Re: Russian Ukraine War
Reply #46 –
Ukraine has to tread a bit of a careful path here.
They can't afford the luxury of being anything other than fully transparent.
If mistakes have been made...if accidents have happened, then acknowledge them.
The longer the war goes on the more the chance supporting countries will find it difficult to maintain support as domestic pressures come into play, and they get a bit war weary.
Dishonesty or some perceived distortion of the truth would be very damaging to the Ukraine cause.
They have to be seen to be the 'good guys'.
Russians play the 'long war'.
It's a war of attrition and a wearing down of opposition before they turn the tide.
They let the other side use up their resources and take the short term hits.
It's like a boxer absorbing the punishment before the counter attack.
It's pretty similar to the way the Ukranians played it at the start.
But at the end of the day they do have a lot of combined history despite the differences.
Yep, imagine that it turns out that this rocket was fired in that direction on purpose? Even if you were to argue that they were defending the Ukraine from a Russian strike the map doesn't lie and the direction it needed to be fired in to hit Poland makes for a potential deliberate hit at Poland and trying to paint the Russians as the culprits.
Thing is, there is enough of a grey area there that they could always state that the "west" is saying it was Ukrainian in order to not escalate the response on Russia.
Very thin line to be walking and dangerous territory. Imagine for a moment the Russians did this on purpose to paint the Ukrainians in a certain light as a false flag. Wouldn't be the first time something like this happened.
Either way, NATO needs to be careful. A stray rocket into Poland is nothing to be concerned about in the scheme of things, even if it were the Russians. That wouldn't lead to good outcomes and only continued fighting which will only lead to more loss of life and a continuation of this conflict.