Ukraine 2023
Yesterday Zelenski held his end-of-year end speech:
Zelensky says Russia made no military gains in 2023, expresses faith in U.S. - Washington Post
Although Putin has claimed that Russian forces are now improving their positions virtually everywhere along the line of contact, Zelensky insisted that the invaders had made no military advances in 2023. “With regard to the battlefield, Russia hasn’t achieved any of its goals this year,” he said.
... to which Olga Bazove replies:
Zelensky: Russia has not achieved any results for 2023
Russia:
January 7: Podgorodnoye
January 10: Soledar
January 11: Opytnoe
January 16: Sol' station
January 19: Kleshcheevka
January 21: Krasnopolye
February 1: Sacco and Vanzetti
February 2: Nikolaevka
February 12: Krasnopolye
February 17: Paraskovievka
February 24: Berkhovka
February 25: Yagodnoye
March 8: eastern part of Bakhmut
March 9: Dubovo-Vasilievka
March 15: Zaliznyanskoye
April 2: Russian flag in the center of Bakhmut
May 20: Bakhmut
May-November: gains more territory than Ukraine during the counteroffensive while being on defense.
December 12: Marinka
December 2023: Avdeevka loading.
Admittedly, the difference on the map isn't that great:
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Dec 20 2023
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However the task given to the Russian troops was not to take land, but to demilitarize and denazify Ukraine.
In that aspect the numbers, given by the Russian Minister for Defense Sergei Shoigu, are indeed impressive:
On June 4, the Ukrainian armed forces launched a large-scale counter-offensive, prepared by their foreign curators. Without breaking through our troops’ tactical defence zone, the enemy was stopped and suffered colossal losses: 159,000 military personnel killed and wounded, 121 aircraft, 23 helicopters, 766 tanks, including 37 Leopards, and 2,348 armoured vehicles of various classes, including 50 Bradleys. Apparently, this is why we still do not see the American Abrams, delivered several months ago, on the battlefield.Since the beginning of the special operation, the losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces have exceeded 383,000 military personnel killed and wounded, as well as 14,000 tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and armoured personnel carriers, 553 aircraft and 259 helicopters, 7,500 guns, field artillery and multiple launch rocket systems.
Ukraine has had nine mobilisation waves, with the tenth wave currently underway where even individuals only partially fit for service are being called up.
Mercenaries that had been recruited since the beginning of the special military operation have, for the most part, been taken out. Over 5,800 fighters have been neutralised, including 1,427 from Poland, 466 from the United States, and 344 from Great Britain. Within Ukraine, 103 military criminals displaying particular cruelty have been eliminated.
Such battlefield numbers are of course never correct. But give or take some 10 to 15% they are still large. They are also somewhat confirmed by the new mobilization request from the Ukrainian military:
Ukraine considers proposal by army to mobilise another 500,000 for war
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Tuesday the military had proposed mobilising 450,000-500,000 more Ukrainians into the armed forces in what would mark a dramatic step up of Kyiv's war with Russia.The Ukrainian leader told his end-of-year news conference it was a "highly sensitive" issue that the military and government would discuss before deciding whether to send the proposal to parliament.
Zelenskiy said he wanted to hear more arguments in favour of mobilising the additional people before backing such a move.
"This is a very serious number," he said.
Ukraine is left with some 20 million inhabitants. More than two-third of those are pensioners and women. Zelenski has rejected attempts to mobilize women as the social consequences and protests would be too large. But he has not enough men and money left to mobilize another half-million men (machine translation):
Zelensky said that the command offers to draft up to half a million people into the army, but he did not approve this figure for two reasons.The first is the lack of proposals for the rotation and demobilization of those who have been in the trenches for a long time. The second - mobilization in the format proposed by the military will cost the budget an additional 500 billion hryvnias and there is no understanding yet where to get them.
The only sensible alternative for Ukraine is to give up, and to negotiate with Russia. Zelenski though is still unwilling to do that.
But it may well be that others decided to make the decision for him:
Kit Klarenberg @KitKlarenberg - 14:03 UTC · Dec 20, 2023An hour and a half ago, a Russian "Special Flight Squadron" plane landed in Washington DC. They are used by Kremlin officials. It set out from St. Petersburg. You do the math.
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The plane actually flew from Moscow via St. Petersburg to Washington DC. I wonder who was on board ...
However the signs that the war, and the views on it, have changed are unmistakable:
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Posted by b on December 20, 2023 at 14:14 UTC | Permalink
next page »The plane actually flew from Moscow via St. Petersburg to Washington DC. I wonder who was on board ...
Good catch!
I wonder if it's an offer.
Something like: 'EITHER you agree to leave Ukraine completely, cease funding assistance and withdraw all NATO missile silos and treaty signatories etc. back to 1991 (7?) OR we take back all of Ukraine up to the Polish border and soon will re-absorb the Baby Baltics to boot. Take your pick!'
Sacco & Vanzetti? The street in Chernihiv Oblast?
Posted by: Cato the Uncensored | Dec 20 2023 14:35 utc | 3
Ukraine 2023 will be remembered for tourniquets and amputees.
Posted by: too scents | Dec 20 2023 14:36 utc | 4
The Russians won't be negotiating. That is to say, they will be doing what winners do, dictating.
The United Satanists is a flailing, failing Empire of murderers and petty thieves, who are willing to go along with all kinds of evil for mammon. A deeply oppressed and dangerous, morally suppressed, degeneracy loving, brainwashed cult of stupid and fat arrogant war fanatics. The fall into apathy for their own people and total slavery to frightening and foreign entities has been a wild thing to behold. Their coming destruction because of money and sin worship whilst smuggly sitting at the hip of evil, An
almost impossible thing to comprehend.
Posted by: Jonathan Caine | Dec 20 2023 14:47 utc | 5
500000 additional mobilization is not an army request, it was an army estimate of what would be required to achieve Zelensky's stated goal of restoring 1991 borders. Zelensky seized on this huge 500000 number to discredit the army (Zaluzhny, in particular).
Posted by: anonposter | Dec 20 2023 14:54 utc | 6
Putin has the calm demeanor right now of Mark Twain’s “God fearing Christian who is holding four aces.”
Whatever Russia wants, they are either going to get (to include Odessa), or someone in the EU is going to have to join Ukraine in fighting them for it. So, show of hands kids. Who is prepared to die, or have their own children die in a nuclear WW III for either V. Zelensky or the border disputes of Ukraine?
Posted by: Packard | Dec 20 2023 14:58 utc | 7
I think this thing has a long way to go because of how far from reality the public is. Russia will require capitulation and the West is still coughing on the "stalemate" hairball. My guess is the message sent right now will be an opening position to anchor Russian expectations. Keep in mind, the general public is still completely in the dark and don't read blogs with up to date information.
I also expect some tough realities on Gaza are being kicked around. On that front I guess Russia is proposing something much more digestible to the US. Knowing where US priorities are, I guess Russia may be saying "speed up your abandonment of Ukraine and we'll help you out of your intractable position in Gaza".
Posted by: Pym of Nantucket | Dec 20 2023 15:00 utc | 8
Aurelien reminds us of what those who weren't reading 'b's blog, in 2022 were being told by the MSM about the comflict: "Russia was bound to lose, the glorious NATO forces-heir to the good bits of Nazism and guided by the ghosts of the Prussian General Staff, now working for Uncle Sam- were poised on the verge of victory.
"....Countries rushed to associate themselves with the plan, and in some cases to join NATO, so as to be positioned to feed off the corpse. When the glorious offensive of 2022 didn’t quite lead to that outcome, then Plan A V.1.1, the glorious offensive of 2023 incorporating western armaments, western planning and western training, was assumed to be going to do so.
"No matter how lunatic these assumptions may seem now, they are really the only way in which we can understand the confidence with which the West repeatedly launched soldiers with, at most, a few months’ training, some in light wheeled armoured vehicles, against a formidably entrenched enemy with massive artillery superiority and control of the air. The assumption was not that the Ukrainian forces were objectively strong, but rather that the Russians were so objectively weak and cowardly that they would crumple at the first shot. These ideas did not, of course, appear out of thin air in February 2022: they were deeply ingrained, in such history as the Professional and Managerial Caste (PMC) is still taught, in folk memories of the Second World War, and in confused recollections of the dire state into which the Russian military had fallen during the 1990s, the years of greatest western influence in the country. Oh, and of course they also derive from centuries of racialist under-estimation of the barbarian Slavs: even as I write, interns in Washington are busy copying and pasting paragraphs of the 1945 speeches of Dr Goebbels, warning Germans to fight to the last amputee against the barbarian hordes who were coming to rape, murder and destroy.
"All that hasn’t worked and isn’t going to. Yet because the assumptions described above come from inductive ideological reasoning rather than any experience, they can’t be completely abandoned that easily. Some influential people continue to believe that, if the Russians have not been defeated yet, it’s because their weaknesses have not been properly exploited..."
Thanks to Aurelien at substack
Posted by: bevin | Dec 20 2023 15:02 utc | 9
Hallelujah? The Berserkers are looking to put down the Ukraine hot potato?
Is it because they want to juggle with a hotter one in the Red Sea?
The imperial collapse accelerates.
Posted by: DunGroanin | Dec 20 2023 15:03 utc | 10
The only MAP that I've come across that places the battle field in territorial context of SVO mission (a/o 2 Dec 2023) —boundaries of Novorossiya FKA Ukraine oblasts Zaporizh*, Donetsk, Kherson, Lugansk.
Ignoring the "big arrow" projection along with crazy-eye Volody's "50% liberation" lap dancing, it's easier for me to see where RU needs to trim the contact line to a umm manageable DMZ border east of the Dnieper.
Taking Zaporizh* city at the Dnipro Dam's gonna be a bitch.
Posted by: sln2002 | Dec 20 2023 15:04 utc | 11
Oh what a wonderful Christmas it would be if this war did end now. Are we so optimistic and innocent that the mere mention of a secret flight from Moscow to Washington has us gushing in anticipation that USUK will do the honourable thing?
Alas, the reality of western lunacy, debauchery, greed and exceptionalism will soon dump our dreams of peace and prosperity on Earth into the gutter once more.
Posted by: Eoin Clancy | Dec 20 2023 15:06 utc | 12
The Ukrainians are going to get sick of throwing themselves into the leaf shredder for Uncle Sam. When patsies realize they've been played its not good. I expect capitulations to increase until a general surrender occurs. First slowly, slowly..then all st once. Even a infinite money printing machine can't stop gravity.
Posted by: Doctor Eleven | Dec 20 2023 15:10 utc | 13
According to Martyanov and others, apparently the Russian MOD daily clobber list numbers are from what they can observe at the front. Whatever is struck in the rear, at least on paper, counts as "zero casualties". The actual losses could be higher by a bit
Posted by: leaf | Dec 20 2023 14:20 utc | 1
Beats me 380.000 from which 160.000 from this last counter offensive onwards is… strange
It would mean 220.000 for the first 15 months, not even 15.000 a month, Zaluzhnyi mentioned 20.000 a month minimum.
On the other hand only half should be Kia, so 110.000 wia beyond recovery and we’re supposed to believe that 20 to 50% (25% if the refined number of 27.000 I saw mentioned somewhere is good) were amputees?
And all the difficulty raising troops… if AFU only lost 380.000 , the first refil would be enough to top it up, even if they had as little as 20 million population 380 would be easy to cover.
Well, maybe there’s a reason…
Posted by: Newbie | Dec 20 2023 15:26 utc | 14
A mixed bag that might indicate what a “no deal” future would look like.
https://t.me/NovichokRossiya/43376
👉👉I sat down with a Ukrainian officer today, fighting in one of the main sections, for his safety and mine. He said to me "We have nothing, not even bullets, We are spending 2 days in the trenches, and 2 days out (replaced by a new group). The Russians have no limits on ammunition and there are many more of them than us. It's even difficult to kill them, because there are too many."He also said that most Russians currently storming positions are ex-prisoners.
Zaluzhny stopped the Ukrainian offensive, Zelensky wanted to continue. There will be a new Ukrainian offensive as soon as they can replenish men and machines.
https://t.me/NovichokRossiya/43351
At Zelensky’s Headquarters they supported the decision of Zaluzhny’s headquarters and decided to be ready to withdraw the remnants of the Armed Forces of Ukraine groups from the settlement area. Krynki on the left bank of the Dnieper.The timing of the landing in the area of the Antonovsky Bridge, islands, etc. Krynki and the Zaporozhye NPP are shifted “to the right” until a stable reserve of the Armed Forces of Ukraine is formed on this bridgehead. The forces and means prepared for the landing were redirected to Rabotino and Ugledar, this information was announced by the TG channel Condottiero.
https://t.me/NovichokRossiya/43374
Kiev has little chance of taking any territory, but to be able to negotiate with Moscow in 2025, Ukraine can only threaten with drones and missiles - New York Times.▪️Kiev will have to wait a long time for Western help to fight the more powerful Russian army, which has the support of a much more developed industry. However, this help from the West is now in question.
▪️A number of senior US military officials are suggesting that Kyiv change its strategy to “hold and produce,” focusing on holding existing territory and producing its own weapons.
▪️With the Ukrainian Armed Forces' offensive stalled and chances of advancing by land slim, the goal is to create a threat with drones and long-range missiles so that full-fledged negotiations with Russia become possible late next year or in 2025.
https://t.me/milinfolive/112884
The Estonian Ministry of Defense recently released an interesting report. The full title is Setting Transatlantic Defense up for Success: A Military Strategy for Ukraine's Victory and Russia's Defeat.In addition to various kinds of agitation and propaganda, there are all sorts of interesting things. For example, an assessment of the production of artillery ammunition in Russia.
In 2023, it is believed that Russia will produce a total of about 3.5 million units, which is more than three times more than in 2022. And in 2024, production, according to the authors, will reach 4.5 million units.
The numbers (against the background of NATO suppliers) are more than impressive.
In addition to production, the report also uses the term “restoration.” This usually means making unusable artillery rounds suitable (replacing a propellant charge, fuse, projectile in a separately loaded shot; reloading a propellant charge with new gunpowder, etc.; replacing a rocket or warhead of a rocket projectile - making one serviceable out of two faulty ones, etc. d) at special enterprises.
This approach makes it possible to turn a significant portion of unusable scrap stocks into fully functional ammunition.
We will notice some reactions to it in advance. This approach to significant stockpiles of unusable ammunition was and is being practiced not only during the Northern Military District and not only in Russia.
https://t.me/milinfolive/112889
We continue to read the report "Setting Transatlantic Defense up for Success: A Military Strategy for Ukraine's Victory and Russia's Defeat" from the Estonian Ministry of Defense.And again something interesting.
Firstly, an assessment of the need of the Ukrainian artillery for new barrels for artillery systems to replace worn-out ones is 1500-2000 pieces per year.
Secondly, the cost per piece stated in the report is impressive - 900,000 euros. One of the stated reasons is a shortage in the available market and insufficient production volumes. Well, apparently the main contribution to the price is made by the higher class barrels, for the 155/52 NATO systems.
Thirdly, the zoo in the artillery of the Armed Forces of Ukraine is also gorgeous - 17 different “platforms”.
Posted by: anon2020 | Dec 20 2023 15:26 utc | 15
The 1989 Census in the Ukrainian SSR of the Soviet Union recorded a total population of 19 in Sakko i Vantsetti, 12 men and 7 women.[5] The population declined by the time of the first independent Ukrainian Census of 2001, which recorded 3 inhabitants in the hamlet.[6]
I thought that B threw that one as a joke. Named after those two innocent men that were executed.
Posted by: Angelo | Dec 20 2023 15:31 utc | 16
Scorpion @ 2
They did not come with an offer. They were summoned. Those listening are likely to hear reality they have never heard before and be unable to process.
Posted by: oldhippie | Dec 20 2023 15:32 utc | 17
Yes, the signs the Ukrainian conflict is nearing the end-zone are many, however I don't believe you can read too much into the Russian flight to Washington... Any serious negotiating would most certainly be taking place in Moscow!
Posted by: North Patagonia | Dec 20 2023 15:41 utc | 18
"Over 5,800 fighters have been neutralised, including 1,427 from Poland, 466 from the United States, and 344 from Great Britain. Within Ukraine, 103 military criminals displaying particular cruelty have been eliminated."
2 300 out of 5 800 leaves 3 500 mercenaries. From which countries?
Posted by: mowgli | Dec 20 2023 15:45 utc | 19
@ #20, zoege:
Any type of pause, ceasefire, or withdrawal would be incredibly naive on the Russian side, but that has long been off the table. Discreet talks, even if not full blown negotiations, are never a bad idea. While the Russians should pretty much count on the Americans not hearing them, and not being trustworthy, talks will at least give the Russians an idea of what the Americans view as a face saving way out of this in time fore the American elections. There's value in that knowledge even if the conclusion is that the Americans have nothing of value to offer, are screeching and delusional, and that helping Biden administration is a non-starter.
Posted by: Another James | Dec 20 2023 16:05 utc | 22
b. noted:
An hour and a half ago, a Russian "Special Flight Squadron" plane landed in Washington DC. They are used by Kremlin officials. It set out from St. Petersburg. You do the math.
Yes. A regular overseas embassy personnel change, gifts, mail, vodka and such.
Not that Lavrov goes to DC and begs anyone over there.
When we see the USA delegation landing in Moscow, that we know that the end is near.
Posted by: whirlX | Dec 20 2023 16:10 utc | 23
Another “Peace Diktat” in the offing, Versailles 1919 style, which followed the November 1918 WWI armistice?
Is December 2023 going to see a ceasefire as happened all along the WWI Western Front in November 1918?
And then it'll just be a matter of "Sign here, Pan Zelensky"?
If the little rat had any sense, he would be getting ready to leg it now out of Banderastan.
Posted by: Moscow Exile | Dec 20 2023 16:11 utc | 24
@ whirlX | Dec 20 2023 16:10 utc | 23
Unfortunately you could be right. In which case we can all be mildly surprised that the USA still allows such flights, given its increasing propensity to deny Russians (and Iranians and…) the right to physically access the UN.
Posted by: malenkov | Dec 20 2023 16:18 utc | 25
I would think Patrushev or Ryabkov or perhaps both are on that plane. However, given the content of the very recent interviews of Ryabkov and Lavrov along with what Putin has said in his several recent very public remarks, I doubt Team Biden is ready to give what Russia wants, and those wants go beyond Ukraine. All those interviews are available at my substack for those who've missed them.
Bevin @9
No need to scour through history to understand why the west is so smugly sure that the Russians would run.
Americans don't do history anyway, we do propaganda. It isn't 70 year old propaganda, it was less than a year old.
There are frequently arguments here at the bar, about the proper way that Russia should have started the SMO. I am with the people who say that Russia expected Ukraine to settle (since they tried at least twice), so there was no reason to send more troops in.
But what about after April, when it became obvious that NATO had a gun to Zelensky's head and were ready to fight to the last Ukrainian for the rich farmland of Ukraine and the wealth of Russia?
Why didn't Russia mobilize? Why wait until after the contracts of the first soldiers ran out and they left, months later?
Here's my theory. As I said, the west has the Mighty Wurlitzer of propaganda, and Maria Zakharova testified about what is obvious to any observer, that Russia has no chance of being heard when they tell the truth. She said that John Kerry told her that after the propaganda blitz about M17, an obvious shootdown by Ukraine that got turned into a sanctions-setting bullshit fest by the US/NATO media. I can't find the quote, but he was gloating about how Russia would never be able to get their side out.
I remember the little boy who starred in the White Helmet production "Assad Bombs His Own People", that the war machine used to get Trump to bomb Syria.
Russia took the little boy to the Hague, supposedly the place where justice is served (ha), and he testified that he hadn't been gassed, he had been snatched off the street, taken to the hospital and hosed off for the camera.
The western media walked out of the testimony and not a word was printed for the general brainwashed public.
So when Russia withdrew from Kharkov and Kherson, they must have known that the west would turn it into a propaganda extravaganza.
And then the west believed their own propaganda, and so, apparently, did Ukraine.
Was this Russia playing to their own weakness? Their inability to control the global consensus maker?
It certainly made a difference in NATO plans, imo. They seriously seemed to think that when they started their Super Duper Spring Offensive, Russian soldiers would throw down their weapons and run.
I guess we'll see. Either Russia was playing 3-D propaganda judo, and they will use their victory to secure Ukraine from the Nazis, or it was actually poor planning and they will throw away their current advantages.
I'm hoping it's the former.
Posted by: wagelaborer | Dec 20 2023 16:19 utc | 27
@ “Any serious negotiating would most certainly be taking place in Moscow!
Posted by: North Patagonia | Dec 20 2023 15:41 utc | 18 “
No criticism. Have been pondering that for the last hour.
The most logical answers for me currently :
1. The Russians need to have clear terms in DC wholly agreed and publicly declared by DC.
So no one a say that a surrender brokered in Moscow by a few can be ignored down the road. Again. Given the way the previous assurances given to Gorbachev, back then, were denied by the WH post facto. Nato did expand.
No backsliding to be possible this time.
2. There is a multi front multipolar war to end as it ratchets up with its thousand cuts and as more Nations of the Global South get their cajones and stand up in the ‘I’m Spartacus’ revolt against centuries of unipolar Anglo European imperialism.
Which means at some point Xi will have his say in being the only Honest Broker , big enough to guarantee, left.
I’m sure others will have other interpretations which I am happy to consider too. We are just watching pawns after all and not the Chess Players.
Posted by: DunGroanin | Dec 20 2023 16:23 utc | 28
Ukraine military have said they need 20,000 new conscripts per month. That is likely the true casualty/attrition rate. That would put the figure at 200,000 every ten months that can no longer fight. Killed captured maimed deserted ect.
Re "Within Ukraine, 103 military criminals displaying particular cruelty have been eliminated." Tornado/Kraken appears to have ceased to exist. They were operating in the northern sector out of Kharkov. A number were killed earlier and I have read nothing more of them since.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Dec 20 2023 16:29 utc | 29
I read that Ukraine has lowered mobilization to age 25. The draft, down to 18 or so, is not the same thing as driving them to the contact line, at least officially.
This suggests that Ukr. is trying to avoid demographic oblivion - which, horrifically, would be the greatest guarantee of a permanent peace.
OTOH, maybe they are lying and sending any breathing young male to the meat grinder. I can't find evidence of that, however.
Posted by: Eighthman | Dec 20 2023 16:32 utc | 30
They were summoned.
Posted by: oldhippie | Dec 20 2023 15:32 utc | 17
---
Talk of seizure of Russia's assets is making the rounds.
The legal case for seizing Russia’s assetsG7 allies are debating whether to spend Moscow’s frozen funds to support Ukraine
Laura Dubois in Brussels and Sam Fleming in London 11 hours ago
After hitting Russia with an unprecedented array of sanctions following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, G7 allies are considering an even more drastic step: spending Moscow’s money.
Western nations, including the US, are exploring ways to justify seizing Russian central bank assets that are frozen in the financial system, and using them to fund Kyiv.
The idea has gained traction in recent weeks as the US and EU struggle to secure political approval for fresh funding packages for Ukraine worth tens of billions of dollars.
continues ==> https://www.ft.com/content/adb09fd6-e5f7-4099-9994-806814b4c9b4
Posted by: too scents | Dec 20 2023 16:35 utc | 31
Pym of Nantucket | Dec 20 2023 15:00 utc | 8
Has made a point that, I believe, to be true.
The public is fed so much daily bullshit in regard to the actual situation on the ground in Ukrainia that any meaningful "negotiation" is politically impossible until they are told the truth.
This because the public does not understand how poorly the Biden's neocolonial puppeteers have played their hand. Militarly, the US has failed utterly in Ukrainia...an outcome that was foreordained but, unforeseeable to the myopic fools that rule this land. And so, the mainstream propaganda outlets continuously spewed delusional DC-think and that has to be rectified before there is any hope of serious negotiation.
Posted by: S Brennan | Dec 20 2023 16:39 utc | 32
Satanism just before Christmas:
Dr Terror deals the Death card: how tarot was turned into an occult obsession
It was a nice innocent game played by Renaissance courtiers, often featuring strong women. Why were these artistically dazzling cards given a black magic makeover that endures to this day?
See the cards:
The Devil, Death and the Emperor
Posted by: phenon | Dec 20 2023 16:41 utc | 33
karlof1 | Dec 20 2023 16:18 utc | 26
Mt initial thought on this is that the Americans cannot go to Moscow due to the optics they have cornered themselves into so have asked the Russians to go to US for a meeting.
It seems the neo-cons keep getting waylaid on their way to China. One faction wants truce with Russia while they attack China, the other faction wants to 'finish' Russia off first. I guess a larger percentage is now on the side of truce with Russia for the interim. The interim now being the middle east and China. Now the naval flotilla being cobbled together to launch war on Yemen again... A busy schedule for the insane.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Dec 20 2023 16:41 utc | 34
thanks b... winning in the propaganda world seems to matter for zelensky and friends.. it really doesn't matter as i see it.. and when the dam breaks it will become very apparent.. we are approaching that time as i see it..
Posted by: james | Dec 20 2023 16:42 utc | 35
Blowback is a bitch.
https://kitklarenberg.substack.com/p/ukraine-grenade-attack-heralds-coming
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Dec 20 2023 16:43 utc | 36
Putin mentioned in the SMO assessment that Russia had no objections to neighboring states exerting territorial claims (Poland, Romania, Hungary). He also said that Odessa is a Russian city (and that Novorussia had nothing to do with Ukraine) What is meant by such statements? Opaque. RT has an article up by Sergey Poletaev with a projection of Russian strategy for 2024: keep up steady pressure along the front while dangling the possibility of a negotiated settlement taking into account Russian requirements, while at the same time building up the necessary military force to impose a purely military solution. Status quo for the foreseeable barring capitulation by Kiev and its backers in the west. Raising the territorial issue is likely an attempt to garner support for a suitable political settlement among Ukraine's neighbors.
Before the start of the SMO the majority of commentators dismissed the possibility of military action. The US did not, while Zelensky was saying that the US was engaged in unhelpful fearmongering. Russia had said that a military technical solution was an option. The US clearly understood this message but refused to change course - likely believing that Russia would be unable to impose a military solution. Apparently they are still not sure, and so Russia is in the business of demonstrating that they are.
Why did Zelensky not believe Russia was serious when the US did? Perhaps this was theatre for domestic consumption to prevent panic prior to the start of hostilities which would be unhelpful. Better to wait for the hammer to fall and then use the shock and outrage to rally public support for a military response. Likely the capitulation of Kherson and Zaporizhia was unanticipated by western planners, but those who thought Kiev would fall in days were out of the loop. Russia hoped that a demonstration of their willingness to engage in military action would lead to an acceptable negotiated solution, but it did not, however they did have contingency plans.
Now there is some hope that the EU will fracture sufficiently to help push the US to accept a Russian solution, but Russia will continue preparing to impose one by military force, however they are not yet ready for this (on their terms) and will move in this direction prematurely only if forced to by circumstances (outside intervention). This is likely the reason for their measured responses to western military provocations. No desire to increase the chances of overt outside intervention (involvement of NATO forces).
I had thought (hoped) this might be over this winter but now think this unlikely. What does Russia consider reasonable regarding territory under its direct control? Not clear yet. Currently they are engaged in improving their tactical position along the front only, and I don't expect significant moves in the near term. I had thought they might take Avdeevka by the New Year, but this now seems rather unlikely. Over the winter - yes.
The Russian military planners and their US counterparts have access to a great deal of information on the effectiveness of Russian missile and drone campaign targeting the Ukrainian rear that is unavailable to public prognosticators. Same for western attacks on Russian rear areas. Likewise the political situation in Kiev is opaque. Lots of noise and speculation with few hard facts. We will just wait and see.
Posted by: the pessimist | Dec 20 2023 16:44 utc | 37
I hate to think that the Russians would be wasting precious time and jet fuel just to listen to more mendacious bullshit from/in Washington.
They could have at least insisted on meeting in Geneva—just as hostile, but closer and a lot more picturesque.
Posted by: malenkov | Dec 20 2023 16:46 utc | 38
@26 Cont'd--
Well, Ryabkov's in Moscow tending to business as the MFA website informs. Lavrov's in Morrocco as this announcement attests: Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's remarks and answers to media questions at a joint news conference with Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Morocco Nicolae Bourita and Deputy Secretary-General of the League of Arab States Hassan Zaki following the sixth session of the Russian-Arab Cooperation Forum, Marrakech. There was a long remarks statement at the Plenary session which was followed by further remarks and several very good questions at the presser that followed that will be translated and posted at my substack in the next hour or so. And today we also have Maria Zakharova's Weekly Briefing.
Russia has done the whole world a favor, not only by denazifying and killing off the Azov/Kraken types, but also by killing so many sheep-dipped mercs.
These are subhuman scum who live to murder. The world has a brighter future with their carcasses rotting on the steppes, being picked at by animals.
Posted by: Ghost of Zanon | Dec 20 2023 16:53 utc | 40
Peter AU1 | Dec 20 2023 16:41 utc | 34--
Thanks for your reply. My assessment is the Outlaw US Empire has its hands tied in its confrontation on so many fronts simultaneously and is at the same time fundamentally weakened to the point where it can do rather little. When a nation plays chicken with its vaunted MBT and keeps it out of harms way instead of showing it can make a difference, you know there's something very wrong with its innards. Again, Asterovitch revealed the rot affecting those innards, and Simplicius detailed how that rot has ruined the USN, the Empire's most important component in power projection that's clearly not in any shape to take on China or even Iran.
It's hard to compare the morale between that of the average non-elite Ukrainian company, and it's Russian counterpart. The Ukrainian unit will have some guys with mental and health issues that would preclude them from serving in a Russian one, and it will have some guys literally dragged in off the street. It will have guys that scarcely get rotated out for rest, and when they do it's to accommodations inferior to the Russian ones. They get inferior access to medical care, inferior pay, and their families back home live under a crumbling economy.
The veterans of the unit, the few that there are, have seen replacements come and get eliminated at a ferocious pace. The stoicism of fatalism, even when combined with copious amounts of amphetamines, can only take such a unit so far. Once they are ordered to "advance to the rear", there will be no denying the reality that the war is lost, and the only remaining question is who will survive it, and what condition they would be in.
Time to queue up Sam Peckinpah's Cross of Iron, and appreciate the parallel.
https://youtu.be/1H9C_XapClg?si=Eg_1SXUDzHa4B60L
Posted by: Babel-17 | Dec 20 2023 17:04 utc | 42
by malenkov | Dec 20 2023 16:18 utc | 25
by karlof1 | Dec 20 2023 16:18 utc | 26
Those flights are usually agreed upon before, also those are somewhat regular and are the minimum dot of a relation there is, between RF and the USA. No need for 4 x SU-35 escorts, yet, thou.
Things are very serious indeed, as RF officials dropped polite phrases like 'our Western partners' and 'friends' and 'colleagues'. They are just calling them 'imperialists'. That means RF is now very angry.
And maybe we witness some new ideology that rises out and up with it. It could position the whole RoW in line, which is a very good thing to do.
As the XTweeter's various random thoughts appear, the general thought overall is, unless the USA/the West have unicorn-magic-alien-weapons-gamechangers that can win hands down over anyone, convincing every country in the world to bow and kneel in front of it, overall impression is they are pretty much screwed on the inside and on the outside, let alone some 'new physical properties'.
They are very afraid to try the other narrative.
Posted by: whirlX | Dec 20 2023 17:05 utc | 43
Either Russia was playing 3-D propaganda judo, or ...
Posted by: wagelaborer | Dec 20 2023 16:19 utc | 27
Yes. I increasingly think Russia was playing propaganda 10 dan judo. The West really had an unshakable conviction that Russia was running out of ammo, its soldiers were drunken cowards etc.That must have been some cool acting on channels the Russians knew were being tapped. The main danger to the Russian side was that the senior leadership would choke to death laughing.
Posted by: Tim | Dec 20 2023 17:07 utc | 44
If the Russians had a goal of killing about 300000 Ukrainan Nazis in the year, then this is exactly what they have done.
Why try and take land and advance as long as the enemy comes to you to get exterminated.?
Attack is far costlier than defense, and that is a fact.
Posted by: g wiltek | Dec 20 2023 17:07 utc | 45
If Ukraine does not have enough cannon fodders left, Lithuania, Poland, Bulgaria and the rest of Balkan Chihuahuas could be enticed to donate personals. Never underestimate the power of blind hatred and crass stupidity.
Posted by: Steve | Dec 20 2023 17:10 utc | 46
The 1989 Census in the Ukrainian SSR of the Soviet Union recorded a total population of 19 in Sakko i Vantsetti, 12 men and 7 women.[5] The population declined by the time of the first independent Ukrainian Census of 2001, which recorded 3 inhabitants in the hamlet.[6]I thought that B threw that one as a joke. Named after those two innocent men that were executed.
Posted by: Angelo | Dec 20 2023 15:31 utc | 16
Granted it's the Donbass equivalent of Dunny-on-the-Wold, but the Ukrainians fought hard failing to defend it and then failing to recapture it, so I guess it count for something, if only a pile of bodies several orders of magnitude larger than the original population.
Posted by: ChatNPC | Dec 20 2023 17:13 utc | 47
On Russian plane flying to DC - there was this sort of hype few months ago and it turned out that the plane was sent to DC to carry RUS diplomats back to RUS. Is it just a rotation of diplomats, flight home for X-mas and NY Eve or withdrawal of diplomats before cancellation of diplomatic relations as RUS side threatened several times?
Posted by: J_Schneider | Dec 20 2023 17:30 utc | 49
twocents@1635
We need to bear in mind that the freezing of assets was in the first instance, unlawful and illegal under any conceivable form of justice. To seize those assets and distribute them to an open enemy of the injured party is out and out THEFT.
If they think they can get by with such measures, it is more than slightly probable that the collective waste will get their comminuppance in due time.
Posted by: aristodemos | Dec 20 2023 17:39 utc | 50
If Ukraine does not have enough cannon fodders left, Lithuania, Poland, Bulgaria and the rest of Balkan Chihuahuas could be enticed to donate personals. Never underestimate the power of blind hatred and crass stupidity.Posted by: Steve | Dec 20 2023 17:10 utc | 46
And Finland, which was signed into a DCA agreement with the US a few days ago. The same kind of document that they signed with the nazis, taking them into a completely unnecessary war against Russia and losing (including losing land). And then having to fight a war with the nazis inside Finland to get them out. The americans don't have to worry though, I think the days when finns had a spine are long gone.
(Think I'm being cynical? Recently media was shushing finnish people and saying that they don't have to worry about the DCA granting US personnel immunity to finnish law, because if US soldiers rape finnish girls, Finland still has a right to beg on its knees... uh, appeal to the US to have it investigated... uh, maybe, if you're feeling nice and only if it's not too much of a bother)
Back then (too) it was an oligarch jew pulling the strings in Finland. How surprising.
Posted by: Michael A | Dec 20 2023 17:42 utc | 51
Posted by: Newbie | Dec 20 2023 15:26 utc | 14
My rule of thumb for the Russian MoD "kill list" is:
- if it's a small number it's exact.
- if it's a large, round number it's 10% below the actual number
Posted by: Passerby | Dec 20 2023 17:52 utc | 52
karlof1@17:02
Calling it like it is, typically astute of you regarding U$$A messing around with Iran, to say nothing of China. Either move would be the classical "bridge too far". North Korea has Japan in a potential checkmate situation if they allow U$$A forces to assault China from their shores. When the new government arises in Taiwan, any chance of that island becoming an "unsinkable aircraft carrier" goes down the big swirly. That's not even accounting what the Chinese can do on their own...such as smother Guam with missiles, thus reducing that F.O.B. Looks like that one is a pipe dream of the Neocons and their masters in City of London.
As for Iran, their steady production of missiles of all descriptions places a total kibosh on the Straits of Hormuz, the Gulf of Oman and even a large chunk of the northwestern Indian Ocean...and possibly extending as far as the big base on Diego Suarez.
At a geopolitical military basis, the armed forces of the U$$A would possess no viable overseas bases from which to launch assaults upon either China or Iran. Perhaps the Neocons at $tate are too belligerently stoopid to come to the conclusion that "the best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley and leave us naught but grief and toil for promised (premised) joy".
Even Obaminable's selected brown-nosers with stars upon their shoulder-boards can read those Tarot cards. Though Pentagon releases do not make that obvious point, there is a certain whiff of smoke in the air...from smuggled in Cuban cigars.
Posted by: aristodemos | Dec 20 2023 17:55 utc | 53
Posted by: Don Firineach | Dec 20 2023 15:56 utc | 21
That joke never gets old.
Posted by: sln2002 | Dec 20 2023 17:57 utc | 54
⚡️🇷🇺🇺🇦⚔️ Front #Summary for 20 Dec 2023 by 18:51⚡️🔹In #Kherson Direction, the AFU grouping is holding the springboard in #Krynki under our fire. An increasing number of AFU boats are sinking under our drone strikes. For the AFU group it is difficult to replenish reserves and supply, but they persist in their attempts. In addition to the boats, our military hit the enemy's deployment point in #Inzhenernoye, which is on the right bank of the #Dnieper River behind #Antonovka.
🔹In #Zaporozhye Direction, our forces have advanced in the wooded areas near #Rabotino. They also took control of several AFU strongholds near #Verbovoye. Our army has made also significant advances north of #Novoprokopovka. Counter fighting continues there.
🔹In #SouthDonetsk Direction, our units have taken control of an AFU stronghold near #Novomikhaylovka. There are successes in the south of the village. Our army has gained a foothold on Ak.Timiryazeva Street. From #Maryinka, our forces are moving towards #Kurakhovo, an important logistics centre of the AFU. The pace and activity of the AFU resistance is in the fog of war. The total distance from #Mariynka to #Kurakhovo is about 15 km.
🔹In #Donetsk Direction, the fog at #Avdeyevka is real, natural fog. Using its veil, our army is attacking in small groups. On the southern flank, the advance of our forces is recorded near #Tonenkoye and #Severnoye. On the northern flank, the powerful work of our artillery is aimed at suppressing the AFU on the territory of the Coke Plant.
🔹In #Bakhmut Direction, our army pushed the AFU back from the village of #Chernomorets. There are about 600 metres left to #Krasnoye (#Ivanovskoye). The AFU attempted an unsuccessful counterattack west of #Bakhmut. They lost two armoured vehicles and retreated under fire from our artillery. In #Kleshcheyevka, the front line is still without advances on our side. But the AFU cannot attack either. Ukrainian resources write that our army has increased the activity of artillery and the number of assault groups. On a video from the road between #Andreyevka and #Kleshcheyevka there are many burnt #NATO vehicles. The whole road is under fire control of our forces.
🔹In #Svatovo Direction, positional battles continue. Fierce attempts by the Russian military to breakthrough the AFU defence near #Sinkovka have so far failed.
https://t.me/sitreports/19737
Posted by: Down South | Dec 20 2023 17:58 utc | 55
Posted by: Don Firineach | Dec 20 2023 15:56 utc | 21
Posted by: sln2002 | Dec 20 2023 17:57 utc | 54
Have you read the latest: Geopolitics is for losers
Posted by: sln2002 | Dec 20 2023 17:58 utc | 56
RE: Posted by: J_Schneider | Dec 20 2023 17:30 utc | 49
Makes sense. Since round trip, we’re probably picking up diplomats & families for the holidays.
Lord knows they we’re probably begging to please not leave them there for the Holiday recess.
Posted by: Trubind1 | Dec 20 2023 18:00 utc | 57
I spoke yesterday with a Pole, who attended a birthday party with a bunch of Ukrainians.
One had just gotten out of Lvov, he had three underage children so he was allowed to leave the country, but is terrified for the fate of his children. His oldest son is 17.
He and other Ukrainians tell of bribes to military commissars to get out of being conscripted, while those who cannot pay are dragged off and certified as front-line capable, even if they have had amputations or multiple strokes. Clinics in Lvov are opening new branches, working night and day to process medical disabilities just as fast as the bribes can come in, however. As much as $15,000 per case. Doctors and commissars are getting obscenely rich.
Meanwhile, there is no shortage of war invalids and funerals are held non-stop.
Every Ukrainian I know complained of corruption before, but now the flood of free western money and no accountability has driven corruption to new heights. And anyone who dares question the official narrative can expect a visit from the secret police. Before, Galicians were de facto exempt from the worst conscription. No more.
The most interesting part was the Ukrainians who recently left Ukraine. Those who haven’t been back in a while insist against all the evidence that Victory Is At Hand. They still recite all the propaganda, that There Is No Corruption In Ukraine, that These Nazis Are Good Nazis, that Everyone Is United, etc.. Of course, Anyone Who Questions The Narrative Is A Traitor, even if they were in Lvov this month.
Those Ukrainians who just broke out tell a very different story. That made for an interesting party.
I told the Pole that none of this was any secret, and I had told her on multiple occasions in the past. She thought I was just reading "Russian propaganda".
Posted by: Feral Finster | Dec 20 2023 18:08 utc | 58
"The United Satanists is a flailing, failing Empire of murderers and petty thieves, who are willing to go along with all kinds of evil for mammon. A deeply oppressed and dangerous, morally suppressed, degeneracy loving, brainwashed cult of stupid and fat arrogant war fanatics. The fall into apathy for their own people and total slavery to frightening and foreign entities has been a wild thing to behold. Their coming destruction because of money and sin worship whilst smuggly sitting at the hip of evil, An
almost impossible thing to comprehend.
Posted by: Jonathan Caine | Dec 20 2023 14:47 utc | 5"
As an Americna Domestic Shorthair myself, I would not say that you are wrong.
Posted by: Feral Finster | Dec 20 2023 18:11 utc | 59
I hope Putin isn't setting a precedent here. The West doesn't need encouragement
Posted by: Eighthman | Dec 20 2023 18:13 utc | 60
by Eighthman | Dec 20 2023 18:13 utc | 60
That is just to secure the interest rate for NorthStream. Russia will send bills later.
Posted by: whirlX | Dec 20 2023 18:24 utc | 61
bevin | Dec 20 2023 15:02 utc | 9
"the 1945 speeches of Dr Goebbels, warning Germans to fight to the last amputee against the barbarian hordes who were coming to rape, murder and destroy"
To be fair, he wasn't far wrong. Russians were seriously annoyed with Germans, who after all killed tens of millions of them, plus the commissars kept them in a state of vengeful anger. Result was not nice.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prussian_Nights
Prussian Nights describes the Red Army's march across East Prussia, and focuses on the traumatic acts of rape and murder that Solzhenitsyn witnessed as a participant in that march.
Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 18:26 utc | 62
I suspect that Oldhippie is correct.
The only thing that will make the leadership in Kiev stop is either they run out of warm live bodies or money, and the West isn't tired of throwing money. That they have to resort to piracy is of no mind.
Posted by: Feral Finster | Dec 20 2023 18:28 utc | 63
Posted by: oldhippie | Dec 20 2023 15:32 utc | 17Scorpion @ 2
They did not come with an offer. They were summoned.
Hmm.....interesting possibility. Of course we don't know who is on board except they probably come from the Kremlin. Could be simple diplomatic pouch being hand-delivered to the Ambassador with a tin of fresh caviar. (Their website has recent Lavrov speeches etc. in English: https://washington.mid.ru/en/)
Anyway...
"Admittedly, the difference on the map isn't that great"
The proper base line would begin 23 February 2022 with an emendation noting the dates of the new admittances into the Russian state.
Posted by: Elmagnostic | Dec 20 2023 18:44 utc | 65
YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 18:26 utc | 62
The Red Army raped millions of Germans is a staple of foundational Cold War rhetoric. I'm unsure what happened and not going to Solzhenitsyn, a famous liar, to find out.
What I do know is that the US army was famous in Italy for its catholic taste in female companions and that it was notorious in Britain how far a packet of cigarettes went in winning the affections of civilians of every conceivable gender.
In other words rape and war have long gone together, as any Japanese, Vietnamese, Korean or Okinawan on this board will surely confirm.
Whether the Red Army, highly disciplined and efficient, was more prone to bad behaviour than the mobs following Patton and Alexander, is a moot point. But one thing , that you mention, is certainly true: no people had been more provoked than the Russians.
Posted by: bevin | Dec 20 2023 19:00 utc | 66
What I do know is that the US army was famous in Italy for its catholic taste in female companions and that it was notorious in Britain how far a packet of cigarettes went in winning the affections of civilians of every conceivable gender.
____
Now be fair, bevin. Italian boys weren’t exactly withholding their charms from American GIs, so let’s not single out only the Brits. ;-) Not sure what the going rate was though; probably a pack of cigarettes there too.
Posted by: malenkov | Dec 20 2023 19:08 utc | 67
by YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 18:26 utc | 62
Solzhenitzin is telling a fairy tales, most of the time. Surely there were atrocities, mostly only towards the SS and local Nazis ideologues. Cossacks were drinking perfume and a gasoline, before raping the liberated villages in East Europa. Sure.
But in one documentary on a liberation of Berlin, a Russian war veteran was telling how they were drinking vodka and slaughtering 200+ SS youth in one basement in Berlin. They had to pause to sharpen the knives.
Germans did so much horrors in Russia towards civilian population, that they actually were lucky to have Allies in about half of the country that helped them to go pretty unscathed.
Russians killed all the Nazis they could find, Allies saved all Nazis they could find and use.
Nueremberg processes were half-assed 'victory' sitcom.
The depth of Nazi structures and the entire Nazi judiciary bureaucracy was and is running free ever since.
Posted by: whirlX | Dec 20 2023 19:11 utc | 68
https://t.me/DDGeopolitics/96201
❗️Vladimir Putin hinted at Russian support for the potential return of Western Ukrainian border regions once annexed by Stalin from Poland, Hungary & Romania.⚡️Putin directly inferred that Russia would not oppose the "re-annexation" of these regions back to their former countries noting that he is 100% certain this is what residents of those Ukrainian border want.
⚠️Potentially:
🇺🇦Transcarpathia back to Hungary 🇭🇺
🇺🇦Galicia & Volyn back to Poland 🇵🇱
🇺🇦Bukovina back to Romania 🇷🇴
Posted by: anon2020 | Dec 20 2023 19:11 utc | 69
malenkov | Dec 20 2023 19:08 utc | 67
My information from soldiers, who might well have been boasting, was that a pack of ten Players Medium Cut or Senior Service would go a long way. But you're right about Naples-not far from the Last Exit to Brooklyn.
Posted by: bevin | Dec 20 2023 19:13 utc | 70
@ bevin | Dec 20 2023 19:13 utc | 70
…or, more appropriately, The Gallery by John Horne Burns…
Posted by: malenkov | Dec 20 2023 19:18 utc | 71
Posted by: Steve | Dec 20 2023 17:10 utc | 46
lovely, isn't that the way to destroy even the roots of well the not sees? :D
Posted by: Macpott | Dec 20 2023 19:24 utc | 74
Fake James - it's Kiev, not Kyiv fyi.
Posted by: the pessimist | Dec 20 2023 19:23 utc | 74
____
Dead giveaway it was fake james. He’s gotten fairly good at imitating the writing style though.
Posted by: malenkov | Dec 20 2023 19:26 utc | 76
When we see Air Force One approaching Yalta I think we can start looking forward to well deserved cigar.
Posted by: blueswede | Dec 20 2023 19:27 utc | 77
bevin | Dec 20 2023 19:00 utc | 66
"Solzhenitsyn, a famous liar"
It must have been for his lies that he was imprisoned after WW2, although you'd think as a Red Army captain of artillery for five years he'd have had some insight into troop behaviours. Did he slander the Glorious Socialist Republic?
"What I do know is that the US army was famous in Italy for its catholic taste in female companions and that it was notorious in Britain how far a packet of cigarettes went in winning the affections of civilians of every conceivable gender."
Hmm. So sleeping with a girl you supply with nylons and cigarettes is the same as forced rape and murder?
Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 19:28 utc | 78
Yeah, Chicken Kyiv just does not look right...
Posted by: Waldorf | Dec 20 2023 19:26 utc | 76
____
Or maybe we could call the Bankova gang “Chicken Kyiv”?
Posted by: malenkov | Dec 20 2023 19:29 utc | 79
Als die Soldaten Kamen
Die Vergewaltigung deutscher Frauen am Ende des Zweiten Weltkriegs
Miriam Gebhardt (2015)
Erstes Kapitel
Siebzig Jahre zu spät
In Bamberg Am Abend dieses Tages wurde die Ingenieursfrau Betty K. durch lautes Klopfen an der Korridortür aufgestört. Als sie – ihr eineinhalbjähriges Kind auf dem Arm – die Tür öffnete, stand sie vor zwei baumlangen Negersoldaten, die sie sofort auf die Seite schoben und in die Wohnung eindrangen. Als sie in sämtlichen Zimmern das Unterste zuoberst gekehrt hatten, fielen sie über die Frau her, die nach ihren eigenen Angaben dreimal vergewaltigt wurde. Der Vater der Frau wurde während der Untat jeweils von einem der Neger in Schach gehalten und schließlich niedergeschossen. Er war sofort tot.
Rudolf Albart, Autor eines Kriegstagebuchs
Posted by: Moscow Exile | Dec 20 2023 19:30 utc | 80
Something like: 'EITHER you agree to leave Ukraine completely, cease funding assistance and withdraw all NATO missile silos and treaty signatories etc. back to 1991 (7?) OR we take back all of Ukraine up to the Polish border and soon will re-absorb the Baby Baltics to boot. Take your pick!'
Posted by: Scorpion | Dec 20 2023 14:32 utc | 2
How about 'both'? I don't think there's anything on offer but some kind of face-saving gesture that western leaders can use to possibly stay in office for a little while longer. Russia is going to do what Russia is going to do, which is all of that, and breaking US global hegemony, the petro-dollar, and the Rules Based Order. The only questions are 1: How long will it take? and 2: How much of the conflict will be kinetic?
Posted by: Honzo | Dec 20 2023 19:31 utc | 81
whirlX | Dec 20 2023 19:11 utc | 68
shorter whirlX
"sure, there were some atrocities, but only against Nazis - all those Nazi women and kids. And anyway, Germans deserved it, look what they did!"
Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 19:32 utc | 82
Feral Finster @58: "One had just gotten out of Lvov, he had three underage children so he was allowed to leave the country, but is terrified for the fate of his children. His oldest son is 17."
The Ukrainians have a choice to make: Take care of their Nazi problem themselves and stop antagonizing Russia, or Russia will deal with the Ukrainian Nazi problem their way and spank the Ukrainians until they learn to behave like adults. If the Ukrainians continue to fail to make the right decision, then conscription definitely will eventually expand to include the guy's eldest, at least.
"To the last Ukrainian" isn't just a joke. It is literally where the Ukraine is going if they choose to continue on their current course.
Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 20 2023 19:34 utc | 83
I hope Putin isn't setting a precedent here. The West doesn't need encouragement
Posted by: Eighthman | Dec 20 2023 18:13 utc | 60
Exactly. The west has already set the precedent and built the Rules Based Order on it. What the west needs is for someone to take back what was stolen from them. That's a precedent that could change the game very quickly, if it catches on in the Global South. Niger already seems to have got the idea on its own.
Posted by: Honzo | Dec 20 2023 19:37 utc | 84
Maybe Vicky Nuland needs to go to Krynki to cheer up the Ukrainian marines crawling in the mud among their own comrades' corpses while under constant Russian artillery fire. She should totally go there and hand out cookies! That'll fire them all up.
Posted by: Biswapriya Purkayast | Dec 20 2023 19:39 utc | 85
Put yourself in the shoes of a Ukrainian man.
He's not political. He doesn't hate Russians. He didn't vote for the nazis. He has no military experience. He's never touched a gun in his life. He's got crippled old parents at home he can't leave, even if he could afford to get himself smuggled out of the country. So far he's managed to avoid conscription by hiding and an occasional bribe. But now his time has run out.
So with Elensky's new Volkssturm conscription he is dragged off the street, crammed into any uniform that roughly fits (never mind that it's a green summer camouflage cotton thing), given a rifle he has no idea how to clean and maintain, allowed to fire three bullets in three weeks of "training", and plonked without officers, or air or artillery cover, into the mud and snow of a trench west of Avdeevka in the dead of winter. Against an enemy hammering his position round the clock with artillery, FAB 500s, and FPV drones.
Exactly how is he supposed to do anything but die, and not in the least bit heroically?
Posted by: Biswapriya Purkayast | Dec 20 2023 19:39 utc | 86
Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 18:26 utc | 62
Citing both Solzhenitsyn AND a Wiki article in regards to Soviet Union history is a two for one whammy deserving some kind of special prize.
Posted by: boneless | Dec 20 2023 19:40 utc | 87
Even Masno, who against all evidence was just a few months ago claiming that he didn't see a single episode of anyone being dragged off the streets by cannon fodder recruiters in Ukranazistan, now reports absolute panic among those who haven't yet been fodderised. The conscriptors are raiding everywhere.
https://t.me/NovichokRossiya/43388?single
Posted by: Biswapriya Purkayast | Dec 20 2023 19:40 utc | 88
West wants ceasefire for sole purpose of rearming Ukraine — Lavrov
"Today, Western leaders are openly talking about it, making the same proposals and making it clear that this would not be an end to the conflict but a pause," the Russian foreign minister stressed
Posted by: mowgli | Dec 20 2023 19:41 utc | 89
Bevin - the Soviet war correspondent Vasily Grossman, who followed the Red Army from Moscow to Berlin, wrote 'Soviet girls liberated from the camps are suffering a lot now. Tonight, some are hiding in our correspondents room. During the night, we were woken up by screams; one of the correspondents couldn't resist the temptation".
And Grossman was attached to an elite unit, the Eighth Guards Army, not some punishment battalion from the works of Sven Hassell.
If liberated Russian women weren't safe, what of Prussian women?
Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 19:49 utc | 90
by Moscow Exile | Dec 20 2023 19:30 utc | 81
»Wer schützt uns vor den Amerikanern?«
Posted by: whirlX | Dec 20 2023 19:53 utc | 91
'EITHER you agree to leave Ukraine completely, cease funding assistance and withdraw all NATO missile silos and treaty signatories etc. back to 1991 (7?) OR we take back all of Ukraine up to the Polish border and soon will re-absorb the Baby Baltics to boot. Take your pick!'
The Kremlin plane is in Washington and the RU army is still on the east side of the Dnipro river but yeah let's imagine for Christmas that RU army already swallowed the Baltic states and Poland - what's next? I mean your fantasy
Posted by: mowgli | Dec 20 2023 19:55 utc | 92
I'm hoping it's the former.
Posted by: wagelaborer | Dec 20 2023 16:19 utc | 27
If you look beyond Ukraine and the SMO per se, I think you'll be confident that it's the former. Putin started from a position of weakness when he came to power after the traitor Yeltsin had turned the country over oligarchs and foreign plunderers, but even so he initiated a long term plan to tame the oligarchs, rebuild the economy, rebuild the military and break US global hegemony- and he told western leaders in public forums exactly what Russia required from the west. The conduct of the SMO has rallied the global south and considerable swathes of the western public to the Axis of Resistance, accelerated the growth of the BRICS system and de-dollarization, and crippled the EU economies while exposing the military weakness of the US and NATO. This would not have happened if Russia had seized Kieve in March 22 and stopped the fighting. We would have Minsk 3, and the west would be prepping for the next round as we speak.
I think a protracted kinetic conflict in a limited theater was always the Kremlin plan, because it furthers the essential global/strategic aims of Russia, China, and the axis of resistance more generally. Russia has been systematically tar-babying Ukraine and its western sponsors since their withdrawal from Kherson and Kharkov, and doing so accelerating the demise of the west. The Russians have been content to let Ukraine throw itself at its defenses and 'demilitarize' them en masse. They will continue to do so as long as the west is willing to sacrifice it's arms and treasure and the lives of Ukrainians. Their current advance is sufficiently slow to encourage the west to continue the fight, and perhaps reaching the entire left bank of the Dnieper will stimulate further futile efforts (because it's so 'defensible') but at some point it will become impossible to keep the Ukrainians fighting, and Russia will occupy everything except the post-wwii accretions from Poland, Hungary and Romania. Then the economic/political phase will take the forefront, and we'll have to see what happens to all the rabid anti-russians pawns of the US then- I suspect that Russia is rapidly moving toward the completely volountary reintegration of most of the Soviet republics, but this time, probably, as collections of oblasts of the Russian Federation, in most cases.
(by rapidly, I mean in the next two decades, some sooner than others).
Posted by: Honzo | Dec 20 2023 19:58 utc | 93
"...What I do know is that the US army was famous in Italy for its catholic taste in female companions and that it was notorious in Britain how far a packet of cigarettes went in winning the affections of civilians of every conceivable gender.
In other words rape and war have long gone together, as any Japanese, Vietnamese, Korean or Okinawan on this board will surely confirm.
Whether the Red Army, highly disciplined and efficient, was more prone to bad behaviour than the mobs following Patton and Alexander, is a moot point. But one thing , that you mention, is certainly true: no people had been more provoked than the Russians.
Posted by: bevin | Dec 20 2023 19:00 utc | 66"
According to a human I knew who had been a kid in Italy during WWII, the British were the worst, especially if their officers were distracted or unavailable. The Americans were mostly pleasant and generous, but not always to be trusted. The Germans were disciplined but brutal if you crossed them or they were simply seeking revenge.
This old man used to give a talk at the local high school. "Girls, if you see soldiers around, you go. Don't wait around, don't get to know them. They come, you go!"
Posted by: Feral Finster | Dec 20 2023 20:03 utc | 94
mowgli, where's this talk of Kremlin planes in Washington coming from?
Big if true.
Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 20:07 utc | 95
"Put yourself in the shoes of a Ukrainian man.
He's not political. He doesn't hate Russians. He didn't vote for the nazis. He has no military experience. He's never touched a gun in his life. He's got crippled old parents at home he can't leave, even if he could afford to get himself smuggled out of the country. So far he's managed to avoid conscription by hiding and an occasional bribe. But now his time has run out.
So with Elensky's new Volkssturm conscription he is dragged off the street, crammed into any uniform that roughly fits (never mind that it's a green summer camouflage cotton thing), given a rifle he has no idea how to clean and maintain, allowed to fire three bullets in three weeks of "training", and plonked without officers, or air or artillery cover, into the mud and snow of a trench west of Avdeevka in the dead of winter. Against an enemy hammering his position round the clock with artillery, FAB 500s, and FPV drones.
Exactly how is he supposed to do anything but die, and not in the least bit heroically?
Posted by: Biswapriya Purkayast | Dec 20 2023 19:39 utc | 86"
If that Ukrainian manages to soak up some Russian munitions, then he has done everything that Kiev, Brussels and Washington ask of him.
Posted by: Feral Finster | Dec 20 2023 20:11 utc | 96
Is it simply a diplomatic flight or holiday time? In top post b says Special Flight Squadron. I will accept that.
Americans can't go to Moscow to talk. Yet. Americans walk like elephants. No possibility of a quiet consultation. So Russia obliges. My first guees was same as karlof above, it is Patrushev on that plane. He is not going to let the Americans think he came as a supplicant. Hardly. He is going to demonstrate what professionalism is to a room full of amateurs. He will start by telling them what their own intelligence agencies are afraid to tell them
Posted by: oldhippie | Dec 20 2023 20:22 utc | 97
I wonder, Would Zelenski be so callously prepared to throw away another 500,000 lives of men women elderly and children if ghey were Jews?
I think not.
Posted by: Áobh O'Sheachnasaigh | Dec 20 2023 20:23 utc | 98
boneless | Dec 20 2023 19:40 utc | 87
Not everyone has such a low opinion of Solzhenitsyn. Putin met him in 2000, and in 2007 travelled to his home to present him with a state decoration.
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/40495
"The head of state thanked Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn for his work and dedication to improving Russia. Vladimir Putin said that “even today as you continue your activities you never compromise your principles. And you abide by these principles in your own life”."
Asked later (in a Der Spiegel interview) about the meeting and his view of Putin, Solzhenitsyn replied:
“Putin inherited a ransacked and bewildered country, with a poor and demoralized people, and he started to do what was possible, a slow and gradual restoration. These efforts were not noticed, nor appreciated, immediately. In any case, one is hard-pressed to find examples in history when steps by one country to restore its strength were met favorably by other governments.”
Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Dec 20 2023 20:34 utc | 99
The public is fed so much daily bullshit in regard to the actual situation on the ground in Ukrainia that any meaningful "negotiation" is politically impossible until they are told the truth.This because the public does not understand how poorly the Biden's neocolonial puppeteers have played their hand. Militarly, the US has failed utterly in Ukrainia...an outcome that was foreordained but, unforeseeable to the myopic fools that rule this land. And so, the mainstream propaganda outlets continuously spewed delusional DC-think and that has to be rectified before there is any hope of serious negotiation.
Posted by: S Brennan | Dec 20 2023 16:39 utc | 32
I'm trying to understand how the US public needs to be told the truth, as most of them would not recognize the truth if it bit them in the arse, much less formulate any principles based on said truth. For most of them, whose historical memory is essentially short term memory, Ukraine has already been memory-holed. They've lost interest in virtue signaling, to tiresome to maintain, and have moved on. When the media stops talking about Ukraine, nearly all of it propaganda, it will completely fade from the US public's consciousness in a heartbeat. The only aspect of project Ukraine that will matter to the US public is how it will affect their comfort level. A doubling of gasoline and food prices will enrage the public, 'losing' Ukraine not so much. They will be looking for someone to blame.
A military failure in Ukraine, of itself, will not wake the zombies from their sleep. The US has failed in its overseas military ventures for decades, yet few in the US question or even pay attention to the disaster that is US foreign policy. All the media has to do with Ukraine is declare victory for a few days and move on. The neocons will keep showing up on the talk shows, presented as wise men. Nothing to see here folks, keep moving. The only question in my mind is whether the present administration decides that it is better to take the loss now and do damage control, trying to keep things in the US somewhat stable until the election, or if it decides that letting Russia get a 'win' is so damaging to the empire's (and it's managers) long term prospects that it must defeat Russia at all costs.
Posted by: Mike R | Dec 20 2023 20:39 utc | 100
The comments to this entry are closed.
According to Martyanov and others, apparently the Russian MOD daily clobber list numbers are from what they can observe at the front. Whatever is struck in the rear, at least on paper, counts as "zero casualties". The actual losses could be higher by a bit
Posted by: leaf | Dec 20 2023 14:20 utc | 1