending troops). Weapons can be sent, but if they run short of people to use the weapons, to the point that they can't maneuver, can't credibly threaten counter-offensives, eventually can't cover the entire front... then things start to fall apart.
Like once they survived and repulsed the initial attempt at blitzkrieg, and things settled in to a stable-ish front, population is the particular figure that would tend to give you a knot in your stomach, looking at the on-paper situation from their perspective, and the prospect of a long war.
I'm not disputing that there are ways to win a war other than killing all the other dudes, I'm just pointing out that if Ukraine got backed into a corner, the smart money very early on was it'd happen either because "allies all pack their bags and go home" or "they run short of manpower".
What you are posting is not factual.
In this particular case Russia doesn't seem to care care about lives and uses WW1 style of waves of meat, which of course drastically increases losses
It's sort of like how Western press has been claiming for over a year that 20,000 people have perished in Gaza, and the figure never goes up.
As strained, but not as bad as Ukraine's.
Russia's population is over 140 million. That's 100 million more than Ukraine's pre-war population. Russia's territory isn't meaningfully compromised, their cities aren't in ruin, their industry is mostly intact. They haven't sustained something like 15-25% population loss from people fleeing the way Ukraine has.
North Koreans aren't in Russia because Russia is out of guys. Putin just wants to avoid wider scale conscription/mobilization if he can help it and will take other options first
That's why earlier stages of this war involved ex-convict Wagnerite units, mercenaries from the third world, local militias raised from the "people's republics" in Donetsk and Luhansk, and conscription when necessary from poorer ethnic minority regions far away from Moscow and St. Petersburg.
This is correct and shockingly obvious given the initial invasion used mercenaries. It's a straightforward exchange with an ally that benefits Russia the most and is great PR for NK, internally and locally.
Almost everything pouring out of his mouth today is replaying what is in Russian state media sadly.
The US is not "aligned against the West". The US is simply breaking from the ideology it's had since WW2 that it's in the US' best interest to get involved in every international conflict in the world.
You'd think that the left would be ecstatic about that considering how much it's criticized US involvement in other countries conflicts, but here we are - it's the left that is trashing the US for not wanting to get involved.
But certainly in the UK it was a party of "the left" that invaded Iraq with the US. It was a party of "the left" that invaded Afghanistan with the US. And it was a party of "the left" that is now bolstering the military after a decade of decline by a party of "the right".
"The left" were fighting fascism across Europe in the last century, from the International Brigade in Spain to the Soviets against Hitler.
The actual problem The West has now is that the guarantor of military power has gone. Trump and Vance were literally shouting propaganda from Russian state media to Zelensky (look up starting WW3, or VIP tours) and making false equivalency between being invaded and defending your country.
Trump has carried out the biggest rug-pull in history and aligned the USA with Russia. Against The West.
This makes no sense. The current ideology is only 70 years old. The "West" has existed for centuries before that.
Maybe you're young and you think there are no options but the current path, but I can assure you there is.
The truth is that the US (or Europe) is not willing to go head to head with Russia. They have neither the public support or the willingness to take the economic hit.
So if they aren't willing to defeat Russia, what is the only possible outcome? A negotiated peace.
So rather than grinding up another few hundred thousand human lives in the war and end up in the same place a few years from now, why not just finish it now?
The term The West applies to those countries born out of European heritage which _assumed_ semi-direct lineage from the Graeco-Roman empires of Antiquity (notably the Late Antique split in the early church across Eastern/Western lines). Like all political terms it's in constant flux, but yes, today it largely means the superset of NATO + Five Eyes countries.
Vance's Munich speech and the Whitehoust confrontation yesterday confirms that the USA has turned its back on the west - you only have to see the reaction of world leaders to see that - outside of Orban, the only people congratulating Trump were Putin and Lavrov. Who could singlehandedly stop the war - right now - by pulling their troops out of a sovereign, democratic state.
Not sure what my age has to do with anything but I was bought up during the Cold War if that helps.
Who said anything about appeasing? Fighting for the best peace deal you can is not "appeasing".
NATO is never going to escalate with Russia to the point Ukraine gets all it's territory back - and Putin knows that. NATO isn't stupid - Ukraine isn't worth expanding the war beyond Ukraine into Eastern Europe. They have neither the financial resources nor the support back home. They are willing to sacrifice Ukrainian lives, but not their own grip on power.
So if we know how this all ends - Ukraine giving up territory in exchange for peace, then why not pursue that instead of throwing another million lives and hundred billion dollars into the chipper and getting the same deal in 3 years instead?
> Vance's Munich speech and the Whitehoust confrontation yesterday confirms that the USA has turned its back on the west
No, it means the US is turning it's back on the neoliberal geopolitical position that grinding down competing powers through proxy wars is always worth it in the end. George Kennan died long ago, and it's time to let his geopolitical strategy die too.
It's a position that only existed since WW2, and one that has gotten the US involved in dozens of wars since then, often at a greater cost than the benefit in the end (e.g. Vietnam, Iraq).
It's utterly naive, given all his history, to think Putin will just acquiesce.
Even if your geopolitical assumptions are correct, Trump and Vance's behaviour yesterday - humiliating a war leader in front of the worlds media, using the rhetoric and tropes of the invaders he is facing was unbelievably disgusting.
The publicized ideology, is not always the reality. The US has always been involved with every international conflict. The CIA was the formalization of the interest.
That's because a good chunk of untapped population would simply refuse.
Ukraine is _stalling_ the war right now. Russia is able to capture more moonscaped villages by forcing expendable (their words, not mine) manpower to assault Ukrainian positions.
Ukraine is slowly retreating, but at the rate that will require Russia _years_ to gain a meaningful amount of territory.
How much is Russia spending on the war compared to Ukraine?
- spending all of its foreign reserves and weakening its currency
- killing tens of thousands of working age men
- permanently removing hundreds of thousands of working age men from the workforce
- increasing the demands on social benefits for disabled veterans by hundreds of thousands of men
- suppressing the birth rate by staying in a protracted 'special military operation'
Ukraine is suffering 3-5 times fewer casualties than Russia, but it's also 3 times smaller than Russia.
…by focusing on controlling sectors in mainly the East?
Russia is not gaining any strategic advances from the push. It's not a fight to get some magical prize.
If you look at the reports from Ukraine high schools - its all girls class, no boys
I live in Ukraine, this is not true.
https://lenta.ru/news/2025/02/16/ukrainskie-klassy-ostalis-b...
translated: https://lenta-ru.translate.goog/news/2025/02/16/ukrainskie-k...
There are almost no boys left in senior classes of Ukrainian schools. This was reported by the publication "Strana.ua" on the Telegram channel with reference to blogger Alena Yakhno.
As the blogger said, the 17-year-old son of her friend studies in Kiev , but all his classmates have left. "Only girls are left in the class. There will be no moral. It's just a fact," she wrote.
The publication recalled that upon reaching the age of 18, young people from Ukraine are no longer allowed to go abroad. In addition, the report notes, information about Ukrainian schoolchildren aged 16-17 leaving Ukraine en masse has appeared before.
Earlier, the Verkhovna Rada reported on hundreds of thousands of schoolchildren who left the country before the start of the school year. According to MP Nina Yuzhina, about 300 thousand students, mostly high school students, left Ukraine in July and August. In addition, due to the departure of young people, 2,114 schools have been closed in Ukraine over the past four years.It's a bummer that just about every media outlet in Ukraine is either tightly linked to Russian propaganda, or on the other side its mostly super pro Ukrainian (formerly funded by USAID) outlets with ties to weird libertarian billionaires who want to turn Ukraine into free market paradise. Hardly any middle ground.
Sometimes, reported news are actually true, this is from Ukraine's Education Minister:
https://www-unian-net.translate.goog/society/osoblivo-hlopci...
Just think about it logically, if you are a mother of 16 y.o kid, and USA says you must conscript 18+ y.o to receive any further aid - would you just sit and wait for your child to get drafted on his next birthday?
You can count how many high school children there are in Ukraine. There is something like 4 millions now, so the loss of a couple hundred of students of both sexes does not make classes girls only.
People, families with kids, leave Ukraine, because living in a country during war is not nice, to say the least. The fear of mobilization is only one aspect of it.
https://rubryka.com/2024/06/25/v-ukrayini-kilkist-uchniv-u-s...
Do you want to share a bit of your story? 3 years ago would mean you left right at the start of the war. How do you feel about that now?
I don't mean to minimize your loss, but I cheer for you to succeed despite it.
Tomorrow there will be the two monthly threads for who's hiring & who wants to be hired on HN. Use those.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43243024 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43243022
Try both. Hope that helps.
I appreciate the clarification, because I had wondered why I hadn't seen it yet.
For China, a balkanized nuclear Russia may be a greater threat than supplying them manpower (due to surplus men and civil unrest) and materiel. I would not expect Russia to run into the WW1 germany problem.
This is a meatgrinder conflict. If China can reduce its dissident or potentially rebellious population while avoiding a collapse of Russia mirroring WW1 Germany, they may very well (and I would argue are likely) do so.
The only thing Chinese nationals fighting for Russia tells us is that China is not expressly limiting freedom of movement to do so...but there has also been at least 1 American who tried to join Russia to fight Ukraine (and was tortured to death by the Russians on suspicion of being a spy for his trouble).
With a country like China, everything is on the table
I wouldn't assume a small number of Chinese nationals volunteering to fight for Russia means China approves of their actions. Several Australians ended up fighting for ISIS in Syria and Iraq, that doesn't mean the Australian government approves of Australians fighting for ISIS, it just means it failed in those cases to stop them – it didn't realise they planned to do that before they left the country, or they didn't decide to do it until after they were already living overseas.
And one difference, is obviously Australia and ISIS are sworn enemies, so when Australians volunteered to fight for ISIS, the Australian government could openly condemn their action. Whereas, China and Russia are allies, so even if China disapproves of its citizens volunteering to fight for Russia, it can't condemn them publicly because it would harm the alliance.
Make no mistake: if China wanted to shut this down it could.
I think the word "supposedly" is important here – I don't think we have any hard data on how many Chinese volunteers there are serving with Russia.
And I'd question how big a military contribution these Chinese volunteers are making. Russia has hundreds of thousands of troops fighting in this war, even a thousand Chinese volunteers would be less than 1%.
> Make no mistake: if China wanted to shut this down it could.
Even if the Chinese government is willing to "turn a blind eye" to this going on at a low volume, that doesn't mean they'd let it grow to a significantly higher volume.
It also isn't clear whether this is a deliberate initiative from the very top, or something that has grown organically bottom-up and the people at the top have decided to let it be for now rather than crack down on it.
It helped that the ww1 western front wasn't inside Germany http://www.greatwar.co.uk/places/ww1-western-front.htm
Russia's refinery's are getting hit and all that crude oil is worthless with a refinery. In the case of the campaign again Nazi Germany's refineries funny enough it's the allies who didn't think it as critical as the Nazis did https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_campaign_of_World_War_II#O...