Ukraine War Watch Thread

[Certain Russian user]

I only have a bachelor's degree.

No matter. As well as this "meduza" YOU came to whine about.

[caltrek]

I only have a bachelor's degree.

No matter. As well as this "meduza" YOU came to whine about.

No, that is not whining. That is praise for Meduza. Gosh, I mean here I come to praise some Russian organization and you still get upset. Maybe if your buddy Putin could actually explain himself in something resembling a coherent fashion, I could better understand your points. Not complaining, just observing.

[R8Z]

Abomination.

War is pretty horrible isn't it? I have been following a few russian youtubers reporting the reality on the streets and it's clear Russia is going towards lame ass North Korea style economy where buying something you actually want isn't going to be possible. Some of these youtubers have already fled as censoring them was to be expected and they weren't receiving any money anymore from youtube (due to SWIFT sanctions).

And the children? Meh. "Would you think of the children"... always the same gamey and pretentious question. I can think of any problem within any ideology and it's always what-about-the-children fallacy. It gets old. Both of us know there's blood in both sides, including childrens'.

If you can't see the blatant propaganda in both "message" videos from both sides, you're being driven by the message and you were the target.

[funkervogt]

A reasonable measure given the situation, or a power grab?

On Saturday and Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky invoked his emergency powers under martial law to suppress several opposition political parties and implement a "unified information policy."

In an address to the nation delivered Sunday, he announced a temporary ban on "any activity" by 11 political parties.

The ban includes the Opposition Platform – For Life party, which holds 43 seats in Ukraine's national parliament and is the largest opposition party.

Opposition Platform – For Life is a pro-Russia party, but on March 8, party leader Yuriy Boyko demanded that Russia "stop the aggression against Ukraine," according to Ukrainian outlet LB.

That same day, Viktor Medvedchuk, who was accused of treason against Ukraine in May and escaped from house arrest shortly after the invasion began, was removed from his post as the party's co-chair. Russian President Vladimir Putin is godfather to Medvedchuk's daughter.

Zelensky's information policy involves "combining all national TV channels, the program content of which consists mainly of information and/or information-analytical programs, [into] a single information platform of strategic communication" to be called "United News."

https://www.yahoo.com/news/zelensky-nat ... 20471.html

[wjfox]

Also interesting and laughable propaganda from the Russians:

The level of brainwashing there is terrifying.

Yeah, for this very reason I feel a deep and sincere contempt to this community I myself once belonged. For you, this girl with her personal experience is irrelevant, as well as killed children she's talking about is nothing more than "laughable Russian propaganda". Cancel culture in all its beauty: Russian Deaths Doesn't Matter, unless, of course, they're too photogenic to appear in Western front pages as "another shocking evidence, look at those killed Ukrainians, that's how real pain looks like"... etc.

Abomination.

But it's clearly propaganda.

Just one of the quotes by her: "...Russian bombs are allegedly destroying Ukraine now."

Allegedly?? Russia isn't just bombing Ukraine, it's committing war crimes, and fuelling the biggest European conflict since World War II. Your country is killing innocent women and children, and there's documented evidence of the deliberate targeting of civilians. Millions of people are now displaced, beautiful cities are being razed to the ground, lives and businesses ruined, due to Russia's actions.

Russia is the aggressor. Russia is the country that started all this. Russia moved 190,000 troops to the border, Russia then crossed that border and started bombing the hell out of a peaceful country for spurious reasons, totally disproportionate to any perceived threat of "Nazis", and even threatening the use of nuclear weapons.

"Special military operation" – give me a f***ing break. Anyone with an ounce of common sense can see that it's an illegal invasion. The vast majority of UN member states passed a resolution condemning it.

Your leader was so butthurt, at not having a big Soviet empire to rule over, it seems he went insane. First Crimea, and now this.

Russia is the world epicentre of corruption, cyberattacks, assassinations, and foreign interference. It even permeates your sporting culture, with a string of doping scandals. You can't win fairly, so you have to cheat at everything, use subterfuge, spread hatred and division. It's partly thanks to your country's influence that we had the whole Brexit disaster, and then Trump.

You have the gall to come on here and act like such a victim all the time. You never post anything nice, constructive, or positive. It's just perpetual victimhood, aggression, and denial.

Russia is now getting what it thoroughly deserves – economic implosion, and relegation to a small group of pariah states like North Korea. We can only hope that a new, better regime emerges from this current evil. One that isn't led by a 19th century imperialist, but a statesman who is level-headed and mature enough to work with other nations, not against them.

[Certain Russian user]

And the children? Meh. "Would you think of the children"... always the same gamey and pretentious question.

OK, got it.

few russian youtubers reporting the reality on the streets and it's clear Russia is going towards lame ass North Korea style economy where buying something you actually want isn't going to be possible.

I'm not need youtubers to see the reality on the streets. Anyway, as I told you, let's discuss this topic one year later.

[caltrek]

And the children? Meh. "Would you think of the children"... always the same gamey and pretentious question.

If you ever read Albert Camus' The Rebel you might notice that he traces back the lament concerning the suffering of innocent children to the Russian novelist Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky.

While I have been citing The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt lately, I think The Rebel could serve as a nice companion piece.

Regarding the suffering of innocents...yes, there often is a lot of hypocrisy on both sides. "Only our children are truly innocent" seems to often be the theme.

[weatheriscool]

An elite Ukrainian drone unit exploits the cover of night to destroy Russian tanks and trucks while
their soldiers sleep, report says

An elite Ukrainian drone unit is destroying the weaponry of the invading Russian forces as their soldiers' sleep, The Times of London reported.

Aerorozvidka, a specialist air reconnaissance unit within the army, says it has destroyed dozens of "priority targets" including Russian tanks, command trucks, and other vehicles in nighttime raids, the paper reported.

Russian forces stop moving during the night and typically hide their tanks in between houses in villages where conventional artillery cannot strike them, Yaroslav Honchar, the unit commander based in Kyiv, told the paper.

But the elite drone unit, which has dozens of squads of expert drone pilots, has these stationary vehicles in its cross-hairs.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/an ... ar-AAViepy

[caltrek]

Speaking of innocent children, Mother Jones is featuring a photo collection. I found this photo to be particularly haunting:

https://www.motherjones.com/wp-content/ ... ey_018.jpg

One thing that is haunting about this young woman is that she could just as easily be a Russian woman on a train trip. Context is so important.

[Yuli Ban]

[caltrek]

It even permeates your sporting culture, with a string of doping scandals. You can't win fairly, so you have to cheat at everything, use subterfuge, spread hatred and division.

The really sad thing is that they actually can win fairly, but they screw it up anyway. Just look at these last Olympics in a sport in which they dominate.
Their number one women's figure skating champion fails a drug enhancement test. Not the first time that sort of thing happens, and U.S. athletes also have problems in that regard. So, what happens?

The pressure and bad publicity impacts upon her performance and she buckles. No doubt, Russian fans were cussing and cursing about the unfairness of it all. The Russian field was so deep that they still managed to win a gold and a silver in that event. Still, the fiasco with their number one skater allowed a Japanese skater to slip in and win the bronze. Had they done better quality control on her intakes (I am being charitable here and giving a benefit of a doubt) they very well might have swept the podium. The adults around here failed, and she bore the brunt of it all.

[R8Z]

One of the biggest telegram shill/propaganda channel for Russian efforts in the war just said they are going out of business. Weird. They were having a total victory there.

[wjfox]

[wjfox]

[wjfox]

Russia ‘accidentally reveals’ 10,000 soldiers have been killed, as Biden warns Putin considering chemical weapons

March 22 2022 02:30 AM

Russia’s ministry of defence appeared to accidentally reveal that nearly 10,000 of its soldiers have been killed in Ukraine.

The figure was contained in a report on March 20 by the pro-Kremlin Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper, which has since been deleted from the paper’s website.

Before it was removed, the article quoted the Russian defence ministry as saying that 9,861 Russian soldiers had been killed, and 16,153 were injured, in more than three weeks of fighting.

Previously, the Russian military had only admitted that around 500 soldiers had been killed.

https://www.independent.ie/world-news/e ... 72840.html

[wjfox]

[weatheriscool]

Russian military has lost more than 10% of combat force sent in to Ukraine, still stalled outside
Source: Yahoo

The Russian military has lost more than 10% of the combat force that President Vladimir Putin sent to invade Ukraine, a senior Pentagon official said Tuesday.

The Russian combat force has dipped slightly below 90% for the first time in the war that began less than a month ago, said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe intelligence assessments.

Not all of the more than 150,000 Russian troops in Ukraine are combat troops. Russian forces remain largely stalled across Ukraine, particularly around the capital of Kyiv, where their closest forces remain about 10 miles from the city’s center.

The official described Ukrainian resistance as quick and nimble – and for the first time in the war seeking to retake ground from the Russians.

Read more: https://news.yahoo.com/zelenskyy-ready- ... 38825.html

[funkervogt]

Here's a long and somewhat sobering analysis of the Ukraine War and its possible outcomes. Skipping the usual points about Russia underestimating Ukraine and making various mistakes, here are some key points:

-The information the West is getting about the War is biased in favor of Ukraine. Proportionately, the Ukrainians have taken higher human, military and economic damage than the Russians.
-The bottom line is that Russia is still gaining territory each day.
-The fighting will probably pause within the next few weeks as the Russian offensives run out of steam. That will provide an opportunity for a peace treaty to be negotiated.
-If it's willing to pay the high price, Russia's military could still take over Ukraine through force. The current offensives will need to be halted first to give the Russian troops time to rest, resupply, and reorganize, and for reinforcements to join them. Instead of signing a peace treaty, Putin could choose to renew the war. The West's sanctions aren't strong enough to stop Russia's army soon enough.
-Russia's armies are fighting on three fronts with three objectives: 1) northern front to seize Kiev, 2) eastern front to encircle Ukraine's armies that were threatening Luhansk and Donbass and to enlarge the sizes of the breakaway territories, and 3) southern front to seize Ukraine's Black Sea coastline. It's now clear they lack the strength to attain all three objectives, and Putin would have been smarter if he'd told his army to focus on only one.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/ ... t-00018906

[andmar74]

Here's a long and somewhat sobering analysis of the Ukraine War and its possible outcomes. Skipping the usual points about Russia underestimating Ukraine and making various mistakes, here are some key points:

....

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/ ... t-00018906

What Michael Kofman is saying, is contradicted by a lot of information out there.

[andmar74]

Belarusian military could 'soon' join war in Ukraine, US and NATO officials say

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/03/22/euro ... index.html

Then the Ukrainian military just have to butcher them too.
Clearly a no-brainer that Nato is allowed to attack any Belarusian forces entering Ukraine, but they probably will not.