Ukrainian Tochka-U Missile Killed Dozens At Kramatorsk Train Station

The current top headline of the New York Times is:

Live Updates: Russia Strikes Train Station, Ukraine Says, as Thousands Flee From East

“Dozens” were feared dead and injured, a local official said, after a missile strike in Kramatorsk, which had been a main point of evacuation for people trying to leave eastern Ukraine.

CNN quotes an Ukrainian military official who described it as an Iskander missile strike:

Two missiles struck the station, according to the head of Ukraine's national rail system, Oleksandr Kamyshin. Pavlo Kyrylenko, the head of Donetsk regional military administration, said the Russian military used Iskander short-range ballistic missiles.

A pro-Ukrainian twitter account also describes this as a result of the missile attack (the time stamp is UTC+2):

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The same account describes this as the remains of the booster section of the missile that hit the train station:

Cont. reading: Ukrainian Tochka-U Missile Killed Dozens At Kramatorsk Train Station

U.S. 'Intelligence' Says Its 'Intelligence' Is Bullshit

U.S. 'intelligence' folks tell their stenographers at NBC News that their obvious lies are obvious lies.

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That announced 'break with the past' of faking 'intelligence' happened when?

How 'rock solid' was the 'intelligence' about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction or chemical weapons attacks in Douma, Syria?

U.S. 'intelligence', then and now, is pure imagination for the purpose of deceiving the U.S. and 'western' public about the reality of this or that conflict:

Cont. reading: U.S. 'Intelligence' Says Its 'Intelligence' Is Bullshit

Ukraine Open Thread 2022-42

Only news & views related to the Ukraine conflict ...

Open Thread 2022-41 (Not Ukraine)

News and views NOT related to Ukraine ...

If The Pentagon Can Not Confirm The Bucha Tales, Who Can?

This was the most important one of yesterday's news items.

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Pentagon can't independently confirm atrocities in Ukraine's Bucha, official says

WASHINGTON, April 4 (Reuters) - The U.S. military is not in a position to independently confirm Ukrainian accounts of atrocities by Russian forces against civilians in the town of Bucha, ...
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"The Pentagon can't independently and single handedly confirm that, but we're also not in any position to refute those claims."

If the Pentagon, which includes the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency, could not confirm what the government in Kiev claimed, who else could?

Certainly not the European minions who reacted to those dubious claims by removing more Russian embassy personal from their countries.

The U.S. is again pushing the Europeans into suiciding their economies. The U.S. would of course be the only country that would gain from that.

Its over. The Ukraine has lost the war. Its navy, air force and defense industry no longer exist. The Russia air force is doing hundreds of bombing runs per night eliminating any fuel and ammunition depot that is left in Ukraine.

Without fuel tanks and trucks are immobilized. Without ammunition artillery falls silent. The heavy Ukrainian units along Donbas are now unable to do maneuver warfare. They can not even flee. Replenishment and reserves are unable to reach them. They have the choice of giving up or getting destroyed in place.

Anyone who is still pushing more weapons into Ukraine or tells Kiev to prolong the war is putting more Ukrainian lives at risk for zero potential gain.

That's criminal.

Parliament Moves, Elections Let Empire Losses Accumulate

Yesterday saw three important political events, each with an outcome that is unsatisfactory for the U.S. and its European sidekicks.

In Pakistan the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) party had left the government coalition. Additionally some members of prime minister Imran Khan's PTI party had change sides. The opposition in the parliament was preparing a no-confidence vote against him. At the same time a report by the Pakistani ambassador to the U.S. said that U.S. officials had warned that Pakistan would stay on their enemy list as long as Imran Khan was left in his position.

This was understood to be a call for regime change with rumored bribes pushing the swing votes against Khan.

Yesterday the deputy speaker of the parliament did not allow the no-confidence vote to take place. Imran Khan then asked the president of Pakistan to dissolve the parliament and announced new elections within 90 days.

The case is now in the hands of the supreme court of Pakistan which, after a session today, will continue to hear the case tomorrow.

It seems likely that the supreme court will make a 'wise' decision, blame everyone and agree to new elections.

It will then be the voters who will have to decide mainly on an issue of Pakistan's foreign policy. Should it be independent and friendly with China and Russia or should it change back to the U.S. side?

I haven't found any recent polls from Pakistan but a few days ago Khan's party had won the local elections in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The people may well be impressed with his position and give him their vote.

As usual in Pakistan the military, who's leadership tends to be pro-U.S., may intervene though I doubt that it will have sufficient public support for it.

In Hungary Prime Minister Viktor Orban has won his fourth election with his party again gaining a two-thirds majority. Hungary is in the EU and in NATO but Orban has his own ways and is friendly with Russia's president Vladimir Putin:

Cont. reading: Parliament Moves, Elections Let Empire Losses Accumulate

The Bucha Provocation

The Bucha 'Russian' atrocities propaganda onslaught may have worked well in the 'west' but it lacks evidence that Russia had anything to do with it.

The former Indian ambassador M.K. Bhadrakumar calls it an outright fake:

An indignant Moscow has angrily demanded a United Nations Security Council meeting on Monday over the allegations of atrocities by Russian troops in areas around Kiev through the past month. Prima facie, this allegation is fake news but it can mould misperceptions by the time it gets exposed as disinformation.

A Tass report says: “The Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday that the Russian Armed Forces had left Bucha, located in the Kiev region, on March 30, while “the evidence of crimes” emerged only four days later, after Ukrainian Security Service officers had arrived in the town. The ministry stressed that on March 31, the town’s Mayor Anatoly Fedoruk had confirmed in a video address that there were no Russian troops in Bucha. However, he did not say a word about civilians shot dead on the street with their hands tied behind their backs.”

Even more surprising is that within minutes of the “breaking news”, western leaders — heads of state, foreign ministers, former politicians — popped up with statements duly kept ready and only based on the videos, seconds-long videos and a clutch of photos, ready to pour accusations. No expert opinion was sought, no forensic work was done, no opportunity given to the accused to be heard.

I had yesterday, at 15:09 UTC, posted a timeline of the events in Bucha on Twitter. Here is an expanded version.

Cont. reading: The Bucha Provocation

The MoA Week In Review - OT 2022-40

Last week's posts at Moon of Alabama:

• Mar 28 - Ukraine - Smoke And Mirrors Around Poisonous Peace Talks
• Mar 29 - Ukraine SitRep - Part II Of Russia's Military Operation Unfolds
• Mar 23 - More Sanctions On Russia Will Destroy Europe
• Mar 25 - Propaganda Does Not Change The War - The Ukraine Is Still Losing - Updated
  Related:
  - Donbass still remains key battleground - Indian Punchline
  - This month will decide world politics for next 30+ years - Dreizin Report
  - We Seriously Underestimated Russia; Our Own Propaganda is Killing Us - Reading Junkie

Propaganda:

• Gonzalo Lira proves without doubt that four different Ukrainian propaganda clips with different actors were all filmed at the exact same location, a 'battlefield' with several long destroyed Ukrainian tanks --> Propaganda BTFO (video)
• Yesterday evening a Ukrainian station showed a video of Ukrainian troops driving through Bucha, north of Kiev, with several 'dead' people lying in the street allegedly 'killed by Russians'. There are two difficulties with these claims:
  - One of the dead appears to move his arm: video
  - Bucha was declared 'completely liberated' of Russian troops by its mayor on Thursday, March 31. Are we to believe it would take three days for such an 'incriminating' video to come out? Or that those 'dead' were lying there for three days with no one bothering?

• Mar 31 - Then I Woke Up And Saw This. WTF?
  Related:
  - The two inch of snow in my backyard are gone.
  - Biden's job approval falls to lowest level of his presidency amid war and inflation fears - NBC News
  - Inside Hunter Biden’s multimillion-dollar deals with a Chinese energy company - Washington Post
  - Scoop: FEC fines DNC and Clinton for Trump dossier hoax - Washington Examiner
  - Joe Biden flying too close to the son - NY Post
  - “Jettison the Animals!” - Kunstler

• Mar 31 - Twitter Fun With Dan Rivers
• Apr 1 - Europe Must Learn To Cheat On Its Sanctions (Just Like The U.S. Is Doing It)
  Related:
  - US carves out mechanism for insulating Russian fertilizer exports from sanctions - India Times
  - Source: Germany withdrew some Russian metals from sanctions - MKRU (in Russian)

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Other issues:

Cont. reading: The MoA Week In Review - OT 2022-40

Ukraine Open Thread 2022-39

Only news & views related to the Ukraine conflict ...

Europe Must Learn To Cheat On Its Sanctions (Just Like The U.S. Is Doing It)

The European Union and China will hold a virtual summit today. Before the summit started Brussels has strewn rumors that it would pressure China to not support Russia.

China is of course rejecting any pressure and retaliates by pointing out Europe's weak strategic autonomy:

Hours before the China-EU leaders' meetings on Friday, Chinese analysts warned that China-EU relations cannot be kidnapped by the Ukraine crisis, and Europe should no longer be abducted by the US in foreign policy, as it will greatly undermine the EU's own interests, making it difficult to ensure economic recovery and people's livelihood, and runs counter to Europe's aim of pursuing strategic independence.
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As the Russia-Ukraine conflict stretches to over a month, Europe has sustained great pressure resulting from sanctions against Russia and its over-reliance on US-led NATO security structure.

"The EU is now kidnapped by the US on security, but that does not conform to the strategic independence EU has pursued," [Cui Hongjian, director of the Department of European Studies at the China Institute of International Studies] said.

To avoid being caught in hot water again, the EU must take control of its own destiny. And developing ties with China provides the EU an opportunity to develop in a more balanced and comprehensive way in the long term, he said.

Its reliance on the U.S./NATO is Europe's core strategic weakness. The U.S. has used it to infiltrate Europe's decision making structures.

Cont. reading: Europe Must Learn To Cheat On Its Sanctions (Just Like The U.S. Is Doing It)