How will a war in Europe affect you?

Munitions production may well be diverted.
Internet breaches of infrastructure, especially commo and energy, are a likely response to sanctions.

How do you prepare?

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Did I miss a war in the news?

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Same as always. Live within my means, stay in shape, stay stocked up on spare parts and survival supplies. One of the benefits of aging seems to be getting to the point of having lots of stuff that comes in handy, and spare parts to keep it operating.
I am increasing our garden size this year, and next house will be farm oriented.

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Who would the combatants be? War between US and Russia will last hours. Need I go into details.

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I think you’re 180 off from reality. There will be little if any hand to hand or equipment combat between U.S. and Russia or China. In either case, both sides know that is stupid. The war will be online, financial, communication, goods/services, etc. It will last forever if it goes formal.

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Joe wants one, I don’t.

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What I’ve heard has to do with higher oil and meat prices.
A lot of feed corn comes from the Ukraine(?) for finishing livestock
A lot of Europe’s oil and natural gas comes from Russia.
Any disruption is going to have an effect on the already ridiculous prices worldwide.
And how many hundred tons of ammunition has the US sent to the Ukraine?
Countries don’t have to be at war to feel the economic effects of war.

Also any economic sanctions by the US can be expected to be met by Russian hackers.
Do you think Russia would wait for US to impose sanctions before letting loose their hackers?
What problems could they cause? Remember the oil and beef Russian hacker shenanigans’ last year?

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Yeah, I believe the war has already started, but most of us outside the cyber profession don’t recognize it. I think we’re unlikely to see ammunition shortages, rations, or drafts. But you might experience first-hand an international supply chain shortage (oops, already got that one), disruptions to your utilities, or malicious attacks on your devices and accounts. The Germans at their height couldn’t do much to the United States except sink ships that left the harbor. The Russians could disrupt your life with the stroke of a few keys.

Preparation might include stocking up on the basics, like you should do anyway because it’s Winter. (Even Texas can have a Winter storm.) But equally as important is protecting yourself online. Use strong passwords, enable 2-factor authentication when you can, maybe invest in VPN, etc. And for crying out loud, stop answering spam calls, texts, and email messages!

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Russia and the Ukraine, unless Brandon gets stupid—oh wait…?

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Nope, we are on the same page. I wasn’t clear enough, sorry. I don’t believe in possibility of direct armed conflict between Russia and the US, 3000 warheads on alert and 20000 in cold storage make absolutely sure of it. Armed conflict through proxies, economic and cyber warfare, propaganda etc. is a different thing.

Russia and Ukraine, I believe, are only separated by a line on the map. They are one entity ethnically, culturally and historically. What is our business in their civil war? What do we buy from Ukraine? And not like we bought millions of tons of hydrocarbons from Russia, with operational Keystone XL pipeline… oh wait…

I will be surprised if Putin and Xi did not already setup a scheme to deliver some kind of defeat to the US. It may be economic, or reputation, or even military. We can trust the wisdom of our leadership not to step into a trap.

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Here’s an attack I anticipate: E M P

Oh, that would be a fantastic day to witness when millennials and Gen Z scramble without their electronic devices.

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I have to semi-disagree. Ukrainians are ethnically slightly different than Russians, however the languages are very close.
The problem was Joe, not Joe Biden (yet) but Joe Stalin.
He engineered the Holodomor genocide
https://ukrainiangenocide.org/ and He drew the current borders which encompass a chunk of Russia (and the Russians living there) into the eastern part of the Ukraine (a common feature in former Soviet Republics, it’s as if there is pre-orchestrated ethnic issue set up in many of the now independent nations in order to keep them weakened by some sort of turmoil.
How Brandon!

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Have any of you considered communication preparations such as HAM or even simple two-way radios should that become an issue?

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It’s not really a civil war. It’s one large, powerful nation trying to annex a smaller nation. The more powerful nation claims that they are doing so to protect their ethnic minority located within the smaller nation. The leader of the large, powerful nation has openly declared his desire to claim his smaller neighbors in an attempt to rebuild a former empire.

We’ve seen this same scenario play out before, about 80± years ago. Back then, the U.S. did not want to get involved in a European war, but we were slowly dragged into it, anyway. The tipping point came when an aggressive Asian empire, who was supposedly our friend, attacked us by surprise. I hope that doesn’t come about.

Point being that we can try to ignore what’s going on in the world, and maybe we should stay out of their affairs and stop being the world police. But that doesn’t guarantee we can remain neutral. We have a way of getting pulled into major conflicts.

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It looks like Quade sees things the same way I do. We’ve read this story before. Putin really is Hitler with nuclear weapons. Once again, the Europeans are too afraid to take the conqueror on until he goes after the Important Nations, and the Americans have our heads in the sand.

Nobody wants war, but I’d rather fight it while there are others left to fight alongside us.

Bush did nothing when Putin conquered part of Georgia. Obama did nothing when Putin conquered part of Ukraine (not The Ukraine, but Ukraine. They are an independent nation). He knew Trump meant business, so he didn’t do anything while Trump was in office, and now that someone more pliable is in office, he’s back to trying to expand his territory.

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Worse case scenario involves our NATO allies.
I don’t think Putin will make a move on Eastern NATO partners, but the rest of NATO, including the US is obligated by NATO to defend against aggression, making this reminiscent of the origins of WW1,
I seriously doubt that would happen, but have you noticed that when polling drops, politicians tend to seek a military adventure because it generally rallies support?

Efforts to worsening of our troubled economy and dysfunctional society seems more likely

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This is the same as getting involved in a street fight. You see 2 nations. I see two governments that are corrupt to the core. Maybe shouldn’t get noble, and just keep walking past.

I will believe this analogy, when Russia invades Poland, or Latvia. Until then - our govt has no obligation to militarily defend Ukraine, but duty to assure Russian nuclear weapons don’t land on our soil.

We need to change it. Maybe you noticed, our economy is stressed. Our strategic supplies are sourced from China and Russia. Even our military has fallen behind technologically, with aging strategic deterrent, air dominance relying on dubious F35 program, and what seems like perennial inability to catch up on hypersonic development. Should I mention military wokeness? In a large scale conflict, Russia can deliver more damage to our nation, than we can to them. On a regional scale, you would be fighting on Russia’s turf, with allies known to, shall we call it, not fully commit. Starting a battle you cannot win is unwise.

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Not if the bad consequences of their decision can arrive within minutes. However, some of them have no mental capacity to appreciate that.

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I don’t think that is even remotely true.

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That’s the nugget Trump was getting control over when JB snuck in the window at the WH.

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