Russian Invasion of Ukraine

[EmirOfShmo]

1 hour ago, China said:

Russia’s Gazprom posts first annual loss in 20 years as sales to Europe collapse

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

Gazprom management better stay away from balconies & open windows.

[ixcuincle]

Russian court says American man jailed for drunken "petty hooliganism" https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-arrest-us-national-american-petty-hooliganism-soldier/

 

 

A Moscow court said Tuesday that it had sentenced a U.S. citizen to 10 days in detention for petty hooliganism after he stumbled drunkenly into a children's library and passed out. News of the American's detention came just hours after Russian and U.S. authorities said a U.S. soldier was being held in custody in the far eastern city of Vladivostok on suspicion of theft in a separate case.

 

Russia's REN TV said the man detained in Moscow had climbed through the window of a children's library in the Russian capital and fallen asleep while drunk. Video aired by the network showed a person, partially clothed, laying in what appeared to be a courtyard of the building.

[CousinsCowgirl84]

The soldier is a big Russia/Trump supporter. I dont want to say any of our troops deserve the treatment of Russian jails but he was certainly trying to earn it.

 

 

 

[China]

Ukraine Says It Foiled Russian Plot to Kill Zelensky

 

Ukraine’s security services said on Tuesday that they had foiled a Russian plot to assassinate President Volodymyr Zelensky and other top military and political figures. Two Ukrainian colonels accused of participating in the plot have been arrested on suspicion of treason.

 

The Ukrainian domestic intelligence agency, the S.B.U., said in a statement that the plot had involved a network of agents — including the two colonels — that was run by Russia’s Federal Security Service, or F.S.B., the main successor to the K.G.B. According to the S.B.U., the agents working at Russia’s direction were tasked with identifying people close to Mr. Zelensky’s security detail who could take him hostage and later kill him.

 

The agency’s statement said the other top Ukrainian officials targeted in the plot included Vasyl Malyuk, the head of the S.B.U., and Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency. The Ukrainian claims could not be independently verified.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[TradeTheBeal!]

 

[CousinsCowgirl84]

 

[China]

Ukraine Breaks New Ground With Drone Strikes on Russian Oil Hubs

 

A drone struck an oil refinery in Russia's republic of Bashkortostan, nearly 1,000 miles from the border with Ukraine, the most far-reaching drone attack on a Russian target in the war so far.

 

Sources in Ukraine's Security Service told news outlet Ukrainska Pravda it was behind the attack on Russia's Gazprom Neftekhim Salavat oil refinery on Thursday morning.

 

 

It marked the first drone strike on the republic during Russia's attempted full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began in February 2022.

 

"According to the source of Ukrainska Pravda, it was a [Security Service] drone that established a record by traveling 1,500 kilometers (930 miles)," the publication reported.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[TradeTheBeal!]

Shoigu in line for a tea party.

 

 

[DCSaints_fan]

33 minutes ago, TradeTheBeal! said:

Shoigu in line for a tea party.

 

 

 

If I was Shoigu I would avoid being around windows for a while

 

And plane trips. 

 

And definitely don't go for night jogs near the Kremlin.

[China]

Facing Russian Advance, a Top Ukrainian General Paints a Bleak Picture

 

Ukraine’s military is confronting a “critical” situation in the country’s northeast, facing troop shortages as it tries to repel a Russian offensive that has been advancing for several days, a top Ukrainian general said on Monday.

 

Russian troops surged across the border last week to open a new line of attack near Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city after Kyiv, capturing at least nine settlements and villages and forcing thousands of civilians to flee.

 

“The situation is on the edge,” Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency said in a video call from a bunker in Kharkiv. “Every hour this situation moves toward critical.”

 

His bleak assessment echoed those of other Ukrainian officers in recent days, that the country’s military prospects were dimming. In addition to being outnumbered, the Ukrainians face critical shortages of weapons, especially artillery ammunition, and $60.8 billion worth of arms from the United States — approved three weeks ago after months of congressional gridlock — has barely begun to arrive.

 

Like most Ukrainian officials and military experts, General Budanov said he believes the Russian attacks in the northeast are intended to stretch Ukraine’s already thin reserves of soldiers and divert them from fighting elsewhere.

 

That is exactly what is happening now, he acknowledged. He said the Ukrainian army was trying to redirect troops from other front line areas to shore up its defenses in the northeast, but that it had been difficult to find the personnel.

 

“All of our forces are either here or in Chasiv Yar,” he said, referring to a Ukrainian stronghold about 120 miles farther south that Russian troops have assaulted in recent weeks. “I’ve used everything we have. Unfortunately, we don’t have anyone else in the reserves.”

 

General Budanov assessed that Ukrainian forces would be able to shore up their lines and stabilize the front within the next few days. But he expects Russia to launch a new attack further north of Kharkiv, in the Sumy region.

 

Fighting on Monday was raging on the outskirts of Vovchansk, a small town about five miles from the Ukrainian-Russian border, northeast of Kharkiv. Russian airstrikes were pounding the town, according to Denys Yaroslavsky, a senior lieutenant commanding a unit currently fighting there.

 

“They’re dropping five to seven bombs every three minutes,” Lieutenant Yaroslavsky said in a phone interview on Monday morning.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

[EmirOfShmo]

 

[BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen]

Russia keeps losing colonels (O-6s) because they don't train junior officers or NCOs fearing they could eventually become a threat to them if they're competent. Whenever things bog down, the battalion commander (an O-5 or O-6) has to go forward to figure things out, and promptly gets whacked because he's too close to the front line. This wouldn't happen if they actually trusted people below them to do their jobs. Sergeants in our military typically have more authority to do their jobs and freedom of action than junior officers in the Russian military do.

 

Russia wants a competent military leader...but not TOO competent. Zhukov (who won WW2 for them) was immediately ostracized by Stalin and sent to a military command in some backwater area...can't have someone competent too close to leadership, or people will start getting ideas!

 

I for one hope the Russians never figure this out, and I hope that their military pulls a WW1 and just refuses to fight any more. It may take awhile, since ethnic Russians aren't the ones being killed like in that video above...most of their combat deaths are minorities, and certainly not the sons of families in Moscow!!

Edited May 14 by BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen

[DCSaints_fan]

49 minutes ago, BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen said:

Russia keeps losing colonels (O-6s) because they don't train junior officers or NCOs fearing they could eventually become a threat to them if they're competent. Whenever things bog down, the battalion commander (an O-5 or O-6) has to go forward to figure things out, and promptly gets whacked because he's too close to the front line. This wouldn't happen if they actually trusted people below them to do their jobs. Sergeants in our military typically have more authority to do their jobs and freedom of action than junior officers in the Russian military do.

 

Russia wants a competent military leader...but not TOO competent. Zhukov (who won WW2 for them) was immediately ostracized by Stalin and sent to a military command in some backwater area...can't have someone competent too close to leadership, or people will start getting ideas!

 

I for one hope the Russians never figure this out, and I hope that their military pulls a WW1 and just refuses to fight any more. It may take awhile, since ethnic Russians aren't the ones being killed like in that video above...most of their combat deaths are minorities, and certainly not the sons of families in Moscow!!

Possibly, the other view is that Russia views its colonels as dispatchable as high level NCOs

 

I'm entirely sold on the "incompetence" of Russian military at a tactical level.  This was certainly true in the early phases of the war, but it was mostly at a higher level (failure of intellgence and strategy, inability to anticipate Ukranian tactics) but they have adapted. 

 

The simpler answer is that Ukrainian army is simply on a closer par with Russia, and advances are extremely difficult for both sides because no one can hide and neither side has been able to control the air.  So to dislodge a well dug in enemy it is simply going to be a slog fest if theres nowhere to flank.  The UAF learned that lesson last summer, and until the situation changes they seem content to let Russia try to bum rush their figurative spear wall.  Because they dodn't have the resources to burn that Russia does.

[BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen]

And all of this is the result of Putin believing what the FSB was telling him, that Ukrainians would welcome Russian troops, etc. Telling the boss what he wants to hear may prolong a career for a little while, but when the stuff hits the fan the boss will look for scapegoats...but then again, that's what most authoritarians (like Trump) want, to be told what they want to hear.

Edited May 14 by BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen

[The Sisko]

They really need to get those F-16s deployed. I think the first of their pilots should be completing that training soon.

[Riggo-toni]

https://youtube.com/shorts/-g0J3-VtoCw?si=IfBK100YcYoVn0JT

 

[Riggo-toni]

These are just shorts, but if you listen to the entire interview, this woman is fascinating and informative.... despite the nitwit doing the interview.

 

[BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen]

2 hours ago, Riggo-toni said:

These are just shorts, but if you listen to the entire interview, this woman is fascinating and informative.... despite the nitwit doing the interview.

 

 

She's spot on. Putin used NATO's expansion (which stopped in 2004) as an excuse for his actions saying that Russian 'culture' is being threatened back in 2022. Since then, he's pivoted to saying he wants to reestablish the Russian Empire, basically, and that all countries that used to be a part of the USSR must be part of it. The fact that NONE of these countries wants to willingly be a part of that either escapes Putin completely or doesn't matter.

 

I'm betting on he doesn't care, since Russian leaders don't care much about their own population's happiness in the first place, why would they care whether Ukraine/Baltics/etc. citizens want to be closer to the West that to Russia?

 

I fear that Putin's view of Russian culture being 'threatened' means they can't expand their borders without consequences. And looking at Russia's demographics, they are dying off...he's living in a pipe dream if he thinks Russian women are going to go back to having 5 to 9 kids...less cannon fodder for the Red Army...who by the way are currently sending troops from minority cultures in Siberia to die in Ukraine...NOT Moscow-born Russians.

 

Talk about unintended consequences...Sweden and Finland have joined NATO, and Gazprom just suffered its first multi-billion loss due to sanctions. But I guess he will keep doubling down on stupid.

Edited May 17 by BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen

[Gurgeh]

This is as close to being on a front line as you want to be ("I'm shot... fingers gone" "why are you so careless?")

 

Ukraine: BBC documentary’s rare access as soldiers film dangerous mission - BBC News

 

(videos on the link. To watch the full thing you'll need to figure out some VPN voodoo)

 

 

[China]

6 hours ago, Gurgeh said:

This is as close to being on a front line as you want to be ("I'm shot... fingers gone" "why are you so careless?")

 

Ukraine: BBC documentary’s rare access as soldiers film dangerous mission - BBC News

 

(videos on the link. To watch the full thing you'll need to figure out some VPN voodoo)

 

 

 

Yeah, definitely need something because I got this error "BBC iPlayer only works in the UK."

[China]

Putin's war turns troops into 'sex sadists' with 'wives braced for abuse with manual’

 

Russian troops returning from war in Ukraine are so broken they return as "sex sadists" with their wives handed a horrific manual on domestic abuse.

 

 

The grim training guide asks women to put up with beatings and violent sex from their partners suffering mentally from the horrors of the frontline where hundreds and thousands have been killed.

 

As such with soldiers decompressing from military life, their girlfriends and wives have been tasked with taking their monstrous behaviour on the chin and instead show empathy and support.

 

The manual reads: "Changes may manifest themselves in temporary intolerance to touch and decreased sexual desire.

 

“However, they can also be expressed in increased sexual arousal, the need for frequent sexual acts, and a predisposition to aggressive forms of sex.”

 

Created by pro-war organisation All-Russia People’s Front, the manual stipulates women must not criticise their menfolk, even if they behave poorly, or compare them to other men who have returned from war more well-adjusted.

 

The guide instructs women to “learn to listen to silence and just be there”, make sure he “doesn’t blame himself” and to speak in a “quiet voice”.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Larry]

Kinda surprised he's letting them come home at all. Would have thought he'd be making them stay there till they die. 

[China]

1 hour ago, Larry said:

Kinda surprised he's letting them come home at all. Would have thought he'd be making them stay there till they die. 

 

That's true for many of them.

[BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen]

1 hour ago, Larry said:

Kinda surprised he's letting them come home at all. Would have thought he'd be making them stay there till they die. 

He probably only allows Russians to come home, since he can keep sending ethnic minorities from Siberia and central Asia into the meat grinder.

[CousinsCowgirl84]

 

interesting…. I think there is a greater than zero chance America and others may pressure Ukraine into accepting.  Especially since they are backed into a corner now.