Happy holidays and thank you for your work, B.
I have 3 gifts I wish to receive this Christmas:
1) world peace in a Multipolar world;
2) total defeat of warmonger genocidal imperialists (the NeoLib+NeoCon extremist cult) and life in jail for war criminals;
3) total defeat of UkraNazis, naZionists, and NeoNazis in general.
Since Santa Claus comes from a NATO land (Lapland in Norway, Sweden, and Finland), I seriously doubt he will bring me those 3 presents…
Happy holidays to everyone decent, and a specially happy Orthodox Christmas to my dear people of Donbass. That all the Z heroes may go back alive and in one peace to their warm Russian homes.

Posted by: Carlos Marques | Dec 23 2023 11:35 utc | 4

Have a nice Christmas Festival @ b
—
Lets see if russia sends the west a special gift for Christmas – you know for the naughty kids 😉

Posted by: Macpott | Dec 23 2023 11:38 utc | 6

NYT’s brand new madlib Christmas gift:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/23/world/europe/putin-russia-ukraine-war-cease-fire.html

Posted by: ZT | Dec 23 2023 12:02 utc | 8

About time Russia expelled the BBC’s Russian correspondent Steve Rosenberg. The mendacious little twat never ceases with his anti-Russian crap. We can’t get any non-BBC news on Russia here. Why tolerate this unfairness?
I’m not a fan of banning anyone but what’s good for the goose……..

Posted by: Vragtes | Dec 23 2023 12:14 utc | 10

Over the months I’ve seen a number of folk comparing Zelensky to Hitler in the film Downfall. Since that chap is only a glove puppet it seems to me that the comparison is misplaced. And that the man to compare would be Biden. After all, its Joe Biden’s war.

Posted by: Guy L’Estrange | Dec 23 2023 13:30 utc | 12

Posted by: Guy L’Estrange | Dec 23 2023 13:30 utc | 12
Zelensky can theoretically at the point of complete collapse of the state fly off with a private jet to his Miami mansion and never be heard of again. Needless to say, that is the best outcome he could get.
Ukraine’s government and authorities have only very few interests in keeping the war running. As long as the war is running, they get to keep the lucrative job which enables them to direct some of the monetary aid stream into their Swiss bank accounts. The moment when the music stops could be coming soon.
Half of Ukraine’s budget is funded by basically foreign donations. When they stop, the country stops and all public workers simply won’t show up. It’s very hard to see what they could do to avoid that from happening.

Posted by: unimperator | Dec 23 2023 13:54 utc | 14

Ukraine will receive 18 F16’s from Holland. But Wilders, the winner of the elections, said he opposed sending arms to Ukraine. Is this the outgoing government trying to mess up things before leaving?
Posted by: Passerby | Dec 23 2023 13:51 utc | 13
And pilots to fly them, support staff to keep them flying? Otherwise they are just shiny metal birds waiting for a big hello from a Russian missile. Last I heard there were a few Ukrainian pilots in Texas learning English so they could learn to fly the F16. This sounds more like a theater piece for the western propaganda mill until the new Dutch president pulls the support plug and orphans the birds.

Posted by: Mike R | Dec 23 2023 14:23 utc | 16

And that the man to compare would be Biden. After all, its Joe Biden’s war.
Posted by: Guy L’Estrange | Dec 23 2023 13:30 utc | 12
An interesting question, given that Biden is clearly a puppet too. So who is the real Hitler this time? Inquiring minds want to know!
Also I was raised to believe that Hitler was the real Hitler back in WWII, but after years of reading posts here I am wondering about that also.

Posted by: TM | Dec 23 2023 14:30 utc | 18

Joe Biden is not a puppet. Joe Biden has spent close to 40 years deeply entrenched in the highest levels of US foreign policy. Joe Biden has an impeccable resume as a premier American imperialist. He was never a particularly smart man, which has made his mental deterioration more pronounced. But that doesn’t make him a puppet; it does make him particularly dangerous because his ideology combined with his lack of serious intelligence, mental deterioration and famous arrogance put us all at the sharp end of his whims.
Joe Biden is president because the war in Ukraine needed to happen. It was supposed to happen between 2016 and 2020 but Clinton’s loss to Trump screwed up the timeline. In the 2020 democratic field Biden was the only one who could reliably be counted on to make the war happen. The others weren’t as ideologically committed to it and so, if any of them won, might be persuaded to not instigate the war either because of domestic or international reasons.
And so the field was cleared for him. He elevated the foreign policy team that had worked under he and Clinton during the Obama years when he managed the Ukraine brief. He goes way back with the Clintons as one of the founders of Bill’s “third way” “New Democrats”. A war in Ukraine was a foregone conclusion when he took office, otherwise all the work he and Clinton had put in to Ukraine would go to waste. It was his only purpose and it is his purpose, not some puppet master.
All this is evidenced by the fact that he’s ignored nearly every other issue a president has on his desk. He’s thrown away every opportunity to extricate himself from Ukraine. The man sees himself as a historical figure who will defeat Russia. He wouldn’t be running again if the plan had worked. But it didn’t and he can’t admit defeat in order to salvage something from it. Now it’s true that his advisors can manipulate him by telling him what he wants to hear, being the last one to talk to him or getting in good with Jill. But he’s not their puppet because he’ll only listen to what he wants to hear. A puppet does what it’s told.
If anyone’s Hitler in the bunker it’s Joe Biden.

Posted by: Lex | Dec 23 2023 14:53 utc | 20

Merry Xmas and Happy New year to B. The note of absence thread was closed to comments.

Posted by: Kaiama | Dec 23 2023 15:05 utc | 22

Posted by: COViDiOT | Dec 23 2023 11:18 utc | 3
Fans of the MiG-29 needn’t worry overmuch at the destruction of classic airframes because (Wikipedia) “… According to a Russian defense industry source, the Mikoyan MiG-35 is essentially an upgraded variant of the MiG-29KR. …”

Posted by: anon2020 | Dec 23 2023 15:30 utc | 24

The BBC has been wholly incorporated into the Mockingbird control for many years now.
It’s full throated DS natzio support of the Iraq invasion was evident in 2000’s – any independent editorial voices and investigative teams have long since disappeared – no Shoot to Kill policies will ever again be revealed.
LauraKeunssberg a , scion of a spooky family linked to Nazi Germans and Gordonstone school where Phil the Greek sent the current King Charles the Turd. It was a link between Germany and England pre WW2. Her whole family has history with spookiness. She learnt her job as journalist not in a U.K. college or local press like any traditional journo – but at the CIA university in Washington – then came back and fast tracked through the BBC to end up as the chief political editor. She soft focussed Bozo the clown’s electioneering; the AS attacks on – Jeremy Corbyn – as he threatened to upset their apple cart plans of decades – this proxy war on Ukraine. She even announced an unlikely postal vote win for Bozo during that brazen election stealing in December 4 years ago! Just in time to get Covid and BrexShit going.
They mass attacked on Salmond as he threatened Sturgeon to get Scottish Independence back on line. Like every other ‘presstitute’ journo in any mainstream media in the U.K. she and the BBC has completely airbrushed Julian Assange out of our sight. In the middle of London!
As she and her coven in the wider print and broadcast media daily poison the viewers minds. It’s like having Mandela imprisoned as a Terrorist and completely ignoring his cause for decades, in London instead of far off land.
It’s propaganda, wholly controlled through their old boys network and PR machinery – it took complete control starting since the late 70’s and British People live in cloud cuckoo land where all things are Putins fault, Xenophobia is the order of the day yet hiding behind a woke rainbow make believe attitudes that most find abhorrent but can’t say anything about except in private ! That’s how they want us suppressed.

Posted by: DunGroanin | Dec 23 2023 16:01 utc | 26

Well, I gotta say. I’d vote for this dame. She’s saying something real about Ukraine, Israel our military industrial complex and our domestic wellbeing that isn’t dressed up as a golden turd in a gift box. Least it sure beats all the crap Biden promotes and nine tenths of the political population adjudicating laws to be made in our government say.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CN0ZC27YY4&t=183s

Posted by: Rick | Dec 23 2023 16:08 utc | 28

@ DunGroanin | Dec 23 2023 16:01 utc | 26
Is there anywhere one could look for a list of those participating in
Integrity Initative ? Perhaps her name appears.

Posted by: dan of steele | Dec 23 2023 16:15 utc | 30

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 23 2023 15:32 utc | 25
Your diatribes are as useless as Shadowbanned dude, your concern is mostly met with laughter and derision here. Russia has the will, the know-how and the means to literally destroy anything in their way if it is crucial or warranted. The SMO is just that, a limited action that does enough to prevent civilian deaths, Russian losses and bad press with the Global South.
Putin himself just said recently that Ukrainian citizens are family, they are their brothers and sisters and fighting them is so sad, so upsetting and he looked like he really meant it. This completely different from any western genocide or bombing nightmare and the whole world has been watching so do us all a favour and give it up, you embarrass yourself with this lying and misrepresenting disinfo.

Posted by: bisfugged | Dec 23 2023 16:18 utc | 32

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 23 2023 15:32 utc | 25
You bring up WWI. The front lines in that war scarcely moved for years and yet one side still won decisively.

Posted by: OnceWere | Dec 23 2023 16:43 utc | 34

Lex@1453
Biden has NO agency. He is owned, lock, stock and poppycock. He should be obliged to wear a jacket similar to those of Nascar drivers who sport numerous logos on their red jackets. Problem for Sleepy Joe would be that he’s owned by so many financier and corporate entities that the logos would need to be virtually microscopic in order for inclusion on the jacket.
Only resolution I can contemplate for that would be to wear a necktie emblazoned with a blue and white Star of David.

Posted by: aristodemos | Dec 23 2023 16:52 utc | 36

I was reading again confirmation of a little known, but interesting and relevant, piece of WWII history yesterday. Albert Speer and his cohorts managed throughout 1944 to keep production of fighter planes at the highest levels, even though Germany was being relentlessly bombed, and Allied fighter planes dominated the skies. Yes, I guess that had a lot to do with the range of Allied bombers, and where a lot of production had been nestled away, but still, food for thought imo.
Yadda yadda yadda, Russian domination over the line of contact between their forces and those of Ukraine, and their advantages in what can be put in their air, and delivered through it, have, relative to the progress made by Russia and their allies against Germany in WWII seem to have gotten them to at about the “late 1943” stage, with early 1944 approaching at an accelerated pace.
One glaring difference here is that Ukraine has avoided being subjected to a strategic bombing, though Russia’s well placed missile strikes often do a startling amount of damage. A big question in my mind is to how and when will Russia deploy all the new missiles it has been stockpiling. Will these strikes reflect a great improvement having been made in Russian intelligence, by satellite, and other means, and have they improved their counter measures against Ukraine’s air defenses? While Russia doesn’t indulge much in symbolic attacks, if Kiev is laid low, and darkened, just as Russia increases its maneuver combat over newly frozen ground, the morale of both sides would likely be affected by that. Can’t imagine it would help Ukraine hit its recruitment goals.
Hitler dodged the plots meant to remove him, I doubt Zelenskyy will be as lucky, what with the CIA having its reputation to maintain. 😉

Posted by: Babel-17 | Dec 23 2023 16:58 utc | 38

@ Posted by: dan of steele | Dec 23 2023 16:15 utc | 30
She is too senior to be part of any lowly country team but you can guarantee they are all part of the same network. Hacked documents and investigators have written much.
Start here -from 2018- and follow the dots , the murderous fake wizards live at the end of the trail
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2018/12/british-security-service-infiltration-the-integrity-initiative-and-the-institute-for-statecraft/
Ps one of the many reasons why Craig Murray has been hounded by the state , even imprisoning him. Support him.

Posted by: DunGroanin | Dec 23 2023 17:12 utc | 40

Canuck@1616
Well done, sir, with your expository info on the $tate of Dupont. A few addendums are called for. As the result of the heavily subsidized by taxpayer dollars in Woody Wilson’s WWI; the Dupont crime clan was provided with massive new buildings to create the latest and greatest in chemical warfare. The chemicalization of agriculture was one of the evil results of that U.$. G. largesse to that bunch
. In 1937, Dupont had just got the gears running on Rottenfeller petroleum based “Nylon” t.m. They got their knickers in a knot over the fact that a hemp decorticater had just been developed and was slated to be used in the production of nylon’s major competitor, Rayon, a purely organic product. As John D. Rottenfeller piously intoned: “Competition
is a sin”.
So the Duponts merrily contacted their fellow corporate barons in Pittsburgh, the Mellon Crime Clan, which introduced fukkin stannous fluoride into most of American’s drinking water supply. They requested the services of one Harry Anslinger, a minion of the Mellons, who had been a major Poobah in the by then sunk costs involved with the Prohibition boys. The Harry one’s new position was to bribe various state legislators for a few thou apiece as well as Congre$$criltters in the Di$trict of Corruption to go along with the new assault. It was a left-handed screwball of an op. Instead of directly attacking the hemp industry, in addition to the buying of pro$tilticians, their scheme involved producing movies such as “Marihuana, the Assassin of Youth” and “Reefer Madness”. A still overload of racism was stimulated in the general public by open threats that their daughters would be raped by Mexicans and Blacks.
Upshot: Both the Feds and the $tates got on the happiness bandwagon and banned hemp along with the sweet stuff. Even Henry Ford’s ’37 Chevy with an all hemp-derived body was consigned to the world of history. Rayon was deplatformed and nylons became the rage, particularly after Japan cut off the Silk Stocking Set.
Matter number Three: If memory serves, the United States of America CORPORATION, owned allegedly by the 65 filthy-richest families across the fruited plain, was duly registered under the corporate laws of the $tate of Dupont, aka Delaware. Those of us who have been in courtrooms, have noticed the yellow-fringed U.S. Maritime flag. Under corporate maritime law, each individual appearing at the bench is regarded as a “Strawman”, lawfared into a vessel coming into the dock. Yes, the very courts of the U$$A do not practice either common law or Constitutional law…it’s all corporate/commercial, thanks to the Dupont Crime Clan and unindicted fellow conspirators.

Posted by: aristodemos | Dec 23 2023 17:26 utc | 42

T.M.@1618
Prime suspect/culprit in the switchover to Biden was the DNC, an American version of the USSR’s old Central Committee of the C.P. Like their co-conspirators in the RNC, those minions of the hyper-rlch get their marching orders directly through Wall $treet and the Federal Reserve Bank of NYC, where the prime shareholders are the Rottenfeller Crime Clan at a nifty 54% control level…and also from a closely held private bank in City of London, where international finance, insurance, media, metals and much, much more are directed.

Posted by: aristodemos | Dec 23 2023 17:34 utc | 44

Furthermore, in general throughout history of war, attack has been harder than defense. This applies to Russia and Ukraine also. It’s easier for U to defend than to do the counterattack. And the converse for Russia…they have a harder job advancing through U than sitting at the Shirovikin Line. So, y’all make a logical fallacy when extrapolating too much from the U failed counterattack to a coming Russian attack. Add onto this that certain aspects of this modern battlefield (ISR capabilities of the two sides, primarily) make it hard for either R or U to attack.
Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 23 2023 15:32 utc | 25

That is correct.
Worse, Ukraine is now digging in and creating its own version of the Surovikin line. Unless RU makes a big move soon, the whole front will be heavily fortified eventually. And then what?
Even worse, Stelkov, who was right about so many things from the start, spent more than a year, and especially after the goodwill gestures early in the war, complaining about the fundamental idiocy of sending men and equipment into frontal assaults against the heaviest fortifications. Anyone with a brain sees immediately that the place to advance is Sumy and Chernigov. There are no such fortifications there, and those places are not the Donbass, the industrial nature of which makes it so well suited to defense and so hard to take (already the Germans had hard time in WWII, then in turn the Soviets had hard time recovering it).
Eventually RU will have to take everything adjacent to the pre-war borders as an absolute minimum. Why not go where the fortifications are least developed, which would also stretch the AFU, instead of losing men and equipment in fruitless frontal assaults?
What exactly is the path to real victory here? Because I have not seen anyone formulate the exact military-technical scenario that will lead to it.

Posted by: shаdοwbanned | Dec 23 2023 18:14 utc | 46

Ukraine will receive 18 F16’s from Holland. But Wilders, the winner of the elections, said he opposed sending arms to Ukraine. Is this the outgoing government trying to mess up things before leaving?
Posted by: Passerby | Dec 23 2023 13:51 utc | 13
That is exactly what Obama did before Trump entered office. First, he expelled Russian diplomats in Dec., right before western Christmas AND they were not allowed to wait in the hangar, they were forced to shiver on the tarmac. Could anything be more petty?
Then the US stole Russian property in the US, which were used for R&R.
The topper was when he sent 3,000 troops to Russia’s borders with Poland and the Baltic poodles, leaving Trump in an impossible position. Withdraw the troops and have the Mighty Wurlitzer scream about “treason” for months (or years), or leave them there as a provocation.
On the other subject, propaganda is very important to the US. I can believe that they would sacrifice a Patriot missile battery in order to shoot down a Russian plane, solely for the propaganda value.
That’s how they roll.

Posted by: wagelaborer | Dec 23 2023 18:17 utc | 48

Posted by: DunGroanin | Dec 23 2023 16:01 utc | 26
It’s propaganda, wholly controlled through their old boys network and PR machinery – it took complete control starting since the late 70’s and British People live in cloud cuckoo land where all things are Putins fault, Xenophobia is the order of the day yet hiding behind a woke rainbow make believe attitudes that most find abhorrent but can’t say anything about except in private ! That’s how they want us suppressed.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Posted by: Scorpion | Dec 23 2023 18:28 utc | 50

Joe Biden is not a puppet. […] If anyone’s Hitler in the bunker it’s Joe Biden.
Posted by: Lex | Dec 23 2023 14:53 utc | 20
You’re a lying dog-faced pony soldier (and if you deny it, it just confirms that you are). Biden is a puppet. Clearly, we was selected, rather than winning a normal primary, so his predispositions and biases were taken into account. However, he did not betray ANY capacity of finding things on his own, e.g. compare to Trump who at least followed Twitter etc., not ANY capacity for critical thinking in recent years, so he is easy to control by the clique that surrounds him.

Posted by: Piotr Berman | Dec 23 2023 18:47 utc | 52

Posted by: Lex | Dec 23 2023 14:53 utc | 20
Obama is the puppet master, as he is in his third term. He continues the destruction of the USA from within. He is the one who foisted this change in America, especially his work in the early childhood sexual grooming and LBGTQ+ religion. Just watched another show that clearly outlines Michael’s original voting records of being a male from 1994 until 2008 when his husband Obama was selected.
Joan Rivers also spoke about the first homosexual President and that Michelle was a tranny, and lo, less than 3 months later, she was dead.
Obama is the comptroller behind the curtain.

Posted by: Arcticman | Dec 23 2023 19:04 utc | 54

According to Gonzalo Lira sr., Gonzalo Lira is suffering from pneumonia: https://youtu.be/4c4274_77E8?feature=shared&t=66

Posted by: Apollyon | Dec 23 2023 19:13 utc | 56

I think it’s pretty clear that few if any of the notables in politics and commerce are the actual policy makers of the Neoliberal deep state. Biden, even if he was an active agent of the ruling class in the beginning, doesn’t have enough neurons to rub together to be one now, he is absolutely a puppet- and Obama is a creation of an elite to which he can never belong. A Janissary, who may or may not being trying to seize power in his own right, but who certainly has not achieved that and continues to direct operations for the hidden sultans who own everything. Now, even though that narrow class is largely invisible, it’s clear from the behavior of their minions and puppets that they are themselves running out of options and are stocking up the Fuhrer bunker for imminent use.

Posted by: Honzo | Dec 23 2023 19:40 utc | 58

Usually I can see shadowbanned’s points. He doesn’t like to see Slavs die, while the puppetmasters sit back and laugh, unscathed.
Point taken.
But this??
“Anyone with a brain sees immediately that the place to advance is Sumy and Chernigov.’
Posted by: shаdοwbanned | Dec 23 2023 18:14 utc
Maybe anyone with a brain, but anyone with a heart has been waiting for the nazi punishers who have been embedded in Avdeevka bombing civilians for the last 9 years, to be rooted out and destroyed.
Now, all of a sudden, there is no point to liberating Avdeevka? I think there is. And I wonder why a champion of the Russian people would blow off the deaths of so many in Donetsk. The terrorism needs to stop.

Posted by: wagelaborer | Dec 23 2023 19:52 utc | 60

One of the photos of a Russian Su-34 allegedly shot down yesterday has been exposed as a fake over at LordOfWar (don’t have the exact link but scroll up a few stories) NAFO was too stupid to forget to change the time stamp; it was from June 2022.
https://t.me/s/llordofwar
This doesn’t mean the whole story is fake, but puts it into doubt.

Posted by: Ghost of Zanon | Dec 23 2023 19:53 utc | 62

Hitler dodged the plots meant to remove him, I doubt Zelenskyy will be as lucky, what with the CIA having its reputation to maintain. 😉
Posted by: Babel-17 | Dec 23 2023 16:58 utc | 38
Zelensky is a ‘Heinz Rühmann’ placed on the throne.
The ‘leader’ is currently Joe Biden, or at least he is lending his face.
Zelensky is a new nobody, as if ‘the Wendler’ were Chancellor in Ger.
You don’t believe that Baerbock would have to be taken out of the game to harm Germany, do you?

Posted by: 600w | Dec 23 2023 20:00 utc | 64

Posted by: sam | Dec 23 2023 20:01 utc | 65
One of the easiest ways to spot a Western troll is to look for how often he/she/x uses the word “Putin”. It is in the epicentre of Western propaganda to replace the Russian state with “Putin” so as not to become enemies of the Russian people but of this autocrat. So they go with it thinking we are somehow Putin fanboys.
Putin this, Putin that is immediately a red flag. Not even a concern troll would do that.

Posted by: alek_a | Dec 23 2023 20:07 utc | 66

Furthermore, the “attrition” lovers are just pushing a word, they saw someone write. Nobody has realiable statistics for either side for their losses … But all that said…the military reality, the brutal geographic, is that we’ve had over a year of fighting and attempts by each side to advance…and NO SIGNIFICANT change in the map.
Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 23 2023 15:32 utc | 25
You’re right … there is no “reliable statistics” for either sides losses and just like WW2 in the east there won’t be until all the archives are opened and all those whose reputations are at stake are dead … in the case of WW2 between the Soviets and Germany was 60 years later in 1995.
There is however a reliable indicator in that one side is being re-armed and rebuilt from the ground up for the fourth time, is on their 11th mobilization (this time for 500,000 men or 20,000/mo) and whose payroll for the entire army and civil service is paid for by their benefactors. Now if that isn’t evidence of attrition then I don’t know what is.
As far as taking ground is concerned study WW2. Taking ground fast is VERY expensive in men and equipment and even the mighty Whermacht lost 750,000 soldiers out of 3 million and half their armour in their first 6 months in Russia. Now you could argue that the Germans took LOTS of ground from the Russian early in the war but where did it get them? By May 1943 the Germans lost the experienced soldiers they started the war with and most of that equipment … so if taking territory is an indicator of success in warfare why did the Germans lose despite being so successful at taking ground? Could it really be that the real winner of WW2 won by attrition … the Germans were outproduced by the Americans and Russians??
The Russians aren’t taking ground in Ukraine because they don’t have to … they know time is on their side. Unlike 1943-45 the Russians aren’t rushing to get to Berlin before the Americans. The Russians also don’t have to get to Crimea before the next US election either like the Ukrainians do … they don’t have to take villages at the cost of 150,000 men just to prove to the US congress they are successful and deserve more money.

Posted by: HB_Norica | Dec 23 2023 20:48 utc | 68

Posted by: 600w | Dec 23 2023 20:00 utc | 64
If Zelenskyy gets yanked off stage it could be for a variety of primary reasons, or a combination of them, same as if President Biden was told by his handlers the equivalent of “It’s not your night”, and it was announced he was dropping out due to a mild stroke, or maybe COVID 19.
If the MIC was on the verge of wrangling together enough support to go big on arming and financing Ukraine yet again, it could be the case that they’d need someone to pin all the woes of the AFU on. So blaming Zelenskyy for “not listening to his best Generals and NATO advisors” would dovetail perfectly with that.
He’d get labeled as being a great guy, and instrumental in rallying Ukraine to oppose Russia’s SMO, but not a good war time leader, same as Tom Hagen was labeled not a war time consiglierie in The Godfather.
Ukraine would get a new leader, one who coincidentally the MIC approved of. IIRC, Zelenskyy loses his authority under the Constitution next year unless there’s an election or some extraordinary legislation gets approved to legitimize his continued governance. Perfect opportunity at that time to tell him he has to step aside. He might regret not having allowed elections.

Posted by: Babel-17 | Dec 23 2023 21:05 utc | 70

Thank you b for your tremendious effort to keep this bar i top shape.
Hope everyone buys you a drink for christmas.
All the best too you and the one’s that you love- you really are something special

Posted by: Paul from Norway | Dec 23 2023 22:25 utc | 72

1. Posted by: Lex | Dec 23 2023 14:53 utc | 20
Lex – if your argument is correct that adds weight to the assertion that the Russian invasion was “provoked” instead of “unprovoked.”
Further weight to that assertion is provided by this speech, made in 2019. At that time the UK was ostensibly involved in a bitter dispute with the EU. But the speech shows quite the reverse:-
https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/the-munich-security-conference
Tony Blair was also at that conferences, stating in a side meeting that integration of the UK in European defence was essential, though as he stated that was not the time to stress that to the UK public: tempers were running high in the UK over the reluctance of the UK politicians to push through Brexit.
Our UK politicians were even at that early date more interested in confronting Russia that they were with leaving the EU. The deployment of HMS Defender in the Black Sea also showed that. Documents forwarded to the BBC showed that the deployment was ordered with deliberately provocative intent.
As for the European politicians, it was asserted that the remilitarisation of Germany was agreed during the coalition talks for the new government. If that assertion is correct – I must make it clear that I never saw it confirmed later, nor saw any minutes of those coalition talks – then that remilitarisation was decided before and not as a consequence of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
So it’s possible that the deliberate provocation of Russia had been decided on in advance by the various Western powers.
However, we do not need these assertions or speculations to show that the Russian invasion of Ukraine was deliberately “provoked”. The weight of fire across the border in February 2022 and the massing of large Ukrainian forces along the Line of Contact left Putin in any case with no alternative but to order pre-emptive military action.
……………………..
2. Then the consequences of that forced pre-emptive move. At present it looks as if the phase of defensive attrition is coming to an end. The Ukrainian forces can no longer be relied upon to continue throwing themselves against the Russian line. Shoigu terms what is happening now as “active defence”, that is, moving forward in order to force the Ukrainian fighters to mount attacks to prevent further Russian advances. So it’s possible that attrition, by whatever means, is getting to the stage where it’s done with. We shall then see faster Russian advances if we don’t see the collapse of Ukraine first.
I don’t see the military experts discussing the current action in those terms so I may be wrong. Doesn’t matter. The absorption of parts of the old Ukraine, and the neutralising of the rest so it can no longer serve as a means of annoyance, was the inevitable result of this war from Istanbul on and we in the West are now watching more or less passively or powerlessly as the Russians carry through that aim.
……………………….
3. It’s what happens after the resolution of the Ukrainian dispute that is now in question. A question, amazingly, that I still see no European or American politicians discussing.
All the talk coming out of the US is of a renewed Cold War in Europe. The talk from such as Scholz and Stoltenberg has been the same for some time.
The consequent remilitarisation of Europe has the advantage that we in the European public will continue to focus on conflict with Russia rather than on the increasingly severe domestic problems our various European countries face. It will also allow further expansion of our defence industries: as in the States those defence industries are powerful lobby groups and will be eager to expand. As is seen from the Williamson speech linked to above the UK is hoping to share in that expansion.
But the new cold war will entail deployment of troops on the Russian border and exercises to match. It will probably entail the siting of more missiles near the Russian border. Such deployments as these are in direct contradiction to the Russian security demands of late 2021. It’s scarcely necessary to point out that Russian security demands have no only not been met. The security problems posed by NATO have intensified.
The fear being raised now on both sides of the Atlantic by the politicians and the press is that after Ukraine the Russians will attack Europe. But unless they are further provoked – say by ill treatment of the Baltic Russian minorities or by attempts to cut off Kaliningrad – there is no incentive for them to attack Europe.
We Europeans think there is. We still hold to the beliefs powerfully expressed by an English conservative philosopher and thinker some time back:- “Events in Ukraine and the expansionist policies of President Putin naturally raise questions about the defense of Europe. Whatever Russian aims might be, there is no doubt that a heavily armed country with dwindling economic assets poses a threat, however theoretical, to an affluent neighbor with only tenuous means of defense.”
Sir Roger Scruton is there saying that we are rich and the Russians are poor so we must fear them. But this is nonsense! We are a continent plagued by a variety of social ills – one need only look at the increasing income gap to see that – and we are poor in resources. Our economy is not what it was and is becoming ever weaker. This is no rich land waiting to be plundered. It is no great prize and in fact is becoming a backwater in the world economy. The Russians would have to expend a great deal of effort to take even a part of it and would find themselves paying out hand over fist to keep what they had taken fed and fuelled.
So “The Russians are coming!” is foolish talk and that talk engaged in only to coax us Europeans into Cold War II. What else might the Russians do were their European Security demands not met?
They could walk away. Just that. Statements made by President Putin at the start of the SMO and by Zakharova recently indicate that is a possibility. And there is no need for the Russians to continue supplying us with the fuel and raw materials we need.
Since the European economy is still dependent on Russian fuel and raw materials it is that walking away we should fear, rather than some invented threat of Russian invasion. The European politicians really should be getting those late 2021 European Security demands out of the drawer and considering how best to meet them.

Posted by: English Outsider | Dec 23 2023 22:42 utc | 74

Lev Davidovichv, alek_a, Naive
BND? GRU?
i think MI6 have little smarter bots

Posted by: theo | Dec 23 2023 22:50 utc | 76

Posted by: theo | Dec 23 2023 22:50 utc | 76
mi6 is one of the most stupid services. Cf. Skripal, Litvinenko, Berezovsky, Navalny, etc.

Posted by: Naive | Dec 23 2023 23:18 utc | 78

Breaking Down Thinktank-land’s Latest: Estonian MoD & ISW Analysis
Excellent SIMPLICIUS THE THINKER analysis of the dire conclusions being drawn by these outfits.
https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/breaking-down-thinktank-lands-latest

Posted by: daffyDuct | Dec 23 2023 23:52 utc | 80

Boom!
https://sputnikglobe.com/20231223/low-and-fast-su-25s-execute-awe-inspiring-precision-strikes-on-ukrainian-positions-in-krasny-liman-1115767456.html

Posted by: Naive | Dec 24 2023 0:03 utc | 82

In case it was not posted before:
https://sputnikglobe.com/20231222/hersh-biden-made-decision-to-destroy-nord-stream-2-few-weeks-before-ukraine-operation-began-1115756868.html
EWmpire of lies as always.

Posted by: Naive | Dec 24 2023 0:08 utc | 84

Cargo train carrying Nato military equipment derailed/blown up in Odessa region, according to workers of Ukraine railways.
https://twitter.com/MyLordBebo/status/1738683228821565597
Posted by: unimperator | Dec 23 2023 22:42 utc | 75
Not to worry. Rhein-Metall will have that stuff up and running in no time.

Posted by: dh | Dec 24 2023 0:22 utc | 86

If the win in World War I was so decisive – why was there a World War II only 20 years later?
Posted by: Julian | Dec 24 2023 0:28 utc | 87
It was so decisive as to prepare for WW2 21 years later. Very simple to understand.

Posted by: Naive | Dec 24 2023 0:42 utc | 88

Canuck@1912
Thanks for the research and presentation. My knowledge base vs the DuPonts was a bit vague about the particulars of the Brandywine plant and the relative entrepreneurial usefulness of the original members of that family.
Time and money did their things, though, to the point where later generations devolved into de-generations, as they had almost alchemically transmuted themselves from a step or two down the scrotumpole of French Royalty, with something akin to baronial status into an enhanced iteration in the springtime years of the American Republic.
With a foundation firmly rooted in governmental contracts, it is logical to assume that becoming purveyors of “blood money” supplies also inevitably served its role in generational devolution into spoiled rich kids whose family still totally dominates the state of Delaware; while their overall status nationally and corporate internationally renders these coupon-clippers into fully platformed members of the Uber-elite.
Who still claims that the ruptured republic does not sport a moneyed elite, which though aristocratic in a materialistic sense; as grande bourgeois they can be considered as well-embedded arrivistes but sans Nobility’? “Sine Noblis” signifies to be without nobility. There is a certain level of polarity between mere aristocrats and genuine nobles.
Aristos tend to ride the general populace like gelded horses trotting along beneath their saddles and spurred on to higher levels of productivity to benefit the corporate shareholders, particularly the primary star actors. Nobles, in the original sense of the word, may or may not be bloodlines types. Their actions are “pro bono publica”…for the good of the people and of the nation…and on a cultural basis of measurement, perhaps for the whole of humanity and for all life.

Posted by: aristodemos | Dec 24 2023 1:23 utc | 90

Posted by: Lavrov’s Dog | Dec 24 2023 1:16 utc | 89
Given that they claim Russia has lost 350+k soldiers and over 90% of its initially deployed equipment, whilst Ukraine has lost far less, two obviously problematic questions are raised by this inconsistent analysis. How, and with what?

Posted by: Milites | Dec 24 2023 1:33 utc | 92

“The future of NATO is bound up with the future of Ukraine much more tightly than most people understand.”
Part Two https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/high-price-losing-ukraine-part-2-%E2%80%94-military-threat-and-beyond

Posted by: Lavrov’s Dog | Dec 24 2023 1:45 utc | 94

Herr B – Fröhliche Weinacht und Silverstersabend! Und glüchlichers Neujahr!

Posted by: Adriatic Hillbilly | Dec 24 2023 2:40 utc | 96

Yes, ZH blows smoke out its ass a bit as the title and content of this posting show
Putin Now Serious About Negotiating End To War: Diplomats
Don’t even think the piece is worth the effort to find and smell

Posted by: psychohistorian | Dec 24 2023 3:28 utc | 98

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 23 2023 15:32 utc | 25
>Furthermore, in general throughout history of war, attack has been harder than defense.
Any such “generalizations” are based on cherry-picked data, meaning inherently non-generalized.
Posted by: anonposter | Dec 24 2023 2:44 utc | 97
Even the generalization only applies to fixed positions with some level of protection. In a war of maneuver much smaller forces can prevail against large forces by seizing the initiative and forcing the enemy to react to their moves. The ability of the ‘active’ force to choose where and when to fight is a tremendous force multiplier. In addition, logistics are critical, and heavily fortified forces isolated from supply will have to surrender sooner or later. Fortifications are only as strong as the ability to supply them, and this is an area where the Russian advantage is huge. Their ability to interdict supply and reinforcements deep in the Ukrainian rear has no counterpart for Ukrainian forces. The only balancing element is that the west provides a safe rear area for training and assembling forces, but once they enter Ukraine itself they are at constant risk of destruction, wherever they are in Ukraine.

Posted by: Honzo | Dec 24 2023 4:05 utc | 100