Ukraine on Wednesday lowered the military conscription age from 27 to 25 in an effort to replenish its depleted ranks after more than two years of war following Russia’s full-scale invasion.
The new mobilization law came into force a day after Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed it. Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, passed it last year.
It was not immediately clear why Zelenskyy took so long to sign the measure into law. He didn’t make any public comment about it, and officials did not say how many new soldiers the country expected to gain or for which units.
Conscription has been a sensitive matter in Ukraine for many months amid a growing shortage of infantry on top of a severe ammunition shortfall that has handed Russia the battlefield initiative. Russia’s own problems with manpower and planning have so far prevented it from taking full advantage of its edge.
Biden isn’t ignoring Ukraine, the GOP or better said the MAGA crowd is playing the conflict for political points.
Over here in Europe we understand the message: Trump wasn’t an exception, the US will stay, at best, fickle regarding any of their commitments, the Americans can’t be relied upon as a partner. I say fuck them good riddance.
And, no, stuff like IRIS-T aren’t “old junk” Germany itself doesn’t field those systems they’re that new. Stuff like the Gepard is old but so capable it’s still the best Flak out there. And yes I think we should send Taurus, pretty much everyone but the Chancellor and peaceniks think so. I guess it’s political calculation on his part: As long as there’s something we hold back the peaceniks have a hard time framing him as a war-monger, it’s trading immediate support vs. long-term support.
Also frankly speaking Taurus seems to be overkill when it comes to striking deep into Russia’s rear, Russian refineries aren’t protected by the anti-air installations that the thing is capable of circumventing and even taking down something highly protected like the Kerch bridge, even with bunker busters (which Taurus are) would take a massive barrage practically depleting the whole stock. It’s a lot of concrete.
Indeed but striking the oil refineries is actually effective. In fact it’s so effective that Biden told Ukraine to cut it out because it’s actually effective and they don’t want Ukraine to actually win something.
US urges Ukraine to stop attacking Russian oil refineries, report says
The US clarified their position on that: They’re “not encouraging” attacks on refineries. Which is different from both “discouraging” and “encouraging”.
That’s some serious “US does everything it does because US is bad” thinking. 6-d CIA chess with evil cackling. There’s plenty of valid economic reasons to not be excited about Russian refineries getting decarbonised, first and foremost the world market price for petroleum products.
My take on that is that economy strategists in the White House are sitting there gritting their teeth after having been told to pound sand by the military strategists.
It’s really effective though. Ukraine was hitting Russia exactly where it hurts, their fuel storage and production. The big money. And then America says "No don’t do that, they might retaliate (as if Russia isn’t at war with Ukraine already?)
This is practically America saying “Go do war with Russia but don’t hit them where it hurts! Just throw some wet noodles at them!”
Well if the US doesn’t like Ukraine hitting refineries they’re free to send enough ATACMs etc. to be able to hit other targets that will have the same overall impact on Russian capabilities. As far as Ukraine is concerned it doesn’t matter whether Russia has no fuel or no trucks, tanks, planes, and missiles.
Which might be why the GOP opposition seems to be at least make appearance of possibly melting away, presumably lobbyists are working the non-MAGA crowd.