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Comment by somenameforme | Hacker News Reader

That was a rather obvious false flag attempt, presumably from Ukraine. It was a weaponized drone, the first that would have been directly used against NATO, that was found just outside a Ukrainian plane and by amazing coincidence just sat there instead of detonating.

When Russia wants to directly attack NATO they'll likely do exactly what the US/EU is doing and simply arm e.g. Iran/Houthis/etc with weapons/locations, let them push the button, and then go all Slava Allah or whatever while Russia is like 'oh we're not involved in this conflict you have with Iran.' Great precedent that's been set.

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That said I do expect Russia is likely involved in at least some of the incidents of weapons factories and other things that have been going boom, but it's always going to be done with plausible deniability - sleeper agents with no direct ties to Russia, and the like. They're not going to just start bombing planes in airports with drones.

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Wow. This post serves as a great example on how propaganda can brainwash people brain. Sure , Ukraine whose survival solely depends on EU, plans a false flag attempt . To achieve what ? Russia openly attacked territory of eu with drones , infiltration, poison operations , not to mention Slovakia , Orban etc . What is there to prove for Ukraine ???

Ukraine is, in the most positive framing - in a war of attrition that isn't going well. They want greater involvement, ideally much more directly, from NATO countries. And Germany is certainly going to be happy to play along because the AfD is quickly becoming the largest single party in that country. They are Euroskeptical and against continuing the war with Russia. A direct Russian attack on Germany would likely undermine the AfD's growing support.

But since I've been brainwashed by propaganda, perhaps you can enlighten me on what benefits you believe Russia would see for themselves in deciding to directly attack a NATO country in a way that would lack any plausible deniability. In particular you need to come up with some sort of argument here for how they might see this as viably resulting in an improved positioning for themselves.

After observing the talk as opposed to the actions of Meloni and Trump, I would bet that the AfD would continue the war as is.

Weidel would make a "Notwendige Politikwende" speech and that's it. They'll then cut social services and enact pro-business laws and make some noise about immigration until ordered by the industry to allow it.

I don't think the fear in most politics is about the actions of the 'newcomers', but about potential of the old guard losing power. In the US if a third party started looking like a real threat, Rs and Ds would 100% come together to frame them as the greatest threat of humanity to ever exist, exactly as happened with Perot even in the age before hyper hyperbole.

Like you alluded to Meloni went from end of the world to business as usual in remarkably short order, and the same could viably if not likely happen with AfD as well, but the bigger change behind the scenes there is that her party went from 2% in 2013, to leading Italy today - and that gain came at the expense of the loss of power by whatever the older establishment was in Italy.

Yeah and that’s exactly what add happily picked up as any MAGA clone eg Afd,FvD, Orban etc . Populism , echo different voices . In this case : Ukriane is dragging us into war . Russia openly warm up this agenda by softly attacking Poland , Romania , other areas. Mixed with nord stream and other similar voices .

Under different angle they will tell this is Ukraine’s false flag attempt … oh evil ukriane , these bastards who try to survive how dare they are

Anyways still 0 political win , only losses . Current German government can’t defend themself and start talking NATO , that is again very unpopular among maga-Germans , since they hate USA

> What benefits Russia would see in deciding to directly attack NATO in a way that would lack any plausible deniability.

Several possible benefits. In the last months Russia has tried repeatedly to lure Nato to a response for their constant provocations.

This way they can claim that Russia is being attacked by Nato and 1) have an excuse to start a massive mobilization of their reserve soldiers planned for this fall and 2) activate the mutual defense treatise with China and NK so they force both countries to participate directly in the war.

Some issues I see here:

- Zelensky has claimed literally every single year that Russia is planning a massive general mobilization. This has never happened nor anything at all like it. The latest claim will likely turn out as all others prior.

- Russia does not have a mutual defense pact with China, nor any sort of military alliance at all. In fact China could cripple Ukraine at any moment if they so chose. 'Ukrainian' drones are loaded with components stamped 'Made in China.' China has historically been, and remains, the world's merchant whose primary interest is themselves, as should be the case for all sovereign nations.

- Your scenario relies on Russia believing that they'd have a greater edge in a direct Russia + North Korea vs Ukraine + NATO conflict than in the current status quo of Russia vs Ukraine with North Korea and NATO playing significant but limited auxiliary roles. This seems highly improbably since they already had endless reasonable justifications to create this scenario if they wanted, and have constantly sidestepped it. By contrast this is the exact scenario that Ukraine and warhawks in NATO have been trying to create. But outside some unprecedented escalation from Russia, Western nations will never tolerate coffins being draped in any color except yellow and blue.

Not sure what was last year etc but this year claims are realistic on mobilization.

Russia already tested playbook by doing drafts on the street in limited regions . There’s plenty of videos just Google that . Seems like their strategy will not be all nation mobilized but rather hey , we do in one region , wait , switch to another , repeat .

NATO is half dead , and that’s the main goal of Russia , north Korea , China etc . If they attack the most weak enemy eg baltic counties and claim like hitler did : we achieved what we wanted we just want piece and we are ready to strike piece also with Ukraine , it will :

Prevent any reaction from the nato , since not that many countries within nato will be willing to defend Latvia or Estonia , especially if offense will be complete and successful. Who will defend Latvia ? Germany ? Doubt , Poland ? They do not have a modern army , they still buying tanks and submarines in the age of drones . And Russia do have lots of drones . More than entire nato by a lot of, not to tell if you deduct USA and Turkey , two biggest military NATO powers that will not be eager to defend Baltic regions . Imagine also that Iran will decide to use the moment and coordinate their offensive.

As a result , this few days war can effectively formalize end of NATO and the western world as it is .

We have to take in mind that Russia is also barely alive and on life support

Putin only has one good exit: to fake a strength that at this moment it does not have, and declare the "victory", in the current broke state of this mess. They would try to trick Ukraine to be polite and let them to keep the occupied territories. They would also need to ask the west to remove the sanctions pretty please.

I assume that after all the pain endured, Ukraine will refuse this solution of returning to the starting point where Russia ask for everything and concedes nothing in return. They would had endured all this fighting years and destruction all for losing a quarter of their country. Would be insane to accept this.

And the idea that EU, or Finland, or Poland will accept Baltic states being taken and Russia at their gates is just... hypothetical

Other possible outcome is that EU will not commit this mistake twice, knowing that they are the next in the menu in five years.

So we are again in a false end. Is very unlikely that the war will stop just at time for the midterms.

Putin is insane, is asking again Russian women to make more babies for keeping the war machine greased, and can't be trusted to keep their word to not invade further.

  > That was a rather obvious false flag attempt, presumably from Ukraine.

German officials have identified two Russians behind this, one of them linked to Russian secret services, and a number of other countries where those people have been active previously are corroborating.

Don't discount russian incompetence and sloppiness. They are really big on half assing everything

> That was a rather obvious false flag attempt

No, it wasn't.

> That said I do expect Russia is likely involved in at least some of the incidents of weapons factories

They're involved in all of them.

> sleeper agents with no direct ties to Russia

This isn't a movie. They pay criminals to do criminal activity. They're not utilizing "sleeper agents" to burn down a building.

>When Russia wants to directly attack NATO they'll likely do exactly what the US/EU is doing and simply arm e.g. Iran/Houthis/etc with weapons/locations, let them push the button, and then go all Slava Allah or whatever while Russia is like 'oh we're not involved in this conflict you have with Iran.' Great precedent that's been set.

What does this even mean? Are you equating Ukraine with Iran and the Houthis?

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