[planarhobbit]

> Russia has now become a fascist state, bent on neo-colonial conquest of everything post-Soviet and post-Russian Empire. Russian population, in substantial numbers, supports this fascism and this neo-colonialism.

I thought 1) Most Russians were against the war (“special operation”), and 2) that Russia is losing this war badly and with the new rocket equipment supplied to Ukraine that they’ll be pushed back, etc.

So which is it?

[dimitar]

Neither is true;

While sociological data in a dictatorship is to be taken with a grain of salt, the data shows that most Russians support the "special military operation": https://www.levada.ru/en/ Worse, there are a lot of people on Russian social media that are aware of war-crimes and support them, I hope their numbers are small, but unfortunately rulers known for cruelty like Ivan the Terrible, Peter I or Stalin are quite revered, and Putin has drawn parallels between himself and them (most recently Peter the First).

Russia lost the war in the sense that the original intent was to occupy all or most of the country. But Ukraine still has lost 20% of the area and much of the population is under occupation, refugees or mobilized. This is far from victory for Ukraine and the country needs to be helped to win. Ukrainian victory is in everyone's interest because otherwise wars of conquest will become the norm again.

[User23]

Most ethnic Russians in Ukraine support the action too. The crisis in the Donbas has really soured them.

The inevitable outcome is that like with Crimea, Russia will successfully annex the parts of Ukraine that are overwhelmingly populated by Russians who prefer Russian rule.

Please don’t mistake a prediction for an endorsement.