Radio War Nerd #322 — Chechen Wars, Pt. 2: 1722-1991 + Ukraine-Russia War Update
Recorded: March 24, 2022
This episode, the War Nerd & Ames discuss the latest in Russia's war on Ukraine.
At 52:00 - Ames goes back a few centuries in the long gory history of the Russian-Chechen Wars, from Sheikh Mansur in the late 18th-c. up to Dzhokhar Dudayev's return to Chechnya as its independence leader in 1990-1.
Map of Chechnya
Listen to Part 1 in our Chechen Wars series (EP #321).
Total time: 1:44:00
Comments (27)
https://vk.com/wall279679914_15075
https://vk.com/video279679914_456240158?list=e11a79827c0124df94
The discussion on post-revolution Russian Empire reminded me of Borislav Chernev's excellent book ' Twilight of Empire: The Brest-Litovsk Conference and the Remaking of East-Central Europe, 1917-1918' on that extremely complicated period. Also, Adam Tooze's 'The Deluge' is also excellent, and particularly relevant these days...
Mark's fantastic cricket sound effects were so realistic, it gave me Havana syndrome
I really learned a lot here. Growing up we learned nothing about Russia or the Soviet Union other than it was evil.
10% population reduction doesn't happen in the 20th century?
Great episode guys
FWIW (and correct me if I missed it being said on the show at some point), Putin didn't seem to have a problem with Latvia and Estonia joining NATO, obviously violating the "not one inch eastward" expansion thesis that's forming one leg of the reasoning for the invasion. Yeah, he could've just changed his mind at this late date, but is there anything special about any of these countries or their situations, now or then, that could tie into Russian reasoning for an invasion? (I really don't think it's a "crappy little countries" reason, FWIW.)
They did have problems with the baltics joining. The difference was that at that time Russia was far to weak to do anything about it. Add to this, that at the time relations with NATO and Russia were relatively okay, both Putin and Yeltsin (as well as Gorbachev) wanted to cooperate with the west, going as far as asking to join NATO themselves.
Come to nyc!!
Will be there June 17
Please come to the Midwest! I'm sure you could draw a good crowd in Chicago
Good idea!
A veteran tank commander has some caveats about all those Ukranian videos: https://youtu.be/W9pVEP0AzZ4 A retired Colonel who took part in the second Gulf War & Afghanistan assesses Russian progress (and intentions!) QUITE differently from the various CIA approved generals featured on CNN: https://youtu.be/NFngc_8RiVc Scott Ritter has a few thoughts on the matter, plus (metaphorically) urinates and defecates on Madeleine Albright's grave: https://youtu.be/OSkpIq3T-Zc And just for giggles, Russia announces they are only going to take payment for natural gas from the EU/NATO countries sligned against them in supporting sanctions in RUBLES from now on- But China can pay in Yuan. And unlike Iraq or Libya, the US military isn't going to be able to make them run THAT decision back. When CIA gets a nice false flag arranged and "discovers" that Russia is using WMDs/hacking USA's infrastructure, are SHOCKED! SHOCKED!!!, US Gov't. declares Russian behavior so far beyond the pale that ANNYTHING done by NATO must be justified and Biden goes nuclear, that little destruction of the US $ as the one and only world reserve currency play will likely have been the final straw.
There was talk about Belarus intervening in the war, it’s kind of quieted down now. Does anyone know any new info about it?
"A contact with connections to Kremlin-thinking" - sounds awfully lot like "anonymous sources near to the administration", meaning just abou anyone having an opinion 🤣🤣🤣 Really interesting episode!
Egypt devalues their currency by 14% and is asking help from IMF. The disruption of wheat imports from Russia and Ukraine has undermined the whole economy. https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/egyptian-pound-drops-10-after-ukraine-war-prompts-dollar-flight-2022-03-21/
This will be a massive problem for the Middle East as a whole. Probably why the gulf countries are currently trying to cozy up to China and Russia.
I'm shocked by the weakness in your analysis of Ukraine these past few weeks. I think the problem may be that you are immersed in western media. In any event, when you see what the Russians are getting close to accomplishing, I don't know how you can view this as having gone badly for Russia (again, unless you put faith in western media). Russia (with a smaller number of troops) has (i) substantially neutralized any meaningful Ukie threat from the air, (ii) held Ukie forces in place by attacking along broad fronts and surrounding cities, (iii) cut supply lines, destroyed stores and discouraged/destroyed reinforcements and (iv) prevented re-formation of Ukie forces. Now they squeeze patiently until Ukie forces are spent. Russia is doing Clausewitz. I know it's easy to be sceptical of this view if you begin your analysis based on western sources, but I would encourage you revisit your assessment of Russian strategy and tactics once the dust has settled and Western media can no longer deny reality. I mean this all with the sincerest goodwill, in the hopes of stimulating your analysis. I have been a loyal reader/listener since The Exile days (bring back Vlad's Daily Gloat!).
I think the Western media earned the slightest smidgen of trust this time, and what's the alternative? Posts on Signal and Twitter, heavily censored media in Russia? Some of it is useful, but a lot of it is sure to be noise and it's difficult to separate the two. RT is doing its best, but it is hamstrung by their own hammer blows of censorship from the EU and social media sites, plus it's not like they have lots of foreign bureaus that can send journalists to Ukraine (not that they would be allowed in).
The Ukrainians are winning the war on twitter, at the very least. But I guess that was expected.
New York meetups? I am not on Facebook. Can you please keep us in the loop?
Yes, there will be a NYC meet up June 17 -- we'll send out more details soon.
I have an easy time believing that the Russian killed-to-injured ratio is extraordinarily poor, given how bad they seem to be at many other comparably basic things. But then, what's a plausible level of extraordinarily bad, versus an obviously absurd one? The numbers we're getting don't seem realistic. (But then, neither does the entire concept of the war.) Along those lines, can someone shed light on how the Russian medical corps are organized? And how they seem to be performing?
Yeah there’s a lot of problems with taking the US 1 KIA for every 10 WIA figure and applying it to the Russian military. For one, it’s not clear that Russia has invested in the logistics capacity to do rapid medevac on all its axes of advance. For another, there are pics of Russian IFAKs with gauze from the ‘70s. Hope it stayed sterile.
The first time the “Z” thing actually started showing up was in the 24 hours right before the war when it became pretty clear to people like me who didnt think it would happen. I read somewhere that Russian units were painting Z’s on their trucks and instructing their allies in ukraine to do the same
Love y'alls insight on this stuff! And thanks for releasing stuff more quickly, it's really nice. As a lowly groveling cheap skate it's more than I deserve. Is there another Civil War episode on the books? I'm super excited for the mid-to-late war coverage.