Ukraine war mega thread

[pickel]

I am afraid I don't really know what Russias game is at this point.

Perhaps you should listen to NATO then, they've been saying it all along.

[Backspin]

Facebook takes the Nazi Azov battalion off the banned list if it fights Russia

https://theintercept.com/2022/02/24/...talion-russia/

[russellsimpson]

I am afraid I don't really know what Russias game is at this point

I think only Putin knows that. Putin has spent the last couple of months telling us that he had no intention of invading, obviously a bold face lie. He's lost any credibility. One certain goal is regime change although it would be disastrous for Russia to try and maintain a puppet in office in Kyiv. I think in the next day or so that hostilites will generally cease and peace talks will begin. Perhaps that's wishful thinking.

In any case this changes the whole ball game for a long period of time. The spectre of a prolonged cold war looms on our horizon. We'll all have to pay a price. Just hoping we don't blast ourselves into untold horrors but it's a real possibility.

[Backspin]

It needs to make that clear then. I am afraid I don't really know what Russias game is at this point. Was invading the Capitol really necessary, unless he is looking to topple the government? There is a lot of ambiguity out there.

It has man. The Russian foreign ministry is asking if Ukraine wants to negotiate a neutrality pact. Not a "join the CSTO" pact. A neutrality pact.

[panama hat]

There is a lot of ambiguity out there.

Fuck you . . . there are hundreds/thousands of dead Ukrainian civilians, murdered by the Russians - you're an apologist, simple.

Hungary will support all European Union sanctions against Russia and will not block anything, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Saturday, speaking on the Ukrainian-Hungarian border."Hungary made clear that we support all the sanctions, so we will block nothing, so what the prime ministers of the European Union are able to agree, we accept it and we support it," he told reporters in English.

Being invaded twice in the last seventy years by Russians has clearly not been forgotten . . .

Germany now supports the SWIFT plans, has agreed for NATO countries and Finland to send German-made military equipment to be sent to Ukraine, is sending 500 stinger systems to Ukraine, is sending 1000 anti-tank missiles etc...

Of course that won't be enough to beat Russia but it'll inflict some serious damage, plus Germany isn't the only country doing this.

I think Putin has miscalculated the 'west's' resolve . . . kind of like our three stooges here.

[misskit]

[sabang]

Not sure what to say about this, but dutifully cut n pasted-



Brit tourist in Ukraine said it's 'still safer than London or Birmingham'


Student Miles Routledge, from Birmingham, is a disaster tourist and has made his way to Ukraine amid the Russian invasion - after previously being 'evacuated' from Afghanistan


A British student claims he is in Ukraine for 'fun' after previously being 'evacuated' from an 'insane Afghanistan holiday '.
Miles Routledge, from Birmingham, is a disaster tourist and shared news of his trip on Twitter, describing the journey from Poland to Kyiv, also spelt Kiev, as a "bargain" at £6 ($8).

He said he likes to explore the "worst places in the world" and said it was "honestly fun, almost like a soldier enjoying it despite what’s going on".
He previously visited Chernobyl in 2019 and now Miles claims is back in Ukraine, currently "a few km from the frontlines.. in the capital Kiev! Listening to 80s music, mostly walking on sunshine".


Miles appears to have started his journey on Friday, February 25, when he tweeted: "It's official. Tintin goes to Ukraine, he's on the train."
Since then he's shared a series of messages about his plans and how his journey is going.
He wrote: "When I get settled in a hostel in Ukraine's capital, I'll do a livestream on my YouTube. I'll announce the time tomorrow or possibly the day afterwards. I know where the armoury is.

"I have an emergency satellite device I can tweet from. If I tweet the activation word 'Ronald McDonald', assume the worst and airstrike my coordinates."




He also shared an image of himself in a military uniform and a mask of Putin's face.
Miles wrote: "Refresher: Last week when I was in Donetsk, Ukraine, I befriended some soldiers, got a free uniform, wore a Putin mask yelling at the Russians and went to an abandoned old airforce base.
"Getting into Ukraine by train involved no bag or on person scan, didn't check my non-existent PCR either. I identified several areas where something could be smuggled in (open wall compartments, taking screws off etc). It's really a bad situation waiting to happen sadly."


Then, at around 9am this morning, he tweeted: "A few km from the frontlines in the capital Kiev! Listening to 80s music, mostly walking on sunshine."
He then went on to ask for his fans to donate money to his cause, adding: "I'm going to help with buying locals supplies, if you want to contribute to that cause or help me pay for accommodation, please specify and thankyou.
"So I've got veteran mates setting up field hospitals and safe houses in case of full occupation. They're fixing up locals and soldiers.
"This is still safer than London or Birmingham to be fair. I'm from Birmingham so I'm qualified to say this."

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-...d-its-26335715

[Cujo]

I am afraid I don't really know what Russias game is at this point. Was invading the Capitol really necessary, unless he is looking to topple the government? There is a lot of ambiguity out there.

How Ukrainian defiance has derailed Putin’s plans




It’s too early to describe the Kremlin operation as a failure, but it has not succeeded yet in its mission to seize and subjugate its neighbour

• Ukraine invasion: latest updates

01:04



'Can I tow you back to Russia?': Ukrainian confronts soldiers by broken armoured vehicle – video




Luke Harding in Lviv
Sat 26 Feb 2022 17.58 GMTLast modified on Sat 26 Feb 2022 20.17 GMT









Three days after the invasion there are signs that Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine is not quite going to plan. In the Sumy region, close to the border with Russia, a local resident came across an extraordinary sight. On a country road lined with birch trees, a Russian armoured vehicle had broken down.
He pulled up in his car and stopped. There was then a surreal conversation.
“Looks like you guys broke down,” he said to three Russian soldiers, standing by the road. “We ran out of fuel,” one replied. “Can I tow you back to Russia,” he joked. They laughed and asked him for news. “Do you know where you are going?” he inquired. “No,” they answered.

Further along the road other Russian vehicles had conked out. The driver told the hapless soldiers that “everything is on our side” and that Russians were busy surrendering. No one from Putin’s invading army seemed to know where they were going, or why they were even in Ukraine, he concluded.
It is too early to describe the Kremlin’s operation to seize and subjugate Ukraine as a failure. The war has only just started. Putin may yet prevail. The Russian military enjoys overwhelming superiority over Ukraine’s armed forces. It has numerous combat aircraft, a vast navy and 150,000 deployed troops.
And yet by Saturday, it was clear Putin’s blitzkrieg operation to remove Ukraine’s pro-western government had run into unexpected difficulties. Evidently, there were logistical issues. Re-supplying troops in a vast enemy country was proving a challenge.
So was seizing Kyiv, Ukraine’s defiant capital, home in normal times to three million people. The Kremlin’s original plan, according to Ukrainian intelligence, was to encircle the city with land forces and, during a night operation, to fly in 5,000 elite paratroopers.
They would storm the Mariinsky presidential palace, detain or kill Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and take control over key government buildings, including the foreign and defence ministries. Having mopped up resistance, and arrested key figures, Moscow would install a pro-Russian puppet administration.
This has not happened. Instead, Kyiv remained under government control this weekend after Ukrainian forces repulsed a series of attacks. Zelenskiy has encouraged his citizens with homemade videos. Meanwhile, Russian parachutists who tried to seize an airfield in the city of Vasylkiv, as a bridgehead to grab Kyiv, were beaten back.










0


Zelenskiy calls on 'all friends of Ukraine' to help fight Russian invasion – video


“Our 40th Brigade was powerful. It repulsed the attack,” Nataliia Balasynovych, Vasylkiv’s mayor, told the Kyiv Independent newspaper. “They [Russian troops] landed with parachutes in the fields, forests and villages.” She added: “The worst fighting was on Decembrists’ street. The whole street was on fire.”
Air defence units said they had shot down an Ilyushin-76 transport plane near Bila Tserkva, 80km south of Kyiv – one of several downed enemy aircraft. Ukraine’s military command said it had wiped out an entire enemy column around the city of Kharkiv, something video appeared to confirm.
Since the invasion began on Thursday, Russia has lost 14 aircraft, eight helicopters, 102 tanks, 15 heavy machine guns and one BUK missile, the Ukrainian military said. It had also lost 3,500 soldiers, with 200 taken hostage, it added.
These figures are hard to verify. But they illustrate the almost universal hostility which has greeted invading Russian forces. The Kremlin has had most success in the south of the country, where it has captured large swathes of territory, including much of Kherson province and the city of Melitopol.
Videos have shown some extraordinary acts of civic resistance. In Bakhmach, in the Chernihiv region, a resident tried to stop a tank with his bare hands. He knelt in front of it before his friends dragged him away. In another viral clip, shared by Ukrainian media outlets, a man jumped in front of a military convoy, with vehicles forced to swerve.






00:35



Video shows Ukrainian ‘tank man’ trying to block Russian military convoy
There are also numerous interviews with Russian soldiers who have surrendered. On Thursday, Kremlin forces captured Sumy, 60km from the Russian border. By Saturday, however, locals appeared to have taken some of the city back, and to have captured a young Russian conscript, who appeared dazed and confused.
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The invasion has caused a vast human exodus, with tens of thousands seeking refuge in the west of the country and beyond. It has also prompted a wave of patriotic feeling. From Lviv to Dnipro in the centre and Kharkiv in the east, volunteers have been picking up weapons, making molotov cocktails or removing road signs to confuse the invaders.
“I’ve had calls from 10 people asking how to help,” Lviv resident Olga Bileychuk said. “Some of the girls wanted to make molotovs but were told only boys could do it. It’s quite sexist.” Others were joining defensive units, she said. One friend gave his Land Cruiser to a Ukrainian soldier seeking to rejoin his brigade in distant Mariupol, which has been holding out against Russian attack.
The creative classes have also been doing their bit. Many have taken up arms, having originally fought in 2014 when Moscow annexed Crimea and kickstarted an armed uprising in the Donbas region. Two standup comedians were busy preparing food in a closed restaurant in Kyiv on Saturday, as a curfew was introduced. Others shared anti-Putin memes.


Ukrainians attend an open military training session for civilians in Kyiv. Photograph: SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty ImagesSo how did we get here? One explanation is the increasingly erratic behaviour of Putin himself. Speaking before the invasion, a senior Ukrainian intelligence official said Russia’s president lived in a strange parallel reality. He had succumbed – like dictators before him – to believing his own version of the world.
“Putin thinks that Ukraine’s government is corrupt, western and irredeemably Russophobic,” the official said. “He understood the Ukrainian people, by contrast, would welcome Russia and intervention. He considers us to be rural Russians.” Putin’s spy agencies had told him what he wanted to hear, he added.


The official continued: “We have always understood Russians better than they understand us.” Other commentators noted that Putin, an amateur historian, had forgotten one of the great lessons of the second world war – that the best Soviet soldiers were Ukrainian.
It is impossible to know if there is growing unhappiness within Putin’s national security council over the decision to go to war. On the eve of the invasion last week all of its members signed off on Putin’s plan to recognise the separatist Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics as independent, an act that pushed the button on military action.
Western defence attaches have claimed that Valery Gerasimov, Putin’s most senior commander and the chief of the general staff of Russia’s armed forces, had warned the president that invading Ukraine might not be straightforward. And so it has proved. For now, though, Russia’s military and political leadership are firmly behind the operation.
As losses mount, difficult questions pile up for the Kremlin. In the face of Ukrainian intransigence and resistance, how does it intend to govern the country? Any Donetsk-style puppet government would lack legitimacy. Even if Moscow succeeds in seizing Kyiv, months and years of problems lie ahead. Nobody expects Ukrainians to capitulate. More likely is partisan war.
The driver who came across the broken-down military carrier best summarised Putin’s predicament. “I asked the whole column,” he said of the Russian soldiers. “No one knows where they are and where they are going.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...d-putins-plans

[Backspin]

The elite special forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine are running, throwing weapons and equipment. Not a bad idea. Just go home.

[kingwilly]

^^ British version of Socal in Sabangs post

[misskit]

[QUOTE=Backspin;4370637]The elite special forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine are running, throwing weapons and equipment. Not a bad idea. Just go home.

QUOTE]

Link?

[Backspin]

^ Its all fog of war. Could it be photoshopped ? sure. But i doubt it


From Mark Sleboda https://twitter.com/MarkSleboda1

Russia, despite an overwhelming military advantage, is intentionally fighting with one hand tied behind their back in this intervention & limiting use of its most powerful weapons systems. Because the Russian military is not only trying to minimize civilian casualties, but minimize casualties among the Ukrainian military as well. Russia's opponent here is not the Ukrainian people or military per se, but the US-backed Putsch regime that seized power in 2014 and the Banderites that make up its vanguard and brownshirts.

Hence the Russian military's repeated pauses and entreaties to Ukrainian conscripts to lay down their arms, don't die for this US-backed Putsch regime that has ruined the country, and you will be treated with respect and sent home.

[beachbound]

^^
Just you wait, he’ll find that link.
He’s famous finding missing links.
just ask Kyle Rittenhouse.

[pickel]

^ Its all fog of war. Could it be photoshopped ? sure. But i doubt it


From Mark Sleboda https://twitter.com/MarkSleboda1

Russia, despite an overwhelming military advantage, is intentionally fighting with one hand tied behind their back in this intervention & limiting use of its most powerful weapons systems. Because the Russian military is not only trying to minimize civilian casualties, but minimize casualties among the Ukrainian military as well. Russia's opponent here is not the Ukrainian people or military per se, but the US-backed Putsch regime that seized power in 2014 and the Banderites that make up its vanguard and brownshirts.

Hence the Russian military's repeated pauses and entreaties to Ukrainian conscripts to lay down their arms, don't die for this US-backed Putsch regime that has ruined the country, and you will be treated with respect and sent home.

He works for RT, so a Putin mouthpiece.

The reason for their repeated pauses is because they are getting their asses kicked and their supply lines broken by Ukraine.

[misskit]

So much for those Chechens.


The subdivision of the National Guard Forces Command of the Chechen Republic is destroyed near Kiev, commander of the regiment Tushaev is killed - Ministry of Defense of Ukraine

In Gostomel area on Saturday, Ukrainian troops defeated a special unit of the Russian Guard of Chechnya. This information was confirmed to Interfax-Ukraine by the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine. It is reported that during the defeat of the unit, General Magomed Tushaev, commander of the 141st motorized regiment of the Chechen National Guard, was killed. This was confirmed by a captured fighter from this unit.


According to a source in the Ministry of Defense, “the National Guard of Ukraine and the Alpha special unit are now dealing with the rest of the unit with small arms already.”

The subdivision of the National Guard Forces Command of the Chechen Republic is destroyed near Kiev, commander of the regiment Tushaev is killed - Ministry of Defense of Ukraine

[tomcat]

This information was confirmed to Interfax-Ukraine by the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.

...*cough*...hand me the salt shaker, please...

[Backspin]

Most of the things the Ministry of defense has been saying are lies. The fog of war propaganda is insane right now.

[Backspin]

BS from the Ukraine ministry of defense

[sabang]

It's like a Glee club for killing around here.

[tomcat]

...^you're posting stuff from RussiaUSA?......your lack of shame is refreshing...

[sabang]

But I still think Ukraine should award them Hero Medals, for their Propaganda value.

[Backspin]

He works for RT, so a Putin mouthpiece.

The reason for their repeated pauses is because they are getting their asses kicked and their supply lines broken by Ukraine.

Its just a fantasy to believe that. Russia has had a live fire training exercise going way out in Syria since 2015. They rolled that up. To think that they are having supply line issues on their front door just isn't realistic.

[Backspin]

Its hard for us outsiders to understand the logic. Russia will be hurt in the short term. But the days of US B52 bombers practice bombing Russian cities from the edge of Ukraine are over.

B-52 Bombers Fly Unprecedented Patrol Along Edge Of Russian-Controlled Territory In Ukraine (Updated)

[misskit]

Ukrzaliznytsia destroys all railway junctions with Russia

Ukrzaliznytsia has destroyed all railway crossings with Russia.


Ukrzaliznytsia has terminated any relations and interaction with JSC Russian Railways.


"Railway crossings between countries that previously provided transportation of thousands of goods and brought millions of dollars to the economies of both countries have been destroyed. Dispatch communications with the Russian Federation have also been terminated. The request by RZD to restore communication with JSC Ukrzaliznytsia had nothing to do with a humanitarian mission, it was a useless attempt resume deliveries of military equipment," a source in the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine told Interfax-Ukraine.


Ukrzaliznytsia will completely reorient freight traffic to Europe and continue to develop the Silk Road bypassing Russia. The company is ready to become a full-fledged member of the European Union logistics chain.


Also, Ukrzaliznytsia will continue to develop transportation with Asian countries, in particular China, and will provide high-quality and fast logistics between Asia and the EU, but without the participation of Russia.

Ukrzaliznytsia destroys all railway junctions with Russia

[Buckaroo Banzai]

Now go figure out why "white"

I did a bit of research and there did not seem to be any consensus of why it was called "White Russia" but the point is not what color it was called but rather what nationality it was associated with. IMO I think it brings a bit of context to the Russian reaction in the attempt of the west to gain influence in the region.
The US has the Monroe doctrine, yet it cries foul if other regional powers require similar consideration. Is it then American exceptionalism, or has the US abandoned it's Monroe doctrine attitude.?