Ukraine reacts to fears of Russian invasion as troops build up at the border

[His Divine Shadow]

No you are the one saying that, I am not. So stop putting words in my mouth, it doesn't matter if France meant to replace their nuclear fleet with coal or even nuclear fusion or whatever. The important thing is they where deciding to halve their nuclear fleet and where actively working towards that goal, not what they where replacing it with.

Yes I maintan that nuclear is cheaper on the whole. 20 billion is an unrealistically high estimate to take as an average value since we are capable of producing them for less, that's taking a high-end scenario and using it as the average value. I used estimates of 3 and 6 billion instead. Once you factor in economies of scale and the experience of building plants will make building more cheaper as experience and production kicks into gear the cost per reactor will drop, not increase. Furthermore there are reactors made on budget in the world still so it's not like this is some unsolvable technical problem, it's an organisational one which is best cured with experience in building reactors again.

Why do you keep bringing up heating? I haven't brought up natural gas for heating once. I am talking about electricity production. Natural gas is extremely relevant to the question of Germany, renewables and electricity because that is what provides Germany with the backup for the renewables in lieu of other sources such as nuclear. I am fully aware Germany also uses alot of natgas for heating, that just makes their natgas dependency worse, it does not change anything I've said about their dependency on it for electricity generation and how high natural gas prices influence electricity prices.

The 600 billion figure is an estimate, there are multiple estimates out there, here's a few with different cost estimates:
https://www.netzerowatch.com/german-ene ... udy-finds/
https://www.bmwi-energiewende.de/EWD/Re ... immen.html
https://world-nuclear.org/information-l ... wende.aspx

[GrosseAdmiralFox]

It should be noted that the US Department of Energy has been funding modular reactor systems for a while now, and they're just coming into fruition...

... but right now, I'm afraid we're in a farcistic version of ZDF's World War 3, with Putin being ZDF's WW3's General Vladimir Soshkin.

[His Divine Shadow]

The impact of SMRs will be interesting to see for sure, but it's an unknown field so far. Meanwhile europe used to know how to build reactors on time and in budget, the current french nuclear fleet cost 100 billion to build in 2022 money. I am not convinced it's a technical issue with the EPR design, the chinese built an EPR reactor on time while in europe it drags behind.

It's probably a lack of experience in both institutional knowledge and management culture. Europe (and the US) seems to have lost the affinity for big projects since the 1980s, interestingly this coincides with the rise of neoliberalism, manageralism and the making of state institutions more like private companies (which contrary to myth are the real fans of bueracracy). Solvable problems with the political will however. It will be intreresting to see if the french manage it with their new nuclear buildout and manage to utilize efficiencies of scale and serial production. A lot is certainly riding on it panning out...

Meanwhile in Finland I hope we quickly get on the boat and build another OL3 style reactor. This jumping between designs for every single build that is now common destroyes economy of scale benefits as well as the hard learned benefits from the problems in the OL3 project. We need to utilize those while the institutional knowledge is fresh.

[madd0c0t0r2]

Meanwhile europe used to know how to build reactors on time and in budget,

citation needed.

[Dominus Atheos]

20 reasons the right and alt-left on Fox News say they support putin and/or oppose Ukraine:

https://www.thebulwark.com/fox-news-put ... primetime/

1. America is marching into a world war. On Saturday night, Fox host Dan Bongino warned viewers that “the U.S. is slow-walking its way directly into World War III.” He repeated this phrase three times, each time citing a different alleged American provocation. First he pointed to the recent sabotage of Russia’s Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, suggesting that the United States may have done it. Then he cited President Joe Biden’s warning to Putin that America would defend every inch of NATO territory. Then he cited a bulletin from the U.S. embassy in Russia, which urged Americans to leave that country. No matter what we do, Bongino has the same warning: It might trigger a world war.

It’s true that Russia might escalate the conflict in response to American acts. But by framing our acts as the cause of Putin’s behavior—and indiscriminately applying that framework to anything we do—Bongino’s advice would paralyze the United States. And he’s hardly alone. On Friday night, another Fox host, Will Cain, blamed American leaders for Russia’s deployment of planes that could carry nuclear weapons. Cain asked Fox viewers: “Why is virtually every politician [in] both parties trying to provoke Russia into using those bombers?”

2. Lower the temperature. In his Friday monologue, Cain proposed that “given” Russia’s nuclear threats, “Every NATO country now needs to answer a very basic question: How are you going to lower the temperature? How are you going to prevent global nuclear war? It’s really the only question that matters.”

The key word in this argument is “given.” Like several other Fox hosts, Cain accepts Putin’s behavior as a given but treats America’s behavior as a variable. This puts the onus on us to appease Putin, regardless of what he does. And Cain, like Bongino, has an endless supply of American acts or statements that in his view might unduly trigger Putin. He accused Biden of “deliberately provoking Russia” merely by suggesting that Putin sabotaged the pipeline.

3. Putin is invincible. No matter how many losses Putin suffers in Ukraine, the appeasement caucus insists he can never truly be defeated. “There is no way Putin is going to give in,” Gutfeld scoffed on Friday. “Older generations like him” in Russia, said Gutfeld, and “the younger people, they’re leaving. So . . . I don’t think he has any reason to worry.” By depicting Putin as relentless and politically secure—more secure than he really is, judging by Russia’s domestic unrest in response to his latest mass conscription—these advocates of conciliation strengthen his hand.

4. Submit to any nuclear threat. Last week, Carlson called for immediate capitulation to Russia. “Putin is making nuclear threats,” he noted. “Whatever the reason he is making them, the fact he is making them . . . is enough for any responsible person to say, ‘Now we stop.’” On this view, any dictator could paralyze America just by issuing a plausible nuclear threat.

5. Helping Ukraine just prolongs the suffering. “We just keep sending billions and billions and billions of dollars” to Ukraine, Gutfeld complained on Friday. “We’re not affecting the outcome. . . . All we’re doing is making [the war] longer.” And “the longer it goes, the worse it gets,” he argued. By this logic, American aid is harmful, and for Ukraine’s sake—never mind what Ukrainians claim to want—we should cut a deal that placates Putin.

6. Give peace a chance. “I don’t understand the problem with the P-word,” Gutfeld pleaded on Monday. He fretted that “everybody is pro-war,” and “we’re just pouring the money in.”

This depiction of military conflict—if you resist the aggressor, you’re for “war,” but if you reward him by capitulating, you’re for “peace”—used to be associated with the left. Now it’s spreading on the right, and conservative isolationists are using it to pose as idealists. Last week, Carlson brought former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard onto his show to make this case. “Our leaders and European leaders are the ones fueling and funding this war,” said Gabbard. Instead of “pushing for more destruction, more war,” she proposed, we should “fight for peace” by using our leverage to “push for . . . a negotiated ceasefire.”

7. Helping Ukraine costs too much. Ingraham, Carlson, Gutfeld, and other conservatives complain about the war’s price tag. But to make this concern sound less selfish, they also enlist nominally progressive guests who talk about America’s domestic needs. On Thursday, Ingraham invited journalist Glenn Greenwald onto her show to praise Republicans who “step up and say, we don’t think billions and billions of dollars should be sent to a war in Ukraine, where we have no vital interests at stake, while Americans are suffering at home.”

8. Sanctions hurt us, not Russia. On Friday, to punish Putin for his illegal annexations, Biden announced new sanctions. To this, Cain responded by rebuking Biden, not Putin. “Why would more sanctions deter Russia?” he asked. “The last seven months of sanctions have led to blackouts and food shortages in Europe. Meanwhile, in Russia, the ruble got stronger,” and “our economy tanked.” By understating the damage to Russia and overstating the damage to Europe and America, this argument seeks to persuade citizens in the West that Putin can hurt us more than we can hurt him, and therefore we should give in. Cain also implied that sanctions were to blame for any further escalation by Putin. “Sanctions don’t deter,” he asserted. “They provoke.”

9. Split the difference. “Picking sides” between Ukraine and Russia is “folly,” Gutfeld told Fox viewers on Friday. To reach a settlement that might end the war, he proposed that we “table the animosities and grudges” and “ask both parties what they want to get out of this.” He sounded like the character in Monty Python and the Holy Grail who—on behalf of a knight who has just butchered wedding guests—pleads, “Let’s not bicker and argue about who killed who.”

10. Russia only wants part of Ukraine. On Monday night, Carlson and Greenwald argued that the stakes in Ukraine weren’t worth risking nuclear war. The stakes aren’t “even Ukraine,” said Greenwald. They’re just “the Donbas, the eastern region in Ukraine, where a majority of people actually identify as ethnic Russians and want to be part of Russia.” Greenwald’s claim about the people of Donbas is false. But it supports the narrative that Russia’s rape of eastern Ukraine is somehow a consensual relationship and that Putin is only asking for territory to which he’s morally entitled.

11. The war is an attack on Putin. Carlson, casting America as the villain, frames the war as a Democratic plot. “Biden’s advisers wanted a total regime-change war against Russia, apparently to avenge the election of Donald Trump,” he told viewers last week. He claimed that this was why the Biden administration wanted to label Russia a state sponsor of terror: not because Putin really does commit terrorism, but because we’re looking for an excuse to “topple” him. Cain extends this argument to NATO, accusing it of conspiring “to remove Putin from power.” The war isn’t “really about keeping Ukraine safe,” he says.

On this view, Russia is just defending itself. According to Cain, Ukraine triggered the war by seeking to join NATO, which aimed to oust Putin. All Putin wanted was a promise from Ukraine to stay out of the alliance. In fact, Carlson asserted last week, the United States “could end this war tonight” by securing a deal to which Putin would readily agree: “Russian troops leave. Ukraine promises not to join NATO. Everything is at it was in January of this year. And everything’s fine.” That’s a preposterous scenario, but it follows logically from Carlson’s comically benign account of Putin’s motives.

In his Monday appearance with Carlson, Greenwald portrayed Putin as a besieged man protecting his homeland. NATO’s “escalating” aggression in Ukraine, “right across [Russia’s] border,” is turning the conflict into an “existential war” for Russia, he alleged. Naturally, he concluded, this threat to Russia might prompt Putin to use nukes.

12. Ukraine is just like Iraq. Many Americans who opposed the invasion of Iraq in 2003 are sympathetic to arming Ukraine because this time, Russia, not America, is the invader. But Carlson says there’s no difference. Our involvement in Ukraine is “designed to topple Vladimir Putin, just like we toppled Saddam Hussein,” he asserts. On Monday, Greenwald echoed that comparison. Americans are being lured into war based on demonization of Putin, he argued, just as we were lured into war by demonization of Saddam.

13. The “elite class” is pushing us into war. On Monday, Ingraham played video of foreign policy experts and a retired American colonel talking about the risks of nuclear escalation in Ukraine. “You would think that the elite class would call for calm,” she told viewers, but “they don’t seem to want calm.” In the view of Ingraham and several other Fox hosts, everything the experts and the media tell us—about vaccines, election results, and the importance of thwarting Russian aggression—is presumptively wrong. “We’re sending another $12 billion to Ukraine,” she complained on Thursday night. “Is there any real debate about how things are going in Ukraine? Or are we just going to agree with whatever CNN says?”

14. This is another Russia hoax. Some Fox hosts and their guests deride anything said about Russia by current or former U.S. intelligence officials. They assert, falsely, that the Russia investigation exonerated Donald Trump, and therefore nothing said about the current crisis in Ukraine by American intelligence experts—in particular, former CIA Director John Brennan—can be trusted. “John Brennan and the CIA . . . invented the hoax of Russiagate,” Greenwald told Ingraham on Thursday. They “spun all of these tales about how Russia was responsible for infiltrating the United States. . . . They blamed Russia for everything, and it turns out to be lies.” On Monday, Carlson chimed in: “John Brennan used to run the CIA. He knows which lies work. He’s an expert.”

15. America is coercing Ukraine to fight. According to Cain and Carlson, Ukraine wanted to sign a peace deal in April but was blocked by the United States so that Biden could “fight to the last Ukrainian” to oust Putin. This story, which wildly distorts a temporary proposal to which Putin never agreed, is designed to sucker Americans who sympathize with Ukraine. In this version of the Carlson-Cain alternate universe, the real aggressor against Ukraine isn’t Russia; it’s America. “Who cares what the Ukrainians want? America and the U.K. demand total war with Russia,” says Carlson. “The Ukrainians, caught in the middle, had no choice but to concede.”

16. Ukraine is manipulating us. Carlson and his protégés alternate between portraying Ukraine as our victim and portraying it as a wicked temptress. On Friday, Cain showed viewers a clip of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky signing an application for admission to NATO. “It’s yet another slick, well-produced video from Kyiv,” Cain smirked.

17. Ukraine is a spoiled parasite. As U.S. military aid to Kyiv increases, some Fox hosts are depicting Ukraine as a greedy welfare recipient. “Ukraine feels entitled to endless support from the West, mostly the United States,” Ingraham groused on Monday. “We’re the ones who pay the bills.”

18. Ukraine is pushing us to start a nuclear war. In his diatribe last week, Carlson accused Zelensky of demanding that the United States “launch nuclear weapons now,” “before Russia actually launches missiles.” This assertion, like much of what Carlson says, was a remorseless lie. It’s also laughably inconsistent with his simultaneous story about how Ukraine just wanted to end the war and has been dragged into combat by America.

19. Ukraine is an arm of the Democratic party. “Zelensky is not the independent leader of a democratic nation,” Carlson declared Monday. “Zelensky is a client of the Biden administration, which runs his country.” In fact, he’s “the puppet of the Democratic party of the United States.” Carlson went on to denounce “Democrats and the defense establishment they control.” By smearing the U.S. government and the U.S. military as partisan enemies of Republicans, Carlson makes it easier for his viewers to think of themselves as patriots, even as they blame America.

20. As Ukraine’s sponsors, we should force Zelensky to settle. Despite their bogus allegations that Biden coerced Ukraine to fight, some Fox hosts are now suggesting that we should, in fact, coerce Ukraine to do what they want: cut a deal. Ukraine should respect our wishes because “we’re paying” for the war, says Gutfeld. Carlson goes further. “We are funding this war. We could end it,” he declared last week. He demanded that Biden “shut this whole thing down and force a negotiated peace.”

It's staggering the number of alt-leftists who believe all or most of this shit.

[Batman]

This is absurd.

[LadyTevar]

20 reasons the right and alt-left on Fox News say they support putin and/or oppose Ukraine:

https://www.thebulwark.com/fox-news-put ... primetime/
(Snip a whole load of total utter insanity)

It's staggering the number of alt-leftists who believe all or most of this shit.

If you ever thought that FAUX News was a Russian Pawn, Here's Your Proof.

How can these jerkwads say this shit with a straight face and then claim they're "Making America Great"?? The mental gymnastics for this shit is just mind-blowing. Just... just... HOW?! HOW DOES THEIR BRAINS WORK!?

[wautd]

It's staggering the number of alt-leftists who believe all or most of this shit.

The regressive left is pretty much far right. Shameless propagandists like George Galloway are doing overtime these days to praise Putin or be an apologist for repressive dictatorships like Iran.

[Lord Revan]

20 reasons the right and alt-left on Fox News say they support putin and/or oppose Ukraine:

https://www.thebulwark.com/fox-news-put ... primetime/
(Snip a whole load of total utter insanity)

It's staggering the number of alt-leftists who believe all or most of this shit.

If you ever thought that FAUX News was a Russian Pawn, Here's Your Proof.

How can these jerkwads say this shit with a straight face and then claim they're "Making America Great"?? The mental gymnastics for this shit is just mind-blowing. Just... just... HOW?! HOW DOES THEIR BRAINS WORK!?

There's a reason Lenin called people like these "useful idiots" (yes, I am aware that Lenin was referring to left wing people with that line but the type of people are the same even if the ideology isn't) they're so wrapped up in their ideology that they reject reality when it doesn't fit their ideology and in some cases, it could be a simple matter that a moderate Democrat is suggesting helping Ukraine therefore it must be wrong.

You got remember that "great" in "Making America Great" means making America be like them, small minded, short sighted (metaphorically that is), bigoted and totally out of touch with reality. There's nothing great about what they're attempting but they're living in a dream where the world works how they want it to work rather then how it actually works.

In the end these people are nothing more then mouth pieces for tyrants who tell them what they want to hear.

[Solauren]

I don't think they're pro Russia per say.

I think they're Anti-Biden, and are just using the current situation to try to rattle away support.

If Trump was still POTUS, and was taking a hard-line against Putin and the invasion, the Ukraine would be a dear loyal ally, and Trump would be saving us all from Putins attempt to start a nuclear WW3.

[Lord Revan]

I don't think they're pro Russia per say.

I think they're Anti-Biden, and are just using the current situation to try to rattle away support.

Ultimately it doesn't matter if they're pro-Russian or Anti-Biden the net effect still benefits Russia and Russia alone. That's why I called them useful Idiots, be it because of fanatism of their anti-Biden position or some naive Pro-Russian stance they really don't understand the results of their actions.

[Broomstick]

And now for a musical interlude:

https://twitter.com/Igor_from_Kyiv_/sta ... 2Fpage-313

[GrosseAdmiralFox]

And now for a musical interlude:

https://twitter.com/Igor_from_Kyiv_/sta ... 2Fpage-313

The music has been flowing for a while, mate.

The first one is particularly savage.

[Dominus Atheos]

Biden making some concerning comments, although at least one world leader gets it:



If Biden sells out part of Ukraine as an "off-ramp" for Putin, I'm really not going to be ok.

[GrosseAdmiralFox]

The problem is that Russia is a nuclear power, and to bring it to heel would instead bring nuclear armageddon. This is especially bad due to the current environment of rechavism in Russia...

[Dominus Atheos]

I agree nuclear armageddon is bad, but we have been through this, on a smaller but still very large scale before, and appeasement didn't work.

"Starting World War Two could lead to the deaths of 75 million people, so we have to give the Axis Manchuria Abyssinia Austria The Sudetenland Czechoslovakia Albania Danzig, it's not worth it!"

Once we we give into a tin-pot dictator one time, it never stops. He'll be threatening nuclear armageddon somewhere else next. If it's not "why die for Donbass", it"ll be "why die for Dushanbe" next, and "why die for Daejeon" after that .

[Highlord Laan]

20 reasons the right and alt-left on Fox News say they support putin and/or oppose Ukraine:

These people need to be rounded up, stuffed in a shipping container, and sent to Moscow where they belong.

[Zaune]

Once we we give into a tin-pot dictator one time, it never stops. He'll be threatening nuclear armageddon somewhere else next. If it's not "why die for Donbass", it"ll be "why die for Dushanbe" next, and "why die for Daejeon" after that.

The alternative to that being what, though, ditch the Non-Proliferation Treaty and sell the Ukrainians a few B61s?

[Ralin]

I agree nuclear armageddon is bad, but we have been through this, on a smaller but still very large scale before, and appeasement didn't work.

"Starting World War Two could lead to the deaths of 75 million people, so we have to give the Axis Manchuria Abyssinia Austria The Sudetenland Czechoslovakia Albania Danzig, it's not worth it!"

Once we we give into a tin-pot dictator one time, it never stops. He'll be threatening nuclear armageddon somewhere else next. If it's not "why die for Donbass", it"ll be "why die for Dushanbe" next, and "why die for Daejeon" after that .

There aren't a lot tinpot dictators who have not only nuclear weapons but enough nuclear weapons to threaten nuclear armageddon. Like, going off Google and Wikipedia here, but there are only two countries known to have arsenals in the thousands and you're living in one of them. And whatever else you can say about the US and its leadership America has lost wars in the past half century or so without nuking anyone in retaliation, and usually without the president even seriously considering it.

Past that you have countries with arsenals in the hundreds. France is not a dicatorship and seems unlikely to become one and set about building a new empire in the foreseeable future. Ditto the UK. China has consistently maintained a no first use policy that they to all appearances are serious about and hasn't had a lot of foreign wars in the time since the country was founded. Pakistan and India, much the same as France aside from their issues with each other. I don't feel super confident about Israel, but past that we're in "Has enough nuclear weapons to destroy some cities and make invading them a really bad idea" cases like North Korea.

What I'm saying is that how much or how little Russia needs to be treated with kid's gloves because of their nuclear arsenal isn't a precedent we need to worry about being applied elsewhere in the future because they're pretty close to being in their own league in that respect.

[Ralin]

I agree nuclear armageddon is bad, but we have been through this, on a smaller but still very large scale before, and appeasement didn't work.

"Starting World War Two could lead to the deaths of 75 million people, so we have to give the Axis Manchuria Abyssinia Austria The Sudetenland Czechoslovakia Albania Danzig, it's not worth it!"

Once we we give into a tin-pot dictator one time, it never stops. He'll be threatening nuclear armageddon somewhere else next. If it's not "why die for Donbass", it"ll be "why die for Dushanbe" next, and "why die for Daejeon" after that .

There aren't a lot tinpot dictators who have not only nuclear weapons but enough nuclear weapons to threaten nuclear armageddon. Like, going off Google and Wikipedia here, but there are only two countries known to have arsenals in the thousands and you're living in one of them. And whatever else you can say about the US and its leadership America has lost wars in the past half century or so without nuking anyone in retaliation, and usually without the president even seriously considering it.

Past that you have countries with arsenals in the hundreds. France is not a dicatorship and seems unlikely to become one and set about building a new empire in the foreseeable future. Ditto the UK. China has consistently maintained a no first use policy that they to all appearances are serious about and hasn't had a lot of foreign wars in the time since the country was founded. Pakistan and India, much the same as France aside from their issues with each other. I don't feel super confident about Israel, but past that we're in "Has enough nuclear weapons to destroy some cities and make invading them a really bad idea" cases like North Korea.

What I'm saying is that how much or how little Russia needs to be treated with kid's gloves because of their nuclear arsenal isn't a precedent we need to worry about being applied elsewhere in the future because they're pretty close to being in their own league in that respect.

[bilateralrope]

There aren't a lot tinpot dictators who have not only nuclear weapons but enough nuclear weapons to threaten nuclear armageddon.

The big worry here is about what Russia will do if they manage to gain from their invasion here. Not any of the other tinpot dictators.

So I can only see Ukraine letting Russia gain territory from their invasion being a good idea under two conditions:
- Ukraine thinks it's a good idea.
- Ukraine, and any other country bordering Russia, are allowed to join NATO as part of the deal. So that any future russian invasion will be opposed by NATO forces.

I'm not sure if that would be enough, but anything less sends Russia a message that this invasion was a success. Which means they will try again once they have rebuilt their forces.

[Captain Seafort]

What I'm saying is that how much or how little Russia needs to be treated with kid's gloves because of their nuclear arsenal isn't a precedent we need to worry about being applied elsewhere in the future because they're pretty close to being in their own league in that respect.

The big worry here is about what Russia will do if they manage to gain from their invasion here. Not any of the other tinpot dictators.

I'm not sure if that would be enough, but anything less sends Russia a message that this invasion was a success. Which means they will try again once they have rebuilt their forces.

Other tinpot dictators are also a concern, because if Putin gets his way by waving nukes around, the rest of the planet will see waving nukes around as an automatic "I win". The result will be a) every piece of shit on the planet rushing to get their own weapons to copy Putin's blackmail, and b) everyone else rushing to get them as a countermeasure to a). The result, of course will be a multiplication of the number of chest-thumping contests that will now also involve nukes, with the commensurately increased potential for someone to lob one, either in a fit of pique or a C3 failure.

[Crazedwraith]

I think there's only a very few good ways out of this. Russia loses the war is forced out and Putin either doesn't fall back on nukes or is replaced internally by someone who won't use nukes.

Most other options seem varying levels of bad:
*Russian wins militarily or by negotiated peace that gives them territory. - Precedent that invasions work, especially when backed by nukes (not the worst outcome but not good)
*Russia loses and uses nukes. Then war expands and escalates massively or the precedent is set that nukes can be used freely.

There must be more options I'm not seeing but it does seem pretty bleak at the moment.

[LadyTevar]

Well, well, well.. There's a Birthday Present for Putin.

CRIMEA BRIDGE EXPLOSION (live updates)

Just after 06:00 local time in Crimea, a large fire erupted on a road and rail bridge that links Russia to the Crimea peninsula

Russian state media says it was caused by a lorry explosion and led to oil tankers on the rail section catching fire, with the road then collapsing.

Three people dead, no other wounded reported. Lorry driver identified as living in Russian southern Krasnodar. A search of his house is underway.

Crimea was annexed in 2014 by Russia, which now uses the Kerch bridge to move military equipment into Ukraine.

An adviser to Ukraine's President Zelensky, Mykhailo Podolyak, called the damage a "beginning" - but did not directly claim Ukrainian responsibility.

[Bedlam]

I think there's only a very few good ways out of this. Russia loses the war is forced out and Putin either doesn't fall back on nukes or is replaced internally by someone who won't use nukes.

Most other options seem varying levels of bad:
*Russian wins militarily or by negotiated peace that gives them territory. - Precedent that invasions work, especially when backed by nukes (not the worst outcome but not good)
*Russia loses and uses nukes. Then war expands and escalates massively or the precedent is set that nukes can be used freely.

There must be more options I'm not seeing but it does seem pretty bleak at the moment.

War bogs down into an extended meatgrinder or a stalemate where both sides declare victory and spend a few decades staring at each other across a mine field occasionally lobbing a few shells at each other for appearance's sake?