As I was just about to release this video, the US House voted to approve the $95 billion aid package for America's allies that includes $61 billion worth of additional funding for Ukraine. This will undoubtedly have a huge impact on the future course of events in Europe, and if you want to learn more about last year's huge Ukrainian counteroffensive, check out this video's companion episode in Modern Conflict on Nebula here nebula.tv/videos/reallifelore-modern-conflicts-the-2023-ukraine-counteroffensive In addition to my monthly Modern Conflicts videos on Nebula, I'm also posting monthly videos to Nebula in my new series called War Room, which provides monthly updates from active conflicts happening all around the world. The second episode of this new series covering the major global events of March can be seen here nebula.tv/videos/reallifelore-march-2024-recap-isis-ukraine-and-haiti Thanks!

as a Pole I would very much like to stop living through historically significant events in my lifetime, thanks

I think I like major historical events more when they are in a history book, not in my lifetime

Dead men tell no tales; we are witnessing a rise in the number of wars around the world as the survivors of world wars are gone, leaving us to grasp the horrors.

The people living between 1919-1939 didn't know they were living in the interwar period

Watching from Poland thinking “ah yes I’ve seen this movie before”

If this war continues, I might have to step in and tell Putin to stop

In Poland we know what total war means, our ancestors suvived it between 1939 and 1945 but 6 millions of them were killed.

Hits different when you see your country in a RealLifeLore thumbnail

Watching Real Life Lore videos normally: Dang, world is a crazy and complicated place. I sure love learning about it! Seeing a Real Life Lore video with my country in the thumbnail: Well fuck

"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo. "So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."

You neglected to mention that the Rand simulations of a Baltic invasion were conducted before the ascension of Finland and Sweden into NATO, which completely changes the outcome when taken into account

As a Canadian who is very far removed from this or any conflict, and makes beer for a living... this is seriously going to affect wheat and barley stocks in the coming decade.

Damn, it does feel rather uncanny to sit in a city, 30km away from Belarusian Border, casually watching a video of how your entire country would be invaded

Earlier today: Ah, yes! A new RealLifeLofe. At last, some clarity… 30 minutes later: I’m sad now.

as a lithuanian, i would very much like history happening in books, not in my lifetime

Finland would be the first one to defend Estonia. Those two are like family countries.

shit went down hill after we killed harambe.

About the Baltic brothers and Russia: I am a Spanish guy studying a master's in Sweden, and I've travelled a lot to neighbouring countries during this schoolyear, including Latvia and Lithuania (also planning to go to Estonia some time in the future). There, I learned about Latvia's and Lithuania's history, and I gotta say, their history with the Soviet Union (including Nazi Germany's occupation) is tragic and obscure at the very least. I really hope they can keep up being independent and free countries, because they really deserve so.

I'm in Thailand now and I'm convinced that half of Russia is out here with me. The Russian people are everywhere here, I've heard it's the same in a lot of tropical locations with relaxed visa rules. I guess it's easier to run away to drink cocktails on the beach than it is to try and do something about it at home however futile it may be.

16:28 Bro on the right saw the opportunity and took it lol. Sincerely hope he got away 😂😭

Nuclear weapons meant in 1962: Mutual assured destruction 2024: Mutual assured deny of mutual assured destruction. Back to conventional warfare. Fuck.

Watching this video makes me realize how lucky I am to be living in boring Arkansas, lol

As we enter the third year of the 3 days military exercise There, fixed.

I miss when you used to talk about walking long distances.

I'm on the other side of the world. I feel you E.U. nation. I live in the Philippines and we face china's aggression at the sea everyday, inch by inch they are slowly encroaching our sovereignty. 🇵🇭🇪🇺

fantastic video, keep up the great work!

The NATO Article 5 interpretation presented in the video is not how the alliance functions, only a member state operating either subversively or in extremely bad faith could cause this to happen. The working interpretation is that the collective will decide on a response, then the individual states will comply and take the responsibilities determined for them by the collective. The idea that NATO countries can individually opt out of Article 5 and send limited humanitarian aid is simply not true, and if it was to become true the alliance would cease to exist at that time. Remember that each individual state must treat any aggression on a member state as they would treat an attack on their own soil. The notion that they could send a few helmets and medkits in response is absurd. It is possible that the entire collective may together decide not to respond, but that would require the US military to admit that they are afraid to face the Russian military, which would essentially end the current world order.

Unlike many other countries, right now, Poland looks to be the most reliable NATO country to stand up to Russia that has a large enough military to put up a good fight.

As a ethnic russian from Latvia. I want honesty say that i love this country, culture, calm people. Turamies, kungi!

Always that one kid that makes things shit for everyone. Russia is now that kid

You cannot straight up ignore the thousands of British and European milltary personnel that are currently stationed in the baltics at the moment. If article 5 is invoked, most of western europe are more or less obliged to engage in an appropriate way.

a foreign state being taken over really hits different when ur just 3 or 4 countries away..

At first, it was just news from far away places, riots in Spain, Japan continued to plunder land in East Asia, the French claimed that the Maginot Line was impregnable, until... no one could escape the fate of being involved.

Great video. Thank you.

As a Swede the fact that this war could advance into the baltics is very alarming.

I'm so happy with Poland as a nato partner. While western europe has been cutting their defense spending in the last 25 years, Poland kept investing and now has by far the most modern and largest army. They truly are our best bet in the east against Russia.

1:39 that amount of armor is unnecessary if they are just going to get struck in the ass by a drone when they’re asleep

A second Soviet Union. There's a dark possibility I never expected to contemplate in my lifetime.

Some days I wished that I was dreaming about all this in 2019

The key issue with Hiiuma Island isn't capturing it, it's holding it. The Russians could set anti-ship and anti-air batteries, but the Finnish would do the same to cover their long-range artillery. With that in mind, it means they'd still be a sitting duck unless they could take out the artillery, which, considering the geography of Finland, is not gonna be easy.

A really nice summary / forecast. Thanks! Good job!

I wonder if it would make sense for Poland to introduce conscription.

Russia does not produce 1.500 tanks per year. They produce and refurbish 1.500 tanks per year. They produce around 200-300 tanks per year- Thats quite a huge difference @4:04

Looks like I'm going to have to get my fat ass in shape for conscription.

Some of this analysis shows very poor understanding of the region, and 90% of the claims are uncited. I'm guessing it only has high viewership because of the well-crafted alarmism of its title. Nice production though.

That quote from Trump about Russia is incredibly out of context. Otherwise this is all very fascinating and concerning.

I don't understand how any european can be against NATO intervention in case of a baltic invasion. Is the Munich Agreement not being taught in history class anymore?

Why can’t we just go back to listening to our iPod nano’s with internet that took minutes to boot up. This world we live in now sucks

Nice, another video from the author of "Russia is dommed" and "Russia's economy will collapse in 2 months" videos released 2 years ago. This guy defo knowns what he is talking about

Some thoughts: 1) "Russia is recruiting 30k people a month". There are NO other sources of this data other but Russian officials which are not reliable in any matter. In fact if it were accurate Russia would have aggregated 360k people over the last year. This isn't a drop in the ocean. Where are they thou? 2) "Russia's military budget by purchase parity is comparably to those of EU-NATO countries". This is not accurate to compare. Russia is heavily relied on importing various technologies from the West, like electronics, optics, gunpowder etc, since she is not capable of producing it on it's own. Every purchase of this kind is extremely complicated and need a long chain of grey import companies. Obviously prices are skyrocketing. So in fact aside of import from Iran and North Korea any other endeavors in military production cost Russia a fortune. 3) "Russia's military production is soaring". Highly doubt it. Russia obviously has tangible limits in producing new armament. Any production like this demands high precision machinery which is all produced outside of Russia. Soviet production potential is lost decades ago. And there is literally 0 (zero) countries in world ready to sell Russia any of the machinery this kind. Even dual use technology (even from China btw) is now under serious scrutiny and de-facto is not delivered in Russia. Among others that's the reason why T-14 will never see the light of day. 4) "Russian speaking minority in eastern Ukraine" This argument is invalid. Most of the Ukrainian army is russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine. Language has nothing to do with that. Speculations about the assault operations on Kharkiv (let alone Odesa, which demands the forcing of Dnipro) are invalid. With the current organizational capabilities it is unattainable for Russia which spent 10 and 24 months respectively to capture minor local cities of Bakhmut and Avdiivka suffering unprecedented losses in both equipment and manpower. With this pace it would take decades for Russia to realize the prospects mentioned in the video. 5) "Since Russian economy is already put on military track she will be incentivized to continue further due to economic reasons". Military economy is not a magic wand. This is an unproductive sector of the economy, it doesn't produce goods that could be used in any economically viable way. Basically it's a huge pitch black consuming resources of the state. Keynesian economics may have a short term positive effect until you have nothing to actually finance it with. It's like saying that we aim to hire entire nation in the police forces and the secret service so everyone would have stable and high salaries and social benefits. It doesn't work like this. 6) "Russia will fully incorporate Belarus, merge Belorussian KGB etc" Only someone who has no idea who Alexander Lukashenko is could make statements like this. He is notorious for sitting on all chairs at ones and no way he will be giving any of his political sovereignty to Moscow. If it's more fruitful for him to betray Putin and ally with EU, he would be the first in the line. 7) "Russia is absorbing new territories and PEOPLE!" Okay but what about the demography of this absorbed populations? Are they 18-35 motivated young men? Well, no. Without going much in detail most of these people are retirees and elderly women. 8) "If Russia succeeds it would have a population comparable to Soviet Union in 1940". And then you reveal a demography pyramid of these two nations and find out something very interesting... 1940 Soviet Union was an agricultural state with a huge supply of semi-literate young men, Russia is a fully industrialized, post second-demographic-transition society with a tiny generation of millennials. Dominated by elderly women as a leading demographic group. A cool combo to conquer the world, isn't it? 9) "Russia can overran all 3 Baltic states in hours or days". Yeah bro Kyiv in three days, old school stuff sheesh The overall taste I have in my mouth after watching analytics presented in this video is that Russia is a some sort of strategy game cheater. It has unlimited amount of savings, unlimited resources, infinite manpower etc. And no one is trying to oppose it at any stage. This couldn't be more misleading.

As a Lithuanian, this definitely hits different

28:03 Citing a _2016_ study on NATO readiness levels to the Baltics? From 10 years ago? That wouldn't be valid even if the Russians hadn't invaded Ukraine.

It's not just about the spending and troops. The russian can make artillery shells faster and cheaper than the west, so they can make more of them with the same budget.

(37:30) The Maginot line was also only meant to slow a German advance and not necessarily stop it in its tracks.

It hits you differently when RealLifeLore isn't talking about some political conflict at the other side of the globe, but instead talking about the potential future of the places where you live, your grandparents live, where your friends live.

As Latvian this is my biggest fear .

Well, time to prepare for my wasteland raider king story arc

What font are you using for your videos?

You mention Navalney but dobt say crap about Assange which means truth is not part of your equation.

4:00 They won't produce 1500 tanks, they will refurbish 1500 tanks, less than 300 of those are new production.

The more things change, the more they remain the same. History will repeat itself.

We are approching a geopolitical scenario similar to that of Fallout's universe in 2077. I can't believe it.

- Изя, зачем вы читаете антисемитские газетёнки?

I'm still convinced that this won't be more than another cold war, but I also didn't believe we'd ever be where we are now, so what do I know?

as a Latvian I would very much like to stop living through historically significant events in my lifetime, thanks

War never changes

Watching this video sitting in Chisinau Moldova just miles away from the Ukrainian border hits really different. I hope sanity prevails soon.

What everyone seems to forget is that we have lived trough these sorts of times from 1945-1991 when nuclear weapons prevented any war between Warshaw pact and Nato.... no one seems to consider that these excact weapons are still there. It is a dark tought, but somewhat reassuring. It is not like war rethoric will result in less risk of an accident or a madman in power from using them.

Thanks for increasing my anxiety this Monday morning while at my barista job.

I just stumbled across this site and feel like I received a national security briefing.. Kudos..

Putin has told Lukashenko to comb over to the right side.

I have a bad feeling that if what he says comes to pass in the country’s that used to be a part of the USSR. The world as we know it will never be the same it will become the 20th century version of the 19th century and there will be a Cold War 2.0 that might happen very soon 😢

Ahh yes appeasement, that worked so well for the world in 1935. This is why we need leaders that actually understand history. Knowing and understanding are very different things.

As a german here, i wish my government would take this more seriously (except for pistorius. he does a good job)

since you mentioned France and nuclear doctrine please do a video on French nuclear doctrine: warning shot. they will nuke the ocean or something and then ask "are we clear?"

...the world will never let us live down sending those helmets, won't it? Probably fair.

Not only is Lithuania right next to Poland, but Baltic states as transit states are economically extremely important to Finland and Sweden. Also, Baltic states are investing heavily in new weaponry. This includes weapons that can take out any Russian vessel. Furthermore, there's no way that there can be a surprise attack. This isn't the 19th century. So all of this is a bit silly.

In the end this might result in the reconstruction of a lot of saunas in Karelia.

What would force Ukraine to comply with any of the peace conditions? What would stop them from saying yes yes sure and then joining nato the next day?

It's so sad that something as big as war is fought over something as small as the greed and egos of a few people.

bro just let me live i wont even be able to enjoy my early adult hood outside the front lines

There's this quote I like for thinking about this: First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out- Because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out- Because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out- Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me-and there was no one left to speak for me.

A good wake up call for Europe indeed.

If politicians were forced to send their children into the front lines we’d have a different story.

25:20 *sarcastically* Nice, my city of Narva is finally remembered by someone. What a time to be alive

How do you come up with hilarious gaffs like: "not sufficient enough"?😂

We, The Baltic’s, are very screwed if not for NATO. But even so, we aren’t defendable which is the scariest part.

I'm about to turn 30 and we are coming up on like ten or so once in a lifetime paradigm shifts/disasters and I don't like it

American, spanish, italian, german soldiers and many more are already in the baltic states, myself at the moment included

All the arrows convinced me for sure!!!

I live in latvia, every week i see Nato army, with canada and usa flags on uniform, if you think that nato+usa will left her own army in baltics, you have a low understanding about whats going on

It is astonishing to imagine just how precarious the situation in Europe can still be even in the 21th century. One country can be a domino that will set in motion a contingency of new geo-political scenarios that more or less may lead to the prospect of continental or even a world war.

Evil triumphs when good men do nothing.

Bookmarking this and will watch again in 2029

It is always a great idea to fight a war at multiple fronts...never gone wrong in history.

Deployment of NATO troops to the Baltics is a very important deterrent, no matter how numerically small. It's one thing for German, Spanish, or US public to think about supporting some far away country because of some treaty. It's a whole other thing when their own people are there on the ground under fire or even dead. Especially with the American "support our troops" mindset.

Brilliant video

why at 5:28 do you show footage of someone loading an airsoft magazine, is that just training?

As lithuanian russian I don't want Russia to "protect" me