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March 30, 2023

Ukraine Open Thread 2023-75

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

The current open thread for other issues is here.

Please stick to the topic. Contribute facts. Do not attack other commentators.

Posted by b on March 30, 2023 at 13:52 UTC | Permalink

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Looks like the Russian security services have arrested an WSJ reporter. Espionage.

Not sure that so-called reporters would make good spies. They cannot get even basic facts rights.

Posted by: Just Observing | Mar 30 2023 14:11 utc | 1

Minimum, incomplete, low-ball KIA(only)(FEBA only) 570+ ... Translated:

Summary of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation on a special military operation (30.03.2023)

◽️ In the Kupyansk direction, army air strikes and artillery fire of the "Western" group of troops hit the enemy's manpower and equipment in the areas of Hryanikovka and Sinovka (Kharkiv Oblast), Novoselovskoye and Stelmakhovka (Luhansk People's Republic).

💥 Up to 50 Ukrainian servicemen as well as two vehicles were destroyed.

◽️ In the Krasno-Limanskoe direction, air strikes, artillery fire and heavy flamethrower systems of the Group of Forces (Forces) Center hit AFU units in the areas of Chervona Dibrova, Nevske of the Lugansk People's Republic, Yampolovka, Torskoye and Hryhorovka of the Donetsk People's Republic.

💥 During the day, up to 130 Ukrainian servicemen, two armored combat vehicles, a Grad MLRS unit, and an Akatsiya self-propelled howitzer were destroyed.

◽️ In the Donetsk direction, as a result of active actions of units of the "Southern" group of troops, air strikes and artillery fire, the enemy's losses for a day amounted to more than 340 servicemen and mercenaries, two tanks, four infantry fighting vehicles, six armored fighting vehicles, nine vehicles, one Uragan MLRS unit as well as D-20 and D-30 howitzers.

◽️ On the South Donetsk and Zaporizhzhya directions, army air strikes and artillery fire of the Vostok Group of Forces hit AFU units in the areas of Vladimirovka, Ugledar of the Donetsk People's Republic, Malinovka and Scherbaki of the Zaporizhzhya region.

💥 More than 25 Ukrainian servicemen and two armored combat vehicles were destroyed in these areas during the day.

◽️ In the Kherson direction the enemy destroyed up to 25 Ukrainian servicemen, 11 vehicles, as well as three D-30 howitzers.

💥 Operational-tactical and army aviation, missile troops and artillery of groups of troops (forces) of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation during the day hit 93 artillery units in firing positions, manpower and equipment in 107 areas.

💥 A self-propelled firing unit of the Ukrainian Buk-M1 antiaircraft missile system was destroyed near the settlement of Grebennikivka, Sumy region.

💥 An ammunition depot of the 126th Territorial Defense Brigade was destroyed near Olhovka, Kherson region.

💥 Also, a fuel storage depot of the 102nd Territorial Defense Brigade was destroyed near the Zaliznichnoye settlement, Zaporizhzhia region.

💥 An anti-aircraft defense aircraft near the village of Temirovka, Zaporizhzhia region, shot down an Mi-8 helicopter of the Ukrainian air force.

◽️ Additionally, during the day, one Grom-2 operational-tactical missile, three HIMARS MBRLS rockets were intercepted, and two Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles were destroyed in the areas of Novoandreyevka and Zelenyi Gay of the Donetsk People's Republic.

📊 In total, since the beginning of the special military operation destroyed (losses over previous 24hrs(+?)):
404 aircraft, (Daily avg 1.1)
227(+1) helicopters, (Daily avg 0.6)
3,622(+2) unmanned aerial vehicles, (Daily avg 8.9)
415(+1) surface-to-air missile systems, (Daily avg 1.1)
8,472(+16) tanks and other armored combat vehicles, (Daily avg 21.8)
1,076(+2) multiple rocket launchers, (Daily avg 2.8)
4,462(+6) field artillery and mortars, (Daily avg 11.4) and
9,199(+22) special military vehicles. (Daily avg 23.3)

Posted by: Outraged | Mar 30 2023 14:21 utc | 2

From the altworld.com

"The Kremlin no longer believes or trusts Washington, so no assurances that this is all a mistake, even if forthcoming, would be believed by the Russians.

Perhaps if every neoconservative was fired from the government, Russophobic think tanks closed, and the military/security complex permitted a president to be elected who immediately went to Moscow, agreed to the restoration of all the broken agreements and pulled NATO off of Russian borders, nuclear war could be prevented.

But can you imagine Washington doing such a thing? It would require leadership that Americans have not seen for a very long time. It would require comprehension in Congress and in the public, and there is no media or experts to instill comprehension.

Enjoy your life. Quit worrying about the future. The neoconservatives have assured that you don’t have one."

https://thealtworld.com/paul_craig_roberts/does-america-have-a-future-3

Posted by: Paul | Mar 30 2023 14:36 utc | 3

Posted by: Just Observing | Mar 30 2023 14:11 utc | 1

Remember that the WSJ put up a fake news story that Xi had agreed to meet with Z.

Good move by Russia to jail that guy. The WSJ is compromised by the deep state. They're no longer journalists, they are pieces on the game board.

Posted by: Chris | Mar 30 2023 14:45 utc | 4

A new Battle of Kursk

History does not repeat but it certainly can rhyme. I've not seen this observed anywhere (yet) but the current situation in Ukraine is very similar to the impending German major offensive in Russia in the summer of 1943. It was their last. Similarities (and I will simply call the Ukrainians and Germans "Nazis", which is surely apt):

--It's an open secret that this offensive is coming. The Nazis simply have to launch one for political and psychological reasons, even knowing the odds of success were very low. Hitler before the offensive made the comment: "when I think about this offensive my stomach turns over." I'm sure Zelenskyy is having trouble sleeping as well as his neck is on the block with it.

--The Russians know it is coming, and where, though not exactly when but clearly within a window of time spanning just a few weeks. They have made their preparations and are more than content to let the Nazis attack first, plowing into defensive lines and taking large losses. Then a pause and the Russian offensive will build up steam and unleash itself in whatever manner they see fit.

--The Nazis are waiting for Wunderwaffe hoping this will give them the edge. For Hitler it was the new Ferdinand 'Elephant' tank killer, and for Zelenskyy it is the new western MBTs.

--Following the failed offensive Nazi attention shifted away from this front. For OKH it was Allied landings in Sicily on July 10th. In parallel terms this shift will be political with major turmoil within "NATO" (i.e. Washington) faced with the Ukrainian defeat and any and all talk of a "Ukrainian victory" quashed.

Finally, one can only wonder if there will be some sort of parallel tank battle of Prokhorovka, "the largest tank battle in history", albeit on a smaller but still very impressive scale. One can imagine drone shots of dozens of smoking turretless cooked-off Leopards, Challengers and Abrams... but let's not get carried away here.

Posted by: DR-Montreal | Mar 30 2023 14:47 utc | 5

@ Just Observing | Mar 30 2023 14:11 utc | 1

---

I'm quite surprised that FT's Max Seddon hasn't been rounded up yet.

https://twitter.com/maxseddon

Posted by: too scents | Mar 30 2023 14:50 utc | 6

An Hour and a bit with Big Serge chatting to Donbass Devushka

Comparisons with Barbarossa and the SMO

https://open.spotify.com/episode/49sS7z1pY6PH9yCsMbPszF?si=b3813bc5ba234572&nd=1

Posted by: Aslangeo | Mar 30 2023 14:50 utc | 7

Shadowbanned : In my opinion...

Natokraine: Bravo.

Shadowbanned: In my opinion...

Natokraine: Very good. I agree.

Shadowbanned: ...I think...

Natokraine: That's it.

Shadowbanned: What was done the next day...

Natokraine: Right.

Shadowbanned: ...should have been done the day before...

Natokraine: Yes.

Shadowbanned: ...so that the impending disaster...

Natokraine: Impending! That's the right word.

Shadowbanned: ...cannot be avoided.

Natokraine: That’s obvious.

Shadowbanned: So the Russian army's advance is in fact a retreat.

Natokraine: Exactly. Great syllogism. Frick is Frock. I mean... It is perfectly logical.

Shadowbanned: That’s very worrying.

Natokraine (teath chattering in fear): Alas!

Shadowbanned: What do you think about it, my dear Shadowbanned?

Natokraine: "Shadowbanned"? I'm natokraine.

Shadowbanned : Oops! Sorry.

Posted by: Leuk | Mar 30 2023 14:55 utc | 8

Posted by: DR-Montreal | Mar 30 2023 14:47 utc | 8

I call the impending offensive Wacht am Citadel, because the operational and strategic situation has unique echoes from both operations. The end result though will be the same, an operational defeat that depletes the attacker and speeds up the process of their eventual defeat.

Posted by: Milites | Mar 30 2023 15:07 utc | 9

Leuk@11
Marvellous writing. I'm not sure that you are being fair to shadowbanned who sometimes makes valuable contributions but all is fair in the cause of comedy.

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 15:09 utc | 10

DR-Montreal | Mar 30 2023 14:47 utc | 8

two other examples:

the nazi ardennes offensive of dec 1944, and the nazis may 1940 offensive through the bulge.

learn the successes of dec 1944 and

correct the problems the french suffered in 1940 at the meusse.

Posted by: paddy | Mar 30 2023 15:18 utc | 11

@ OttoE | Mar 30 2023 15:00 utc | 13

I would love to see, in the fashion of your "...In total, since the beginning of the special military operation..." listing, a summary of the crimes against humanity committed by the Nazis. Better still, since 2014.

An incomplete OTOH here. Perhaps bar collectively contribute to a summary compilation ? Or someone aware of a concise working list already extant ? 'Tis on topic.

Posted by: Outraged | Mar 30 2023 15:28 utc | 12

DR Montreal - 8

I've been thinking about the similarities with Kursk for some time as well. Both Guderian and Zalushny who tell the boss it's risky, both launched before the armies have enough of their new armors to really punch strong enough. Both cases Russian army has set up a wide and deep defense with several lines. If Ukraine uses all that's available, US intelligence, drones, sats, all the new tanks, it can even go far and maul the very last line of defense, before being blunted and then caught in another pincer move.
That, or they'll try a double pincer move and both parts of Wagner's pincer around Bakhmut, like if they're trying to outdo Operation Uranus, and actually reenacting the failed Gallic attempt to relieve Alesia from Caesar's siege before the eventual surrender of the city.

Posted by: Clueless Joe | Mar 30 2023 15:58 utc | 14

https://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/14676

Here's the switch from a destroyed ukraine to Poland. Pointing to a Ukrainian collapse, the news feed from ukraine is getting less by the day, usually a prelude to being forgotten in an orwellian fashion. The old memory hole,

I'm thinking a polish "protectorate" in ukraine, and good luck getting those troops out later.

Heck russia even gave signals that Poland seizing western ukraine might be ok.

Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | Mar 30 2023 16:04 utc | 15

Andrew @ 22

Thanks for that. Apparently far-right Austrian lawmakers walked out because they were unhappy about violating Austria's neutrality.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/3/30/austria-far-right-lawmakers-walk-out-of-zelenskyy-speech

Posted by: dh | Mar 30 2023 16:08 utc | 16

Posted by: Clueless Joe | Mar 30 2023 15:58 utc | 23

Hope they don’t think waves of suicide drones are a suitable substitute for gaining operational air superiority/dominance, something the Germans maintained throughout Citadel. The weather around Bakhmut, for the next two weeks, is predicted to be a mixture of snow, sleet and rain, so another tick for Wacht am Rhein echoes, if they launch it this month.

Posted by: Milites | Mar 30 2023 16:25 utc | 17

@ DR-Montreal | Mar 30 2023 14:47 utc | 8
@ Clueless Joe
@ Milites

Quite so. The key aspect being the massive forces held ready, separately, in Front reserve, to immediately launch the Russian Strategic Offensive, OP Kutuzov, concurrent with massed counter-attacks, the moment the Heer stalled. Then second phase Offensive OP Polkovodets Rumyantsevthe. Boom-boom-boom. Entire Eastern front all down hill from thereon ... definitely shades of ...

Posted by: Outraged | Mar 30 2023 16:33 utc | 18

Most non-Germans are looking at Olaf Scholz in disbelief, given how he subordinates vital German interests to the orders he receives from the White House. He even made plans together with Biden of how to conceal from the public Biden's role in the NordStream sabotage. This happened early in March on Scholz's 80-minute visit to Washington, as Seymour Hersh has learned from a source. It resulted in the ridiculous story that was fed to the media, about a sailboat crew of 6 people committing the attacks. Nobody believed that story even in Germany, but at the same time, nobody seems to care about anything here - let alone shine a light on Chancellor Scholz's role in the cover up.

This could, however, change soon. Scholz is in for trouble. In Russian TV, he has already been pronounced a traitor. The online magazine Anti-Spiegel now published a German language article
https://www.anti-spiegel.ru/2023/das-russische-fernsehen-bezeichnet-kanzler-scholz-als-hochverraeter/
which addresses the case in ample detail.

Posted by: grunzt | Mar 30 2023 16:42 utc | 19

"A counteroffensive by Ukraine that has been much-anticipated should not be considered as a make-or-break moment in its conflict with Russia, Kiev's Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba has said, urging his country's foreign backers to maintain their support regardless of the outcome of this expected operation.

“We should counter by all means the perception of the counteroffensive as the decisive battle of the war,” he told the Financial Times, as quoted on Wednesday.

He said Kiev was concerned that the operation would not result in Ukrainian troops pushing Russia “100%” out of the territory it wishes to reclaim. However, in this scenario of underachievement, he feared, “some people may say this was the last decisive battle and now we have to think of an alternative scenario.”

The Ukrainian leadership has insisted that the only option it is considering is retaking all land lost by Kiev, including Crimea, before any peace talks can start. The government has also prohibited by law any negotiations with Russia for as long as President Vladimir Putin remains in office.

Kuleba suggested that following a counter-offensive operation like the one anticipated, minority voices “in Washington, in Berlin, in Paris, in London” will try to push for a ceasefire “along the lines of a Minsk III.” He was referring to the two Minsk agreements that were supposed to guide Kiev and its then-breakaway regions to co-operate in a stable peace."

https://www.rt.com/russia/573869-kuleba-counter-offensive-importance/


Comment:
There's very little faith in the much expected counter-offensive, it's a roll of dice with poor odds. So just keep sending Ukraine more packages. In fact, Military Summary channel speculated that the Ukrainian counter-offensive might actually be postponed sometime late summer, in expectation of getting fighter jets like F-16. Of course the other obvious reason is the AFVs and tanks being blown up in warehouses along the Dnieper river.

Posted by: unimperator | Mar 30 2023 16:44 utc | 20

Ukraine is playing down importance of the expected counter-offensive. It seems there is very little faith of it succeeding.

https://www.rt.com/russia/573869-kuleba-counter-offensive-importance/

Posted by: unimperator | Mar 30 2023 16:45 utc | 21

Posted by: Leuk | Mar 30 2023 14:55 utc | 11

Heh, reminds me of Questions from Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

Posted by: Forest | Mar 30 2023 16:48 utc | 22

Chevrus @17

It makes perfect sense for the Russians to wait until the Nazi offensive. Let the Nazis break their teeth against prepared defenses and then go on a counteroffensive while the Nazis are reeling. The Russians will have defenders’ advantage while Ukrainain forces are at their best, and still be fresh when the Ukrainians are spent. If the goal is to maximize Ukrainain demilitarization while minimizing Russian casualties then that is the ideal order of events.

Posted by: William Gruff | Mar 30 2023 16:49 utc | 23

Now we are seeing how many countries are beginning to switch to the calculation of national currencies. Putin was the first to move this topic as a blow to the dollar monopoly, now China has joined in, which is already conducting trade operations with Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Brazil in yuan.

Europeans have begun sounding the alarm as their Euro is collapsing, losing its position as the world's second reserve currency.

We immediately found out that the Ukrainian crisis has become a kind of catalyst for a major financial redistribution, which is now only at the very beginning.

Conclusion: the dollar will eat up its satellites, driving them into an even stronger crisis. As is now happening in the European banking sector, where large European banks are forced to take loans from the Fed, thereby becoming hostages and completely tame assets of Washington.

We expect in the near future the strengthening of US sanctions against China in order to try to somehow stop the dominance of China and the Yuan.


https://t.me/legitimniy/15059

Posted by: Down South | Mar 30 2023 16:51 utc | 24

What is known about the arrest of a WSJ journalist in Russia:

The Lefortovo court arrested Evan Gershkovich, a US citizen who was previously detained on suspicion of espionage and works in the Moscow bureau of the American newspaper The Wall Street Journal.

The journalist was detained in Yekaterinburg while trying to obtain secret information. Gershkovich, according to the department, collected data on one of the enterprises of the military-industrial complex of the Russian Federation. The Wall Street Journal denied the allegations against its employee and demanded his release.

Collected the main thing that is known about the detention of Gershkovich.

Circumstances of detention

- According to the FSB, Gershkovich was detained while trying to obtain secret information. He collected data constituting a state secret about the activities of one of the enterprises of the military-industrial complex of Russia.

- The Investigation Department of the FSB of the Russian Federation opened a criminal case under Art. 276 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Espionage").

The court's decision

- The Lefortovo court arrested the journalist in the case of espionage until May 29. He will be held in the Lefortovo pre-trial detention center. The issue of bringing charges against Gershkovich is being decided.

- The case of Gershkovich is marked "top secret", law enforcement agencies told TASS.

- Lawyer, by agreement, Daniil Berman, in the interests of Gershkovich, was not allowed to participate in the court. The correspondent had a lawyer by appointment.

The journalist pleaded not guilty.

Moscow statement

- The official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, said that Gershkovich's activities have nothing to do with journalism.

Press Secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov said that Gershkovich was caught red-handed, so "this is not about suspicion."

- According to him, the Kremlin monitors foreign media and is familiar with the publications of the detained American.

- Peskov said that The Wall Street Journal correspondents who conduct "normal journalistic activities" can continue to work in Russia.

The Kremlin hopes that the incident will not entail any additional inspections of Russian media outlets abroad.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said that it was premature to raise the question of the possibility of exchanging Gershkovich.

The reaction of The Wall Street Journal

The newspaper denied the allegations against Gershkovich and demanded his immediate release.

- According to the publication, Gershkovich works in the Moscow bureau of The Wall Street Journal and covers events in Russia.

The newspaper expressed "deep concern" for the journalist's safety.


https://t.me/DonbassDevushka/51521

Posted by: Down South | Mar 30 2023 16:54 utc | 25

Did anyone see the Chinese journalist take the UN to school about the US occupation of Syria? It was a thing of beauty!

Posted by: Slat1 | Mar 30 2023 16:56 utc | 26

President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on spring conscription, according to which 147,000 people will be called up to the Russian Armed Forces from April 1 to April 15

https://t.me/Slavyangrad/39750

Posted by: Down South | Mar 30 2023 16:58 utc | 27

@1 re spies
A Spanish reportero has been in a Polish jail for supposedly spying for over a year and not a peep from the "defenders of journalists"

Posted by: c | Mar 30 2023 17:01 utc | 28

A thing of beauty indeed!
https://mobile.twitter.com/Frontlinestory/status/1640974197655756801

Posted by: p | Mar 30 2023 17:02 utc | 29

It's a conundrum for ukraine. It can't take territory without an offensive, and it can't end the war until it takes all the territory.

However they can't generate enough military power to do it, as they depend on the west for almost anything, and I gotta say a hundred Abrams and leopards won't do it.

Chinese summer peace plan is looking more likely.

Zelensky basically called off the war when he said no offensive without more weapons.

But he's boxed himself in, and he's publicly worried about his grip on power.

I just can't believe Biden is going to let China be the adult and tell the kids to go back to their room.

But if it happens, then I must.

Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | Mar 30 2023 17:04 utc | 30

We publish a request from the editors of The Daily Beast and the answer:

good morning,
My name is Dan Ladden-Hall and I'm a journalist with The Daily Beast. I'm currently looking into reports that Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich has been detained in Yekaterinburg after writing about Wagner PMC.
Is Prigozhin aware of this arrest? If so, why was Gershkovich arrested? Please send any comment you wish to make me at this address.

We publish a comment by Evgeny Prigozhin:
“Dear Dan, I am not aware of the detention of Evan Gershkovich in Yekaterinburg. If you want, I can check the torture cellar in my house to see if he is there. Among the American journalists, whom I keep dozens of there, at first glance, I did not see him. I can, if you like, also see the fresh graves of foreign journalists in my house adjoining plot. But if I’m not mistaken, we didn’t bury him there either.”


https://t.me/Slavyangrad/39711

Posted by: Norwegian | Mar 30 2023 17:06 utc | 31

Posted by: Norwegian | Mar 30 2023 17:06 utc | 31

What a weapon of information mass destruction, his language is just like their prefered non musical instrument, the jackhammer. I avidly check his TG for his sound posts, amazingly entertaining and fantastic language.

Posted by: Paco | Mar 30 2023 17:11 utc | 32

@William Gruff:
I couldnt agree more. They will be pushed onto the rough equivalent of fire hardened spikes and like lambs to the slaughter they will perish.
Oh and my comment at 17 got erased....who knows why? Maybe because I made fun of a troll?
whatever...ZH is more fun anyway.

Posted by: Chevrus | Mar 30 2023 17:13 utc | 33

Although not fully on board with PCR on this point, he does have make one, namely that the entire SMO business is extremely risky with unacceptably high likelihood, in his view, of escalation to nuclear war thanks to the neocon capture of the US. Conclusion from his latest piece:

What can be done?The Kremlin no longer believes or trusts Washington, so no assurances that this is all a mistake, even if forthcoming, would be believed by the Russians.

Perhaps if every neoconservative was fired from the government, Russophobic think tanks closed, and the military/security complex permitted a president to be elected who immediately went to Moscow, agreed to the restoration of all the broken agreements and pulled NATO off of Russian borders, nuclear war could be prevented.

But can you imagine Washington doing such a thing? It would require leadership that Americans have not seen for a very long time. It would require comprehension in Congress and in the public, and there is no media or experts to instill comprehension.

Enjoy your life.Quit worrying about the future. The neoconservatives have assured that you don’t have one.

PCR fear of NuclearWar

I think this is important in that I don't see any positive outcome from all this unless the neocons are excised from the US Body Politic. Most importantly, which PCR doesn't mention, they are not merely a native group pushing US interests as many like to characterize them, rather a local arm of some sort of weird, internationally linked financial-political-intelligence network intent on dominating the world status quo to maintain their Plunder model. They do not truly work for 'America' or 'UK' or 'France' or 'Germany' or 'Ukraine' or 'the EU' or even 'the Jews,' though those nationa state designations are viewed as the agents responsible for their various initiatives, rather they dominate each and every one of them (and more), with only their administrative-political arm in the US being called 'neocons.'

So what's really going on, Ma?

1. Does Russia-China have a plan for how to dislodge them? Certainly not without considerable (probably clandestine) linkage within each of these countries and more.

2. Or are Russia-China pushing for a new Iron Curtain / Cold War / fully bifurcated model? Problem: the neocons will remain in power, making nuclear war increasingly likely if they succeed in this, as PCR warns, ergo not a great plan.

3. Or are elites in Russia-China working behind the scenes with these same 'neocon' networks to bring about a new arrangement centered around world-wide CBDC tech after some sort of world-wide crash, perhaps making the current pandemics and conflicts a bit of internationally coordinated kayfabe-kabuki? (As I reluctantly suspect is the case, meaning that the Elite Club Membership is being expanded to those in other polities but a new system has to be put in place to include governance of many more billions in ways that are fully integrated with digital technology introduced only thirty years ago but now far advanced.)

4. Or is there a secret contrarian international network who have decided that the neocon-central bank elites have got to be brought down and somehow what is transpiring will lead to that? (Which is #1 again unless they have some devious countermeasures already mapped out as Putin as hinted is the case - unless he is in on #3.)

If I was forced to bet, I would put money on #3 though I hate that outcome. Expecting Russia-China to have some sort of benign plan (#1) to liberate innocent Western citizens - aka 'us' - from their multinational parasitic elites - though a consummation devoutly to be wished - is a wish and a wing and a prayer too far. Plus: if we lived in such a world, we wouldn't be facing all this crap in the first place.

#2 has to have a magic bullet element in that they can bifurcate the world cutting the neocon-controlled polities off from 75%+ of the world's population without any sort of neanderthal (aka nuclear) counter measures? That's pretty risky. OR: if #2 is it, then they presumably feel they can handle and win nuclear war? Do they have a special ray gun that can eliminate all nuclear incoming? Do they control the launch codes? Do they have a fancy EMP strategy which will knock out even submarine missile launches? Well, they better. If they don't, #2 doesn't look all that good. And #4 is the same as #1.

It is not clear where this is all headed, put it that way, which is why PCR is concerned. Whether he is right or not about nuclear escalation risk, there are still many unanswered questions yet to be clarified...

Posted by: Scorpion | Mar 30 2023 17:15 utc | 34

@ Slat1 | Mar 30 2023 16:56 utc | 26

Mar24'23 ?

UN lies about US military occupation of Syria, reporter calls out Ukraine hypocrisy Youtube 14m37s

Brief introductory commentary, then the actual exchange starting at the 2m07s mark.

Posted by: Outraged | Mar 30 2023 17:16 utc | 35

Down South @24--

Interesting the Ukies becoming keen to dedollarization, but Putin wasn't the one to initiate it. This critical 2019 presentation by Dr. Hudson, "U.S. Economic Warfare and Likely Foreign Defenses", places dedollarization at the forefront of defenses against dollar hegemony. A search of his website using the term dollar hegemony brings many results, and of course his major opus, Super Imperialism focused on that issue when first published in 1972. So, the "tribute system" operated by the Outlaw US Empire has long been known but until now has never been seriously challenged. Hudson's latest is a podcast at Geopolitical Economy for which no transcript is available yet, "Did Wall Street take over the Treasury? Bank crisis exposes public realities of private banking", that I await as I prefer them to the oral presentation.

Posted by: karlof1 | Mar 30 2023 17:22 utc | 36

Posted by: Milites | Mar 30 2023 16:25 utc | 29

I shouldn’t have to remind you that ‘victory” isn’t the the goal of Zelensky’s sponsors and patrons, they have stated publicly that “imposing costs” on RF is. It is also the stated strategy of the US axis to provide UA forces with just enough support to keep them engaged with RF forces but not enough to be victorious in any meaningful sense.

They certainly don’t need air anything to support this mooted offensive, even assuming enough is left of the earmarked forces by the time they get around to it. Pervitin-crazed conscripts killing Russians soldiers, civilians and infrastructure before they are inevitable shredded themselves is the entire scope of it.

Almost everything Ukrainian forces have been goaded into is intentionally low tech, near-kamikaze rubbish designed to consume men & materiel, the diminishing of Ukraine and Russia is a win in US calculations so swarms of killer bomb-drones or MLRS salvos, while apparently insignificant in some kind of Gerasomov’esq view of things, would serve the intended goal of sowing death and destruction very nicely.

Ukrainians are supposed to get blown to bits in the process of killing Russians, that’s all.

Posted by: anon2020 | Mar 30 2023 17:30 utc | 37

@ karlof1 36

thx!

Posted by: AG | Mar 30 2023 17:36 utc | 38

Outraged no. 35

Brilliant. Shame a lot more reporters haven't got his gumption.
(Euphemism for balls.)

Posted by: ThusspakeZarathustra | Mar 30 2023 17:53 utc | 39

Slat1 @ 26

Did anyone see the Chinese journalist take the UN to school about the US occupation of Syria? It was a thing of beauty!

The best part is at the end you realize how he set the UN idiot up, head fake for the dunk. Please China, more where that came from.

Posted by: LightYearsFromHome | Mar 30 2023 17:55 utc | 40

28 - Yes, I remember him getting arrested in the Rzeszow area, a major hub for sending weapons to Ukraine. I wondered what happened to him.

Posted by: Waldorf | Mar 30 2023 17:58 utc | 41

Is not the UN official in question a man with a Pakistani pedigree?
His name rings a bell:

"General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq HI, GCSJ, ร.ม.ภ, (Urdu: محمد ضیاء الحق; 12 August 1924 – 17 August 1988) was a Pakistani four-star general and politician who became the sixth President of Pakistan following a coup and declaration of martial law in 1977. Zia served in office until his death in a plane crash in 1988. He remains the country's longest-serving de facto head of state and Chief of Army Staff.[1].."
wikipedia

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 18:00 utc | 42

Posted by: Scorpion | Mar 30 2023 17:15 utc | 34

Speculations on a postcard to the usual address. ;)
Personally, I doubt all these complex theories of behind the scenes grand strategic games being played out. IMO It's more likely a case of: "here's the logic dictating what we have to do now, and let the chips fall where they may. We'll cross the next bridge when we come to it".

Whether you find one scenario more unsettling than the other is probably a function of which way you're wired.

Posted by: GT Stroller | Mar 30 2023 18:01 utc | 43

Another week has passed so it must be time for another Weekly Briefing by Marai Zakharova of which Ukraine is third on the list and long as usual. It begins with the following reminder:

Yesterday, March 29 this year, marked one year since the third round of Russian-Ukrainian talks took place in Istanbul, following which it was possible to reach a certain understanding of the parameters of possible agreements.

Let me remind you that almost immediately after the start of the special military operation, Kiev requested negotiations, and the Russian side responded to this request. When the prospect of reaching mutually acceptable agreements appeared, the Kiev-regime side interrupted the negotiation process, leaving unanswered our latest proposals of April 15, 2022 on the draft agreement on the settlement of the situation in Ukraine. It is obvious that the prospect of a peaceful solution to the crisis frightened Westerners, and they forbade Vladimir Zelensky to continue the negotiation process. After that, the rhetoric of the Kiev regime and its Western masters only hardened. They were obsessed with the obsession of "defeating Russia on the battlefield." The very possibility of dialogue with Moscow was categorically rejected. Five and a half months later, this position was enshrined in law, when on September 30, 2022, V.A. Zelensky signed a decree on the "impossibility" of negotiations with the Russian leadership. [My Emphasis]

And many paragraphs of review later, we read the following:

Western curators also do not allow them to back down, because this is all one criminal logic. They demand determination from Kiev and want to make sure that all the costs that have already been addressed to the Kiev regime are not in vain, that many people have already died, that many Ukrainian citizens have already become victims of this criminal adventure of the West and V.A. Zelensky. Thoughts of a possible truce are not allowed. It seems to me that Ukraine will soon be shot for this. I would not be surprised if a special "cruel punishment" is introduced for those (in Washington, too) who intend to think about stopping the bloodshed. We are talking about the destruction of the Ukrainian people by the forces of the West and the hands of V.A. Zelensky. Is that not clear? Obviously. ON March 28, US Secretary of State E. Blinken frankly said that calls for a ceasefire could be a "cynical trap." The supply of weapons and the allocation of billions of dollars for the conduct of hostilities is not a cynical trap, but an effective one from Washington's point of view. In fact, the Ukrainian army is being driven to slaughter by their curators from Washington. The whole story goes back to the last Ukrainian soldier. [My emphasis]

The briefing transcript as of now is incomplete, although the video is available at the link. Perhaps in six hours it will be done and more can be shared.

Posted by: karlof1 | Mar 30 2023 18:07 utc | 44

Scorpion @34
All incisive observations & numbered scenarios are well thought out, though we shouldn't assume there are not scenarios we haven't yet imagined.

Underlying your numbered scenarios as a set is perhaps the presumption that only one of these is being pursued, and pursued with the *expectation* rather than the *hope* that it might bring about outcomes better than nuclear annihilation, or that this shady transnational, trans historic network nevertheless retains a constraining sense of self-preservation.

Nuclear war by accident or miscalculation is one thing, but there is some hope that those who have, after all, the most to lose are not insane enough to *choose* to almost certainly lose it to nuclear war, when whatever happens they and their immediate networks could otherwise survive to fight, and predate and parasitize another day.

Posted by: Paul Damascene | Mar 30 2023 18:09 utc | 45

@42 Haq or al-Haq is a very common surname among muslims. It's actually a suffix meaning Tuth. This particular Faran Haq seems to have trouble living up to his name.

Posted by: dh | Mar 30 2023 18:11 utc | 46

@46 I will try that again...

@42 Haq or al-Haq is a very common surname among muslims. It's actually a suffix meaning Truth. This particular Farhan Haq seems to have trouble living up to his name.

Posted by: dh | Mar 30 2023 18:13 utc | 47

Offensive v Counteroffensive
I was led to believe that a counteroffensive is a military operation designed to disrupt/breakup an existing offensive. Since Russia has no active offensive at the moment (Bahhmut is just an attritional operation), then it's more correct to say that Ukraine is about to launch an offensive and it's Russia that might launch a counteroffensive to disrupt/breakup the Ukrainian offensive in the future.
Any comments?

Posted by: Ghost Ship | Mar 30 2023 18:15 utc | 48

@48 Any comments?

You are probably quite correct grammatically. However I expect to see the term counter-offensive used frequently in connection to the Ukraine situation.

Posted by: dh | Mar 30 2023 18:19 utc | 49

@48 its counter to the initial invasion.

Posted by: neofeudalfuture | Mar 30 2023 18:30 utc | 50

@35 Outraged - Thank you for that video. At 10 min 30 in on it, there is a woman named Dana Stroul Co-Chair of the Syria Study Group. She gives a very scary glimpse of the neo-con mindset regarding Syria. Thank you!

Posted by: lex talionis | Mar 30 2023 18:30 utc | 51

It is not clear where this is all headed, put it that way, which is why PCR is concerned. Whether he is right or not about nuclear escalation risk, there are still many unanswered questions yet to be clarified...

Posted by: Scorpion | Mar 30 2023 17:15 utc | 34

As long as the War Party can use debt to buy weapons for Kiev, the fighting will continue. That’s why De-Dollarization is the critical variable to watch. Only De-Dollarization ends the fighting.

Posted by: Exile | Mar 30 2023 18:32 utc | 52

Posted by: Ghost Ship | Mar 30 2023 18:15 utc | 48

You're correct ... and there's also a smaller scale counter stroke as opposed to a large scale counter offensive. I think you have to be a military nerd to know the difference as far as most consumers of news are concerned and offensive means on the attack. Counter offensive sounds less aggressive than an offensive and in the media Russia is framed as the aggressor so they go on the offensive while poor victim Ukraine always framed as going on the counter offensive as they are just reacting to Russian aggression.

Posted by: HB_Norica | Mar 30 2023 18:42 utc | 53

DR Montreal 5

I hadn't really thought about Kursk until you mentioned it. During the SMO I've made comparisons (not all sound) with Stalingrad and the '44 Ardennes Offensive but not Kursk. Indeed there are some similarities - but on a much larger scale. If you remember, the Russians, having obtained intelligence from ULTRA (I think) knew when the offensive was coming so launched an artillery strike on the German positions. I think there is a strong possibility of the Russians doing the same thing IF the offensive is ever launched.

Posted by: Rob Campbell | Mar 30 2023 18:46 utc | 54

Why are the Ukie fans still going on about peace deals and negotiations? There will be no end of this conflict for the Ukraine (or whatever it will be called at that time) beyond total unconditional surrender.

Furthermore, the longer this conflict is drawn out by foolish support from the US and its gimps the less of the Ukraine there will remain to unconditionally surrender. Hold tight to those delusions of Ukrainian victory and the conflict could very well go “...to the last Ukrainian” by the simple fact of there no longer being a nationality called “Ukrainian”.

Posted by: William Gruff | Mar 30 2023 18:59 utc | 55

grunzt | Mar 30 2023 16:42 utc | 19
The problem in Germany has always been the propensity of a critical mass to vote for leftwing and socialist parties. This enables incompetent socialist governments to take the reigns and ruin the country. Most of the damage has come from socialist rule, in addition to that double-agent Merkel.

Posted by: Ghi | Mar 30 2023 18:59 utc | 56

For the historically minded:

Though I fully concede that the scale of battles now is orders of magnitude smaller than those of WW2. The length of the line of contact, however, may not be quite so disproportionate. Wondering if there are meaningful similarities to WW2 and conclusions in a more general context of military art that one might draw based on this geographical scale issue.

Posted by: Paul Damascene | Mar 30 2023 19:01 utc | 57

Exile @ 52

As long as the War Party can use debt to buy weapons for Kiev, the fighting will continue. That’s why De-Dollarization is the critical variable to watch. Only De-Dollarization ends the fighting.

Good point, however everyone was busted from the Great Depression going into WW2, Germany beyond flat broke, yet they always find the money for war. I'm no economist but I think you have to go to a full on war economy to do that, in this hybrid war you are correct about de-dollarization. I wouldn't be too triumphalist though, it's not like the dollar will go to zero, which is absurd, but it'll probably level off at 60% for a long while, there's a lot of inertia here, not just the petrodollar but all the three hundred years of Anglo-Saxon financial plumbing that makes global capital and trade go round. Probably it'll take 20ys for the dollar to just become one of many currencies in a multi polar world, if hegemony winds down in a reasonable way and not in destruction and chaos inducing fitful bangs and booms.

Here's what might speed it up a bit, it's not zero sum for a nation idly switching from dollar to yuan, there's actually a bonus of no longer paying the dollar tithe to the empire, so a nation will have extra money on hand, for a big nation a whole damn lot, for it's oligarchs to steal but hopefully to invest in development - and who offers the best deal on development? The Chinese.

So, lots of things in play but IMO too complex to happen fast.

Posted by: LightYearsFromHome | Mar 30 2023 19:14 utc | 58

The neo-cans have not "captured" Washington. They are just employed there. And they are employed to do what they are doing, which is to defend the practise of US hegemony.

The idea that the world is run by competing groups, rooted in various philosophical schools- each with its own worldview- is mistaken. It's a crude form of idealism which finds that the sordid realities of the material world are, for a variety of reasons, best not talked about. The idea is that if you ignore embarassing reality it will eventually disappear.

The reality in the present case is not mysterious. There are no real secrets of any importance. We may not know the exact details of where the bodies are buried, but we know who kills people and who believe that they have the right-for the greater good- to lie, kill, cheat and steal anywhere, whenever the fancy takes them.

What is this reality?
It is in all the history books. The books are slanted, biassed, full of propaganda and not a few lies BUT the outline is clear enough.

To begin at an arbitrary, but justifiable 'breaking point', since 1492 successive western European countries have been involved in conquering, looting and colonising the American continents. By doing so they have enriched themselves to the point that their trading projects to the east-Asia and Africa- became armed raids on communities which eventually were prostrated, bound, shackled and gagged into imperial possessions.

Half a millenium later the shock of the imperialist assault having worn off, the communities in question have revived and undertaken the long and painful task of overthrowing the political, social and ideological hegemony of the imperialist system.

As is almost always the case with revolutions of any kind, the current revolution in global affairs was undertaken with the greatest reluctance- what we call the BRIC powers were perfectly prepared to increase their stature, sovereignty and power incrementally- slowly evolving from colonised victim to equal partner.

Hence, for example, the willingness with which China's government accommodated the interests of foreign capital and reconciled itself to the inconveniences of nourishing its enemy in the form of a potentially powerful, influential and organised capitalist class.
Hence too the remarkable self control shown by Russian governments in the face of three decades of increasingly arrogant and humiliating advances by American imperialism, swallowing insults, allowing its resources to be plundered, watching ther fruits of its education systems plucked by its enemies; smiling as its neighbours were turned into enemies, imperialist bases, including torture chambers, set up on its borders, biological warfare stations established all around it. And, one by one, its old friends in the world ripped apart by imperialist subversion, their populations drowned in blood, their treasuries looted.
And all this while soothing lies were pumped out in a world in which hypocrisy and propaganda became the dominant gases composing our intellectual atmosphere.

Russia and China did not want to have to form an alliance and, once again, to dedicate treasure and energy to building war machines.
They did not want to transform neighbourly relationships into security organisations.
They did not want, particularly, to embrace the Irainan regime with its history of hostility to the imperial powers, with which both Russia and China wanted nothing more than friendly relations, or to be forced into the cauldron of emnities that the imperialists have brewed up in the 'middle east'. They did not want to have to be the ones to tell France that its role in Africa was not just anachronistic and nasty but, increasingly, implausible.
They did not want to have to come to the rescue of the Syrian government, still less to run the risk of arousing the hostility of the Turks. They would far rather not look too closely at what the Israeli government is doing to Palestine and millions of non Jewish citizens.

But they have been forced to do all of these things and much more. They had to act, the alternative would have been to kow tow to Washington, to cede to a government with a proven record not just of malignoty but of incompetence and slovenly disregard for the basic rules of life (Rule#1: Do not Foul your Abode) the continued right to do whatever it chose anywhere, to whomsoever it wanted.

In short. What is happening is very clear. There is nothing mysterious about either the object or the process.
What you see, and hear, is what you get. The Bear and the Dragon have been woken up, they were very happy to continue their slumber. But it was impossible for them to sleep any longer. They have woken up, and most of the rest of the world is inclined to follow their example.
Most not all, apart from Europe-an exceptional case- there are many others and a few other countries where submission to the Ugly Imperium has become a habit so deep-seated as to be impossible to grow out of. Japan for example, like Europe an occupied country, allowed every freedom but that of sovereignty where the taste for american shoe leather has become a central part of elite cuisine.

Xi said it in Moscow: changes not seen in a hundred years are taking place, and Russia and China are the catalysts of this change.
As always, these were not changes that the world (a conservative place) wanted,(the world did not ask for Cortez or Clive or Admiral Dewey either). They were forced upon it, and us, by that form of stupidity mixed with strength, inertia and mass that the Greeks called hubris.
The world Xi and Putin and are building will have GW Bush's name on its foundation stone.

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 19:15 utc | 59

Ghi@56
Most of what you call the socialist measures in (West) Germany were actually introduced by the Allied Occupation authorities as necessary to prevent the re-emergence of fascism.
During most of the history of the Bundesrepublik the government-in so far as it has ever had one- has been in the hands of US designated capitalist politicians. As is clear the Social Democrats are neo-liberals through and through as well as enthusiastic valets for the empire.
But then, no doubt, you would regard the USA as a government run by socialists and Wall Street as a conclave of communism.
The real problem with neo-nazis is that they are like Nazis without brains.

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 19:23 utc | 60

@ bevin

Great writeup.

>> The neo-cans

Agree, it’s misdirection, to persuade younger voters “this isn’t who we are” and “isn’t who we’ve always been”.

Years ago, it worked on me.

Posted by: natokraine | Mar 30 2023 19:25 utc | 61

@Outraged | Mar 30 2023 15:28 utc | 12

Thank you for the link to your previous post (Mar 17 2023 20:07 utc | 103). What a horror! Having grown up in East Germany, we were taught the terror against Jews, conscientous Christians, communists, unionists, blacks, and many other opponents. (Not in this sequence though; Stalinism had its favourite victims; At least until the 70s). And we were shown the museums in the concentration camps. All you wrote is just...all too familiar. The parallels between these two fascist regimes and their fellow travellers are overwhelming. Those Ukrainian Nazis and the USUKEU gangsters who cultivate such scum deserve a Nuremberg-style trial. With hanging.

Posted by: OttoE | Mar 30 2023 19:29 utc | 62

From Victor's telegram channel....
https://t.me/vicktop55/14135
The striking graphics are featured in The Times today. They compared UN data on Ukrainian demographics for 2021 and 2023. Judging by this table, in Ukraine, 20-year-old boys and girls are actually running out. If there were 200,000 guys of this age in 1921, now they are around 70,000. The number of girls, respectively, has fallen from 200,000 to 50,000.
Everything is as Boris Johnson promised: the war “to the last Ukrainian”… https://t.me/ukraina_ru/140153

Would seem that both sexes of military age are depleted....

INDY

Posted by: Dr. George W Oprisko | Mar 30 2023 19:37 utc | 63

So, lots of things in play but IMO too complex to happen fast. Posted by: LightYearsFromHome | Mar 30 2023 19:14 utc | 58

Agreed - my timetable is similar to your 20 years, only I count De-Dollarization to have begun in the 2007-08 period …..20 years takes us to 2027 or so.

Posted by: Exile | Mar 30 2023 19:37 utc | 64

What are 200s and 300s ?

Sample sentence: Retreating, the fighters of the Armed Forces of Ukraine abandon their 200s, or even 300s, in the abandoned positions.

Posted by: OttoE | Mar 30 2023 19:46 utc | 65

at Paul. Operation Barbarossa had a contact line as big or bigger I believe

Posted by: Tannenhouser | Mar 30 2023 19:51 utc | 66

What are 200s and 300s ?
@ OttoE | Mar 30 2023 19:46 utc | 65

---

Cargo. 200s are corpses, 300s are wounded.

Posted by: too scents | Mar 30 2023 19:53 utc | 67

bevin | Mar 30 2023 19:23 utc | 60 "...The real problem with neo-nazis is that they are like Nazis without brains.

Nazi with brain is an oxymoron. Proof enough is that they drove people with brains into exile. The most prominent example is Albert Einstein, I guess.

Posted by: OttoE | Mar 30 2023 19:54 utc | 68

@OttoE | Mar 30 2023 19:46 utc | 65

Dead and wounded

Posted by: Norwegian | Mar 30 2023 20:00 utc | 69

A bit of a classic on twitter about US journalist /agent

https://twitter.com/RWApodcast/status/1641416152193613824

Posted by: Aslangeo | Mar 30 2023 20:10 utc | 70

Having learned, during a fortnight in France, that Sputnik and RT are unavailable there I post this


"MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russia is calling for an independent investigation into the last year events in the city of Bucha, near Kiev, and calls on the United Nations to publish a list of the victims, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.

"We are saying it once again. In order to find out the truth, it is necessary to carry out a fair, impartial, independent investigation, which should be focused on giving answers to four questions: identification of bodies, time and cause of death, signs of possible transportation of the bodies," Zakharova said during her press conference.

"Russia has requested the full list of Bucha's residents, who died at the time of the events, from the UN, but the organization has not provided such a list yet, Zakharova added.

"The UN referred to the lists of victims available on the Internet and in social media, but Moscow would like to deal with official information, the official said, adding that the events in Bucha were a provocation aimed at scuttling the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, as well as imposing new anti-Russia sanctions.
"In April, the Russian Ministry of Defense said that no residents of Bucha suffered from any violent actions while the city was under Russian control."
https://sputniknews.com/20230330/russia-calls-for-probe-into-bucha-events-asks-un-for-list-of-victims-1108969134.html
Will someone please tell the ICC?

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 20:11 utc | 71

This is my first post. What is really going on in Bakhmut? I thought from reading on MOA that it had already fallen to Russia, perhaps I was mistaken. In any event, why is it still in contention do you think?

Posted by: TreborSays | Mar 30 2023 20:16 utc | 72

Heavy precipitation in the Donbas region. Trains have been halted due to snow in Rostov-on-Don.

https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/overlay=precip_3hr/orthographic=-324.65,49.97,2339

Posted by: too scents | Mar 30 2023 20:17 utc | 73

@ bevin

> Having learned, during a fortnight in France, that Sputnik and RT are unavailable there I post this

swentr.site

For how long? Who knows.

Posted by: natokraine | Mar 30 2023 20:18 utc | 74

It has been reported that in the last week 5% of Bakhmut has fallen to the Wagner forces of Russia. If the Russian advance is at that rate and continues at that rate, then Bakhmut will completely fall to Russia in around 7 weeks.

Yet, it appears that the Russian advance is intensifying. So, Bakhmut could fall in less time. It is difficult, if not impossible, to determine exactly when Bakhmut will fall because of the dynamics of the zero line in and around Bakhmut are continually changing. For now, it looks to completely fall to the Russians within the next couple of months.

Whenever Bakhmut falls, this will be both a morale and a strategic military defeat for Ukraine. For sure, such will be a significant blow to Ukraine's ability to hold onto the Donbas.

Since the lion's share of the AFU is in the Donbas, the loss of the Ukrainain army there will significantly reduce the strength of a hostile army on the Western border of Russia. At that point, the Ukrainian army will have little choice but to retreat to a more defensible position which most likely will be West of the Dnieper River.

If Russia blows the bridges across the Dnieper, this will be a strong indicator that Russia has no intentions to take the rest of Ukraine West of the Dnieper. The Dnieper will provide a good natural barrier for both Ukraine and for Russia to find rest from the fighting. This would allow Russia to deal with more serious matters like dealing with the USA and the UK.

Posted by: young | Mar 30 2023 20:20 utc | 75

This is OT but there seems to be a lot of concern in the MSM about the Wall Street Journal reporter who has been detained in Russia on charges of espionage. These teleprompter readers would have more credibility if they had displayed any concern for Julian Assange. I would think Putin could troll the west by trading one for the other but I am not sure Julian would want to be tainted by such a deal.

Posted by: Quid Me Vexare | Mar 30 2023 20:20 utc | 76

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 19:15 utc | 59

Impressively succinct writing.
Thanks for sharing. I will pass it on.

Posted by: Anto | Mar 30 2023 20:25 utc | 77

unimperator@24
I believe that Axel Springer owns Politico.

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 20:28 utc | 78

" Nazi with brain is an oxymoron. Proof enough is that they drove people with brains into exile. The most prominent example is Albert Einstein, I guess.

Posted by: OttoE | Mar 30 2023 19:54 utc | 68 "


Einstein is a big fraud designed to take the glory away from the true Slavic genius called Tesla.

Posted by: Deplorable Commisar | Mar 30 2023 20:28 utc | 79

This is my first post. What is really going on in Bakhmut? I thought from reading on MOA that it had already fallen to Russia, perhaps I was mistaken. In any event, why is it still in contention do you think?

Posted by: TreborSays | Mar 30 2023 20:16 utc | 72

Because enough people are still willing to fight for it, and pay for it.

Posted by: Bemildred | Mar 30 2023 20:29 utc | 80

TreborSays | Mar 30 2023 20:16 utc | 72

One source of information that is frequently used by MoA people is "Military Summary"
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUnc496-PPmFZVKlYxUnToA
If you have time and patience, the videos of Alexander Mercouris
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=UUwGpHa6rMLjSSCBlckm5khw
may provide even more details and analysis. As a third source of information, I can of course always recommend RT international - if you know how to access it through either odyssee or rumble.com.

There seems to be no decision yet in Bakhmut, since RT didn't even mention the place in the news this morning. Besides, while you're at MoA, somebody is sure to shout it out if anything major happens...

Posted by: grunzt | Mar 30 2023 20:35 utc | 81

@ TreborSays | Mar 30 2023 20:16 utc | 72

There’s been so much written this already. Please read through any open thread on ukraine during the past month.

Posted by: natokraine | Mar 30 2023 20:44 utc | 82

Posted by: TreborSays | Mar 30 2023 20:16 utc | 72

read this. It's taking so long because every building is fortified since 2014. Same for Avdeevka. These are the places where the Nazis are launching their artillery and rocket attacks on east Donbass since 2014.

https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/sitrep-32923-bakhmut-pincer-tightens

Better still read everything here.
https://simplicius76.substack.com/

Posted by: Surferket | Mar 30 2023 20:52 utc | 83

Since months Western tv news states food prices have increased "because of the war in Ukraine". This is a good excuse to avoid blaming government. But peoples' support for the war disappears.

Posted by: Passerby | Mar 30 2023 20:58 utc | 84

TreborSays | Mar 30 2023 20:16 utc | 72

Try also: Military Summary
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUnc496-PPmFZVKlYxUnToA
where Bakhmut and the other combat zones are discussed every day.

Posted by: grunzt | Mar 30 2023 20:59 utc | 85

@Bevin@59
Second sentence make no sense to me as its as idealistic as u claim thinking the world is run by unseen groups.
Especially when followed by the 3rd sentence where u say we know who does these things.

Yes we do know who. Mostly the followers of neo liberalism aka Neo Cons. Naming the group responsible is hardly idealist and mistaken.

Have I completely missed youreaning here?

Posted by: Tannenhouser | Mar 30 2023 21:03 utc | 86

Posted by: Just Observing | Mar 30 2023 14:11 utc | 1

Looks like the Russian security services have arrested an WSJ reporter. Espionage.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
wsj (lower case intentional since they distinguish between Black and white; capitalization racism) has been egregious in biased Ukraine reporting. I canceled last year and after three months surrendered at a dollar a week. I still do not read it every day.

Every comment that disagrees with the party line gets censored. I can no longer wish a single person a nice day.

Likely the Russians are showing some irritation. wsj won't care. Neither does Blinken.

Posted by: Acco Hengst | Mar 30 2023 21:10 utc | 87

Xi said it in Moscow: changes not seen in a hundred years are taking place, and Russia and China are the catalysts of this change.
As always, these were not changes that the world (a conservative place) wanted,(the world did not ask for Cortez or Clive or Admiral Dewey either). They were forced upon it, and us, by that form of stupidity mixed with strength, inertia and mass that the Greeks called hubris.
The world Xi and Putin and are building will have GW Bush's name on its foundation stone.

Posted by: bevin | Mar 30 2023 19:15 utc | 59

Great post, beautifully argued.

It appears that it all boils down to pretty much everyone in Europe and America being basically wicked and it's time for the rest of the world to push back so they can move forward freely in the basically good ways they desire.

I tend to regard societies, especially large nations with hundreds of millions, as complex organisms with no end of interlocking and overlapping levels and layers. There are elements in any large polity that become money and/or power addicted and there is no system which has found a way to be entirely immune from the damage they can infict on both their own and other polities. And they aren't the only form of corruption. But the point is that I find it a tad simplistic to paint entire civilizations, nations or races with overly broad brush strokes as you and others seem to be doing, though clearly not without reason.

Perhaps I am trying to hard to hypothesize a few key, small networks. One of Thierry Meyssan's articles on the Straussians, for example, demonstrated just how efficiently a relatively tiny group spread throughout the senior levels of the USG in the past few decades. This was intentional. It has been successful. It is not simply a typical manifestation of Washington DC nor a generally imagined conspiracy hypothesis. Now, maybe it's not an important phenomenon. Maybe the very few numbers of extremely wealthy corporations in the capitalist-modern world owning increasingly high percentages of all other corporations is also not significant because the real issue is that the entire society is filled with wicked people who quite naturally throw up wicked elites who in turn quite naturally plunder the rest of the world as much as they can get away with. It is possibly so.

But I like to think that most people are not wicked and that there are a concentrated few who are getting away with too much in which case there should be a way to get rid of 'em!

I think by and large the masses have shown that although they do have great power, they are like a herd of buffalo (or lemmings for that matter): far too easy to stampede in any direction they are told. Best to concentrate on those organizing such stampedes, I say, though of course it's hard to make them out behind their scarves and in all that dust kicked up by the panicked herd!

That said, if you look a little into the infamous British Empire exploits in India for example, again you see a very small group of extremely wealthy and powerful at the top of various financial networks (largely based in the infamous City of London) were pulling the strings of the national government of Great Britain who was supposedly perpetrating all of this for the benefit of her own Empire. And those same muckety mucks are almost certainly behind the extraordinary success of tiny groups like the Straussians...

Well: one thing the Eurasian bloc is doing which seems truly effective is just ignoring the Old Empire as much as they can and instead going ahead with their own fun and games, including trading with their own money. What a novel idea, eh? This is giving the West a heavy, heavy, HEAVY dose of inertia. If the lunatics aren't running the asylum there, maybe they'll just slow down so much because of old age and fatigue and befuddlement that we won't have another World War after all and the neocons, who some say don't really have much to do with anything, will just all fade away and leave us alone. Now wouldn't that be nice? I certainly hope it happens that way.

But if history is any guide, with the sort of changes Putin and Xi congratulated themselves on last week, billions will be dying before this is all over, including perhaps most of us now enjoying this bar. Many, many hundreds of millions even without nukes (war, privation, disease, crop failures etc.), but with them......

Posted by: Scorpion | Mar 30 2023 21:18 utc | 88

@ ThusspakeZarathustra | Mar 30 2023 17:53 utc | 39
@ LightYearsFromHome | Mar 30 2023 17:55 utc | 40

Set up. Shooting fish in a barrel.

@ lex talionis | Mar 30 2023 18:30 utc | 51

Prime example of it's kind. :(

@ bevin | Mar 30 2023 19:15 utc | 59

Bravo. Cheers.

@ OttoE | Mar 30 2023 19:29 utc | 62

Hopefully, may well yet come to pass.

Posted by: Outraged | Mar 30 2023 21:24 utc | 89

Julian Ropke, broke bad in my book today:

https://twitter.com/JulianRoepcke/status/1641440723638849537?s=20

This is just false. He doesn't know the first thing about just war theory or international law.

My apologies to those who I referred to Ropke's reporting, on the grounds he was an impartial source. I had never seen him use "scum" to refer to pro-russians before.

I disengage from anyone who uses loaded language to describe the war whether they're calling Ukrainians chaff or Russians 'rashists'. If you can't speak plainly, you are not a reliable observer.

Posted by: GoFast | Mar 30 2023 21:33 utc | 90

Military Summary channel report today mentioned (Russian) sources of Ukraine losses in Bakhmut which aren't included in MOD reports. They mentioned approximately 230/170/30 KIA/WIA/MIA

Posted by: unimperator | Mar 30 2023 21:34 utc | 91

The Americans snatched defeat in front of Victory when the 9th Army could have walked into Central Berlin in April 15, 1945 and Eisenhower decided to honor the agreement with Soviets and save maybe a few thousand lower-class American lives which were more than made up in a peninsular named Korea, which very few Americans had heard about before, 5 years later.

If Eisenhower entered the 9th Army to Berlin back then George W Bush would not have visited Kremlin and kowtow to Putin on May 9 2005

The Russian approach of sparing men will lead to the same result

Posted by: kulmthestatusquo | Mar 30 2023 21:38 utc | 92

Corbyn becoming an independent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkHjxOJlcq8

Posted by: pretzelattack | Mar 30 2023 21:38 utc | 93

@ GT Stroller @ Paul Demascene. Thxs for replies.

Re:
>> The neo-cans
Agree, it’s misdirection, to persuade younger voters “this isn’t who we are” and “isn’t who we’ve always been”.
Years ago, it worked on me.

Posted by: natokraine | Mar 30 2023 19:25 utc | 61

So you think they spend a long time building a highly effective political network just to fool young people about who is really in charge? Then who is it? The Presidents and Congress just like it's supposed to be?

I recommend Thierry Meyssan's article about the Straussians from a year ago now (March 5 2022). He is a serious writer with a pretty decent track record, I believe.

Russia declares war on the Straussians

Personally I hope he's more or less right and that Russia is committed to waging war on the Straussians because unlike you I think - respectfully - that they are very dangerous and are not being called out nearly enough. Of course they do not operate alone, but nor are they just a harmless typical part of the overall USG doing what it does so 'nothing to see there folks, walk-on, ha-ha!'

And will now read his latest which just noticed on his Home Page:
The preparation of a New World War

Posted by: Scorpion | Mar 30 2023 21:43 utc | 94

Outraged @2

Apologies if this has already been posted but I noticed an interesting tidbit in this MoD report. Just what is a Grom-2 operational tactical missile I wondered? Well according to EurAsian Times it is a brand new Ukrainian missile developed with Saudi money by the Yuzhmash enterprise. Those who hang out at the fag end of threads may have seen a few of my posts regarding Yuzhmash/Yuzhnoye, one of the jewels of the Soviet missile/space complex that ended up marooned in Dnepropetrovsk. Losing it was a serious setback for the Russian Federation as it produced some the Soviet Union's most advanced tech, like the SS-18 "Satan" heavy ICBM and the the "Zenit" orbital launcher that dominated the global space launch industry as part of the Russian/Ukrainian/US Sealaunch system (before being knocked out by the 2014 sanctions and losing its market to SpaceX).

The Grom-2 looks to be the Ukrainian equivalent of Iskander or ATACMS, with 2 ~500km range ballistic missiles on a wheeled Transporter/Erector/Launcher (TEL). EurAsian Times claims its development was funded by Saudi Arabia, which was prevented from accessing US missile tech under Israeli pressure. The Saudis turned to China (and now Ukraine) for missiles instead. The missile itself may not be anything special, but as with the Neptune antiship missile when combined with NATO ISR it may be a headache for Russian forces. It seems Russian air defense is up to the task of intercepting them, but its long range allows it to threaten high value targets like the Crimean bridge, or cities beyond the 2022 borders of the Russian Federation.

Although it is speculated that production of Grom-2 may be taking place outside Ukraine, the threat is poses may result in Yuzhmash being thoroughly "demilitarizated". That would be a sad end for a legendary Soviet design bureau.

Posted by: S.P. Korolev | Mar 30 2023 21:45 utc | 95

I am amazed by the skill with which they handled Trump’s indictment and subsequent arrest to come. They were very worried about reactions but handled it very well.

Planting false stories that the case is going nowhere, giving Trump and his allies security and thus pacifying the public did the trick.

This is why the West is still going strong despite all things going south. Factories, schmaktories. Public manipulation at level 10 is what keeps them at the top.

All enemies take notice, you need to be able to defeat that. Not militarily.

Posted by: alek_a | Mar 30 2023 21:46 utc | 96

sorry wrong thread for post on Corbyn.

Posted by: pretzelattack | Mar 30 2023 21:47 utc | 97

Posted by: unimperator | Mar 30 2023 21:34 utc | 90

Also, supposedly the Russians managed to block off up to 500 UAF troops in one of the very large industrial buildings in the northern part of Bakhmut. Every day there can be several tens surrendering in Bakhmut.

Posted by: unimperator | Mar 30 2023 21:50 utc | 98

Posted by: GoFast | Mar 30 2023 21:33 utc | 89

Last year he made the following posting:
"By the way, the Ukrainian army also repelled this Russian attack and turned hundreds of Russians into fertilizer."

After pressure he deleted this tweet. You find articles online (in German) about that.

Posted by: NoName | Mar 30 2023 21:54 utc | 99

bevin | Mar 30 2023 20:11 utc | 71

Having learned, during a fortnight in France, that Sputnik and RT are unavailable there I post this

WTF ? Je suis français, and, oddly, I have lived 'ere for a while..
I can read RT, Sputnik on my phone, no problems, and on my PC where I am using a VPN.

Posted by: Sarlat La Canède | Mar 30 2023 21:59 utc | 100

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