It's millions[1] between the number the have been drafted and the number that have fled, and that's taking the Kremlin at their word about how many people they drafted.

Also Russia has a brewing demographics collapse, similar to what Japan is experiencing. This is going to royally fuck them for the next 50 years.

I think the Ukraine invasion might be the beginning of the end for Russia as we know it, I wouldn't be surprised to see parts of Russia break away going forward.

[1] https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/11/25/russia-uzbekistan-kyrgy...

A disorderly failure of the Russian state is pretty much one of the nightmare scenarios.

Depends to whom.

To countries far away, but wary of, dunno, nukes going into the hands of terrorists, sure.

To countries bordering Russia who are intimidated and threatened (or invaded!) on a continuous basis, this is a definite improvement.

I doubt that countries bordering Russia are keen to have failed chaotic states with economic problems on their borders. The refugee situation that will create is pretty intense.

I will reiterate. Baltic states, Poland, Ukraine, Georgia, are constantly harassed and reminded that Russia doesn't really see them as sovereign states. They fly bombers into their airspaces (oops), deploys military manoeuvres at their borders, rambles about aiming their nukes at the capital cities. It actually invaded Ukraine for the second time in a decade! And even as this is all going on, Russia happily says, "hey Latvia, or Finland, you guys better stand to attention or you are next".

Refugees on the border suddenly seems like a nice problem to have.

Is there a citation for the threat of invasion apart from unhinged Russian TV commentators?

For example, the most hawkish interview with Dugin (Pozner is the interviewer) is from 2014. The interview is in Russian and Dugin is clearly enraged about the Maidan events, so he is more straightforward than in English interviews.

If the English subtitles are correct, Pozner explicitly asks which countries should be part of the "Greater Russia". Dugin unambiguously excludes the Baltic states, Poland and Finland.

He wanted the eastern Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Kazakhstan in a Eurasian union.

So if even the hawk who is always cited as an expansionist does not want Latvia/Finland/Poland, who does?

The U.S. does military manoeuvres and close fly-by missions in the South China sea.

The people in charge in Russia grew up during the cold war and believe that NATO is a threat. It does not matter to them what people on Twitter who were born in 2000 think.

I don't think either that NATO is a threat in the case of Russia (unlike for Kosovo, Iraq, ...), but they don't care. If someone is in the business of foreign policy, he has to take the opponent's thoughts into account.

Russia's unlimited expansionism is a narrative that is supposed to obfuscate the mistakes that foreign policy has made since 2008.

> I don't think either that NATO is a threat in the case of Russia (unlike for Kosovo

You think NATO is a threat to Kosovo?

Of all places, TIL from FIFA that the Kremlin line probably is that Kosovo is part of Serbia, which would make gp semantically consist.

If that is the case: «ты всё Россию прославляешь; а лучше б мусор выносил!»

> They fly bombers into their airspaces (oops), deploys military manoeuvres at their borders, rambles about aiming their nukes at the capital cities.

Your argument would be valid, if this was something exclusive to Russia, and not a common mutual thing between Russia and NATO. NATO bombers just as well fly into Russian airspace, NATO deploys military manoeuvres at Russian borders, and NATO states politicians are just as keen to ramble about nukes as anyone else.

Yes I forget. Russia is the bullied one here. And is constantly attacked by NATO, in Georgia, Ukraine... Seriously poor Russia for being so unfairly treated.

Even now, if only those pesky Ukrainians would stop shooting back at them, peace could be introduced overnight.

> in Georgia

Russian peacekeeping corps WAS attacked in Georgia. The EU fact-finding mission, had blamed Saakashvili:

https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/new-report-on-rus...

https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/a-shattered-dream...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/sep/30/georgia-attack...

It's insane how this truth has been erased in the last 14 years, despite being publicly available and easily goolable. This wiki article should provide a good enough context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgian%E2%80%93Ossetian_conf...

But hey, why bother with studying facts when you can study propaganda memes, am I right?

Russia has, in my lifetime, conducted no fewer than five invasions, all of which could be fairly characterized as driven by naked territorial aggression ("this land deserves to be ours"). In the same time, the US has invaded three times, none of which could be characterized as naked territorial aggression, even if you squint at it really, really hard.

I don't see how is this possible, are you counting each operation as a separate "invasion" so you get two invasions in Ukraine (2014 and in 2022) for Russia, then I imagine Syria and Georgia? But what is fifth - is it Transnistria/Abkhazia/Ossetia in 1990s? Then the US had 20+ invasions in the same sense (Yugoslavia, multiple ops in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and various countries in Africa) over your lifetime.

Russia invaded Ukraine twice (once in 2014, once this year), Chechnya twice (1994 and 1999), and Georgia once (in 2008).

Chechnya is a region of Russia and always has been, how can Russia invade itself? And let's say Chechnya is some kind of independent country that Russia really invaded, in 1994. So you had been born before 1994 and only recall three US invasions since then???

Chechnya, apparently, deserves to be part of Russia.

> Chechnya twice (1994 and 1999)

In 1994 Chechnya was legally a part of Russia. By that principle, are you considering that Ukraine had invaded Donetsk? Not trolling, just wondering if it is a point of principle or doublethink.

In 1999 Chechnya had invaded Russian Dagestan, which triggered a military response - exactly how does this consitute as "Russia invaded"?

> Georgia once (in 2008)

Georgia attacked Russian peacekeeping corps in 2008:

https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/new-report-on-rus...

https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/a-shattered-dream...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/sep/30/georgia-attack...

I am really puzzled by how people are so reinforced in their ignorance, despite facts being easily available for anyone who cares to spend 5 minutes to learn something.

It is safe to assume that they just never even heard of the half of those US military actions. Ironically, things like "Nothing happened in Tiananmen Square on 4 June 1989" (nothing happened in Yugoslavia, nothing happened in Yemen, nothing happened in Syria, nothing happened in Somalia) are extremely common in Western info-bubble.

> In the same time, the US has invaded three times

Like at least four, and if we use the same counting logic you did for Russia, it would be at least 20.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NATO_operations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_mili...

> naked territorial aggression

Well, that depends on what you consider to be worse: pushing neo-colonial policies by installing puppet governments through war and staged coups on the other part of the world, or resolving local conflicts created by dissolution of the SU along the administrative (instead of historical, ethnical, or national) borders, while granting citizenships, providing social infrastructure, or at least allowing states to gain sovereignty (if Kosovo can be independent under UN's self-determination principle, why can't Ossetia, who had been at odds with Georgia for ages and was only territorially related to it, because at some point the Soviet Union decided that budgeting that way is easier?)

Besides, considering the US geography, it's kinda hard for it to have territorial disputes, even if it really wanted to. On the other hand, you can ask Mexicans what they think of US law enforcement openly operating in Mexico.

>NATO bombers just as well fly into Russian airspace

What's the source on that claim?

>I doubt that countries bordering Russia are keen to have failed chaotic states with economic problems on their borders.

As opposed to a single, stronger failed state with economic problems?

I'm about 200km from the russian border right now. Having those a*holes go down would be definitely a cause for celebration.

The in-fighting that will occur when the current government collapses will weaken them further.

The Ukraine war has strengthened NATO and shown the (quite surprising!) unity of Europe to the point that people here just aren't afraid any more.

Refugees are easier to handle than tanks.

> I doubt that countries bordering Russia are keen to have failed chaotic states with economic problems on their borders.

You're somehow ignoring that countries bordering Russia have already a failed chaotic state with economic problems on their border which also is systematically threatening with invasion, destruction, and genocide.

There are very good reasons why Baltic states are the highest per-capita providers of military and economic support to Ukraine.

There's no love for Russians in any of these countries; they'll just deport any refugees.

The Baltics probably would, but Georgia is literally swamped with Russian émigrés right now. By the Georgian official data, more than 100k Russians arrived in 2022 alone, which is 2-3% of the country's population.

Lithuania and Poland have been coordinating to keep the migrants coming in via Belarus out of their countries, although these are Middle Easterners and Africans. And all of the Baltics have placed a travel ban on Russians. I don't see them caring about the misfortune of Russians in such a scenario.

Not so sure about this. That a handful of aggressive and hungry Russo-Warlords with Nukes is any improvement over Putin.

>Not so sure about this. That a handful of aggressive and hungry Russo-Warlords with Nukes is any improvement over Putin.

They will fight between them with their remaining soviet weapons, since they are not competent to fight any large country. Maybe some of those would actually become a democracy.

> They will fight between them with their remaining soviet weapons

Says who? They can just as well harass non-Russian neighbouring states. Or quite likely form some kind of

> since they are not competent to fight any large country

That doesn't prevent them from trying though.

> Maybe some of those would actually become a democracy.

Democracy in such states is an illusion. You are either USA with sustainable, refined over time, extremely restricted (2 parties, electors, strong continuity of the government of the selected few) and deeply rooted in tradition mechanisms of democracy, or you are just a vassal to a state with a good propaganda.

Да ну. A 2 party state is barely better than a 1 party state, and electors are a fancy way to circumvent 1 person 1 vote. It's deeply rooted mechanisms of something, but not exactly democracy )))

Why? It's actually much closer to a classical democracy. Remember that "dēmos" was never the same thing as the "óxlos".

Ex sovitet/communist states prove that democracy is possible. Go ont hose countries subrteddits and ask them if they feel they are vassals or if they would prefer to be part of USSR,

I know imperialists prefer to see the small countries as brainwashed nations that need to be put back in their place and probably this is the reason Putoin is threatening this countries all the time, they show non brainwashed Russians that democracy works, that you can live better then during Stalin or Putin regime, that cooperation works.

Wow, what a rant. You don't really travel much, do you? Given that you srsly experience the world through "countries subreddits". JFYI, Reddit is something rather obscure in ex-soviet states, especially to non-teens.

Sorry, but when just a few of many countries had managed to barely setup an election process, but can't go on without some violent political crisis every 10 years, that is hardly a functional and sustainable democracy.

What does this have to do with Russians anyway? It's a general principle, which works all ways with all actors. The fact that some west-leaning ex-soviet states are hard on censorship and restriction of Russian media illustrates my point perfectly.

Americans loosing sleep over the idea that TikTok is a threat to national security is another good illustration of this general principle.

See, one really doesn't have to be an imperialist to assess how popularity-based systems can be hijacked in the era when internet and targeted propaganda exist.

Russia seems to be throwing it's entire war machine at Ukraine. It deployed units, and conscripts, from all over Russia, including the Far East (in fact sourcing conscripts predominantly from poorer regions, and preferentially not ethnic Russians). Chop that machine into 4 or 5 pieces and it's far less scary.

Even the nukes, scary as they could be, are less of a threat when the individual actors are smaller and weaker. They may not even be able to maintain these nukes. And even if they are capable of using them, they are at a more precarious position than eg. Putin at the helm of Mighty Russia.

> Even the nukes, scary as they could be, are less of a threat when the individual actors are smaller and weaker. They may not even be able to maintain these nukes. And even if they are capable of using them, they are at a more precarious position than eg. Putin at the helm of Mighty Russia.

I'm not sure "the people with nukes would be in a precarious position" is the comforting statement you intended it to be.

Big, united Russia with lots of nukes can afford to use them much more than 5 small, weak post-Russias, each with some nukes.

If nothing else, these post-Russias would struggle to afford even more to upkeep and upgrade the stash of nukes. And would be easier to neutralize too...

> If nothing else, these post-Russias would struggle to afford even more to upkeep and upgrade the stash of nukes.

Again, not comforting. "Might as well use them on <hated neighbor>!"

>Chop that machine into 4 or 5 pieces and it's far less scary.

Ask the people living on the Borders of Latvia, Estonia or Georgia what they think of that. These warlords won't respect borders.

>even if they are capable of using them, they are at a more precarious position than eg. Putin at the helm of Mighty Russia.

I think they have even more incentive to use them, far less consequences if they do. Losing your position as warlord of some Fiefdom is a lot less scary then losing your position as the Dictator of a nation with a top 10 GDP, a permanent UN Security Council seat and having personal wealth in the Hundreds of Billions?

Milosevic of Serbia was taken to court. Gaddafi was captured and killed before any court could protect him. Putin is never going to stand trial, unless somehow Russia rats him out (but I struggle to imagine that).

Smaller dictators can do less harm, not more.

>Putin is never going to stand trial, unless somehow Russia rats him out (but I struggle to imagine that).

I'm sure Serbs and Libyans had said the same about Milosevic and Gaddafi for years before they were removed from power.

Isn't that pretty much what happened when the USSR crumbled ? That collapse peeled away an outer ring of subjugated nations.

My armchair analysis tells me that there might be coming another round of peripheral nation(alitie)s peeling away.

Not such a bad thing. And let the center - the Burkina-Faso-with-nukes - keep the comfort of their nukes, if it's what it takes to keep them from actually using those weapons in fear or in anger.

Yes. It's a pretty scary possibility given their massive stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction of all kinds.

It's also the only scenario that guarantees long-term stability. Also, it's not like we've hadn't been through this twenty years ago already, and the result was quite good.

How does it guarantee long-term stability?

By eliminating the main perpetrator - Russia. Smaller countries are manageable.

Something that makes this a little harder to analyze is that there is robust demand for the "Russia will collapse tomorrow" thesis, and pushing back gets coded as pro-Putin stooging. I worry that it makes the public conversation a little unmoored.

He drafted 300,000 in the partial mobilization. There were I believe three other call ups before then that didn’t quite reach into 100k range but were close. Also relatively comparable numbers have left Russia during the partial mobilization, so losing a million able workers from the workforce is not an unreasonable estimate.

That's what they claim anyway.

Corruption, fear and propaganda is absolutely rampant, so it's very likely some numbers are adjusted.

ISW had verified independent reports that while they didn’t quite meet the goal, they were close. And tens of thousands of the poorly trained call ups had already shown up on the front lines.