Russia launched a series of missile strikes across Ukraine on Thursday in one of the heaviest Russian bombardments in weeks.
The strikes targeted energy infrastructure, and Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said power facilities were hit in eight regions of Ukraine. “Generation and distribution facilities in eight regions have been damaged,” he said on Telegram.
Ukrainian authorities said the strikes also hit residential buildings, and six people were reported killed. Moscow said the strikes also targeted Ukrainian military facilities.
The Russian Defense Ministry said the strikes were launched in retaliation over an attack in Russia’s Bryansk Oblast, which borders Ukraine. The Defense Ministry said hypersonic missiles were used in the bombardment.
“In response to the terror attacks carried out by the Kiev regime in the Bryansk Region on March 2, the Russian Armed Forces delivered a massive retaliatory strike. Long-range air, sea, and ground-based high-precision weapons, including Kinzhal hypersonic missiles, hit key Ukrainian military infrastructure sites, enterprises of the military-industrial complex and related energy facilities,” Russia’s Defense Ministry spokesman said.
Moscow accused Ukrainian saboteurs of killing two civilians in the attack in Bryansk, which Kyiv has denied. A group known as the Russian Volunteer Corps that’s fighting for Ukraine took responsibility for the raid. The group’s leader, Denis Nikitin, said he was unaware of casualties and claimed the attack was carried out with the support of the Ukrainian government. According to the Financial Times, Nikitin is considered an extremist and has “ties to neo-Nazis and white nationalists across the western world.”
The Russian Volunteer Corps is part of Ukraine’s Territorial Defense Forces and was formed in 2022. It’s made up of Russians who have been fighting for Ukraine since 2014, including former members of the neo-Nazi Azov Regiment. According to UnHerd, elements of the group are “overtly sympathetic to neo-Nazi ideology and praise Hitler on Telegram.”
Russia always blames their aggression on some body else.
Every regime always blames its aggression on someone else. Nothing unique there.
So true.
Including the US?????
👏👏👏
It doesn’t look like a statement attributing “blame” for Russian action. It looks like an explanation: “They did that and, in response, we did this.”
It isn’t really that difficult, most of the time, to figure out that actions are likely to have consequences and, fairly often, to make good guesses about what the consequences are likely to be.
As I said, Russia always blames someone else for their aggression. You can spin anyway you want, but Russia is the aggressor.
Except the US of course. Right Kenny? Now remember, any bad mouthing makes you anti-US so be careful.
Is it time to clean out the bunker?………………………………………………….
I’d hold off for a bit. Our noble leaders may be figuring out that this mess isn’t going to turn out the way they (stupidly) expected it would.
They might be smart enough to also figure out that failing to distance themselves from the bloody omnishambles they’ve created is likely to hurt reelection chances, or, in some European cases, to increase the chances of no-confidence votes or the collapse of coalition governments.
Remain vigilant, of course. The crazed neocons have no reverse gear, aren’t worried about elections, and continue to have way too effing much power and influence.
Clean, clear and concise Red.
So far the evidence is that supporting Ukraine is a major plus in elections in Europe – while distancing yourself from that support loses the parties votes.
Keep paying close attention, and remember that devil-in-the-details thing.
According to your source:
So yes the support in the US is falling and it is perhaps also marginally lower in Europe, but it is most certainly still not a thing that a politician can win votes on by trying to distance themselves from.
Keep paying close attention, and remember that devil-in-the-details thing.
In the future things might change but as it stands this is not likely at least not in large parts of north eastern Europe.
Northeastern Europe, led by the Poles, continues to harbor undiminished hatred for all things Russian.
Neither Sweden nor Denmark, Norway or Finland are led by Poland – the same holds true for the Netherlands – in all of these countries there is the same sentiment regarding allowing wars of territorial conquest in Europe.
Wow, the Scandinavian countries plus the Netherlands getting pissed off… scary thought
😂
They are not scary by themselves, but as part of a very wide coalition of small countries in EU, they just about guarantee that the Germans Italians and French do not decide to ignore what Poland, the Baltic states, the Netherlands and some additional EU states are promoting i.e. a harder line on Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
I know you have to read the whole exchange to get this point – but if you had then you might have picked up on why this point actually probably does scare the Russians – their hope of normalizing relations with EU while still holding Ukrainian territory has taken a major step in the wrong direction.
The key numbers will be the support for the war in France, Germany, Italy and Spain, where it’s never been very popular with the citizenry to begin with. The rest of the EU nations really don’t count, as they are merely fleas riding the dog – they contribute virtually nothing, because their GDP is miniscule compared to the “big 4”. The UK will continue to do the USA’s bidding but as they are out of the EU they will have limited clout. If their governments ever “release their findings” of the nordstream sabotage, and it confirms that the US did this, I think public support in Germany and France for this stupid war will collapse.
You could argue this, but the same argument was made for why Germany, France and Spain would sell the interests of the Republic of Ireland down the river in the Brexit negotiations – and that did not work out as the argument would have it.
The point being that inside EU the big 4 cannot disregard the interests of even a single small country, if that small country has the support of the other small countries. Or to frame it differently – if they do, they will face very severe difficulties working within EU – the small nations can choke the progress on any number of important issues – which is why they never even contemplated selling out the Irish.
The UK has several times been the nation leading – the notion that they are merely doing the bidding of the US is no where near proven.
There is not going to be a clear finding from the NS bombing – even if there was the control over the investigation is in the hands of Sweden and Denmark – two of those small countries that you suggest the big 4 can just ignore – so even should the dead body of several US service men be found near the pipeline the Swedes and the Danes would not be likely to point fingers.
Which was my point; the key remains the public opinion in the 4 biggest EU economies, and whether that manages to sway their rulers. That support is minimal now, but would collapse IF the truth about nordstream ever comes out; and while Germany is conducting their own investigation, I doubt their government would ever admit the truth if it anyway, damn their own people’s interest. Re the UK, even many UK politicians are accusing their government of being our lapdogs – one of the reasons why public sentiment about the US is pretty low in the UK right now. And no, what the Poles, Balts, and Romanians want is pretty irrelevant, except as fodder for Biden to demonstrate “support” for what he’s doing; they are beggar nations, trying to get someone else to settle their grudges against Russia for them. Why Germany and France don’t slap them down like unruly puppies and stop supporting them economically is beyond me.
If their populations were massively against the support for Ukraine, they might consider trying to persuade the small others to end the support – but even that would cause them major headaches – that was my point. So first of all the support is still massive and only in some countries is it reduced to less than 50% – we would have to get to a significant majority against support to get any movement.
No investigation will prove anything – whom ever did the sabotage was not as incompetent as to leave evidence behind and even had they it would have been suspect. Furthermore supporting Ukraine is not against the interests of the population of any of the EU nations – allowing the Russians a free hand will lead to a massively poorer world as international trade collapses and military investments skyrockets.
Can you provide any evidence that this is a significant attitude in UK regarding Ukraine – I know it was regarding Iraq – but I have seen little evidence that this is a widely held opinion on Ukraine.
This could have been the case had they not been backed so very significantly by the Swedes, the Finns, the Norwegians and the Danes – not nations with a grudge to settle and not beggars.
Again the answer is that even if they thought this was wise their problem would be that within EU that would land them in big trouble – you did not pick up on that part of my argument?
No, I don’t see much to pick up on in your argument at all; but you’re welcome to it. I stand by my post and you can stand with yours. Read some of the other articles about public opinion in France, Germany, Italy and Spain posted on this website (AW,com) and go argue with their authors; I believe them.
I am aware that the support for increasing support for Ukraine is not increasing in France, Germany, Italy and Spain, that however is far from the idea that they want the Russians to win or that they are about to vote for governments that will enter into conflict with their EU partners to force an opinion not widely supported in their own countries i.e. forcing Ukraine to end the war on Russian terms or ending the sanctions.
If you check the levels actually wanting to reduce support for Ukraine they are quite small:
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/international/articles-reports/2023/02/24/one-year-european-and-american-attitudes-war-ukrai
So there would need to be a very dramatic shift for these countries to enter into conflict with their EU partners to support Russia – can you link the sources that claim that the support for Russia is higher than what the source I provided does?
Re read what I wrote, you are arguing with yourself. I don’t know if you have a comprehension problem or are willfully dissembling, and I don’t care; but go annoy someone else.
So you are not arguing that the opinion in these 4 large countries is even remotely amounting to a significant democratic force to make peace on anything other than a return to the 2021 borders – good to know!
Wouldn’t that be nice?….
Macron and Scholz are urging ZelBoy to negotiate.
So, YEAH, Red!
It could happen.
In which case, the outcome for the Russians would probably be more like the Russian and US experiences in Afghanistan, rather than the Korea-like outcome it’s headed toward now.
Huh? Would you explain that, please?
Right now, the war is headed for a Korea-like outcome — a DMZ/line of control on the borders of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts and a perpetual “frozen conflict.”
If the US/EU/NATO withdraw their support for Kyiv — as I agree they should — then it’s more muddled and, like in Afghanistan, the Russian forces bleed for 10-20 years before throwing up their hands and going home.
I think it’s too late. I have a feeling, nobody (especially the Russians) is going home, Thomas. It’s the point of no return with both sides not happy until nuclear war. The odds could be worse with Congress dragging China, Iran, and North Korea into war. Nobody seems to be concerned. By the way, I hope I’m wrong. I have kids and grandkids to pray for.
I don’t see that at all. Russia doesn’t need/want control of all Ukraine; just the 4 eastern oblasts, plus Crimea. MAYBE, if Ukraine really collapsed, they would want Kharkov and Odessa as well, and extend the zone of control all the way to the Dnieper; but I see that as pretty iffy. Without those (Donbas, Zaporizhe, and Kherson-south-of-the-river), and the loss of industry, population, and resources included therein, Ukraine is a broken shell. And Russia already controls most of those; most of the remaining population is pro-Russian, and should be readily assimilabile into Russia proper.
Russia will not stop until the SMO objectives have been met. Disarm and Denazification.
There will not be any DMZ/line. Ukraine as a country is over and there is no way back, there literally is nothing to go back to.
NATO is occupying the region formally known as Ukraine.
Russia is not very good at knocking out the power. You would think it would take weeks or months to rebuild it after a strike but it is up and running the next day in most instances.
That’s really not true. Ukraine has done a good job of restoring service and managing outages, largely by employing rolling outages to protect the overall grid. Restoration certainly has been impressive, but that is, in large measure, because Russia has been targeting transmission facilities, mostly substations which can be repaired or temporarily bypassed fairly quickly, rather than key generating capacity, which cannot.
If Russia wanted to take down the grid for a very long time, it’s pretty obvious that it could do so. Those missiles and drones could hit generating facilities as easily as substations. That doesn’t seem to be part of the plan, at least so far.
And it’s a mistake to minimize the impact of the ongoing strikes on Ukraine. From one of the relevant UN agencies:
https://reliefweb.int/report/ukraine/rfi-impact-strikes-power-grid
Let me see if I understand the logic here. Anti-Russia trolls criticize Russia for not destroying generating facilities because they care about Ukraine? Not as funny as bombing Nordstream to help Germany. (Sarcasm alert)
Shut up Red. You are too Russian biased. Ok, You are a west Educated guy with a Russian birth certificate.
We get you.
Red is clearly a big fan of Russia and Putin. He clearly dislikes Ukraine and the West. His Anti-American bias is obvious.
Ukraine isn’t the West. Is your middle name McCarthy?
No kidding. Did I not state “Ukraine and the West”. It is like saying I like “Apply pie and ice cream”. That does mean Apple Pie is Ice Cream, does it?
You really are a simpleton. Tell us Kenneth, were you anti-American when you were against US wars in Vietnam and Iraq? Or were you a fan of the NV and Saddam and clearly disliked the US and the west??
History does nothing, if not repeat itself…
“In response to the terror attacks carried out by the Kiev regime in the Bryansk Region on March 2, the Russian Armed Forces delivered a massive retaliatory strike“
Terror attacks? Says the country that has been terrorizing Ukraine for over a year. What a bunch of losers. This is embarrassing.
There is not a good way out of this sh!t show for Putin.
The de-nazifier will get de-nazified soon.
“Russia Launches Barrage of Missile Strikes Across Ukraine. Moscow says the strikes were retaliation for an attack in Bryansk”
Mostly a great analysis by Col. Douglas Macgregor however; photos of a destroyed home were suspect.
The home in Zolochiv suffered an explosion which many believe was caused by an S300 Surface to Air Missile – SAM that failed in it’s launch or intercept phase and landed on the house in Zolochiv!
The S300 has a 180 Kg / 396 Lb high explosive warhead. The mass of the S300 is around 1900 Kg / 4200 Lbs. Combined with unused fuel the S300 can cause a great deal of destruction against targets which are not hardened, such as farm houses.
This is not the first S300 to cause death and destruction. Remember the S300 which Ukraine launched into Poland that killed two Polish
citizens.
The Russian MOD is fighting a very successful war of attrition disarming NATO (Ukraine was disarmed in March), tank by tank, artillery by artillery, air defense by air defense.
NATO overall has accumulated the following equipment losses;
400 Aircraft, 218 helicopters, 3373 UAV’s, 411 Anti Aircraft systems, 8249 tanks inc. APC’s, 1055 multiple rocket launchers, 4315 rocket launchers and 8830 military automotive equipment.
What the empire looses in the Ukraine, they loose for the final Russian attack on NATO. Remember Russia attacked Ukraine just as NATO was about to unleash in the Donbass. Russia has shown they will pre-emptively attack to defend the Motherland when the time is dictated by events on the ground.
If Russia is so successful why has war lasted over a year?
What a joke… The U.S. was in Afghanistan almost twenty years and finally sneaked out in the dark of night. Harper is harping over a year as too long…. IS he nit picking or harping….????????
The joke is on you, unless you maintain that
The
RussianUS MODiswas fighting a very successful war of attrition disarmingNATOthe Afghans – is that really what you claim?You have a very odd sense of humor…
If there is a joke on anyone here then it would be on the side claiming that the SMO is a very successful war of attrition – here MvGuy just tried a Tu quoque argument failing very badly as the US invasion and occupation of Afghanistan can hardly be an example of ‘a very successful war of attrition ‘.
Well Afghanistan was a successful war of attrition. It was just that the roles of the two sides were reversed.
I don’t use Afghanistan as an example of anything beyond a colossal waste of human lives and resources, so there’s that.
The SMO is limited in scope for political and strategic reasons, not military ones. Anyone following Putin’s pronouncements would understand his reasons for the label and it’s underlying military components. Were the extent of US involvement in this conflict not the primary issue, the SMO would have appeared very very different in both scope and ferocity, and the timeline would have been severely truncated.
So you are claiming that the Ukrainians are killing far more Russians than the Russians are killing Ukrainians!?
That is what the SMO will look like in the future to most Russians I’m sure.
So are you predicting that the Russians will pull out as soon as they come to realize that all they are achieving is to ruin their economy?
It would look much more like the Soviet debacle in Afghanistan I guess.
Your style of argumentation resembles that of a junior high school member of a debating team.
We’re attempting to hold a discussion in this forum, not score kiddie debating points.
You come up short to an extent that reminds me of the antics of an adolescent.
Good to hear. Then there is hope that if Ukrainians continue to resist, they will get their land back as Russia will eventually pull out. 👍
Invasion is like sex, a pull out is extremely difficult.
If Ukraine is kicking ass, why haven’t they recovered Crimea?
Have anyone claimed that the Ukrainians are kicking ass? From what I read they are mostly putting up very stiff resistance and inflicting severe losses for every square meter they lose. As for taking back territory we have only seen them in action twice.
So perhaps wait to assess their ability on the offensive to the time when they actually get to it.
CNN and some of our think tanks.
So really no one with actual knowledge of what is going on.
You asked him a question and he gave you an answer. His answer was accurate. So, just change the meaning of the question. Classic.
What I did was to point out that if your claim is that there is a general story of the Ukrainians kicking ass then the type of source matters – it does not surprise me that this point was not clear to you.
I am fully prepared to accept the notion that a lot of people with very limited knowledge about the conflict could have claimed or may indeed still be claiming that the Ukrainians are kicking ass – people who know and are closer to the information meanwhile may be impressed by how well the Ukrainians are performing but that is about it.
No serious/competent sources have been promoting the idea that Ukraine could reclaim Crimea not last year and doubtful even this year – and that was the claim of the comment.
So no I did not really change the question, have anyone claimed that the Ukrainians were kicking ass and that to the extent that we were supposed to expect them to take back Crimea by now, the last bit I grant you was implicit – but it should have been very clear to most that without this specification the original comment was pointless.
You: “Have anyone claimed that the Ukrainians are kicking ass?”
Him: “CNN and some of our think tanks.”
“You: So really no one with actual knowledge of what is going on.”
You asked him a question and he gave you an answer. The point that was clear to me was that you found a way to discredit his answer even though it accurately answered your question.
Sure as none of these sources actually claimed that Ukraine was kicking ass to the extent that we were supposed to expect them to push the Russians out of Crimea – it was as indicated a worthless way to try to back up an absurd claim – i.e. that the Ukrainians were disappointing any expectations.
“none of these sources actually claimed that Ukraine was kicking ass to the extent that we were supposed to expect them to push the Russians out of Crimea”
Now you’re adding even more!
“it was as indicated a worthless way to try to back up an absurd claim – i.e. that the Ukrainians were disappointing any expectations.”
And it wasn’t a worthless attempt if you follow our MSM. The Yahoo page I visit every day to get my e-mail had daily proclamations that Ukraine was indeed kicking ass. And I’m sure their sources were the same as where CNN and the ‘think tanks’ gets their info from. His answer was spot on.
No I’m not adding more, it was in the start of the thread – i.e. it was the subject being debated – if you cannot follow a debate why do you even try?
Seriously? You asked:
“Have anyone claimed that the Ukrainians are kicking ass?” And that’s the extent of the subject being debated.
Only to those who cannot read the reply given to the original comment:
If you do not understand what is being debated then that explains why you think that the goalposts are being moved – it is starting to feel like debating Mr. Magoo.
Ok. You answered his question, in part, with:
“Have anyone claimed that the Ukrainians are kicking ass?”
He replied to that part of your question with:
“CNN and some of our think tanks”
At this point Crimea became irrelevant to what we were “debating” about. Even Magoo could see that.
The clue being in part and taken in context – kicking ass is only relevant in the sense as to whether it was meant to imply that we were supposed to expect the Ukrainians would take back Crimea by early 2023 – so no Crimea was always relevant to the debate.
Otherwise it is a mere truism that Ukraine was kicking ass in the Kharkiv offensive and many sources were just right to point this out.
Nah man. I can’t prove your intent, but I’m inclined to believe you took his answer as “in general” and not pertaining to anything specific. And I believe he was only addressing the first part of your comment that asked the question about who said Ukraine was kicking ass.
I cannot speak to how he took my question, I can only say that the unspecified claim that the Ukrainians were kicking ass, is just true, however if you as the commenter wanted use that to imply that we were supposed to be disappointed that they have not taken Crimea then it is just false – as in no one have made the claim that this was the level of ass kicking the Ukrainians were handing out.
So without context this is not a relevant issue – in context I’m just right – i.e. no one have made the claim that the Ukrainians were kicking ass so much so that we should expect them to take Crimea by March 2023 – I do not know for how long you want to try to twist this argument into what it never was – but I’m happy to point out how and where you misread or forget the context or what is/was being debated.
I didn’t misread anything Fonz.
If not then you just do not understand – but then perhaps it is too high a bar to set that you’d be able to understand how debates work?
Him: “If Ukraine is kicking ass, why haven’t they recovered Crimea?”
You: “Have anyone claimed that the Ukrainians are kicking ass? From what I read they are mostly putting up very stiff resistance and inflicting severe losses for every square meter they lose. As for taking back territory we have only seen them in action twice.”
“So perhaps wait to assess their ability on the offensive to the time when they actually get to it.”
There is his question and there is your full reply. First you asked if anyone had claimed that the Ukrainians were kicking ass. Then you proceeded to say that Ukraine was holding its own and then you say that they haven’t attempted to take Crimea as of yet. So, you asked a question that you then answered yourself before adding the part that they haven’t tried any offensive on Ukraine as of yet. There is no way in hell you can try and tell me you were asking about who said Ukraine was kicking ass as it related to them trying to retake Crimea. You answered his question about who said Ukraine was kicking ass separately and then when he answered that part of your question only, you started with the caveats. Context my ass.
So now you are completely aware of the debate he asks why have they not taken Crimea if they are kicking ass
and I respond with have anyone really claimed that they were (to the extent that we were to expect that) – a fairly straight forward exchange – so what is your trouble with this?
Is it that the ‘to the extent that we were to expect that’ was not included????
If so you have to take issue with large sections of people commenting here asking for brevity – it is not hard to understand that this was to be understood from the context – that you and others seem so willing to disregard the context merely reflect your desire to score points rather than actually understanding the debate.
Bullsh*t. You answered each part of his response separately. The first part you explained why Ukraine wasn’t kicking ass after you asked who said Ukraine was kicking ass. And the second paragraph you said they hadn’t tried to take Crimea as of yet. Once he answered your question with “CNN” and “think tanks” it was obvious that he was answering a particular part of your comment and that being the part where you asked who said Ukraine was kicking ass. Why would he say “CNN” and “think tanks” to this:
you: “So perhaps wait to assess their ability on the offensive to the time when they actually get to it.”
That’s all you said about Crimea to his original comment. You separated your comment into two different points. He obviously answered one of them. I guess he didn’t understand your vast debating knowledge either.
The question of whether Ukraine is kicking ass is as I pointed out only interesting in the connection as to whether we were led to believe that they could take back Crimea by March 2023 – otherwise it is a simple fact that they did kick ass in the Kharkiv offensive.
I did not even bother to say that they had not tried to take Crimea yet – I thought this was self evident.
I agree that he answered as if he like you had misunderstood the core of the argument – this did not surprise me as acknowledging that no one had led us to believe the Ukrainians were kicking ass to the extent that we should expect them to take Crimea by March 2023 kind of punctured his absurd argument.
I rest my case.
He didn’t misunderstand the core of the argument. He wasn’t responding to the core of the argument. This is a comment section not a debate. I rest my case.
Exactly – he tried to make the disassociated statement that some sources had indeed claimed that Ukraine was kicking ass – but specifically without context, thus not justifying the basis for his comment that we should think this statement was wrong because they had not yet taken back Crimea – so yes avoiding the core and thus failing to back up his case!
Certainly not the way you are doing it.
He made a comment that was off topic which people on comment sections often do by answering your god damn question. You, being the most motherf*cking anal person on the planet refuse to acknowledge that. I guess you think you’re on a debating team and you just won’t let it go.
No you are being stubborn beyond reason – he made an unsubstantiated implicit claim i.e. that some sources had indicated that Ukraine was kicking ass and we were hence supposed to expect that they could/would have taken Crimea by March 2023 – all I did was to point out that this was not the case.
Since then you have made a lot of fuss about the nature of my answers – failing to take the context into consideration – that is on you!
You are full of sh*t. He answered your f*cking question and was speaking in general terms and you know it. Man you are annoying. So long.
What he did was answer your question. And you know that. But you’re such an anal motherf*cker that you just refuse to accept that, and you pretend you’re involved in some high level debate.
No if you read back my answer to him – you will actually discover that I did not make the point to him that he had failed to take the context into consideration – I took his failure to do so as an admission of the weakness of his argument – it is only with you that I have had the pleasure of fletching out why you are both failing to see the weakness of the point made in the first reply.
I never claimed Ukraine is winning. But I did claim that Russia is not doing as well Doom is claiming? Do you believe Doom’s claims?
No.
I do understand why you think so. It is because we never analyze Russian objectives and Ukrsinian measures to thwart those objectives.
This war was not caused only by abstract military-strategic reasons, such as NATO expansion, but by the post-2014 Kiev regime under control of pro-NATO Banderite ideology and its systemic legal and physical attacks on majority Russian speaking population.
An attempt is made at forcing majority (Russian ethnic and Ukrainian Russian speakers, and other Russian speaking minorities) to speak the language of Catholic West Ukraine as the official Ukrainian language, To achieve that, those populations lost the right to organize, have political parties, hold jobs in Goverment, media. Their businesses confiscated, ie “nationalized”.
I do not think I need to give you a lecture on death squads and their exploits. It is a common knowledge. Massing troups at Donbas region to take it by force and cause mass refugee problem for Russia — was Kiev solution, rejecting Minsk agreement.
What did Russia do to adress rhat? Russia had outsmarted all NATO planners with its faux Kiev move tying Ukrainian forces and , allowing its forces to move swiftly into areas of majority Russian population. Donetsk, Lughansk, Zaporozhie and Kherson. These, while still not fully under Russian control, are strategic. Water source for Crimea was unblocked, Zaporozhie nuclear power plant secured, Aziv Sea secured, preventing Ukrainian sabotage. Land bridge to Crimea established.
If all Russia wanted to do is to check-mate the regime, that would have been easy. But that would have resulted in negotiations , that would only prolong the agony of population that does not want to stay under Kiev regime.
What you see today in this “slow” process are two things. One, pushing Ukrainian army out of the remainder of the 4 Russia annexed regions. No small feat as Ukrainians dug ditches in people’s back yards, and established artillery on apartment building roofs. Like Bakhmut. Bet you never heardcof such things. Russia is practicing a sliw attrition method, Zelenski could care less for those soldiers. Majority of them are from Russian speaking regions anyway, Eventually as in Mariupol, those trapped soldiers will have to go.
Second process going on taking a great deal of time, people and money is rejuvenating anexed areas. Everything from food supplies, infrastructure, banking, medical services, etc.
There are still four more regions that woukd prefer to join Russia. Again, patience. Kiev under the current regine is not likely to agree with Russia’s proposal that Ukraine becomes federated so no region can dominate another.
As Kiev losses are already massive, what us Kiev solution. Praying something happens to Putin? What diference would it make? Russian system of governnance has depth and is childish to think otherwise.
And if Kiev regime stays on on its present course, other regions may follow the four already gone. Patience, thoroughness, awareness of how the conflict affects international relations — are the bywords.
We are accustomed to think of Russia’s actions in tge worst possible light. They are stupid, brutal, underequipped. No possibility of their actions being thought theough, wnd have more noble goals.
We need to let go of assumptions being supplied via nedia. Keep eyes wide open, and scour many sources.
Bianca, you are an in your face Kremlin Propagandist but you already know that.
NATO is the aggressor. Russia should put missiles back in Cuba since NATO puts them on their borders.
US is the new Roman Empire corrupt ruthless and evil.
NATO has not put any missiles in even one of the members that have joined since 1991, and the US has to face the threat that the Russians can have nuclear armed submarines closer to their capital and any place in the US than Cuba is, so why would you think this would change anything?
As for NATO being the aggressor – what part of Ukraine did NATO invade?
You are mistaken we have nuke capable missiles in Poland and we use nuke subs also .US promised it would not recruit former Warsaw Pact nations into NATO or move closer to Russian borders.
If Russia put troops and missiles in Canada and Mexico and Cuba would that be “aggressive”. ? Russia was deliberately provoked by neo-con psychopaths. US has 405 military bases surrounding China and Russia and around the world; how many do they have outside their national boundaries? USA is the new Roman Empire.
nuclear capable is not having nuclear missiles stationed in Poland and the US does not have ballistic missiles capable of reaching e.g. Moscow in Poland so…
The US did not recruit former Warsaw pact nations they applied very much by themselves and they had to qualify to be accepted by the rest of the NATO members.
Not if they did so at the request of the Mexicans the Cubans or the Canadians – but then neither the Mexicans nor the Canadians are ever likely to ask – as for the Cubans, they may ask but I do not think that the US would feel very threatned.
The Russians and the Chinese have few bases outside their territory as few would want their protection – the US has bases in some nations which would rather not have them there, but most nations are actually not very eager to have the US leave – the Philippines have just negotiated to have US bases on their territory and after having the US leave 30 years ago – the fact is that many nations want US bases there to protect them from those very friendly Russians and Chinese.
https://time.com/6252750/philippines-us-military-agreement-china/
I agree with your first three points. As for US bases in foreign countries, many of them are concessions by corrupt regimes seeking perks from the US or by regimes that are more afraid of their own people than external enemies, like Saudi Arabia. The US is the major imperialist nation in the world and has bases in many countries where the regimes don’t reflect the will of the people.
There is a very significant component of this as there is cases like Cuba where it is not even according to the current desire of the government. My point is that this is not the case everywhere – very far from it, and that as the case of the Philippines show quite a few of the nations do not have a horrible experience having hosted such bases and are hence willing to host such bases again when their security situations warants it.
Or to put it a different way – the US bases are very far from always used to keep the domestic population in check – so you might find that a post revolution democratized Saudi Arabia might very well vote to host a US base to keep safe from Iran – it is very far from certain, but under the right threat the problems they have with the US is that they are infidels not that they were patrolling the streets shooting protesters.
Hosted bases bring dollars.
Good story Bro.
OMG. Now you’re on about the Chinese as well?
What have the Chinese ever done to your country?
BTW, I grew up in the 60’s and I can assure you that Amerikkka was very, very upset at the thought of Russian nukes in Cuba. Fortunately we had a leader ( the last one in my memory) with a cooler head.
The Chinese have tried partially successful to curb freedom of speech in my country, NB I only included China because Top Paine mentioned it.
Yes because at the time the ability of submarines to replace land based nukes was at a very limited level – things have changed since then, thus the need to get all up in arms should the Russians station nukes in Cuba is no longer there – at least not from a military standpoint.
Kennedy if not for a very coolheaded Soviet submarine commander willing to break nuclear retaliation protocol, actually provoked what according to Soviet protocol should have resulted in a launch of his nuclear torpedo’s on US war ships.
Are you sure that you would call that cooler heads?
https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2022-10-03/soviet-submarines-nuclear-torpedoes-cuban-missile-crisis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasily_Arkhipov
“US promised it would not recruit former Warsaw Pact nations into NATO or move closer to Russian borders.” Can you show me a link to that treaty?
Nobody ever claimed it was a treaty, and you’ve been shown the actual promises multiple times.
You know it’s a fact. And yet you keep lying about it.
That’s not a good position to keep putting yourself in.
Ken Harper is not lying. He is reiterating that there was never a promise by the US that a responsible head of state could have relied on. The only four ways to bind future US governments are treaties, acts of Congress, contracts or constitutional amendments. Any promise by the executive branch can be revoked by a new administration or even by the sameadministration that made the promise.
Gorbachev is arguably the greatest statesman of the 20th century. But he made a colossal blunder in taking Baker’s and Kohl’s word without insisting that their promise be enacted by treaty or an act of Congress or the Reichstag. It could have been a bilateral treaty between the US and USSR or an act of Congress committing the US to block the accession of any east European country to NATO.
There are no promises from US officials that anyone other than a fool would rely on. Try to keep up.
So you are saying that the Russians were fools – or are you saying that they knew very well that they could not trust NATO to reject former east block countries when these very likely were going to apply to become members
“The only four ways to bind future US governments are treaties, acts of Congress, contracts or constitutional amendments.”
Remember the War Powers Resolution? Always good for laughs to hear someone intone about US laws relating to combat.
Where is the Promise Evidence?
Come on Tom. It was never promised.
Never on paper. I can say Putin promised never to invade Ukraine but in reality, he said he would not invade, he never promised it though.
But i must be lying on this subject as usual.
https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017-12-12/nato-expansion-what-gorbachev-heard-western-leaders-early
Try reading it this time.
Your own source makes it fairly clear that the Russians were not promised anything – they were led to believe – far from the same thing!
Did you stop reading there? I wonder why he was “led to believe” that wouldn’t happen. Maybe by the repeated assurances in those documents? So, we’re down to semantics? They weren’t “promised” but they were given assurances that Gorbachev used as selling points to the hardliners. It must just have been Gorby’s gullibility.
That was/is rather the point – this did not even amount to a promise – so not a treaty nor a promise but merely assurances. Given that others have here stated that only fools would trust a US promise, what does it tell you that the Russians accepted mere assurances, I do not think the Russians are/were fools, but that they knew that a NATO attack was not a big threat and hence that these countries joining NATO did not matter so much to them.
assurance: 1. a positive declaration intended to give confidence. 2. a promise or pledge.
Yes, just merely assurances. And since the US word is sh*t, it’s the Russian’s fault for taking their word. Plus, they didn’t bitch when countries they didn’t think posed a threat joined NATO, so they had no right to bitch about those that they thought posed serious security threats were seeking membership (Georgia, Ukraine). I guess if you try hard enough you can convince even yourself that NATO encroachment being a threat was just a figment of Russia’s imagination.
Why is Georgia joining NATO a bigger threat than the Baltic countries??
The reason that countries joining NATO is not a threat is that Russia has a very significant nuclear arsenal – NATO was never going to invade Russia, they simply have nothing to gain from such a move. I’m sure that the Russian MIC and top management had good reasons to promote the idea that they were threatened – but even when military chances were at their best in 1991-3 NATO did not invade.
In early 2022 when the political perspectives are at their best as in the most public backing for direct involvement, NATO bend over backwards to avoid direct involvement – so no there was never a real threat of a NATO invasion of Russia.
So, you had to drop the no promise argument and move on to something else? Since assurances actually mean promises, you can no longer run with that. So, it’s back to there being no threatening actions from the US/NATO and it’s all a figment of their imagination.
No there was no promise words were said that could have led the Russians to believe that no eastern block countries would be entering NATO. What I further did was to reply to the rest of the comment – assurances does not man promises, it means assurances – as in we can assure you (the Russians) that we will not seek to enroll any of the eastern block countries in NATO.
Which they did not, they did however not refuse these countries to join if the applied – so an assurance is very different from a promise that they would not join. And for the record it is not back to there ‘being no threatening actions from the US/NATO‘, because there has been several threatening actions – none however that would indicate preparation for an invasion.
assurance: 1. a positive declaration intended to give confidence. 2. a promise or pledge.
I guess I have to post WEBSTERS definition again. The one you’re trying to twist yourself into a pretzel denying. And to do that you throw out the word “enroll” even though it is you that keeps pointing out that NATO membership is applied for so there is no such thing as enrollment. But in order to downplay “assurances” you had to find another way to make your case. So now, the assurances were made only if those eastern bloc countries were enrolled but not if they applied. Absolutely f*cking ridiculous.
Exactly in this case a positive declaration intended to give confidence – demonstrably not a promise or pledge.
You seem to have problems understanding the difference.
Ah, now a “positive declaration”. Had to move away from “merely assurances”.
I understand you keep trying to avoid what the word “assurance” means.
Assurances does as the definition you provided yourself not mean promises – it can equally mean: a positive declaration intended to give confidence – which is not the same as a promise – and will not look like it if committed to paper – so the US declaring that they were not going to recruit – is an assurance, but it is not a broken promise when they allow the nations to apply and join by themselves.
I see. Now we are to assume expansion eastward was acceptable to Russia as long as it wasn’t a result of those eastern countries joining NATO because of US recruitment. Expansion by enrollment, er I mean application would be acceptable. Got it.
Yes funnily enough we are to assume that the Russians actually accepted that the nations of the eastern block were sovereign – you know allowed to make their own decisions, and they had to accept that but wanted assurances that the US would not exploit this to strong arm these nations to join NATO.
Are you trying to convince yourself of that or me? Try reading the link again and tell me how you came to that conclusion. It isn’t stated or implied. And it isn’t limited to US officials.
https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017-12-12/nato-expansion-what-gorbachev-heard-western-leaders-early
Try quoting the parts where you see a smoking gun (i.e. a place where there are actual promises that NATO would not accept applications from former east block countries.
I’m not going to quote anything. I mean, you are unbelievable. Most people at least acknowledge that there were assurances made as to “not once inch eastward”. Most just go with nothing was in writing so it isn’t binding but that isn’t good enough for you. You say you’re not a US citizen, but you certainly sound like one. And one of those that just can’t admit that the United States did not keep its word. Whether written or spoken, there were assurances made and they were flat ass ignored. But hey, I give, it was just a declaration of something or other. You win. Now take your debating trophy and move along.
I also admit that there were assurances made – how is that not evident from what I write??? As for the assurances being ignored – it took 7-8 years before any of the nations in question joined NATO – so more than a policy cycle.
First you said no promise. Then you said, “merely assurances”. When I pointed out assurance means promise, then merely assurance was downgraded to a “positive declaration intended to give confidence”. So sure, you were right on board with assurances.
And ending the cold war and the dissolving of the USSR should have merited a little more than a “policy cycle”. It should have been etched in stone.
But assurances does not mean the same as promises – as your first source indeed pointed out!
If it should then it was certainly the duty of the Soviets to get the important stuff codified in treaties.
What “first” source? I only posted one. You really have a problem with the definition of assurance for some odd reason. An assurance is a promise or a pledge. And especially in the case of “not one inch eastward”.
Yeah, shame on the Soviets for taking someone at their word.
Your decision to call me a liar has put me in an interesting position. I have decided a while back ago to not engage in senseless name calling with people. It is just counter productive and not worth my time. So when someone insults me like you did by calling me a liar, I simply hit the ignore button and move on. Which I would do with you except your suppose be some type moderator. Obviously not a good one, because a good one would not insult someone. So my question is to you, what happens if I hit the ignore button for a person who is classified as a moderator? I assume that you can still see my comments which is part of your job, but I can not see yours. Is that correct?
I’m not sure how the ignore button works in that respect. I SUSPECT it would mean that I can’t see your comments on the web site, but can see them in the moderation space (which is where I look at comments anyway).
The function of a moderator is to enforce guidelines. Antiwar.com’s guidelines don’t forbid personal insults, or you’d have already been long gone anyway. So the fact that you feel personally insulted by me noticing you lying isn’t really relevant to me being a moderator.
Thank you for your honest reply. I will be shortly putting you on my ignore list. As I understand it, I hope you realize that I can no longer read your comments so replying to my comments will have no meaning to me.
That’s your call to make. Go with God, etc.
But, keep in mind that I will likely still reply to your comments when I find them interesting, and others will see those replies.
US devious to not put in treaty try reading a bit numerous officials
from Bush administration agreed if Russia let the Soviet Union break up NATO would not expand.
You are not naïve enough to believe the US doesn’t lie through its teeth about everything I hope. And US breaks treaties constantly.
Try Lew Rockwell site or Antiwar.com to broaden your Overton Window or Ron Paul.
Tom I get what you saying, but it is important to understand that there is major difference between a treaty than a promise by a President. Presidents change. For example Trump promise to build a wall. When Biden became the President that promise ended. Obama made an agreement with Iran, not a treaty. Trump cancel that agreement. To whine that a new President did not honor an older President is just nor relative and certainly not a reason to start a war.
Come on man lol what would US do if Russia and China put their military on the borders of Mexico and Canada and nukes in Cuba?
Presidents and treaties are all BS when faced with real actions.
NATO is the aggressor.
NATO invaded Kiev, they overthrew the Government in a violent bloody coup. NATO shot and murdered police and civilians in the Maidan. Brian Christopher Boyenger a US Trooper ran a crew of 50 NATO snipers in the Ukraina Hotel.
Viktor Yanukovych the elected President fled for his life to Russia, he fled from the NATO Nazi’s who were going to assassinate him.
NATO then started a campaign of ethnic cleansing and genocide of the ethnic Russians in the Donbass. Brian Christopher Boyenger was embedded with the Right Secter and Azov Nazi’s committing atrocities in the Donbass, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
NATO took over the attack on Russia after Ukraine was defeated in March 2022. Boris Johnson cancelled peace and committed NATO to war against Russia.
Except that was not what happened not even according to the Russians involved – you should know this:
It’s a case of the very pro Russians agents admitting that they were behind it – I can find many more such admissions and I should remind the possibly ignorant readers that Igor Girkin was elevated to serve as Minister of Defence of the Donetsk People’s Republic so not a nobody in this!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_Girkin
And finally there was no NATO troops in Ukraine starting any ethnic cleansing!
Grammar is our friend. Try to use it properly.
So you are a grammar Nazi – good to know!
I have to agree with you on this. Grammar should not get in the way of your misguided world views.
This video should be posted each time the pro Russia folks here bring up the 2014 coup that ‘started’ the war.
“NATO invaded Kiev” They did? I missed that bit of news.
with subterfuge and funding to help implement the violent coup that overthrew the peaceful democratically elected government.
Wow- the Ukraine’s “relationship” with NATO/USA has really done wonders for it, hasn’t it? If the Coup of 2014 hadn’t been perpetrated by the USA, there would be peace and prosperity now, not death and destruction. It looks like someone in the Ukraine made the “wrong” decision when picking friends! With friends like NATO/USA, who needs enemies?
It wasn’t as amply proven by the following elections and the support the current government enjoys – not the kind of support foreign imposed governments most often enjoys – remember e.g. Afghanistan.
Good of you to let it slip that this was indeed the decision of the Ukrainians – add to this that you do not think that they should have the sovereignty to make such a choice without having Putin invading and you may get a picture of why it is so many support the Ukrainians.
They should be free to chose their friends with whom they want to align and trade without facing a Russian invasion – you are here arguing that it is right to invade a foreign country because of the choices their population have taken – pretty damned pathetic on an anti war site.
Write your Congressman and tell them to lift all sanctions on all nations because “they should be free to choose their friends. Stop using economy as a weapon.
I’m not a US citizen, and I did not argue that Russia did not have the freedom to apply sanctions to Ukraine – as the US did to Cuba – applying sanctions is much the same as having the freedom to chose with whom you want to trade and with whom you do not want to trade.
You seem to have confused the freedom to chose with whom you want to trade with the right to invade – these are two very different things!
Michael, have you eaten too many of Nuland’s cookies? You appear to be on a sugar high…
I get that you don’t do history. Try someplace beyond the NYT and other satellite mouthpieces for the CIA et al.
Find me just one link that shows that NATO has put nukes in one of the countries which joined post 1991. Or just one that proves that NATO or the US attacked either Ukraine or Russia at any time between 2013 and 2022 – just one will do!
Otherwise we can surmise that it is you who do neither facts nor history.
Another Anti-American shows up to comment.
So you were 100% for all of Trump’s policies or were you anti-American?
Not much anti-American as anti Nazi and anti-stupidity. What did Stoltenburg & Zelensky think would happen when Russia had 140,000 troops on Ukraine border and asked for negotiations about a NATO membership for Ukraine, & Stoltenburg said “No negotiations with you”. What other choice did Putin have but to force the issue. You don’t seem to remember what JFK did. He told the Russians to get their missile out of Cuba, or we would.They negotiated and a compromise was arranged, not a shot was fired and no one died. It could have been so in Ukraine, but they refused to address Moscows concerns and war was the result. It would have been ir-responsible for Putin to allow NATO to get a first strike advantage by allowing Ukraine to join NATO and they put missiles on their border too close to Moscow to allow time for Moscow to launch a response to being attacked.
The poster is immune from logic.
The poster is a fucking idiot.
Love the Constitutional America hate the GAE. (Global American Empire) Hate US ruling class love We The People. I didn’t see you at J6. Or are we anti American terrorists? lol
War is anti-American, doesnt serve US interests.
Cut war spending to $50b annually.
I’m OK with spending $50b annually to support Ukraine. A little high, but OK.
Total, not category Ukraine. You’d have to bring all troops back, close all foreign bases, cut significantly.
It is not long ago that I read analyses which claimed that the Russians would be out of rockets soon.
Then I remembered the miracle of the production of the T32 tank during WW2.
That is why these analysts were wrong.
Lies, lies, and more lies that are shown in this video.
Yes it is clearly evidenced by the ever increasing Russian use of missiles, which was completely able to effectively curb Ukrainian electricity production – oh wait no that was not the case, so just perhaps it is true that they are now nearly reduced use missiles at about the rate of production – i.e. they have depleted their stock of missiles to a level beyond which they do not want to deplete them.
“They’ve depleted their stock of missiles” is one plausible explanation. But it’s not the only one.
Another plausible explanation is “they have plenty of missiles but haven’t yet figured out how to (or if they even can) use them to real military advantage in this particular conflict.”
Pretty much all the news coverage of military happenings in Ukraine is narrative shaped by the side the outfits covering those happenings favors. Whenever one side takes some action, that side’s supporters brag about how successful it was in this or that respect, while the other side’s supporters snort that it’s a big nothingburger.
My impression — and it’s only my impression — is that Russian missile strikes on “Ukrainian infrastructure” haven’t tipped any significant military balances, and that the civilian casualties involved are more likely a function of Ukrainian air defenses intercepting those missiles and knocking them off course than of an intention to inflict those casualties, or to create terror/panic. But that doesn’t really tell us anything about how many missiles the Russians have. They could have plenty, and only using a few to rattle Ukraine’s cage at the moment, while planning to use a lot more of them in coordination with a coming ground offensive.
They were on a winning streak in November 2022 – as in had they kept up the intensity or just elevated it slightly then the Ukrainians would not have been able to keep up with the repair works – the Russians did however not keep up the level but instead allowed it to drop off to the degree that there was no serious implications in Ukraine.
Had your explanation been the truth then why did they continue wasting missiles as long as they did on a venture that was not worth the expense? – Notice that I’m not claiming that the strikes were a nothing burger, but that they were indeed a mortal threat to the electricity grid and one that had it been kept up at a just slightly elevated level or even just at the level of November would have caused a collapse in the electricity network.
The strikes were primarily directed at the electricity network – the goal which was within their grasp had they kept up the level of successful strikes for just about a month more, was clearly not achieved.
I concur – anything different would require that I thought the Russians completely incompetent – I do not.
Given that it was a near public knowledge that the Ukrainians were on the brink of a complete collapse – it would be quite remarkable if the Russians just let them off the hook at that very late stage, basically making the strikes up until then a complete waste of missiles.
I sincerely doubt that they had so any as to take the Ukrainian electricity network to the brink of collapse – only then to decide that this was just a threat and keeping a huge reserve for a later offensive – especially as they used so many resources trying to finally take Bakhmut only to fail at the last minute before the one year anniversary.
I could be wrong, but if I am I would think that there will be a significant amount of Russian widows and cripples who would quite rightly be very angry at the priorities.
I consider these barrage of missile strikes as knock on door. Will Ukraine finally open the door?
More Fog of War claim/counter claims: