Considering what happened in bucha and other places... Ukraine is probably afraid that the civilians in bakhmut might have to face the revenge of the Russian army if bakhmut falls. I hope all civilians are already taken out of there.

Also every line of defence counts. If u go by the mentality that it's alright if the first one falls cause u have others, u won't be able to defend anything.

Your comment only states the issue I acknowledge also agree everything you say but it doesn't give a solution. Btw I dont think I am racist to underdeveloped parts of the world when I say they are exploited by the West or China and that's the reason they can't develop not because they are inferior. Your last sentence is the summary of the problem so I am only going to talk about that. I think the only way to break western or eastern intervention to Africa is by force. Eliminate all Wagner , corporate, Chinese mercenaries. Eliminate local forces who terrorise the people for power like what el salvador does. Than nationalize cobalt mines , make a collective fund like Norwegian oil fund . Buy cobalt in decent price instead of cheaping out send the money to the fund mentioned. Spend the money in the fund to build infrastructure in those countries. Also do not put a democratic government until population reaches certain point of education ( academic). But gather local leaders to address their issues as a nation wide parliament will get corrupted shortly because population is just not educated. Last part is the main reason my country Turkey is failing. Imposing western style government on uneducated masses causes it to fail in time. We should form an interim government controlled by forces that have all their actions monitored publicly (I am talking GPS position, live cams of police; continous Voice recordings of officials monitored by AI stuff).Afterwards the local authorities can form a their own unique form of government adhering to their cultural norms. Otherwise we are just imposing our own governance style on to them like we have done in the past. İdk wanna talk more here is TLDR; My argument is it's okey to hurt few people now instead let more people suffer in the future. Also developing rest of the world meanw more Amazon customer Jeff would love it so give more money to them

Today's Russia is what nationalism inevitably leads to.

Defence spending isn't why the US has such a terrible health care system. US public health care spending is way higher per capita than in countries with universal health care. Adopting a universal model would save them money.

This isn't the actions of a strong man. A strong man protects the people by uniting them against all comers. They fight.. but they don't commit suicide while doing it. The strongman persona is attractive because its a signal that everyone survives or everyone dies and thus promotes unity.

This is the action of a great coward. When you cant admit, even to yourself, that you have failed. You cant face the consequences of your actions. When the only thing you can do is pretend you haven't failed like a petulant child demanding more candy.

And if everyone in the audience was keenly interested in funding or getting their hands on the technology

I’m willing to renegotiate the consitions on my mortgage. As long as I can stop paying and get to keep the house.

Butto famously said "We will eat grass, even go hungry, but we will get one of our own(nuclear bomb)..."

Well time has come for Pakistan to understand consequences of huge military budgets, giving safe haven for terrorists, encouraging religious fundementalist and not investing in civilian infrastructure and educational institutions while at the same time have overpopulation.

Pakistan is going to have a grim future. Americans have turned their back, after ISI chief went to Afghanistan when the Taliban took over. China will buy Pakistan infrastructure but they now realise what's the point of buying something from someone who has nothing. Saudi might be the only country that might still help Pakistan.

The irony in this is Pakistan has been shouting for decades that India wants to invade them and destroy them. At the same time they dug their own downfall.

Gods.. I wish we would do that.

Buy Russian gas and sell the new regime Mercs.

Putin’s strategy is to just throw bodies into the grinder and wait for the rest of the world to get tired of supporting Ukraine and cut them off, so he makes unreasonable demands he knows will be rejected so he can at least claim “Hey I’m open to dialogue but that mean old Zelensky won’t cooperate.” Sadly this strategy has an all too real chance of working.

Oh no, I don't disagree, I just wanted to remind you that the arm swings both ways, and a massive defense budget is money that doesn't get invested in public good. We spend roughly a sixth of the budget to maintain our doctrine of fighting the next two strongest countries, while letting our infrastructure crumble, our teachers need to work second jobs, and our hospitals be privatized to the point of excessive costs for minimal aid. Spend more, but don't spend so much it starts to eat into every other aspect of your society, like we do.

[removed]

I've got a couple of buddies who are engineers that work in the arms industry and, though they can never really say much about their work. They did recently say at a dinner party that business was booming like none other.

You have Russian assets in Parlament!!

What I find strange is how so much of this war is being focused around Bakhmut right now, as if it falls, it's all over.

Isn't it essentially Ukraine's first line of defence right now? Don't they have 3 or 4 similarly, perhaps more, fortified cities to fall back to to their West?

It seems to me more right now that Russia are throwing everything they can at one small city, which Ukraine could probably just pull out of to a more advantageous position at any time.

Honestly feels like the Ukrainians are leading the Russian army into a nasty trap to me lol

Wars usually end when at one or both sides give up something that they didn't want to give up before. That's the whole point of wars. Talks start when foreign soldiers are still in your country.

While I don't think Russia has any intentions of ending the war without forcing huge concessions from Ukraine, the reality is that Ukraine currently can't get those territories back. They're dying without gaining anything...

Trump was ready to burn the country down and Todd out the constitution and republican voters love him for it

So..... they're not open to talks, then?

Source?

Burglar says I’m open to talks but I won’t get off your couch

You also know that’s not what I’m saying. Stop being disingenuous

Or it is misdirection to make the Russian overcommit, and then be crushed by a counterattack from the Ukrainian reserves. A modern version of the Parthian shot.

Note that I am not claiming either way. Just that you should always consider the misdirection motive in war. Feinted retreats into ambush are a classic tactic.

[removed]

So many people only want the bad guys to be on the other side.

Stir up the far right, stir up the far left, both accuse each other of being Nazis or whatever. Amplify the chaos to ensure maximum outrage from both sides. Made so much easier by all the algorithms the likes of Facebook produce to help you target people effectively!