GenZedong

russia's air defense is lacking.

I do have another thought. RT claimed in a story a week ago or so that Ukraine had no working airfields in pristine enough condition to allow them to take-off and recover F-16 fighter jets they were going to be given. The implication being they would have to take off and land from surrounding countries and that would be uh an escalation. If that is true and the facts on the ground don't change (Ukraine getting airfields pristine enough in the far west to service them and dealing with strikes to damage them) then a provocation like this could be a minor test of that type of thing.

If they really are doing this, and Russia really needs to prove it if so. There is a good argument for Russia making good on their threat and letting fly tactical nuclear weapons against these military installations that are participating. The rub of course being that could draw NATO into things directly and may be something they're hoping for to rally people. The flip side being, if they don't and let them walk all over them, cross that line, they'll keep crossing lines forever. The most positive outcome of using such weapons is it could shock the west into backing off. The worst of course is it brings NATO including the western nations and not just the nuclear crumple zone ones in the east, into the fray directly and/or leads to a retaliatory nuclear strike on a Russian installation and spiraling escalation from there.

Nice