Thread: Russia launches Ukraine invasion

Former Russian commander Strelkov Igor Ivanovich, better known as Igor Girkin, has hit out at President Vladimir Putin's visit to Crimea, declaring that "cretinism blooms."

Girkin was scathing of Putin in a March 18 social media post on Telegram, where he appeared to insist the visit had little purpose while mentioning the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for the Russian leader.

"They've already issued him an arrest warrant, and he still hasn't figured a damn thing," he told his 800,000 Telegram followers. A year ago, it was necessary to travel to military units and formations, and he was all..chizhikov eats'...that is, historical and archaeological complexes are inspected, [and] built by military builders.

"Which, it must be understood, have nothing else to do during the war. Cretinism blooms and smells, and there is no end to it."

Putin visited Mariupol, in the occupied Donetsk region, which has been one of the most heavily contested and bombarded cities in Ukraine during the war.

The president considers the territory to be part of Russia and annexed the region, as well as other areas in eastern Ukraine, in September last year.

Ukraine and its allies do not recognize the annexation and Kyiv considers the region to be under occupation.

Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, compared Putin to Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler for visiting one of the cities most heavily bombarded since the war began last year.

Putin also visited occupied Crimea on Saturday, which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014 which he attempted to legitimize with a referendum that is unrecognized by Ukraine and the U.S.

His visits came after the ICC issued a warrant for his arrest over alleged war crimes, namely the unlawful abducting and transporting of Ukrainian children and teens to Russia.

While Girkin hit out at Putin, he admitted to having "mixed feelings" about the arrest warrant that was issued by the ICC. He claimed that it "is a spit not only at him but also at Russia."

In the past, Girkin has shared rants about Russia's domestic and foreign policies and has made references to the conflicts between the country's military leaders.

He previously said: "Conflicts between the leadership of PMC [Private Military Company] 'Wagner' and the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation should also be encouraged in every possible way, while not allowing the conflict to end in favor of one of the conflicting parties—both are important and valuable to us, each performs its task within the framework of our plan.

"In the future, there should be more such conflicts, they should constantly intensify and expand, and the parties should mutually discredit each other."

He added that Russian forces have "no chance" of controlling some Ukrainian regions following an unsuccessful winter.

Newsweek has contacted the Kremlin for comment.

Vladimir Putin Slammed by Igor Girkin Over Crimea Visit: 'Cretinism Blooms'

BRUSSELS — Add NATO’s military planners to the list of those concerned about having enough shells.

In the comingmonths,the alliance will accelerate efforts to stockpile equipment along the alliance’s eastern edge and designate tens of thousands of forces that can rush to allies’ aid on short notice — a move meant to stop Russia from expanding its war beyond Ukraine.

To make that happen, though, NATO must convince individual countries to contribute various elements: Soldiers, training, better infrastructure — and, most notably, extensive amounts of pricey weapons, equipment and ammunition.

With countries already worried about their own munitions stockpiles and Ukraine in acute need of more shells and weapons from allies, there is a risk that not all NATO allies will live up to their promises to contribute to the alliance’s new plans.

“If there’s not somebody hosting the potluck and telling everybody what to bring, then everyone would bring potato chips because potato chips are cheap, easy to get,” said James J. Townsend Jr., a former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for European and NATO policy.

“Nations,” he added, “would rather bring potato chips.”

It’s a challenge NATO has faced in the past, and one that experts fear could become a persistent problem for the Western alliance as Russia’s war drags into a second year. While the U.S. and EU are making plans to source more weapons — fast — the restocking process will inevitably take time.

That could run into NATO’s aspirations. Military leaders this spring will submit updated regional defense plans intended to help redefine how the alliance protects its 1 billion citizens.

The numbers will be large, with officials floating the idea of up to 300,000 NATO forces needed to help make the new model work. That means lots of coordinating and cajoling.

“I think you need forces to counter a realistic Russia,” said one senior NATO military official, underscoring the need for significantly “more troops” and especially more forces at “readiness.”

A push for ‘readiness’

There are several tiers of “readiness.”

The first tier — which may consist of about 100,000 soldiers prepared to move within 10 days — could be drawn from Poland, Norway and the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania), said Heinrich Brauß, a former NATO assistant secretary general for defense policy and force planning. It may also include multinational battlegroups the alliance has already set up in the eastern flank.

A second tier of troops would then back up those soldiers, ready to deploy from countries like Germany in between 10 to 30 days.

But the process could get tricky. Why? Because moving so quickly, even given a month, requires lots of people, equipment and training — and lots of money.

Some militaries will have to up their recruitment efforts. Many allies will have to increase defense spending. And everyone will have to buy more weapons, ammunition and equipment.

Ben Hodges, former commander of U.S. Army Europe, said that “readiness” is “basically, do you have all the stuff you’re supposed to have to do the mission assigned to a unit of a particular size?”

“An artillery battalion needs to shoot X number of rounds per year for planning purposes in order to maintain its level of proficiency,” he said. A tank battalion needs to hit targets, react to different situations and “demonstrate proficiency on the move, day and night, hitting targets that are moving.”

“It’s all very challenging,” he said, pointing to the need for training ranges and ammunition, as well as maintaining proficiency as personnel changes over time. “This obviously takes time and it’s also expensive.”

And that’s if countries can even find companies to produce quality bullets quickly.

“We have tended to try to stockpile munitions on the cheap … it’s just grossly inadequate,” said Stacie Pettyjohn, director of the defense program at the Center for a New American Security. “I think the problems that our allies have in NATO are even more acute because many of them often rely on the U.S. as sort of the backstop.”

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, meanwhile, has repeatedly said that allies have stepped up work on production in recent months — and that the alliance is working on new requirements for ammunition stockpiles.

But he has also acknowledged the problem.

“The current rate of consumption compared to the current rate of production of ammunition,” he said in early March, “is not sustainable.”

The big test

Once NATO’s military plans are done, capitals will be asked to weigh in — and eventually make available troops, planes, ships and tanks for different parts of the blueprints.
A test for NATO will come this summer when leaders of the alliance’s 30 member countries meet in Lithuania.

“We are asking the nations — based on the findings we have out of our three regional plans — what we need to make these plans … executable,” said the senior NATO military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive planning.

“I think the most difficult thing,” the official added, “is the procurement.”

Some allies have already acknowledged that meeting NATO’s needs will take far more investment.

“More speed is needed, whether in terms of material, personnel or infrastructure,” German Colonel André Wüstner, head of the independent Armed Forces Association, told the newspaper Bild am Sonntag.

The German military, for instance, is carrying out its assigned missions, he said, “but that is nothing compared to what we will have to contribute to NATO in the future.”

And while Berlin now has a much-touted €100 billion modernization fund for upgrading Germany’s military, not a single cent of the money has been spent so far, German Parliamentary Commissioner for the Armed Forces Eva Högl said earlier this week.

Underpinning the readiness issue is a contentious debate over defense investments.

In 2014, NATO leaders pledged to aim to spend 2 percent of their economic output on defense within a decade. At the Vilnius summit in July, the leaders will have to decide on a new target.

“Two percent as floor” seems to be the “center of gravity” in the debate at the moment, said one senior NATO official, while cautioning that “2 percent would not be enough for everybody.”

A second issue is the contribution balance. Officials and experts expect the majority of high-readiness troops to come from European allies. But that means European capitals will need to step up as Washington contemplates how to address challenges from China.

The response will show whether NATO is serious about matching its ambitions.

“It’s hard to make sure you remain at the top of your military game during peace when there’s not a threat,” said Townsend, the former U.S. official. NATO, he said, is “in the middle” of a stress test.

“We’re all saying the right things,” he added. “But will we come through atthe end of the day and do the right thing? Or are we going to try to get away with bringing potato chips to the potluck? The jury’s out.”

NATO is racing to arm its Russian borders. Can it find the weapons? – POLITICO

It appears the Russians are in more need of training. I wonder if Xi offered this option to Vlad.

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP) — The first four of 13 Soviet-era MiG-29 fighter jets that Slovakia decided to give Ukraine have been safely handed over to the Ukrainian air force, the Slovak Defense Ministry said on Thursday.

The ministry said the warplanes were flown from Slovakia to Ukraine by Ukrainian pilots with help from the Slovak air force, Ukrainian personnel and others.

“I thank (all) involved for a fantastic professional job,” Defense Minister Jaroslav Nad said.

The ministry said the remaining MiG-29s will be handed over to the Ukrainian side in the coming weeks. It said it will not provide any additional details until they’re safely in Ukraine.

On Friday, the Slovak government approved a plan to give Ukraine its fleet of 13 Soviet-era MiG-29 fighter jets, becoming the second NATO member to heed the Ukrainian government’s pleas for warplanes to help defend against Russia’s invasion.

Slovakia grounded its MiGs in the summer due to a lack of spare parts and expertise to help maintain them. Fellow NATO members Poland and the Czech Republic stepped in to monitor Slovak air space.

Slovakia previously signed a deal to buy 14 U.S. F-16 Block 70/72 fighter jets, but delivery was pushed back two years with the first aircraft to arrive in early 2024.

The Slovak Defense Ministry said Wednesday the United States has offered Slovakia 12 new military helicopters as compensation for the fighter jets the European country is giving to Ukraine. Under the offer, Slovakia would pay $340 million for the Bell AH-1Z attack choppers in a deal worth about $1 billion. U.S. foreign military financing would cover the other $660 million,

Slovakia delivers first 4 Soviet-era MiG-29 jets to Ukraine

UN Says Both Russia and Ukraine Summarily Executing Prisoners of War

The United Nations on Friday said it was "deeply concerned" by what it described as the summary executions of prisoners of war being carried out by both Russian and Ukrainian forces on the battlefield in Ukraine.


The head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, Matilda Bogner, said her organization had documented killings, often on the battlefield, by both sides in recent months.


"We are deeply concerned about summary execution of up to 25 Russian prisoners of war and persons hors de combat by the Ukrainian armed forces, which we have documented," Bogner said at a press conference in Kyiv.


"This was often perpetrated immediately upon capture on the battlefield. While we are aware of ongoing investigations by Ukraine authorities into five cases involving 22 victims, we are not aware of any prosecution of the perpetrators," she added.


Bogner also related the UN's "deep" concern over "the summary execution of 15 Ukrainian prisoners of war shortly after being captured by Russian armed forces."


She said the Wagner mercenary group, which claims to be leading Russia's assault on the city of Bakhmut, the longest and bloodiest battle of the war, was responsible for some 11 of those killings.


Ukraine and Russia have both accused each other of mistreating prisoners of war since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his forces into Ukraine a year ago.

French DIY Retailer Leroy Merlin to Cede Control of Russian Stores - The Moscow Times

Oh dear, looks like the high heeled war criminal needs some more meat for the grinder.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree removing an upper age limit for Russian National Guard members serving in parts of Ukraine that are under the control of Russian forces.
The presidential decree, signed on March 27—which Putin designated as National Guard Day in 2017—states that age restrictions for its citizens in the Federal Service of the National Guard Troops of the Russian Federation serving in the affected regions have been lifted until January 1, 2026.

Putin Removes Age Limit for Conscripts as Russian Forces Devastated

Russian Military to Draft 147,000 New Recruits in Spring Call-up

President Vladimir Putin on Thursday signed an order allowing Russia's Defense Ministry to enlist 147,000 men for their compulsory military service in the upcoming spring call-up.


The number of draftees to be called up this year marks an increase of 12,500 compared to last year's recruitment figures.


The Defense Ministry will kick off the conscription campaign on Saturday, drafting eligible men between the ages of 18 and 27. The recruitment drive is scheduled to wrap up on July 15.


Enlistment officers will likely crack down on draft dodgers in order to meet Putin’s ambitious 147,000 target, according to experts quoted by the independent news outlet Agentstvo.


The experts also said that the pool of potential conscripts born between 1995 and 2005 has grown insufficiently to meet the military’s increasing demand for fresh troops, despite a steady rise in birthrates since 2000.


“There was definitely no surge [in birthrates], so the idea is apparently to catch as many [draft dodgers] as possible,” Ilya Kashnitsky, a professor of demography at the University of Southern Denmark, told Agentstvo.

Russian demographer Alexei Raksha estimates that up to 19% of the 770,000 men born in 2004 will be sent draft papers during this year's spring call-up.


“If the fall draft is the same, a total of 38% from the 2004 generation [will be recruited] this year,” Raksha told Agentstvo.


Russia’s General Staff said Friday that none of the soldiers conscripted in the latest recruitment campaign would be sent to fight in Ukraine. The biannual draft allows conscripts to be sent to fight abroad after just four months of military training.


Roughly 400,000 contract soldiers are currently serving in Russia’s armed forces.


Putin increased the spring call-up figures after greenlighting Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s December proposal to boost Russia’s combat personnel from 1.15 million to 1.5 million.


The latest draft is expected to be one of the last before new rules that raise the conscription age limit to 30 take effect in 2024. The lower-age limit will also gradually increase from 18 to 21 over the next three years.

Georgian Car Sales to Russia Surge Despite Tightening Sanctions - The Moscow Times

Well-known Russian military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky has been killed in a blast in a cafe in St Petersburg, according to Russian news agencies, quoting sources as saying it was caused by an explosive device.

Russian news reports said Tatarsky was killed in the explosion at the Street Food Bar No. 1 cafe on Sunday. Twenty-five people were wounded, and 19 of them were hospitalised, according to the regional governor, Alexander Beglov.

Tatarsky is the pen name for Maxim Fomin, who had accumulated more than 560,000 followers on Telegram and was one of the most prominent of the influential military bloggers who have provided an often critical running commentary on Russia’s war in Ukraine.

He was among hundreds of attendees at a lavish Kremlin ceremony last September to proclaim Russia’s annexation of four partly occupied regions of Ukraine, a move that most countries at the United Nations condemned as illegal.

A St Petersburg website said the explosion took place at a cafe that had at one time belonged to Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of the Wagner Group of mercenaries fighting for Russia in Ukraine.

Russian media and military bloggers said Tatarsky was meeting with members of the public and that a woman presented him with a box containing a statuette that apparently exploded.

A patriotic Russian group that organised the event said it had taken security precautions, but added that “regrettably, they proved insufficient”.

Russia’s state Investigative Committee said it had opened a murder investigation. There was no indication of who was responsible.

The Interior Ministry said everyone at the cafe at the time of the blast was being “checked for involvement”.

Al Jazeera’s Dorsa Jabbari, reporting from Moscow, said there were at least 100 people in and around the cafe for the event organised by the “Cyber Front Z Movement”, where Tatarsky was speaking.

“This was a well-known and busy area of St Petersburg known as University Embankment, in the heart of the city … on a Sunday afternoon at 5pm is when the event started. There would have been a lot of people in this cafe and also in the vicinity,” Jabbari said.

Mash, a Telegram channel with links to Russian law enforcement, posted a video that appeared to show Tatarsky, microphone in hand, being presented with a statuette of a helmeted soldier. It said the explosion happened minutes later.

“According to officials in St Petersburg, they are looking for this woman who presented this gift to the organisers and the speaker himself. They’re trying to figure out what happened to her, to question her about where this gift initially originated from and what her involvement would be,” Jabbari said.

Tatarsky had filed regular reports from Ukraine. He championed Russia’s war effort while often criticising the failures of the army top brass.

After the Kremlin’s annexation of four regions of Ukraine last year, Tatarsky posted a video in which he vowed: “That’s it. We’ll defeat everybody, kill everybody, rob everybody we need to. It will all be the way we like it. God be with you.”

Russia’s foreign ministry paid tribute to Tatarsky, lashing out at Western governments for failing to react to the attack.

Bloggers like Tatarsky “are defenders of the truth”, ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Telegram, adding that the lack of reaction from Western governments “despite their concerns for the welfare of journalists and the free press speaks for itself”.

‘Spiders are eating each other in a jar’

Since the war in Ukraine began on February 24, 2022, various fires, explosions and apparent assassinations have occurred in Russia without any clear connection to the conflict.

A top Ukrainian government official speculated that internal Russian opposition to the Kremlin’s invasion was behind the blast.

“Spiders are eating each other in a jar,” Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak wrote in English on Twitter. “Question of when domestic terrorism would become an instrument of internal political fight was a matter of time.”

Denis Pushilin, the Moscow-installed leader of the part of Ukraine’s Donetsk province that is occupied by Russia, suggested publicly that Ukraine was to blame.

“He was killed vilely. Terrorists cannot do otherwise. The Kyiv regime is a terrorist regime. It needs to be destroyed, there’s no other way to stop it,” he said.

If Tatarsky was deliberately targeted, it would be the second assassination on Russian soil of a figure associated with the war in Ukraine.

Russia’s Federal Security Service accused Ukraine’s secret services last August of killing Darya Dugina, the daughter of an ultra-nationalist, in a car bomb attack near Moscow that President Vladimir Putin called “evil”. Ukraine denied involvement.

Russia’s war bloggers, an assortment of military correspondents and freelance commentators with army backgrounds, have enjoyed broad freedom from the Kremlin to publish hard-hitting views on the war, now in its 14th month. Putin even made one of them a member of his human rights council last year.

They reacted with shock to the news of Tatarsky’s death.

“He was in the hottest spots of the special military operation and he always came out alive. But the war found him in a Petersburg cafe,” said Semyon Pegov, who blogs under the name War Gonzo.

Alexander Khodakovsky, a leading pro-Moscow figure in eastern Ukraine, wrote: “Max, if you were a nobody, you’d have died of ‘vodka and headcolds’. But you were dangerous to them, you did your business like no one else could. We will pray for you, brother.”

Prominent Russian military blogger killed in cafe blast | Russia-Ukraine war News | Al Jazeera

Over the winter, Ukraine rebuffed a Russian offensive. Now it’s Ukraine’s turn to go on the attack — and there are signs that the counteroffensive will begin in the next month or so.

Thousands of recruits are training in newly constituted fighting units tailored for offensives. And the military command is holding back elite soldiers from the worst of the fighting, in order to throw them instead into the coming campaign.

The new Ukrainian campaign, when it comes, will be a test of its army’s ability to rearm and reconstitute battalions while maintaining the motivation and maneuvering skills that gave it an edge in three previous counteroffensives.

The challenges are daunting. Ukrainian officers will have to choreograph artillery, infantry and armored vehicle assaults that can crash through the Russian trenches, tank traps and minefields.

But if its weapons and trained troops fall into place in time, Ukraine is capable of inflicting losses on the Russian Army that could have far-reaching geopolitical consequences, said Evelyn Farkas, an expert at the McCain Institute. She posited a once-unthinkable outcome: that Ukraine could render Russia a weakened military power, with little leverage in negotiations to end the war.

The goal: Ukraine is seen as planning to drive a wedge through Russian-occupied territory along the southern coasts of the Black and Azov Seas, near Crimea, or seek a humiliating turnabout in the fighting in the eastern Donbas region — or both.

nytimes.com

Finland to join Nato on Tuesday as Russia sounds border warning

Russia has said it will bolster its defences near its 1,300km border with Finland after the Nato secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, announced that the Nordic country would formally join the transatlantic defence alliance on Tuesday.

The accession marks the end of an accelerated process that began last May, when Finland and neighbouring Sweden abandoned decades of military nonalignment to seek security as Nato members after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Turkey last week became the last of the alliance’s 30 member states to ratify Finland’s application, but Turkey and Hungary continue to hold up Sweden’s bid. Stockholm said last week it was not sure it would join in time for a planned Nato summit in July.

“Tomorrow we will welcome Finland as the 31st member of Nato, making Finland safer and our alliance stronger,” Stoltenberg said in Brussels on Monday. “We will raise the Finnish flag for the first time here at Nato headquarters.”

Ankara and Helsinki would hand their official texts to the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, on Tuesday, at which point Finland would become a Nato member, he said, describing the moment as “historic”.

Finland’s accession was “good for Finland’s security, for Nordic security and for Nato as a whole,” he added. “President Putin went to war against Ukraine with the clear aim to get less Nato. He’s getting the exact opposite.”

The Finnish president, Sauli Niinistö, and the foreign minister, Pekka Haavisto, will travel to Brussels to take part in the ceremony. “It is a historic moment for us,” Haavisto said in a statement after Stoltenberg’s announcement.

“For Finland, the most important objective at the meeting will be to emphasise Nato’s support to Ukraine as Russia continues its illegal aggression. We seek to promote stability and security throughout the Euro-Atlantic region.”

In Moscow, Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Alexander Grushko, responded to the news of Finland’s accession by saying Russia would increase its forces in its west and northwestern regions if necessary.

The most pivotal stories and debates for Europeans – from identity to economics to the environment

If the “forces and resources of other Nato members are deployed in Finland, we will take additional steps to reliably ensure Russia’s military security” by “strengthening our military potential in the west and in the northwest”, Grushko said.

UN demands access to Ukrainian children deported to Russia

The United Nations Human Rights Council demanded Tuesday that Russia provide access to and information about Ukrainian children and other civilians forcibly transferred to territory under its control.


The top UN rights body passed a resolution demanding that Moscow "cease the unlawful forced transfer and deportation of civilians and other protected persons within Ukraine or to the Russian Federation."


The text, which passed with 28 of the 47 council members voting in favor, 17 abstaining and only China and Eritrea opposed, highlighted in particular the transfer of "children, including those from institutional care, unaccompanied children and separated children."

Ukraine War: NATO Welcomes Finland, Doubling Border With Russia - The Moscow Times

This is game set match when the southern offensive starts...

German arms firm Rheinmetall said Monday it would soon open a maintenance center in Romania for military equipment used in Ukraine’s battle against Russian forces.

The company said the “service hub” near Satu Mare in northern Romania, close to the border with Ukraine and Hungary, was set to become operational before the end of April.

The maintenance center will “play a central role in maintaining the operational readiness of Western combat systems in use in Ukraine and in ensuring their logistical support,” Rheinmetall said in a statement.

Leopard 2 battle tanks, which Germany recently shipped to Ukraine, as well as self-propelled howitzers, Marder infantry fighting vehicles, Fuchs armored transport vehicles, and military trucks could all be serviced at the new hub.

It could also service NATO combat vehicles, Rheinmetall added, saying this would give NATO’s eastern flank “shorter reaction times.”

“It is a central concern for us at Rheinmetall to give the NATO forces as well as Ukraine the best possible support in this critical situation,” Rheinmetall CEO Armin Papperger said.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, on a one-day visit in Bucharest, welcomed Rheinmetall’s announcement, describing Romania’s and Germany’s cooperation to support Ukraine as “very, very intensive.”

“We are always looking at how we can advance our common concerns as Europeans and as NATO allies,” he told reporters, adding it was “necessary” that equipment is repaired near Ukraine’s border.

Rheinmetall, in partnership with German arms maker Krauss-Maffei Wegmann, inaugurated a similar maintenance center in Lithuania last June to provide logistical support for combat vehicles for the Lithuanian armed forces and other NATO troops stationed in the Baltic states.

Rheinmetall to Open Maintenance Hub in Romania for Ukraine Weapons

You are responsible for strained relations, Putin tells US and EU

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday (April 5) bluntly accused the United States and the European Union of being responsible for strain in relations with Russia. He made the accusation in front of the respective ambassadors during a ceremony in Kremlin. Russian ties with the West have seen dramatic deterioration since Russian invasion of Ukraine last year.

The EU and US ambassadors were among 17 who formally presented their diplomatic credentials to Putin at a televised ceremony in the Kremlin.

Putin told new US ambassador Lynne Tracy that US support for a revolution in Ukraine in 2014 had led to the current situation where Russia and Ukraine were in conflict.


He said relations were in "a deep crisis" that was "based on fundamentally different approaches to the formation of the modern world order".


"Dear Madam Ambassador, I know you may not agree, but I cannot but say that the United States' use ... of such tools as support for the so-called 'colour revolutions', support in this regard for the coup in Kyiv in 2014, ultimately led to today's Ukrainian crisis," Putin said.


Putin took a similar line with the new EU ambassador, Roland Galharague, who took up his position in September, telling him that "the European Union initiated a geopolitical confrontation with Russia".


Putin also accused the West of staging terror attacks in Russia.


"There are grounds to assert that the potential of third countries, Western intelligence services is being used to stage sabotage and terrorist attacks," Putin said without providing any evidence.


During his speech, Putin also urged Denmark to support Russian proposal of an independent international commission to investigate the blasts that ruptured the Nord Stream undersea pipelines. Nord Stream pipelines bring natural gas from Russia to Germany.


Putin also stressed that Russia was open to constructive partnership with every country and would not isolate itself, despite the complex situation in the world.

You are responsible for strained relations, Putin tells US and EU - World News

Originally Posted by misskit

You are responsible for strained relations, Putin tells US and EU

What a wanker.

Having lost at least 2,000 tanks in its 14-month wider war on Ukraine, and struggling to source the high-tech components its needs to build new tanks, Russia has been pulling out of long-term storage hundreds of 60-year-old T-62s and 70-year-old T-55s. Tanks that were obsolete decades ago.

A 41-ton T-62 with its 115-millimeter smoothbore gun, or a 40-ton T-55 with its 100-millimeter rifled gun, isn’t just easier for Russian industry to restore than a newer T-90 or T-72 is—after all, the T-62 or T-55 requires fewer ball bearings and electronic components. The older tank also is easier for its crew to operate.

That has training implications. "The crews prepare for them [the T-55s and T-62s] in a shorter timeframe," Ukrainian commentator Oleksandr Kovalenko said.

The T-55 and T-62 are from a generation of Soviet tanks before the introduction of automatic gun-loaders, sophisticated fire-controls and crew layouts that allow a gunner and commander independently to search for targets.

The upside is that a four-person crew could learn to operate its old tank fast—as in, after just a few weeks of training. The downside, of course, is that the crew still is riding in an obsolete tank. A T-55 or T-62 is easier to use because it’s old, crude tech.

Old, crude tech that might not last long in combat—and which might end up getting new tankers killed faster.

Still, the Russians seem to appreciate the old tanks’ less demanding training requirement. After all, many of those 2,000 tanks they’ve lost in Ukraine took their crews with them when they blew up.

It’s possible thousands of experienced Russian tankers have died in the wider war; replacing them might be as difficult as replacing their tanks is.

Kovalenko noted Russia’s growing shortage of good tank crews when he tracked a batch of a dozen restored T-72s, T-80s and T-90s reaching Russian army motorized units near Svatove in eastern Ukraine. "The most interesting thing is that there are no crews in the unit who can operate these tanks," Kovalenko said.

Assigning new crews to old tanks might seem like a solution to this problem. In reality, it’s a short-term expedient—and a self-defeating one, at that.

It’s possible to upgrade the optics in a T-55 or T-62 by swapping out the 70-year-old TSh 2-22 gunner’s sight for a 1PN96MT-02 analog sight that, while not as sophisticated as the state-of-the-art Sosna-U digital sight is, at least is new and reliable. It also is possible to boost an older tank’s protection by bolting reactive armor blocks onto the hull and turret.

But there’s very little Russian industry can do to improve a T-55 or T-62’s main gun, internal layout or turret-hull integration. And all are problematic.

“The T-62's most significant weakness is its slow rate of fire,” the U.S. Army explained in a 1979 bulletin. Where the crew of a Ukrainian T-64, Leopard 2 or M-1 can fire 10 or even 12 rounds a minute, a T-55 or T-62 crew might manage three or four rounds a minute.

The reasons are myriad. “The ammunition is inconveniently stored for rapid loading,” according to the U.S. Army bulletin. “Under certain conditions, the gun must be elevated before the loader can place a new round in the breech. The automatic ejection system requires six seconds to complete a cycle.”

While the T-55 and T-62 suffer other limitations—slow turret-traverse mechanisms, for instance—the lethargic rate of fire is one constraint that’s bound to get a lot of Russian tankers killed in direct clashes with the Ukrainians.

During the pivotal battle around Chernihiv in north-central Ukraine in the spring of 2022, the Ukrainian 1st Tank Brigade hid its T-64s in the forests around the city. When Russian tanks rolled past, the T-64 crews opened fire.

“Better crew training combined with short-ranged engagements where their armament was competitive, and the faster autoloader on the T-64, allowed Ukrainian tank crews to achieve significant damage against surprised Russian units,” analysts Mykhaylo Zabrodskyi, Jack Watling, Oleksandr Danylyuk and Nick Reynolds explained in a study for the Royal United Services Institute in London.

As T-55s and T-62s replace T-72s in Russian formations, the Ukrainians’ gunnery advantage only will grow.

But comparing an old Russian tank to a newer Ukrainian tank really is missing the point. The Kremlin’s tank-crew crisis is a reminder that, in warfare, people matter more than machines do. Rushing new tankers through a short training course in order to squeeze them into old T-55s and T-62s and speed those tanks to the front line might create an impression of Russian strength. But it won’t win battles.

Because those crews—tank commanders, or TCs, especially—will lack experience. “It is ... important that deciders in crews and platoons (TC's and platoon leaders) have the necessary experience to allow them to react to rapidly changing future battlefields,” Billy Burnside, noted in a 1979 study for the U.S. Army.

In solving their tanker-shortage by equipping crews with obsolete tanks, the Russians might end up creating an even deeper tanker shortage—by getting a bunch of four-man T-55 and T-62 crews killed in lopsided fights with better-equipped, better-trained Ukrainian forces.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidax...h=692f87f24ba3

Tanks for teh mammary

Ukraine war: Leak shows Western special forces on the ground

The UK is among a number of countries with military special forces operating inside Ukraine, according to one of dozens of documents leaked online.


It confirms what has been the subject of quiet speculation for over a year.


The leaked files, some marked "top secret", paint a detailed picture of the war in Ukraine, including sensitive details of Ukraine's preparations for a spring counter-offensive.


The US government says it is investigating the source of the leak.


According to the document, dated 23 March, the UK has the largest contingent of special forces in Ukraine (50), followed by fellow Nato states Latvia (17), France (15), the US (14) and the Netherlands (1).


The document does not say where the forces are located or what they are doing.


The numbers of personnel may be small, and will doubtless fluctuate. But special forces are by their very nature highly effective. Their presence in Ukraine is likely to be seized upon by Moscow, which has in recent months argued that it is not just confronting Ukraine, but Nato as well.

In line with its standard policy on such matters, the UK's Ministry of Defence has not commented, but in a tweet on Tuesday said the leak of alleged classified information had demonstrated what it called a "serious level of inaccuracy".


"Readers should be cautious about taking at face value allegations that have the potential to spread misinformation," it said.


It did not elaborate or suggest which specific documents it was referring to. However, Pentagon officials are quoted as saying the documents are real.


One document, which detailed the number of casualties suffered in Ukraine on both sides, did appear to have been doctored.


UK special forces are made up of several elite military units with distinct areas of expertise, and are regarded to be among the most capable in the world.


The British government has a policy of not commenting on its special forces, in contrast to other countries including the US.


The UK has been vociferous in its support of Ukraine, and is the second largest donor after the US of military aid to Kyiv.


US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the Department of Justice had opened a criminal investigation and he was determined to find the source of the leak.
"We will continue to investigate and turn over every rock until we find the source of this and the extent of it," he said.

Ukraine war: Leak shows Western special forces on the ground - BBC News

The price cap on Russian oil seems to be working

Russia is still shipping crude, but its oil revenues have plunged, fulfilling the twin goals of the energy price cap the U.S. government devised last year.

Why it matters: After it launched its war on Ukraine in 2022, Russia's position as a major oil supplier to global markets was seen as a constraint on the West's ability to punish Moscow.

• Now, the price cap may be helping to solve that problem.

The latest: There are fresh signs that Russia's finances are in trouble.

• Russian oil and gas revenues dove by 45% in the first quarter, as its deficit exploded due to the costs of the war.
• The average price for Russia's Urals grade crude oil was $47.85 a barrel in March, down from $89.05 last March.
• In a sign of the economic stress Russia faces, the ruble just suffered its worst week of the year, hitting its lowest level against the dollar since April 2022.

Background: Last year global oil prices were soaring — $5 gasoline! — amid widespread uncertainty about access to supplies.

• Effectively, Russia was benefiting from a surge in prices that its own illegal invasion had set off.

What they did: In December, the European Union — long Russia's largest buyer — imposed an embargo on Russian oil (the U.S. did so back in March 2022)

• Simultaneously, the G7 group of advanced economies, along with allies, agreed to a never-before-attempted plan to impose a price cap of $60 on Russian crude oil that the U.S. Treasury Department had spearheaded.

How it works: In practice, the plan is actually a series of rules and restrictions on companies like shipping giants and insurance providers — almost all based in the West — that are the backbone of the global oil market.

• Basically, shippers and insurers are required to get those buying and moving the oil to officially promise — in signed "attestations" — that the petroleum was sold below $60.
• Violations would open companies to potential criminal and civil penalties.

The big picture: Given the obvious potential loopholes in the plan — for instance, people simply lying about paying less than $60 for Russian oil — there was a fair amount of skepticism that this price cap plan would work.

• But the early evidence suggests that the cap, in conjunction with other sanctions, has been pretty successful at keeping Russian oil flowing — while reducing the amount of money Russia reaps from its sale (predominantly to China, India and Turkey).

What they're saying: "Most people would say it's probably helped reduce revenues," says Robert McNally, president of consulting firm Rapidan Energy Group, who served as an energy advisor in the administration of President George W. Bush. "It does give some leverage to India and China when they're negotiating with Russia."

• On the other hand: Kevin Book, who heads up energy research at consulting firm ClearView Energy Partners, emphasizes that it remains to be seen how well the cap would operate if energy demand from China — where the economy has struggled to recover from the COVID crisis — fully bounced back.
• "On the surface, it looks like both goals are being met," Book says. But "it's hard to see below the surface," he adds.

The bottom line: There are always a number of factors at play in market prices, making it essentially impossible to prove something is "the reason" a price is moving one way or the other. But the red ink in Russia's budget suggests this policy is performing pretty well.

Latvia confirms sending soldiers to Ukraine, claiming they don’t take part in combat

Latvia has sent its military personnel to Ukraine to carry out “specific support functions”, they do not take part in fighting, Delfi reports, citing the national Defence Ministry.


The functions in question are named as guarding the Latvian Embassy in Ukraine and various shipments. At the same time, it is not clarified whether these shipments have anything to do with weapon supplies.


Moreover, it is not clear how many Latvian soldiers are stationed in Ukraine. Their service missions are also not disclosed.


The Pentagon’s classified documents containing US intel were earlier leaked online. Among other things, the documents claimed that some countries had sent their soldiers to Ukraine. These countries included the UK (50 soldiers), Latvia (17), France (15), the United States (14), and the Netherlands (1).


The leak was reported by The New York Times on 6 April. Initially, the documents appeared on social media. Some of them revealed details of US surveillance of its allies: Ukraine, South Korea, and Israel. Others noted the extent of the US penetration into the Russian Defence Ministry and the mercenary Wagner Group. And still others revealed shortcomings in Ukrainian armaments, anti-aircraft defence, battalion sizes, and their combat readiness.


In addition, the documents provided detailed descriptions of Ukrainian counteroffensive plans. Although the documents did not specify dates, they described the types of weapons and the number of units of equipment that Kyiv intends to use in the counteroffensive.


The casualty estimates presented in the documents raised the most scepticism. As many media outlets noted, Russian losses were significantly underestimated in the documents, while Ukrainian losses were overestimated.


Новая газета Европа

The war in Ukraine has gutted Russia’s clandestine spetsnaz forces and it will take Moscow years to rebuild them, according to classified U.S. assessments obtained by The Washington Post.

The finding, which has not been previously reported, is among a cache of sensitive materials leaked online through the messaging platform Discord. U.S. officials attributed their assessments to Russian commanders’ overreliance on the specialized units who have been put to use as part of front-line infantry formations that have suffered massive numbers of dead and wounded.

Typically, spetsnaz personnel are assigned the sorts of stealthy, high-risk missions — including an apparent order to capture Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky — for which they receive some of the Russian military’s most advanced training. But when Moscow launched its full-scale invasion last year, senior commanders eager to seize momentum and skeptical of their conventional fighters’ prowess deviated from the norm, ordering elite forces into direct combat, according to U.S. intelligence findings and independent analysts who have closely followed spetsnaz deployments.

The rapid depletion of Russia’s commando units, observers say, shifted the war’s dynamic from the outset, severely limiting Moscow’s ability to employ clandestine tactics in support of conventional combat operations. U.S. officials believe the staggering casualties these units have sustained will render them less effective not only in Ukraine but also in other parts of the world where Russian forces operate, according to the assessments, which range in date from late 2022 to earlier this year.

The hollowing of these units appears to be evident in satellite imagery featured among the leaked materials. Before-and-after photos — showing a base used by the 22nd Separate Spetsnaz Brigade in southern Russia, according to the document — reveal that “all but one of five Russian Separate Spetsnaz Brigades that returned from combat operations in Ukraine in late summer 2022 suffered significant losses.”

The slide includes two overhead images, one taken in November 2021, months before the invasion began, and another captured a year later. The former shows a bustling motor pool teeming with vehicles; the latter reveals what U.S. officials concluded is a state of extreme depletion months after the brigade’s return home with fewer than half of the Tigr tactical vehicles it had before the deployment. The 22nd and two other spetsnaz brigades suffered an estimated 90 to 95 percent attrition rate, the assessments say.

Compounding Russia’s problems is the loss of experience within its elite forces. Spetsnaz soldiers require at least four years of specialized training, the U.S. documents say, concluding that it could take as long as a decade for Moscow to reconstitute these units.

The documents do not say how many spetsnaz troops are estimated to have been killed or wounded in Ukraine, but the materials, citing intelligence intercepts, assess that one unit alone — the 346th — “lost nearly the entire brigade with only 125 personnel active out of 900 deployed.”

U.S. intelligence analysts tracked every spetsnaz unit that returned home to southern Russia from Ukraine — except for one: the 25th Spetsnaz Regiment. Severe personnel and equipment losses, the documents say, “could explain why there is no clear [intelligence] signature of their return to garrison.”

The U.S. government assessments dovetail with analysts’ observations. Rob Lee, a Russia military expert and senior fellow with the Foreign Policy Research Institute, said that because Russia’s motorized rifle infantry soldiersproved ineffective, commanders have sought to compensate by pushing elite airborne units, naval infantry and spetsnaz to the front, including in the failed bid to capture Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and for campaigns in the east and south.

There was an immediate consequence to that strategy, Lee said. Russian commanders, having burned through the best-trained fighters, forfeited the valuable skills those troops possess, including intelligence gathering and reconnaissance, from the start of the invasion through last fall.

“That affected the rest of the war because Russia lost all these key capabilities up front that they couldn’t easily replace — both equipment-wise and talent-wise,” he said. “That affected what they could and couldn’t do.”

Just days into the war, spetsnaz troops arrived in the eastern city of Kharkiv in small numbers and without much support from conventional troops, Lee said. Many of them were killed or captured, he noted. Several of their specialized vehicles were destroyed, videos and photos show.

A similar situation played out in Mariupol in the south, Lee said, and in the eastern Donbas region, where fighting often took place in wooded areas where regular Russian motorized rifle units had difficulty operating. Spetsnaz forces have also operated in the coal-mining town of Vuhledar in the Donetsk region, Lee said, where Ukrainian and Russian forces have battled each other for months.

A soldier who served in Vuhledar with Ukraine’s 72nd Mechanized Brigade told The Post that while he could not confirm his unit faced spetsnaz, that was probably the case because they carried advanced body armor along with high-end night vision and thermal optics. Those enemy troops operated in small units, this soldier said, conducting traditional reconnaissance and infantry missions. He spoke on the condition of anonymity citing the sensitivity of recent operations.

The apparent death of a spetsnaz brigade commander in Vuhledar in February further illustrates the scope of problems facing Russia, Lee said. If such a senior military leader “is that far forward, there is probably something not quite right. Either losses are too heavy in that unit, or they’re being used in a way they’re not supposed to be used,” he added.

Russia’s expenditure of its elite troops will have cascading effects, the documents say, including a loss of some ability to train paramilitary groups in unconventional warfare tactics, “which Russia has used to advance its interests abroad.”

It’s clear that spetsnaz are a finite resource that can’t be easily replenished, Lee said. What’s not clear is whether conventional Russian commanders have learned from what’s happened in Ukraine or how best to use these elite forces. “It’s going to be a while before there is a full understanding of how they are adapting,” he said.

There are signs online of the 22nd Separate Spetsnaz Brigade’s activity in Ukraine. One video from last summer appears to show members of the unit’s sniper section moving through buildings, using high-end equipment out of reach for many Russian regulars.

Other images lack the same bravado. Photos purporting to show a young captain in the 22nd, Alexei, circulated in March 2022 along with images of a granite memorial to soldiers killed before the war was even two months old. Alexei’s name is inscribed at the top.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...sian-spetsnaz/

Originally Posted by bsnub

Having lost at least 2,000 tanks in its 14-month wider war on Ukraine, and struggling to source the high-tech components its needs to build new tanks, Russia has been pulling out of long-term storage hundreds of 60-year-old T-62s and 70-year-old T-55s. Tanks that were obsolete decades ago.

A 41-ton T-62 with its 115-millimeter smoothbore gun, or a 40-ton T-55 with its 100-millimeter rifled gun, isn’t just easier for Russian industry to restore than a newer T-90 or T-72 is—after all, the T-62 or T-55 requires fewer ball bearings and electronic components. The older tank also is easier for its crew to operate.

I wouldn't get too complacent about Russia using T54/55's even if they aren't upgraded to modern configurations.

It's a tank and is well suited to the current way in which the war is being fought. It may not be a match for modern tanks but it is more than capable of supporting infantry advances on infantry. It is also easy to use and doesn't take as much time to train crews to use them. Forget using them against heavy armour but use with HE shells at Company strength and they can be effective. The Javelin/NLAW is trashing the modern Russian tanks anyway so why bother with them.

They could update the night vision systems to be more effective and many export versions have updated armour and main guns.

Dangerous to laugh them off in my opinion. Especially if this ends up going on for several years, which the Russians are quite capable of sustaining.

Originally Posted by Troy

Especially if this ends up going on for several years, which the Russians are quite capable of sustaining.

It will and they are.