On The Upcoming Putin Speech And Announcements

September 20, 2022

Moscow has made a decision how to proceed in the proxy war with NATO in the Ukraine.

We do not yet know what the decision is.

The President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin will hold a TV speech at 8 pm Moscow time (17:00 UTC) followed by an announcement by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

In July Putin has held a press conference or speech where he said with regards to Ukraine something like: "We haven't even started yet."

It may be that Russia will do that now.

That a decision had been made was noticeable.

Yesterday the parliaments of the Luhansk and Donetz People's Republics suddenly requested their government to immediately launch referendums about the republics accession to the Russian Federation. Today Denis Pushilin, the head of of the DNR government, announced that a referendum will be held on September 23 to 27.

Also yesterday the Russian parliament introduced amendments to the Russian Criminal Code which will increase the prison penalties for 'voluntary surrender', 'looting', 'non-fulfillment of military orders' during a time of mobilization, martial law and war. Companies who reject to produce for the military will also be penalized. The amendments passed their second reading in parliament today and will become law after a third reading.

If the LNR and DPR vote to become part of Russia, and if Russia accepts it, any attack of them will be an act of war against Russia. The 'Special Military Operation', which Russia is currently proceeding with, would thus change into something way more serious. Russia could declare the conflict to be a war. It could then use conscripts in war functions, mobilize reserves and use its full arsenal against the Ukraine. Potentially also against those who support it with weapons and other war material.

I find this whole seemingly hasty process atypical for Putin's usual way.

My hunch is that Russia received information over some weapon systems the U.S. is secretly providing to the Ukraine. This could be missiles with several hundred kilometer range or other types of weapons that could seriously threaten Russia's towns and cities.

If so, Russia has to do something now to end the war before its becomes more than a nuisance for Russia and its people. Ending means of course by winning it.

Training up a mobilization force takes about three months. It would put it on the front in the mid of winter, a season during which Russian forces can operate quite well.

Posted by b on September 20, 2022 at 16:32 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Declan Hayes writes about Europe’s Road to Serfdom, “The European Central Bank’s Zimbabwean Model”. Here’s his opening:

Though the function of European, German, Japanese and Zimbabwean central banks is to enable the credibility and efficiency of the financial side of their respective economies so that the real side of their economies may achieve the nation’s broader macro economic goals, NATO’s central banks have obviously and disastrously abandoned those tasks for reasons this article makes apparent. Because Zimbabwe, like Germany’s Weimar Republic before it, has reached annual inflation rates of 90 sextillion per cent a year, Europe should not be emulating the financial and economic basket case of Harare.
Whatever about Zimbabwe, Germany has been famously down this road before and, in a total reversal of earlier post-war policies, seems determined to traverse it again. The European Central Bank, based in Frankfurt, is printing euros as quickly as their colleagues in Zimbabwe are printing Zimbabwean dollars, as the Confederates printed their Greybacks and as Weimar printed their famously worthless marks.
Although Weimar’s woes were many, two of the most pertinent were that the Kaiser borrowed immensely to fund his armies, whose victories were supposed to enable him to repay his nation’s debts, and that the Western allies bled defeated Germany’s resources dry, thus opening the way for Herr Hitler once Weimar fell. Europe’s central banks are following this very policy today. They are doling out billions to ease energy bills, to bribe farmers and, most notoriously, to feed the money laundering Ponzi scheme that is Zelensky’s Kiev junta. The money supply, at more than 15 trillion euros, is at record levels and real interest rates are in negative terrain, pauperizing pensioners but failing to kick start their fuel starved economies. Inflation,.Germany’s bane, is again on the march as too far much money is in search of far too few bags of fire wood; and English toilet paper has increased in price by 50% in the last few months, Albion is really in squeaky bum time.
As the European Central Bank’s leaders presently have no other card to play, they must think their printing presses are enough to prevail in Ukraine and to allow Europeans to both eat and heat themselves this winter. Not only is that wishful thinking on the part of ECB President Christine Lagarde, the ‘multi cultural’ Parisian, who previously fronted the IMF and who held senior Ministerial positions in the French government but it betrays her fundamental ignorance about monetary policy.

And he concludes thusly:
“And so, Europe is at a crossroads, where the path of the World Economic Forum, NATO and the European Central Bank is Hayek’s Road to Serfdom with all the horrors impoverished Africa, Syria, Iraq and Yemen have endured, and the alternative path that is taking root in Russia, China, Iran and Latin America can also be ours if we can rid ourselves of our ECB, EC and WEF lords and ladies. In the one, we will own nothing and will, like tame dogs, learn to love our nothingness. In the other, if we work for it, we at least have the hope of living as free citizens and, as the Dutch farmers are showing, that is something worth opposing von der Leyen, Lagarde, Stoltenberg and Europe’s other Quislings and the perches they pontificate from.”
Crooke is so much softer on the hysteria, but does that softness accurately reflect reality?

Posted by: karlof1 | Sep 21 2022 0:54 utc | 201

The postponement of “the speech” might be a teaser, vis a vis, “pee tapes” or the equivalent or worse, on every goldang US president still living. All compromised on “Putin’s” video.
The kompromat on these, plus every high profile US Senator and House Representative would shake the very foundations of society worldwide.
Think about Epstein, The Maxwell’s, Nygard, Brunel, Jimmy Saville…
The scandals – all buried. ignored. And lots of dead potential witnesses.
Ferchrissakes the only photos you see of a happy Charles are when he yucks it up with Saville. Giddy with laughter. The only times the man cracks a smile!
For example.

Posted by: Chaka Khagan | Sep 21 2022 1:10 utc | 202

Thank you for your quote and analysis/synopsis of Crooke’ . I agree fully with what you and Crooke say. I feel it more than I can put in words. But I was grasping for those words when I was watching the funeral of the Qeeen Elizabeth. It was “visceral” for me to see this Western world fading away, but certain eternal (really?) symbolisms remain.
I tried to comment about those observations to my wife – and I probably failed, but a small piece may have gotten through to her (for reasons which go beyond this note).
Posted by: fanto | Sep 20 2022 23:46 utc | 182
I honestly have to confess, if confess is the right word, that I am so sick and tired of hearing about the dead Queen. My wife watched every minute of the whole affair, from the announcement of her death until they delivered her body to its final hole in the floor. I am sure that she was a grand old lady, despite all the evil that her Kingdom had done during her 70-year reign. She loved dogs and horses, and that said a lot for her as a human being as far as I am concerned. She had little to no political power to change the policies that the termites in the UK Parliament were doing to the people of the Commonwealth, or in places like Vietnam, Iraq, Libia, and Iran, or Northern Ireland. So, what is the point of all the celebration for Royalty with no powers. The queen is dead, Long live the Queen.

Posted by: Guernica | Sep 21 2022 1:13 utc | 203

Maybe Erdogan has exited the reservation again. And so soon too.
https://thecradle.co/Article/News/15933

On the sidelines of the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan criticized his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin for the military operation in Ukraine and demanded that Russia returns all of the occupied lands, including Crimea, to its “rightful owners.”
The President made the comments during an interview with PBS NewsHour on 20 September, just days after being photographed walking arm in arm with Putin at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Uzbekistan.
When asked if Russia should be allowed to keep Crimea in a negotiated end to the war, Erdogan answered that the people of Crimea are in part Turkish descendants.
“If you were to take this step forward, if you could leave us, you would also be relieving the Crimean Tatars and Ukraine as well. That’s what we have always been saying,” the president said.

Fantasies of return to the grand Ottoman Empire. Sheesh this clown is such a ridiculous, murderous distraction.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 1:17 utc | 204

this will be like when gaza voted hamas about 15 years ago except the outcome won’t a surprise to anyone (that one was another US “intel” “success”.)
all the naive “democracy” fetishists will shit their diapers, the “democracy” cynics who just use voting to virtue signal will bitch about “rigging” and the parade will move on. unless there really is a “game changer” (67th time is the charm!) the russians have no reason to escalate. winter will do it for them.

Posted by: the pair | Sep 21 2022 1:18 utc | 205

Take *that* Putin:
(It’s schadenfreude to see one of the yapping chihuahuas now yelping in pain
Ewa Krukowska. @E_Krukowska
My favorite bakery in Warsaw has just closed for good. Exorbitant energy costs and an increase in taxes (social contributions) introduced this year. With inflation in Poland at 16% y/y, this crisis will mean a much bigger challenge for the govt than tackling an energy crunch.
Also on twitter:
Holger Zschaepitz. @Schuldensuehner. Peak #inflation? Not in #Germany! German Consumer Prices (CPI) are likely to rise further after Producer Prices (PPI) increased by almost 46% in August, the strongest increase since 1949. [graph…to the moooooon^]
All retweets @javierblas
https://twitter.com/javierblas

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 1:23 utc | 206

karlof1 | Sep 20 2022 22:52 utc | 162 wrote:
“Some see the world fracturing into two blocs…a Neoliberal bloc led by Outlaw US Empire and its vassals, and the RoW arranged as a Socialist-Industrial bloc…”. Essentially a Zero-sum bloc versus a Win-Win bloc. How long such a configuration can exist is unknown…”
Once one sees this, one can no longer stand aside, insouciant. Therefore, the Zero-sum neo-Liberal bloc do everything they can to prevent anyone from seeing this.

Posted by: Clover | Sep 21 2022 1:28 utc | 207

Guernica #205

She had little to no political power to change the policies that the termites in the UK Parliament were doing to the people of the Commonwealth, or in places like Vietnam, Iraq, Libia, and Iran, or Northern Ireland. So, what is the point of all the celebration for Royalty with no powers. The queen is dead, Long live the Queen.

This queen of the englanders was a warmongers whore.
The titular head of the anglican church had immense power in her lone voice to urge the people to respect their messiah and to refuse to covet their neighbour’s possessions and wives, to accept and respond to the messiah’s edict ‘thou shall not kill’.
This single person held immense power to lead her people to a place of prosperity through peaceful coexistence, peace making and post colony prosperity on a global scale, and influencing the power mongering of englander merchants and political forces to build a polity and economy of christian sharing.
She failed to maintain and foster the peace of the world when she had the immense power to do so. She had an entire adult life exercising crime against humanity through her silence and complicity.
So you tell me she loved dogs and horses. Puke.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 1:29 utc | 208

uncle tungsten@160…notice the Referendum that was cancelled, and to be held later, is now front and centre, to be held in three days…..the Russians know the Ukies have a big attack planned for Sept 24th…..the main vote will be over on the 23rd….Ukies attacking on the 24th will be attacking Russia…….ouch!
Cheers M
Dima mentioned Ukies are very angry with this vote…..guess they’ve been going to the beach for the past six months, missed the memo.

Posted by: sean the leprechaun | Sep 21 2022 1:30 utc | 209

sean the leprechaun #211
re September 24.
All the more reason to consider how much effort Russia and the militias put in to attenuating/destroying the Uke capacity in the next 3 days. My confidence in a good outcome will be increased if I observe action NOW.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 1:36 utc | 210

Guernica 200
Iran 1953, Chile 1973 (on September 11th…..are they taking the piss?), Imran Khan (the other day), Philippines, Nicaragua, Cuba, Angola, Ukron 2014, ) Australia 1975- even one of their own! etc, etc…….Cuba (again) last year, Belarus 6 months prior…..El Salvador, Honduras, Operation Gladio throughout Europaland, Operation Condor- Latin/Central America…..and that’s just off the top of my head.
Venezuela…..how many times since the new millennium?

Posted by: Prince Andrew | Sep 21 2022 1:39 utc | 211

“…The “leftoids” who cannot see this cannot adapt to the different approached required in this era of mass rentierism, and keep repeating mechanically obsolete formulas…”
Blissex@201
OK then, I’ll say nothing about your mid fifties sociological analysis of the bourgeoisification of the skilled worker (complete with title of fifties anti-union movie from Boulting bros). Let’s put that aside. The question is what is your programme? What magic words do you propose to utter to galvanise the people into action in what you call, puzzlingly, an era of ‘mass rentierism’?
Incidentally since the fifties and the heyday of the Shop Stewards movement the skilled working class has been decimated and the industrial society which was being satirised by the Boultings and parodied by the political scientists has almost disappeared.
And not because the Shop Stewards took up banking or the skilled workers got into currency speculation.

Posted by: bevin | Sep 21 2022 1:47 utc | 212

Posted by: Guernica | Sep 21 2022 1:13 utc | 205
With all respect for your opinion about the Queen, my thoughts did not circle about her, but about the tradition of kings, emperors, khans, sheiks, chiefs, and the splendor of the rituals, and that particular funeral in London was a picture of a passing civilization. So, you have not really understand what I was trying to convey. I am sorry, it is my inability to say what I feel. “quod non est in dictu non est in intellectu”, one could say about my rant.

Posted by: fanto | Sep 21 2022 1:51 utc | 213

karlof1@203
Not everybody here will be aware that Hayek’s, dated anti-socialist screed, The Road to Serfdom was Maggie Thatcher’s bible.
And that the world developing around us in the “West” is one that von Hayek dreamed of: a world in which wages are declining, unions are broken, strikes are illegal and rare and imperialism has carte blanche to suppress popular movements. The road to Fascism in other words.

Posted by: bevin | Sep 21 2022 1:53 utc | 214

dh 202
‘a picture is worth a thousand words’
Like the Ghost of chicken shit Kiev…..or the pictures of my most fragrant former sister-in-law taken after the ‘automobile accident’ in the Paris tunnel 1997….

Posted by: Prince Andrew | Sep 21 2022 1:56 utc | 215

uncle tungsten@210
If there were any truth in what you say we should all feel sorry for the oppressed capitalist class of the UK still as far away from power as they were in Charles I’s day.
But there is no truth in your rhetoric: the monarch is a cypher in the hands of the ruling class. The Queen was very happy to be so- she did not regard her interests as opposed to theirs.
And she was very well rewarded for assisting them by focusing public attention-including it would seem yours- on her well tailored and choreographed persona while the real power brokers went about their business of picking the world’s pockets.
Getting rid of the monarchy is long overdue but only as a preliminary to chasing out the capitalists who hide behind the carefully scripted pageantry and bullshit.
Not that you do not know all this as well as I do.

Posted by: bevin | Sep 21 2022 2:01 utc | 216

“As the member of a community you cannot simply engage in a radical re-imagining of the self. The community lends its vitality but also constrains you. You cannot participate in community without experience of both the flawed self and flawed other. The result is humility and generosity or, in sanskrit, donpha and bindu.
Those who have been successfully atomized by the process of private accumulation face no such constraint. The limited world they inhabit reflects the appropriated imagined self back to them in the form of courtiers, underlings, sycophants and the laudatory pages of the WaPo and NYT.”
Interesting take. Thank you.
Another take: most modern societies have shared experience in cyber not living community space. The former is often mistaken for the latter because there IS shared experience in the mix, in time if not space (those watching the same broadcasts albeit each in their own living room). But cyber space, be it television, radio or internet, is not living space. There is no beating heart connection, no shared awareness of the same place-based space. Cyber space is not local place.
How can there be a sense of community without a shared sense of place? Well, whatever sense there is – and clearly there is one – it is a very different animal. Some might argue it’s the difference between a paper and a real tiger but no matter.
What is shared in cyber space seems to be more abstract and concept-laden. Again head not heart. Barely human.
You mentioned – rightly – that you felt the masses mustered out of a sense of community more than reverence for the pageantry and paraphernalia. True. But the pageantry and outfits act as brilliant focal points which heighten the shared sense of place and time. Collectively time stopped in Britain and much of the world yesterday with 4 billion watching the same thing at the same time. But only those physically there were really connected. But they connect in part through the ritual, through the pageantry, through the display. How many saw the living symbols of Crown, Scepter and Orb? These resonate on a deep, non-verbal level, a timeless level, a level wherein the Heart is felt without interpretation or translation by Head.
This, btw, is the yogic meaning of bindu you referenced. Literally a spot or point, it is often translated as essence. But you could also call it character. In the case of a person there is a body with its shape and form, and there is movement and display of that body but there is also an overall character each person has, they are instantly recognizable as a particular individual and each part of their body, each expression of speech or thought reflects that particularity – that bindu.
The objects viewed during such pageantry reflect various luminous particularities, or bindus. These too are appreciated in the non-verbal zones especially heightened in shared place and time. So it is with all sacred rituals or objects.
There is something to this old stuff, something perhaps Crooke was hinting at. I think a sine qua non of all that is experience of community which comes from people sharing both place and time together, something mimicked in cyber space events (like television series, sports and newscasts) but never actually experienced.
This lack perhaps explains why collectively we have of late created a dysfunctional pathocracy. We are linked by separation-ness via virtual reality (dis)connection. We like to blame the elites for deliberately fooling us, for taking over and destroying our world, but they are just doing what elites always do which is operating from a different perspective which is sometimes both needed and valuable. But these self same elites are also confused and alienated by the modern pseudo-community cultures and so keep developing distorted views and pushing for bad outcomes. They are deluded too swimming in the same poisoned waters.
In collapse we might return to shared space and find authentic community again. This would be a very good thing.

Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 2:10 utc | 217

Melaleuca @192
Albania? or Armenia?
re Alasdair MacIntyre, I recollect him as a Trotskyist (none the worse for that either) who had previously been a Jesuit. Or so it was said. After Virtue is a very good book.

Posted by: bevin | Sep 21 2022 2:13 utc | 218

Re#106 – Need a brain to have a brain fart…or is it the reverse.

Posted by: Angelo | Sep 21 2022 2:14 utc | 219

@217 It’s OK Andrew. You can relax now. No more Epstein and nasty law suits. We have top PR people on the job. People have short attention spans these days. It was all just a bad dream.

Posted by: dh | Sep 21 2022 2:17 utc | 220

@Scorpion
Indeed, for a piquant take see:
https://samkriss.substack.com/p/the-internet-is-already-over

Posted by: Moaobserver | Sep 21 2022 2:18 utc | 221

b says: “If the LNR and DPR vote to become part of Russia, and if Russia accepts it, any attack (on) them will be an act of war against Russia.”
So what? Ukraine has already attacked Russian facilities and territory including Crimea (haven’t they?) Russia did nothing specifically about those events, afaik. Putin didn’t declare war on Ukraine. Russia didn’t strike/bomb decision making centers in Kiev or Lviv as result.
Is Putin going to act differently now? If so why? What has really changed since February?
After 7 months of distinctly avoiding any direct confrontation with NATO/USA and after 8 years of Putin outright refusing to bring LPR/DPR into the Russian Federation proper the west is going to use such a shift as a major propaganda win … ‘ see Putin has always wanted to reconstitute a Russian empire like the USSR. ‘
Yes that’s bs yet the entire western hemisphere is going to swallow that whole via the media and it will be ‘ sold ‘ as the crazed evil dictator of Russia intent on starting a global war.
What the RoW thinks about this won’t amount to a hill of beans in the self-righteous West. I cannot see how the vote or an address by Putin solves anything. Will wait and see though. I’m willing to be surprised.

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 2:20 utc | 222

Sorry my Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 2:10 utc | 219
was in response to:
Posted by: Sushi | Sep 20 2022 23:45 utc | 181
I deleted that reference line by mistake.

Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 2:24 utc | 223

What the RoW thinks about this won’t amount to a hill of beans in the self-righteous West. I cannot see how the vote or an address by Putin solves anything. Will wait and see though. I’m willing to be surprised.
Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 2:20 utc | 224
With each passing month, what the West thinks about them matters less and less to the ROW. THAT is what has changed considerably since the beginning of the SMO.
A very significant development which has already set the entire world on a new tack…

Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 2:30 utc | 224

Short of a successful prosecution of a war against the USA, and the removal of the current US regime/system, what can Russia, China, SCO, BRICS, or the UN do about this?
RT – US reveals plan for seized Russian funds
The US Department of Justice would like Congress to amend laws governing asset forfeiture, so money confiscated from Russian “kleptocrats” can be given to Ukraine, the head of the interagency sanctions task force Andrew Adams told the Senate on Tuesday while testifying at a hearing called “Tightening the Screws on Russia.”
Adams, formerly a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York (SDNY), is the head of the interagency Task Force KleptoCapture, a sanctions enforcement outfit created in February. The “scope, intended impact, and international alignment” of the anti-Russia sanctions are “without precedent,” he told senators.
This is what the ” international rules based order ” actually is. What the US wants the US gets and does without restraint.
An independence vote in the Donbass and Ukraine won’t change any of that. Will it?
(I am simply wondering where all this is heading and what if anything is really going to change for the better anywhere. )

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 2:30 utc | 225

fanto | Sep 21 2022 1:51 utc | 215
Yeah. I reckon I get what you’re going for.
London (UK) this past 10 days….. and of course here as well…
I was heartened when in the first 12-24hrs “#FFS” was trending in response to the obsequious obsessive orifice drivel being irrigated on us ….. but the media….globally has been primed for “Operation London Bridge” for decades….they weren’t going to surrender to actual public opinion when there’s a free all expense paid trip to London..
I’ve avoided all media – even more scrupulously than is my usual. But I did see a “gaff” snippet..…..Australian commentators doing a roll call of arrivals to Westminster Abbey.
A nondescript middle aged haggard woman arrives… commentators both give her a “nope, no idea…maybe she’s a minor royal, or ….” Obviously the earpiece does it’s job…..”er… just been informed that is Liz Truss, new Prime Minister of Britain….”
And then, being Australian, the indelicate observation that the very last official function for QE2 was to swear at, sorry swear in, The Truss.
Seeing the caliber of PMs now…. It was the death of her, obviously.
Aaand… I’m of the view Boris knew her health was “delicate”… and hung on for as long as he could… hoping to still be PM when 400/500??? World “leaders and dignitaries” were hosted. But Truss got that glory. Bessie out lasted him.

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 2:30 utc | 226

… Prince Charles part 3 (Camilla’s tampax)…
Posted by: Prince Andrew | Sep 20 2022 22:24 utc | 149
Prince Andrew, please show some respect, for one who is both your elder brother and Sovereign. He is now Tampax Rex!

Posted by: tucenz | Sep 21 2022 2:47 utc | 227

Posted by: tucenz | Sep 21 2022 2:47 utc | 228

@ bevin 218
I like your style Sir.
To be fair though, Elizabeth II was a pauper compared to Queen Victoria, who reigned at a time when the East India Mafia controlled goods various inward and outwards. Unlike Liz II, she didn’t have to beg for grants to tart up Buckie Palace.
Shocking but I head Lizzie was down to her last £3 billion.
Charles III, if all goes tits up here in the UK, has a huuuuuuge organic dairy farm in Romania, where he can spend the rest of his days in peace, away from brother Andrew . . . . and out of my sight.

Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 2:48 utc | 229

Scorpion @219
Is community possible in a megalopolitan realityscape? My sometimes deeply settled on a rural homestead, interjected with occasions of peripatetic adventures and misadventures found me living in a 4th tier suburb of a major metropolitan conglomeration of more than three million individuals for an entire year.
In short, I encountered no there, there. A sense of community does not exist in a high percentage of American suburbs and exurbs. Many do not even know their next-door neighbors beyond a “hi, how are you? Isn’t this weather something? No genuine communication engenders no real community. Living the rat-race and conforming to the tropes and memes of the herd is not a place for either the cultural rebel or for the creative individual.
Central cities were once refuges of cultural richness and neighborhood neighborliness. No longer, in my experience.
Ghettoization of minorities, mostly Blacks and because of language preferences, a high proportion of Hispanics. In some larger metros there are even gay ghettos….there are some levels of communities in these sequestered realities, but at the same time, again particularly amongst deracinated and culturally devolved Blacks, there is an undertow of violence and a rootless and arrogant anarchy.
The now famous old African proverb that it takes a village to raise a child, should be an object-lesson to those who wish to bring new people into this world. But that Big Brass Ring of consumerism, fluff and frills for all too many women and toys for boys who have devolved into adulterated men; has become akin to some machine which simply and repetitively churns away in the same ruts of ruptured reality.
Perhaps the ancient Mayans had the right idea when they gave up on their marvelous cities and headed off to the hills and lived close to the land. Is that still possible? Perhaps amongst the survivors of the looming crash.

Posted by: aristodemos | Sep 21 2022 2:50 utc | 230

Posted by: Moaobserver | Sep 21 2022 2:18 utc | 223
That takes rant to an almost sublime level. Thank you!
World events stunned me into silence earlier this year. So I stopped trying to write stuff.
And instead ended up putting up far too many comments here! It won’t last. But I have already decided not to write into the internet sphere. It’s a fake food fake thought realm. The medium is the message.

Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 2:54 utc | 231

Putin randomly rescheduling his speech seems like just the latest disorganized maneuver coming out of Russia, with the whole referendae being emblematic of Russian incoherence as well. Remember, they recently called off the Kherson referendum a few weeks ago because of the Kherson offensive and assassinations against electioneers. Now suddenly it’s back on in THREE DAYS? and so is a Donetsk referendum? And Zaporizhzhia? Where they just lost their only functioning Ukrainian nuclear power plant (could not suppress enemy fire from over the river or Ukrainian joy-boaters or whatever it was). Meanwhile, Donetsk isn’t even fully under Russian control. Luhansk isn’t either. There are Ukrainian commandos drunk driving around Kherson City at night – who is going to go to the polls under these conditions? Russian-occupied Ukraine is absolute bedlam.
For someone who is wary of both sides’ propaganda networks, this is the first data point that unequivocally points to Russia getting slammed. I can see the Kiev thing being a feint, and Kherson counter-offensive was ambiguous, then the Kharkiv counter-offensive was maybe overstated, but having a referendum in THREE DAYS during a major war and on territory, you don’t fully control? It’s a mess.

Posted by: GoFast | Sep 21 2022 2:54 utc | 232

If you like Hayek, you will love Rob Larson’s brutal take down of him in “The Toll Road To Serfdom”

Posted by: Wester | Sep 21 2022 2:55 utc | 233

Scorpion @ 226: Yes, it’s for the ROW, but it’s also to inform the domestic public. In conjunction with the War-related laws being promulgated in the Duma, it’s a comprehensive rationale for war.

Posted by: Paul Spencer | Sep 21 2022 2:58 utc | 234

Posted by: aristodemos | Sep 21 2022 2:50 utc | 232
Great post! I can tell you had a good time composing it!
Well, we are staring into the abyss these days, aren’t we.
But consider: it was into such an abyss that the One Ring was thrown to return the world back to its own nature after being almost conquered by Nightmare.
Time to wake up back in ordinary, blessed reality. With fresh food, fresh air, honest work and good old fashioned laughter just for the hell of it. Hobbitlandia!
Speaking of hobbits, I’ll report back on this community business in a year: in about 6 months I’ll be moving up to the edge of a small (but very ancient preColumbian) village with only a few hundred people. Many of them are not educated, quite a few are thieves, some are seriously hostile, all are gossips and so every day, every encounter is fraught with mishap. I have no desire to become a great community member and prefer to avoid the whole thing, my wife and I keeping ourselves to ourselves as is our wont (and as is easier to do in cities). But it won’t go down that way: I’ll be in a community – a real community – whether I want it or not.
Maybe I’ll be pining for your dead suburbs somewhere and bolt back to gringolandia retirement havens which are dead and deadly. Hopefully not. But if not, it’s gonna be quite a ride in old-fashioned, narrow-minded village life! (Think Doc Martin on bad acid trip!) Where, incidentally, only a handful have electricity and internet but now that I’m getting electricity next week (bribes, bribes, bribes!) I’ll be able to hook in if I want. Am thinking of not, though. Just to see what it’s like…..

Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 3:09 utc | 235

@Posted by: GoFast | Sep 21 2022 2:54 utc | 234
The Russians know that the Ukrainians, US etc. will do as much as is at all possible to disrupt these referenda, therefore much better to carry them out at very short notice to give them no chance to fully respond. Then the four oblasts will be part of Russia, allowing Russia to treat the shelling of Donbass as a terrorist act and legally escalate the conflict. This proper process is important with respect to the Rest of the World (non-West) for the ongoing legitimacy of Russia’s actions.
You are sounding very much like a concern troll, please step back. The Russians have done what many successful armies have done through history, withdraw from hard to defend areas and allow your enemy to over-confidently throw his reserves against your defences. Once his reserves are exhausted counter-attack. In a few weeks the leaves in all those forests in the Kharkiv and other regions will be gone, and the ground will become hard and white – perfect for the counter-attack, especially against troops who seem to be very short of winter supplies. The altered status of the conflict will allow Russia to go big and hard, as Kadyrov is stating.
Whether or not Putin makes an address at certain time is minutiae in the general scheme of things. Lets see what it actually says when released tomorrow.

Posted by: Roger | Sep 21 2022 3:12 utc | 236

@ 238 Roger
Well, the Ukies threw what they could last night/this morning at those areas but yet again lost around 40 tanks/other and hundreds in manpower.
On a sidenote, for staunch Royalists like myself – Isn’t it amazing that the whole Windsor family/clan with only 3 o-levels among them are still riding high at the top of the charts?
Those Deep State shadow government operatives just love dim politicians and heads of state. So much easier to control.

Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 3:28 utc | 237

bevin #218

Getting rid of the monarchy is long overdue but only as a preliminary to chasing out the capitalists who hide behind the carefully scripted pageantry and bullshit.
Not that you do not know all this as well as I do.

Thank you for those words. It is not that ‘she’ focused my attention but rather I lament that she squandered the opportunity to advance our world and played her role as a distraction as you say.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 3:29 utc | 238

In response to GoFast@234,
The speech wasn’t rescheduled — it wasn’t even announced. That it had been pre-recorded at 1900 Moscow time was revealed by insider journos, and the Russian media did the rest in trying to predict on when that speech would be made available to the public, unsuccessfully. So much for the supposed state control over the press.

Posted by: Skiffer | Sep 21 2022 3:36 utc | 239

@Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 3:28 utc | 239
If the new King was not easy to control the powers that be would get a new one, just like with the “Glorious Revolution”. They don’t mind about the ancestry just the ability to follow orders and wear funny costumes without feeling stupid.

Posted by: Roger | Sep 21 2022 3:44 utc | 240

Can you ‘Adam & Eve’ (believe) it that Russia’s stock-market fell 9% on the Referendum news?
I mean, I thought it would go the other way, anticipating a speedier end to the SMO.

Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 3:46 utc | 241

I mean, I thought it would go the other way, anticipating a speedier end to the SMO.
Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 3:46 utc | 243
Western houses pulling out?

Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 3:58 utc | 242

@karlof1, Sushi and others, re: Crooke’s article
Thank you for the discussion, very interesting
Perhaps you might also be interested in this post, it follows similar lines after a long winded intro through science fiction
https://aurelien2022.substack.com/p/from-starship-troopers-to-starship

Posted by: htyul | Sep 21 2022 4:02 utc | 243

If you missed, there is an exellent article on RTDE, by Dagmar Henn.
It is about Germany which want to send Leopard2 tanks in Ukraine.
About training of such team, about fact, that Germany never signed peace treaty with Russia, so that means they are actualy in war and similar.
https://rtde.xyz/meinung/149434-wirkliche-gefahr-wenn-deutschland-leopard/

Posted by: preseren3 | Sep 21 2022 4:44 utc | 244

bevin | Sep 21 2022 2:13 utc | 220
>>Albania? or Armenia?
Err… got my strangely relevant irrelevant shitholes mixed …. Armenia.
@barfly (can’t find, despite repetitive scrolling)… who posted yet another example of the Sultan of Swing… arm in arm with Putin one day, decrying the SMO and reunification of Crimea.
Yep. The Sultan is a slithering snake. But he can be understood.
He has a massive headache with the [USIS backed] Kurds… who want independence.
If he endorses the Crimea and Donbas separatism….. then he’s made a case for the Kurds who want Kurdistan carved from Syria, Turkey, a sliver of Iran and Iraq.
Another Israel. Another Kosovo right in the middle of the Middle East.
The same way Xu does not support Crimea and Donbas….. because Taiwan.
Putin IMO cares less for what the Sultan says, and more for what the Sultan does.
And his comments re the Crimean Tartars are valid. That’s a messy historic wound probably no one wants to pull the scab off.
Keeping the Bosphorus locked, being a NATO intermediary for the March peace talks, and the later grain deal. The Sultan is shitting up NATO.
Back in the late 1800s my family kept a 100lb snake.. python? carpet snake? in the roof to eat rodents and possums. The reptile, family lore says, was quite domesticated and bothered no one (other than visitors) and it’s prey.
I wonder if Putin views the Sultan in the same way… aware he’s a reptile, but useful in curtailing and controlling pests.

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 4:47 utc | 245

preseren3 | Sep 21 2022 4:44 utc | 246
>>…”Germany never signed peace treaty with Russia,”
Japan. Has never signed a peace treaty with Russia.
Putin some years back said he would like to see the resolution.
The sticking point was once a treaty was signed, the US would install bases on the disputed Kuril islands.
Nope. Russia wasn’t about to have more US bases on its borders.
@bar. Apologies for typos. Losing badly to autocorrect and poor editing.

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 4:59 utc | 246

Irrespective of the Russian outcome in Ukraine, the ‘West’ will never cease trying to agitate. interrupt, disable, destroy what BRICS is creating. Just look at Pelosi in Armenia for instance.
This process will continue for decades, maybe a century or more. The US oligarchs will never give up trying to claim (back) all that land and wealth they see as owing to them.

Posted by: digital dinosaur | Sep 21 2022 4:59 utc | 247

Getting rid of the monarchy is long overdue but only as a preliminary to chasing out the capitalists who hide behind the carefully scripted pageantry and bullshit.
Not that you do not know all this as well as I do.
Posted by: bevin | Sep 21 2022 2:01 utc | 218
yes Bevin but they are all the same people. Stop equivocating on this topic.
If it quacks like a duck its a duck.

Posted by: K | Sep 21 2022 5:03 utc | 248

Some ancient cultures strove to follow the sun westward thinking life would be better. This thread remained latent, occasionally rising to the surface of cultures. Promoters in North America have always invoked the notion that the future lies in the West. I live on the western edge of the North American continent, and when I look West, I see the East, the adage urging me to go further Westward. I followed that siren song twice to Hawaii but went no further West to the East. It seems to me there’s something to that primordial urge to go West. But the West is now in the East. Follow the sun or wait for it to rise? Good thoughts for meditation.

Posted by: karlof1 | Sep 21 2022 5:07 utc | 249

Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 4:47 utc | 247
Exactly : extremely reliable and very useful, a much bigger problem for the USEU than for RF – guaranteed to make USEU livid: they only have themselves to blame – T application to join EU was in which century?
From RT « ‘Turkey’s plans to join the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) have sparked an angry reaction in Berlin, with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz slamming Ankara’s decision to seek membership in the Russia and China-led security bloc.
“I’m very irritated about this development,” Scholz told journalists in New York following his meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. The chancellor said he believed the SCO was “not an organization delivering an important contribution to a good global coexistence.” ‘

Posted by: Gerrard White | Sep 21 2022 5:21 utc | 250

(I am simply wondering where all this is heading and what if anything is really going to change for the better anywhere. )
Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 2:30 utc | 227
Hate to tell you, but the consensus among the barflies is the Ukranian Civil War lasts until 2025 and Cold War 2.0 until 2030 at least.

Posted by: Exile | Sep 21 2022 5:34 utc | 251

What? RE: Starship Troopers (a good parody of US imperialism)
a 1959 novel of the same name by the American SF writer Robert Heinlein, and is a satire on militarism in American life after the 1990-91 Gulf War.
How is a 1959 novel a satire on American life after 1991?

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Sep 21 2022 6:08 utc | 252

Already past 9 am Moscow time. Did Putin chicken out?

Posted by: Membrum Virile | Sep 21 2022 6:12 utc | 253

Ok, just after posting previous, I saw first news on the mobilization.

Posted by: Membrum Virile | Sep 21 2022 6:14 utc | 254

Yep, partial mobilization has been announced.

Posted by: Skiffer | Sep 21 2022 6:16 utc | 255

Posted by: K | Sep 21 2022 5:03 utc | 250
What does this mean? The British monarchy are the same people as whom, and what do you allege bevin is trying to obfuscate?

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Sep 21 2022 6:23 utc | 256

@257
https://www.rt.com/russia/563209-putin-donbass-mobilization-ukraine/
Hereby begins the REAL GAME CHANGER.

Posted by: YIU | Sep 21 2022 6:23 utc | 257

The Russian government seems to finally accept that a massive increase in man power is necessary to win. All that talk of preserving the lives of Russian soldiers has just given the Ukrainians a fighting chance. Overwhelming force is the way of fewest casualties.
600,000 men from Kharkiv to Tjernihiv with support from the professional army plus 400,000 in the south and the Ukrainian army will have lost their offensive punch. Yes the Ukrainians cannot leave the north to their border guards, overweight National Guardsmen and some army recon/commando groups. They will have to redeploy armoured brigades northwards even if the Russian don’t cross into Ukraine. All the Russians have to do is advance 3-4 km a day and after 3 months they will be at the Dnieper river and it’s game over for Ukraine.

Posted by: Poul | Sep 21 2022 6:24 utc | 258

Tom_Q_Collins #258
To clarify perhaps ;))
guernica posted @205
uncle tungsten retorted #210
bevin responded to UT rhetoric #218
ut responded politely
K responded
etc.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 6:32 utc | 259

So after deconstructing Uke air, navy and military kit and tens of thousands of Uke army soldiers with press ganged citizens, Russia is, from today, applying extreme force.
The great struggle to denazify and demilitarise THE Ukraine continues with more oomph.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 6:37 utc | 260

via RT Russia defence minister in tv interview confirmed russian army losses in ukraine are 5937 dead

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 6:39 utc | 261

Shoigu here immediately after Putin announcement to the Russian people.
https://www.rt.com/on-air/563210-defense-minister-shoigu-mobolization/

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 6:39 utc | 262

Putin said that Ukraine had shown promising signs during Istanbul meeting, but once again “western advisors” had sabotaged the talks by simply breaking them ofd. Meanwhile the “great Kherson counter-offensive” continues, every day.
A large #Ukrainian column attempting to attack the village of #Pravdyne (Kherson oblast) appears to have been wiped out by #Russian troops.
https://t.me/chris_759/86

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 21 2022 6:40 utc | 263

German Press, didn’t get memo that Putin’s speech was delayed, their headlines Wednesday am are all about Putin’s speech Tuesday night. 😳
Empire of Lies outdoes itself again
https://app.handelsblatt.com/politik/international/liveblog-zum-ukraine-krieg-alle-entwicklungen-putin-kuendigt-teil-mobilmachung-der-streitkraefte-an/27982126.html
https://m.faz.net/aktuell/politik/ukraine-liveticker-putin-kuendigt-teilmobilisierung-an-18134628.html
https://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/ukraine-krieg-newsblog-russland-putin-1.5660932

Posted by: Exile | Sep 21 2022 6:41 utc | 264

The British Pound is making new lows.

Posted by: too scents | Sep 21 2022 6:44 utc | 265

Gerrard White | Sep 21 2022 5:21 utc | 252
Yep. From RT:
Turkey owes no explanation to EU – Erdogan

Turkey has no obligation to report to the European Union after it took part in a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday. Earlier, the Turkish leader revealed that Ankara is seeking to join the bloc, which includes Russia and China.
>……“The European Union would keep us out for 52 years, it wouldn’t let us near, and then they would say, ‘Why did he talk with this country, or that country?’” he said, referring to the fact that Turkey has been seeking to join the bloc for decades without success.
>……”…we are not going to report to the European Union at this point,” Erdogan reiterated, adding that Ankara is willing to hold talks with every country in the world.”
Also. Erdogan is still vetoing Sweden NATO application. Because they are supporting Kurd activists.

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 6:45 utc | 266

Can anyone confirm the number of reservists that will now be made available for this ?

Posted by: Night Tripper | Sep 21 2022 6:46 utc | 267

Posted by: Membrum Virile | Sep 21 2022 6:12 utc | 255

Already past 9 am Moscow time. Did Putin chicken out?

As I’ve said many times before, and will say again: “Putin doesn’t bluff”.

Posted by: Arch Bungle | Sep 21 2022 6:49 utc | 268

Posted by: Blissex | Sep 20 2022 23:16 utc | 170

152: «It’s depressing to think that what we still call “the West” is “led” by these people»
They are cunning operators, not idiots, but in large part they are frontpersons, not principals, and their “sponsors” have legions of top quality experts briefing them, and enormous resources.
The USA elites are capable of skilful long term plans. Just consider: how many successful regime change operations or invasions have the USA achieved in the past 30 years? How many have been achieved by the RF or PRC or anybody else?

Absolutely. I would also add that the metrics we use to classify interventions as successes or failures is often biased by our haste to dismiss Western strategies. In fact, if we consider Karlof’s notion of zero sum vs win-win in his post at Sep 20 2022 22:52 utc | 162, we have a different outlook on Western actions and what clearly appears as planned arson.
A generation ago, who could have imagined that the US and UK would achieve the wholesale destruction of one of the main soviet republics, a territory intimately linked to the Russian nation’s History? And who could have believed that this destructed would be acted out, at great cost, by Ukraine and Russia themselves?

Posted by: robin | Sep 21 2022 6:50 utc | 269

While I agree, no one could fight in the cold like the Russians, it is my understanding that it takes much longer than three months to prepare recruits for war. Churchill said, it takes two years to make a soldier (if memory serves me correctly). I have always thought this was one of the reasons why Ukraine has not done too well. People think they can volunteer & just go over there and start fighting. But it’s my understanding, this takes much more than three months.

Posted by: Pat | Sep 21 2022 6:56 utc | 270

@269
300,000 reserves will be called up.

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 6:59 utc | 271

Pat | Sep 21 2022 6:56 utc | 272
“………how will this work.. with reserves….”
I’ll wait for Brian Berletic at New Atlas to explain it to me.
And no doubt the Alexii at Duran will chime in.

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 7:03 utc | 272

A generation ago, who could have imagined that the US and UK would achieve the wholesale destruction of one of the main soviet republics, a territory intimately linked to the Russian nation’s History? And who could have believed that this destructed would be acted out, at great cost, by Ukraine and Russia themselves?
Posted by: robin | Sep 21 2022 6:50 utc | 271

Western Ukraine are not part of the historical “Rus” or “Slav” family. It appears 21st century Russia thought they could dominate all of Ukraine via the majority Russian speaking population in the south and east. Could the Maidan events of early 2014 have been prevented by providing more support to Yanucovych?

Posted by: Opport Knocks | Sep 21 2022 7:07 utc | 273

(RoW) A very significant development which has already set the entire world on a new tack…
Posted by: Scorpion | Sep 21 2022 2:30 utc | 226
Well I hear it, I do, but I do not see it. I’m curious about the general tone come the UN speeches by the RoW to see if anything has shifted in attitude. How many will up front support the Donbass, Russia, China and the SOC against the west.
eg
How many will demand the US release the central bank money back to Afghanistan/Russia – I expect none will say a word to challenge the USA’s ongoing abuse of power in any way (bar Iran/Nth Korea as they have done in the past)
thanks for the reply and your commentary overall.

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 7:17 utc | 274

Could the Maidan events of early 2014 have been prevented by providing more support to Yanucovych?
Posted by: Opport Knocks | Sep 21 2022 7:07 utc | 275
Not in any way whatsoever. Once Kravchuk unravelled the remnants of USSR with Yeltsin it was inevitable that plunder of the most prosperous SSR would follow and the various oligarch and clan structures would seek control and look west for support against Russian oligarchs

Posted by: Paul Greenwood | Sep 21 2022 7:19 utc | 275

But… But… i thought Russia was running out of missiles and military gear. I know its true because I read it on the internets!

Posted by: alek_a | Sep 21 2022 7:21 utc | 276

Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 20 2022 21:06 utc | 129:
“…however, those days are long gone, well almost..”
Not exactly. What did colonialism morph into? Now it’s just bribes, coups, proxy wars, and big mining/big ag/big pharma/big mil/big narco all with their snouts in the trough, and the lucre always flows to the most corrupt and insidious.
It’s really disheartening, when you think about it too much, as so many here at the bar do.
In the interim, I’ll just keep telling myself that the sum outcome will be a net positive for the 99.9%.

Posted by: Jon_in_AU | Sep 21 2022 7:26 utc | 277

Posted by: alek_a | Sep 21 2022 7:21 utc | 278
They’re probably producing more missiles than ever before at this point (in RF history). According to Ursula von der Liar, the traffic for washing machines and dish washers must be running hot to Raduga facilities to extract those ‘valuable chips’.

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 21 2022 7:27 utc | 278

Posted by: Pat | Sep 21 2022 6:56 utc | 272
Not sure how it is in your country but in many it is common for conscripts to be discharged to the reserves and to be required to do regular training.
Germany circumvented the Versailles limits on the Reichswehr by rotating troops into reserves even before Hitler came to power so it had a large cohort of trained soldiers. UK uses Territorial Army which was mainstay in both wars and even in Afghanistan.
Churchill still went into trenches himself in 1915 having been trained as a cavalryman 20 years earlier…….so much for 2 years training and since a Maxim gunner had a 30 minute life-expectancy it was not as if huge time was spent on training especially after the losses of 1916.
Russia has been expecting an attack from the West since at least 2012 when “White Tiger” was released as a movie……..and the Siloviki have known since Yeltsin what USA had planned

Posted by: Paul Greenwood | Sep 21 2022 7:28 utc | 279

Based on RIA Novosti bit by bit reporting of Putin”s address:
Putin said that only those already in the reserve will be called. They will be given the same status as contract soldiers.
Putin said that the West has crossed all lines and is threatening Russia with nuclear weapons.
Putin said that those who threaten with nuclear weapons should remember that Russia also has WOD.
Procedure for receiving Russian citizenship for foreigners who join the Russian army will be simplified.
I am extremely alarmed because it seems that the real reason for these developments is the realistic possibility of the use of nuclear weapons. Just a couple of days ago Biden (kind of out of the blue) warned Russia of consequences if it uses nuclear weapons. That sounded ominous to me; as a sign that a nuclear false flag may be seriously considered.
Also, three days ago the German member of the EU parliament, Christine Anderson, told Bannon in a TV programme that:
“people should be aware that something big is coming and it will turn out to be the biggest crime ever committed on humanity”.

Posted by: JB | Sep 21 2022 7:29 utc | 280

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 21 2022 6:45 utc | 268
The West might have no real idea about how China or Russia is working, but I think Erdogan`s Turkey has no idea itself what direction it takes. Every other day something different … it is probably best to assume that Turkey simply does what Erdogan sees fit is to the benefit of Turkey, no matter the word or speech or assurances he gave 24 hours before. Some “partner” to have.

Posted by: CM of Berlin | Sep 21 2022 7:30 utc | 281

Not in any way whatsoever.
Posted by: Paul Greenwood | Sep 21 2022 7:19 utc | 277

I am talking of surgical intervention at the State Security and SBU level. Maidan would not have been possible if those organizations had not been controlled by forces hostile to the elected President, like Andriy Parubiy.

Posted by: Opport Knocks | Sep 21 2022 7:31 utc | 282

Pat | Sep 21 2022 6:56 utc | 272
“………how will this work.. with reserves….”
Oh, you mean does Russia use the British system of putting Reserves into active combat units to replenish losses; or as some countries do – create new formations to add to forces deployed.
Britain lost 51st Highland Division in the collapse in France in May 1940 and they were POWs. So it had to re-form the 51st Highland Division from the Reserves in UK and ready it for active service in North Africa

Posted by: Paul Greenwood | Sep 21 2022 7:32 utc | 283

Posted by: Exile | Sep 21 2022 6:41 utc | 266
They obviously turn it as they see fit, but …
Brief summary of Putin’s address on 09/21/22:
1) Partial mobilization has been announced: first of all, those who served in the RF Armed Forces have combat experience, etc. + those who are in the reserve. Mobilization activities start today
2) Mobilized receive the status of contractors and the corresponding salary
3) Russia will do everything possible to hold referendums in the liberated territories for their entry into the Russian Federation (LPR, DPR, Kherson and Zaporozhye regions)
4) Russia is ready to use nuclear weapons and any other means of mass destruction in case of a threat to territorial integrity. “This is not a bluff,” according to Putin.
https://t.me/intelslava/37553

Posted by: CM of Berlin | Sep 21 2022 7:33 utc | 284

The waste want this to end in a nuclear war – that’s what they’ll get. If they increase the weapons flows to Ukraine and attack newly integrated regions then in 6 months the first nuclear strike will hit Kiev.

Posted by: Night Tripper | Sep 21 2022 7:37 utc | 285

@ 272 Pat
Quoting Churchill on soldiering is akin to quoting Pol Pot on pacifism.
Some good speeches though to muster the fodder from the trenches.

Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 7:39 utc | 286

From Etymonline.com:
insidious (adj.)
1540s, from French insidieux “insidious” (15c.) or directly from Latin insidiosus “deceitful, cunning, artful, treacherous,” from insidiae (plural) “plot, snare, ambush,” from insidere “sit on, occupy,” from in- “in” (from PIE root *en “in”) + sedere “to sit,” from PIE root *sed- (1) “to sit.” Figurative, usually with a suggestion of lying in wait and the intent to entrap. Related: Insidiously; insidiousness.
I think it quite an apt descriptor.

Posted by: Jon_in_AU | Sep 21 2022 7:46 utc | 287

There was also this remark on RT:
“Some senior officials in NATO states have even suggested that using tactical nuclear weapons against Russian troops would be justified, according to Putin. The president stressed that Moscow would not hesitate to retaliate to such an attack with its own nuclear weapons.”
Earlier I thought that shelling of the Energodan nuclear plant could be regarded as this kind of attack but apparently some neocons have also stated otherwise.

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 21 2022 7:58 utc | 288

I think it should be obvious by now that this is not where Putin expected things to be like in late Sept 2022.
Whatever the best outcome hoped for, or expected and planned for back in Dec 2021 and again in Feb 2022 has not come to fruition. iow the Russian plans for the Donbass/Ukraine have failed.
All the pundits guesswork that having a thinly manned line of defense along the front in Kherson and Kharkiv as some kind of ruse to draw in Ukrianina forces to destroy is complete fantasy.
The facts are (clear in hindsight) the Russian had insufficient forces to maintain a defensive positions across 1,000+ klm front and to simultaneously maintain adequate control and management of the territory already taken and ensure supply lines to the front.
Therefore, it should be obvious this is not what they expected or planned to happen 7 months into the Donbass Special Military Operation.
My best guess / conjecture with the benefit of hindsight, is that Putin / Russian leadership expected a peace deal to be done early on – such as in March/April but that failed to come together. Yet they have taken another 5 months before “deciding”increasing their troop numbers strikes me as another tactical/strategic failure given how much territory they lost recently.
Now they are pushing through voting for four oblasts to join Russia proper? Something Putin has been refusing to do from the very beginning. Another fact which I believe again suggests that where we are today is not where Putin expected to be. But of course this is only my conjecture – we do not know for. We actually barely know anything.
The situation today seems to be that Ukrainian/ nato backed military forces are all within 5klms of the western front/border of the Lugansk People’s Republic. The Donetsk People’s Republic with Russian support have barely “liberated” half of that territory in 7 months. Ukrainian military forces have been shelling Donetsk city almost all this year. The Kherson and Zaporizhzhia Oblasts are also not fully under the full control of Russian/pro-independence forces.
While millions of Donbass people have already left for Russia and safety. Whatever they had in mind for the Donbass and this SMO in Ukriane it seems far far away from being a genuine success to date. Having said that Ukraine has not been successful either.
What a shit fight! Cheers all … maybe next year something good might come of it.

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 8:12 utc | 289

Some music for the moment by Tchaikovsky.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEHGxpRoZQM&list=RDGMEM8h-ASY4B42jYeBhBnqb3-w&start_radio=1&rv=rc_JjSx30L0
Played by an englander of renown.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 8:18 utc | 290

CM of Berlin | Sep 21 2022 7:30 utc | 284
On the contrary Turkey is the best partner and the supreme go between – he is the pivot between Europe and Asia, he has feets in both camps, he always acts out of self interest and can be persuaded to modify his demands by equally practical allies or partners, he is indispensable in this conflict, he is frustrated by the contemptuous EU attitude to his EU membership application
He controls the refugees, he is the outlet for many cross Asia pipelines railways seaports etc etc and so on and so
He bears grudges he talks nonsense sometimes but never random and always pointy, but he knows it and others can recognise this
The only to find him impossible to handle are the EUUS no matter how hard they try – who could be a better partner than that ?
If he were not to be offended one could say he was better than the very best of the Cardinals éminence grise pupils of Machiavelli

Posted by: Gerrard White | Sep 21 2022 8:19 utc | 291

oops try this link for Tchaikovsky
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qO_h00i6s0Q
I had better stop celebrating at the bar for a wee while.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 21 2022 8:20 utc | 292

SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 8:12 utc | 292
One minute you despair the next you exult
As many have asked you and told you – cut out the hysterical hattie ! give birth to a confident child !
Scratch the itch but do not launch any infections

Posted by: Gerrard White | Sep 21 2022 8:22 utc | 293

RT report – Serbian leader warns of imminent global war
Aleksandar Vucic sees only escalation ahead for the West’s relations with Russia and China
“I think realistic predictions ought to be even darker,” Vucic said. “Our position is even worse, since the UN has been weakened and the great powers have taken over and practically destroyed the UN order over the past several decades.”
Asked about the upcoming speech by Russian President Vladimir Putin, Vucic said it’s not difficult to predict its general outline.
” I assume that we’re leaving the phase of the special military operation and approaching a major armed conflict, and now the question becomes where is the line, and whether after a certain time – maybe a month or two, even – we will enter a great world conflict not seen since the Second World War.”
end quote
—-
That’s the most logical rational reality-based observation and most likely prediction I have heard for months from anyone.

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 8:23 utc | 294

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 8:12 utc | 292
You’re right that a lot of people have already left Donbass, but most haven’t. Nato pushed Russian’s back against the wall, there’s no more anywhere to retreat and the spring is compressed. Initially they just wanted a ‘neutral/non-aggressive’ Ukraine, or at least a major part of it and the SMO was measured to produce that result – however what failed was underestimating the amount to which Nato controlled UKR government to “go to the end”.

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 21 2022 8:23 utc | 295

@ 200 unimperator
Worn down by the endless bravado/rhetoric of UK/US/EU’s so-called leadership, combined with the lethargy of their citizens, I’d rather embrace a nuclear war, than suffer this slow motion trainwreck being played out.
Watching the BBC’s last broadcast or Parliament’s last PM question time would be a blessing/tonic, even better, The City of London’s complete obliteration.
Obviously I’d rather be participating in a full-on revolt against the current scum ruling over us, but to be truthful, I’m beginning to despise, hold in equal contempt, the pathetic imbeciles (zombie hordes) who parade up and down every high street transfixed to/by their smartphones oblivious to what’s being done/said in their name.

Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 8:26 utc | 296

@ 296
STOP telling other people what they should or should not do and say, or how they should say it.
It’s unbecoming, abusive, and unnecessary. Thank you.

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 8:27 utc | 297

@ 296 Gerrard
He’d never get a job at Amazon.

Posted by: WTFUD | Sep 21 2022 8:34 utc | 298

SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 8:27 utc | 300
But you do the same ! Calm down
All’s alright – no worries right – this is not the place to freak out !
It’s like down the bevvykin- the mates there will set you right – abusive is a word for sheilas

Posted by: Gerrard White | Sep 21 2022 8:34 utc | 299

underestimating the amount to which Nato controlled UKR government to “go to the end”.
Posted by: unimperator | Sep 21 2022 8:23 utc | 298
Seriously? Do you really believe that is what they got wrong? They misjudged the USA and NATO.
After Iraq2, Libya, Syria, and Afghanistan for 20 years they underestimated how far the USA/NATO would go with this? This boggles my mind. It’s just too unbelievable. Putin and Russian leadership surely cannot be that naive and gullible surely.
RE ” Initially they just wanted a ‘neutral/non-aggressive’ Ukraine”
I totally get that and understand the history up to this point. I think Russia has been incredibly noble, patient, reasonable and sincere. Hoping for the best and offering Ukraine flexible options in good faith has been impeccable. Cheers

Posted by: SeanAU | Sep 21 2022 8:35 utc | 300

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