Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Mon Jun 05, 2023 11:57 am

Blackmail
POSTED BY @NSANZO ⋅ 06/05/2023

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Once again, a Ukrainian officer, this time Volodymyr Zelensky, has publicly stated that the Ukrainian Armed Forces are ready for the announced spring offensive, delayed so many times that it has already turned into a summer offensive. Oleksiy Reznikov, defense minister, and Oleksiy Danilov, president of the National Security and Defense Council, reportedly already stated that the preparation has been completed and that only the president's order remains. Danilov added that it was necessary to wait for the improvement of the soil conditions, still humid after the spring rains, a circumstance that was resolved some time ago. More intrepid in his public messages, Mikhailo Podolyak has already written on several occasions that the offensive has already begun. The Ukrainian attacks in the Belgorod region would be part of it,false flags of the Kremlin.

While the Ukrainian discourse has remained certain of victory, for months the Westerner has begun to tone down its enthusiasm and, above all, its triumphalism. Zelensky has adapted his speech by linking the victory to the supply of Western weapons. In his last interview, the Ukrainian president insisted on this idea, repeating once again the risk of suffering heavy casualties, an argument that he already used several weeks ago to justify a new delay in the start of the Ukrainian attack. Since then, the Western trend for a continuous flow of war funding has been coupled with obvious Ukrainian moves on different fronts and attacks from the rear. There have been explosions in Melitopol,Russian partisans from the General Directorate of Military Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.

The first of the two adventures that took place last week, seemed to not get beyond its initial phase and the group's advance party was eliminated by the Russian authorities. There was no epic comeback on this occasion recorded by the press, which was able to hear first-hand from one of the main leaders who does not consider the term neo-Nazi an insult. Unable to infiltrate the Belgorod region, the Ukrainian military resorted to the tactic used by nationalist battalions in Donbass in the summer of 2014: attacking civilians and artillery shelling towns without a military presence. These days it has been possible to see both the image of the fallen Ukrainian commando and the burning apartment buildings due to the impact of Ukrainian projectiles.legion . The group did not explain why, in that case, it had not been able to infiltrate the region.

Images of a burning residential neighborhood in shelling have also not stopped Ukraine from bragging about not targeting civilian areas. “While the Russian Volunteer Corps has the protection of its compatriots as a priority, carefully checking every step and action, Putin's troops have no mercy for their own civilians. No way, ”Mikhailo Podolyak wrote reflecting a reality that exists only in his imagination. And taking his arrogance to the extreme, the adviser to the Office of the President offered to open "humanitarian corridors" for the population of Belgorod, the same population that Ukrainian troops continue to bombard and carry out a new infiltration attempt in the last few hours. After threatening raids, small group attacks and artillery barrages against civilian border village .

As for Podolyak, for Zelensky the solution to all problems is clear. In his interview with The Wall Street Journal, the Ukrainian president was aware that the casualties among his troops will be high at the moment the offensive begins. However, everything can be avoided if Ukraine receives the weapons it demands. "Anyone is aware that any counteroffensive without air superiority is very dangerous," he said, making it clear what kyiv's desire is. The argument, which Zelensky has already used in the past, is still a form of blackmail to his partners, eager to see the start of the Ukrainian offensive, in which they have pinned their hopes to later force Russia to a humiliating resolution. . The Ukrainian president's reasoning is also manipulative, since the problem of Russia's air superiority that he now denounces is not going to be solved this summer by delivering F16s, whose arrival would be delayed for weeks, even months, once the American promise was consummated. Blackmail is not just a matter of groups like RDK.

Campaigning to win support for his candidacy for NATO Secretary General, UK Defense Minister Ben Wallace has come out in similar terms to Zelensky. A few days ago, an article in The Wall Street Journal commented on the differences in the position of Ukraine's Western partners, specifically mentioning London's much more belligerent stance compared to Washington. Wallace's words are an example of these differences. While Pentagon representatives have insisted since the Ukrainian offensive began to be considered that Kiev's chances of retaking Crimea are slim, in an interview with The Washington Post,the British minister showed a speech much more aligned with the kyiv narrative.

"What we have seen on the battlefield is that if you hit the Russian forces in the right place, they will really collapse," he said, alleging that it is "a real possibility" for Ukraine to recapture Crimea militarily. To do this, Wallace relies on an argument also regularly repeated by the Kiev political authorities, who seem not to care that even their political authorities have denied it in relation, for example, to the battle for Artyomovsk. "You can send tens of thousands of young people to die, which is what they do, but you can't magically produce the tanks and weapons systems they need," he said, falling back into another of the commonplaces of this war: that Russia is at point of running out of resources to fight.

In war, discourse and reality do not have to coincide. No need to turn to Russian propagandato be aware of the immense personnel cost that the battle for Artyomovsk has taken on the Ukraine as well, which has not yet conceded the loss of the city and in whose fight it has acted exactly as Wallace claims Russia acted. The very development of the war is enough to observe that Wallace's argument for the lack of weapons does not hold up either. Moreover, despite the fact that since March 2022 there began to be talk of a shortage of missiles in the Russian arsenal, the attacks have increased notably now that the Ukrainian preparations for the offensive seem to be in their final phase. And you don't have to go to the Russian media to find out that, despite the damage that Western sanctions are causing in some sectors of the Russian economy, the coercive measures have not brought about the economic collapse they sought nor have they impeded the ability to continue the war. According to an article published this weekend byThe Economist , hardly a pro-Russian medium, Russia has spent 3% of its GDP on the cost of the war, a higher percentage than the 2.3% that the Vietnam war meant for the United States, but that is not going to prevent Russia from have the option of preparing for a long war.

Faced with Russia, which has an important military industry that has been able to supply its troops, Ukraine depends on its allies to replenish, replace and maintain the bulk of the weapons that make it possible for its army to continue fighting. In the first months of the Russo-Ukrainian war, the West repeated ad nauseam the argument that Moscow would not be able to fight a long war. This reasoning was based on both the economic and the military argument: the NATO countries expected a further collapse of the Russian economy that has not occurred, while the country has managed, for the moment, to maintain military production to guarantee the necessary weapons. What's more, Russia's problem in the initial months was a lack of troops, not weapons. In any case, The idea that a long war favors Ukraine has already disappeared from the discourse of the West, which, as Josep Borrell stated on Saturday, seeks to maintain the flow of arms supplies to avoid a quick victory for Russia. To paraphrase Ben Wallace, Ukraine cannot magically produce the tanks and weapons systems its soldiers need. Hence, kyiv's partners must keep very high or even raise military spending to ensure that their proxy army can keep fighting.

https://slavyangrad.es/2023/06/05/27429/#more-27429

Google Translator

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SWEDEN WANTS TO REVERSE THE BATTLE OF POLTAVA – WATCH OUT FOR THE JUNE 12 DEADLINE

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By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with

In a month it will be three hundred and fourteen years precisely since the Swedes lost their king, their generals, their soldiers, and their empire when Tsar Peter the Great and the Russian army defeated them at the Battle of Poltava (lead image). That battle of July 8, 1709, is the greatest disaster in Swedish military history; it is the bitterest grudge they hold against Russia, still.

The Swedes were obliged to accept their inferiority and become a minor power in Europe. Their strategic calculation ever since has been to conserve their resources by keeping to the winning side in Europe, while hoping to revenge themselves on the Kremlin. At Poltava, in eastern Ukraine, they still hope if, with Swedish money, arms, and men, the regime in Kiev can manage it.

Over the past week the Swedish Air Force has taken its Saab-made JAS39 Gripen fighter-bombers to the air, alongside other NATO forces and the USS Gerald Ford in what they are calling Operation Arctic Challenge 23. At the same time, the Swedish Defense Minister Pål Jonsson, has admitted that he is discussing with Kiev supplying the Gripen for attacking Russian forces over the Ukrainian battlefield. “Yesterday [February 14], I had the opportunity to discuss this with the Minister of Defense of Ukraine, Reznikov….We are significantly increasing opur support for Ukraine”. “President Zelensky also asked for it.”

Jonsson didn’t admit that the Swedes are discussing with the US, NATO, and the Czech Republic a form of disguising the battlefield deployment of the Gripen through third countries and through NATO’s Air Defender 23 exercise, which begins on June 12.

Listen to the new War of the Worlds broadcast for a briefing on the latest battlefield developments, followed by a discussion with Marcello Ferrada de Noli, a professor of psychiatry and philosophy who has lived and taught in Sweden for many years.

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https://tntradiolive.podbean.com/e/prof ... june-2023/
Left: for the playback link, click. Right: Professor Marcello Ferrada de Noli. Read his latest publications on Sweden’s NATO move and this -- and on the European war strategy here. Follow his commentary here. https://twitter.com/ProfessorsBlogg

On May 30 Putin introduced General Patience and the Russian strategy of standoff targeting without the commitment of Russian ground forces or manned aircraft to a conventional offensive across the Dnieper River. “Russia was forced to respond to the war the Ukrainian regime unleashed in Donbass,” Putin said. “We all had to respond by launching the special military operation. We are striking at the territory of Ukraine, but with long-range precision weapons, at military infrastructure facilities only, either at ammunition or fuel and lubricants warehouses used for combat operations. We have talked about the possibility of striking at decision-making centres. Of course, the headquarters of Ukrainian military intelligence is one of them, and a strike at this target was carried out two or three days ago. In response, the Kiev regime has chosen a different path – attempts to intimidate Russian citizens with strikes at residential buildings. This is an obvious terrorist approach.”

Read more analysis of what happens next for Odessa, Nikolaev and Kharkov.

Boris Rozhin’s (“Colonel Cassad”) analysis of the Russian method of operation in striking the GUR, the Ukrainian military intelligence agency, can be read here.

In a US interpretation of the operation, published on June 1, it is claimed that “the building appears damaged ‘from below’ rather than above, and does coincide with a huge ground-rumbling earthquake which was said to have come from some underground explosion. Rumors of NATO generals being ferried now abound, though I take those as low confidence… Now, of course, there are the obligatory rumors that GUR head Budanov is missing and some claiming he was killed in the strike. Just recently coming off from the Zaluzhny debacle, I remain skeptical. But it’s definitely possible and we’ll just have to wait for any further information and see. After all, aspiring Bond-villain Budanov is a camera whore that loves making idle threats and zinging Russians so it is very odd that he’s suddenly so quiet. Recall, that after the previous round of strikes, the righteously indignant Budanov immediately recorded a threatening video, which I posted last time, where he told Russia that something is coming ‘soon’ for them. One would think that after a hit completely burns out his HQ he would at least make some kind of retort, no?”

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Left: the GUR headquarters building after the Russian strike. Right, GUR chief, Kirill Budanov.

To follow the Swedish hankering for imperial revenge on the Russians, start here.

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For the recent polling of Swedish public opinion on the war in the Ukraine, read this piece from the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. In the Ipsos opinion surveys reported from mid-2022, the Swedes rank far ahead of other west European countries in the attention they are paying to the war; in the risks to their country they see from the war; and in their support for supplying weapons to Kiev.

Follow the upward (red) line of voter support for the current Swedish coalition government’s anti-Russian line. According to de Noli, Swedish support for NATO has been dictated by the political and corporate elites, backed by the mainstream media, without a genuine referdendum test of public opinion. There are almost no alternative media, he adds.

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Source: https://www.politico.eu/

A summary of the 2022 election can be read here. At the current 37% level of voter support recorded on May 21, the Social Democrats have gained 4 percentage points on last year’s election level.

For additional background on Swedish government discussions to provide the Ukraine with battlefield weapons like the CV90 infantry fighting vehicles and the MBT LAW anti-tank missiles, as well as the JAS39 Gripen aircraft, click to read.

In this US Defense News videoclip, produced this week, it is revealed that Ukrainian pilots are already training on the Gripen, and that NATO staff consider the Swedish fighter has many advantages over the US F-16, including its cost, ease of pilot training, and capability to land and take off from Ukrainian roads, after the regular airfields have been destroyed.

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https://johnhelmer.net/sweden-wants-to- ... more-88081

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Patrick Lawrence: The War We’re Finally Allowed to See
June 1, 2023

After 15 months of conflict, The New Yorker’s reportage by Luke Mogelson and photographer Maxim Dondyuk shows us the war in Ukraine that the propaganda machine has been concealing.

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Ceremony in Kiev on March 24 marking the ninth anniversary of the National Guard of Ukraine and the graduation of officers of the National Academy of the National Guard of Ukraine and the Kyiv Institute of the National Guard of Ukraine. (President of Ukraine, Public domain)

By Patrick Lawrence
Original to ScheerPost


Let us consider the following paragraphs, which appear in the May 29 edition of The New Yorker:

“While Tynda and his team were fighting from the trench, long and powerful fusillades had issued from another Ukrainian position, on a hilltop behind them. I later went there with Tynda. In a blind overlooking the no man’s land stood an improbably antique contraption on iron wheels: a Maxim gun, the first fully automatic weapon ever made. Although this particular model dated from 1945, it was virtually identical to the original version, which was invented in 1884: a knobbed crank handle, wooden grips, a lidded compartment for adding cold water or snow when the barrel overheated….

“In the course of the past year, the U.S. has furnished Ukraine with more than thirty-five billion dollars in security assistance. Why, given the American largesse, had the 28th Brigade resorted to such a museum piece? A lot of equipment has been damaged or destroyed on the battlefield. At the same time, Ukraine appears to have forgone refitting debilitated units in order to stockpile for a large-scale offensive that is meant to take place later this spring. At least eight new brigades have been formed from scratch to spearhead the campaign. While these units have been receiving weapons, tanks, and training from the U.S. and Europe, veteran brigades like the 28th have had to hold the line with the dregs of a critically depleted arsenal.”


The piece, from which this passage is drawn, carries the headline, “Two Weeks at the Front in Ukraine” and is the work of Luke Mogelson, a magazine correspondent of a dozen or so years’ experience.

Mogelson’s text is accompanied by the photographs of Maxim Dondyuk, a Ukrainian of roughly Mogelson’s age, either side of 40, whose work focuses on history and memory, topics that suggest a lot of thought goes into those 1/1000ths of a second when Dondyuk clicks his shutter.

There are many things to think about and say as we read this piece. I will shortly have more to say about the excellence of Mogelson’s text and Dondyuk’s photographs. For now, the first thing to note is that, after 15 months of conflict, their work suggests Western media may at last begin to cover the Ukraine war properly.

I will stay with the conditional verb for now, but this could mark a significant turn not only for the profession — which could use a significant turn, heaven knows — but also in public support for the U.S.–NATO proxy war against the Russian Federation.

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Luke Mogelson, on right, in a 2015 panel discussion of his coverage of political asylum seekers. (Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy University, Flickr, Attribution-NoDerivs, CC BY-ND 2.0)

As astute readers will already know, apart from a few staged forays near the front lines — officially controlled and monitored, never at the front lines — correspondents from The New York Times, the other big dailies, the wire services, and the broadcast networks have accepted without protest the Kiev regime’s refusal to allow them to see the war as it is.

Content these professional slovens have been to sit in Kiev hotel rooms and file stories based on the regime’s transparently unreliable accounts of events, all the while pretending their stories are properly reported and factual.

The exceptions here are Times correspondents such as Carlotta Gall, whose Russophobia seems reliably unbalanced enough to satisfy the Kyiv regime, and the two Andrews, Higgins and Kramer, who have an exquisite talent for stories that make absolutely no sense.

It was the two Andrews, you may recall, who had the Russians shelling the nuclear power plant they occupied and, later on, bombing their own prisoner-of-war camp in eastern Ukraine.

If correspondents cannot see the war and it makes no matter to them, we will not see it either. The result, as your columnist noted a while ago, has been two wars: There is the presented, the mythical war, and the real war.

“Our current brainwashing for war is similar to that preceding other wars,” John Pilger, the journalist and filmmaker, wrote in a Tweet the other day, “but never, in my experience as a war correspondent, as unrelenting or bereft of honest journalism.”

This is what makes Mogelson’s file so startling. In its graphic honesty it is a major step on from the gruel of propaganda corporate media have fed us since the Russian intervention began in February 2022. Those three Times correspondents just mentioned? They all have many years’ experience on Mogelson. None of them could change his typewriter ribbon, as we used to say.

Two Weeks in Trenches

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Ukrainian trenchline at the Battle of Bakhmut, November 2022. (Mil.gov.ua, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons)

Mogelson and Dondyuk spent two weeks this past March with a Ukrainian infantry battalion as it fought in trenches “at a small Army position in the eastern region of the Donbas, where shock waves and shrapnel had reduced the surrounding trees to splintered canes.”

This was just outside a village south of Bakhmut, the much-embattled city lately lost to Russian forces. I have no doubt these two journalists were officially embedded with the high command’s approval. That is the way the Kiev regime is running this war. But, for whatever reason — and I will get to this question in a sec — there is no whiff of inhibition or self-censorship in either the reportage or the photographs. Both are raw, unflattering, as unforgiving as the scenes they depict:

“By the time I joined the battalion, about two months had passed since it had lost the battle for the village, and during the interim, neither side had attempted a major operation against the other. It was all the Ukrainians could do to maintain the stalemate. Pavlo estimated that, owing to the casualties his unit had sustained, eighty percent of his men were new draftees. ‘They’re civilians with no experience,’ he said. ‘If they give me ten, I’m lucky when three of them can fight.’

We were in his bunker, which had been dug in the back yard of a half-demolished farmhouse; the constant rumble of artillery vibrated through the dirt walls. ‘A lot of the new guys don’t have the stamina to be out here,’ Pavlo said. ‘They get scared and they panic.’ His military call sign was Cranky, and he was renowned for his temper, but he spoke sympathetically about his weaker soldiers and their fears. Even for him, a career officer of twenty-three years, this phase of the war had been harrowing. On a road that passed in front of the farmhouse, a board had been nailed to a tree with the painted words ‘to moscow’ and an arrow pointing east. No one knew who’d put it there. Such optimistic brio seemed to be a vestige of another time.”

Mogelson then introduces us to others in the battalion:

“Just two of the soldiers who were rebuilding the machine-gun nest had been with the battalion since Kherson. One of them, a twenty-nine-year-old construction worker called Bison — because he was built on like one — had been hospitalized three times: after being shot in the shoulder, after being wounded by shrapnel in the ankle and knee, and after being wounded by shrapnel in the back and arm. The other veteran, code-named Odesa, had enlisted in the Army in 2015, after dropping out of college. Short and stocky, he had the same serene deportment as Bison. The uncanny extent to which both men had adapted to their lethal environment underscored the agitation of the recent arrivals, who flinched whenever something whistled overhead or crashed nearby.

‘I only trust Bison,’ Odesa said. ‘If the new recruits run away, it will mean immediate death for us.’ He’d lost nearly all his closest friends in Kherson. Taking out his phone, he swiped through a series of photographs: ‘Killed . . . killed . . . killed . . . killed . . . killed . . . wounded. . . . Now I have to get used to different people. It’s like starting over.’ Because the high attrition rate had disproportionately affected the bravest and most aggressive soldiers—a phenomenon that one officer called ‘reverse natural selection’ — seasoned infantrymen like Odesa and Bison were extremely valuable and extremely fatigued. After Kherson, Odesa had gone awol. ‘I was in a bad place psychologically,’ he said. ‘I needed a break.’ After two months of resting and recuperating at home, he came back. His return was prompted not by a fear of being punished — what were they going to do, put him in the trenches? — but by a sense of loyalty to his dead friends. ‘I felt guilty,’ he said. ‘I realized that my place was here.’”


Reporting and writing of this caliber makes Mogelson look the dazzling star next to the correspondent-reenactors in their Kiev hotel rooms. But for my money he also keeps pace with a lot of standout names from the past. I see in his copy a little Dexter Filkins, a little Bernard Fall, a little Michael Herr, a little Martha Gellhorn, and I’ll go so far as to say a little Ernie Pyle.

As for Dondyuk’s pictures, the way they leap off the page brings to mind Tim Page, Horst Faas, Robert Kapa, and some of the other great war fotogs of their day. If this piece portends a turn or return (however you want to think of it) to reporting with some integrity to it, the project could not have got off to a better start. But let us stay with “if” for now.

There are at bottom two kinds of journalists: There are the analysts, as I call them, who add an interpretive dimension to their coverage — understanding in addition to knowledge. And there are the reporters, empiricists in the just-the-facts vein who stay close to the ground and do not much dolly out for any kind of larger take.

Mogelson is of this latter type. Reporters of his sort invite us to infer from what they tell us. What shall we infer from superbly tactile, eye-of-the-camera reportage?

No Pretense of Victory

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No Man’s Land between Russian and Ukraining forces during the Battle of Bakhmut, November 2022. (Mil.gov.ua, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons)

Luke Mogelson is not telling us about an army on the way to victory — or an army that pretends to itself it is on the way to victory, or one that wants the world to think it is on the way to victory. There are no battlefield successes, no advances, no high expectations in Mogelson’s story. There is “holding the line,” although few seem to hold, and there is staying alive. This is a story more given to severe attrition among soldiers waiting for the end and wondering how distant in time the end will prove.

In Mogelson’s writing we meet conscripts sent to the front after little or no training. He describes one man who was kidnapped on a city sidewalk and was under Russian fire three days later. Paralyzing fright, exhaustion, demoralization, desertions, a sort of Beetle Bailey incompetence — these are rampant among the green draftees that now make up the majority of the AFU’s infantry. They fight with Vietnam-era vehicles shipped from the U.S., or muzzle-loaded mortars long out of production, or Soviet-era weapons left over from the pre–1991 days—and, withal, too little ammunition for this kind of matériel to make any difference at all.

A 1945 Maxim gun of 1884 design? Jeez. Mogelson is right to question, if too briefly, where may be all the weapons the U.S. and NATO allies are shipping into Ukraine. A great number of them have already been destroyed, he reports, which comes as no surprise. Being as close to the scene as he put himself earlier this spring, he would have done well to tell us something about the greedheads who run the regime and the military as they sell shocking amounts of arms into the black market as soon as they arrive across the Polish border.

At one point, Mogelson and Dondyuk spend a day in a dugout with a seasoned sergeant named Kaban and a 19–year-old codenamed Cadet, so young he hasn’t lost his baby fat. “Later, Kaban entertained us with stories about his past romantic escapades,” Mogelson recounts, “and Dondyuk, the photographer, asked him whether he’d imparted any lessons to Cadet.

“ ‘There’s no point,’ Kaban said. ‘He’ll be dead soon.’

Cadet laughed, but Kaban didn’t.”


These are the voices of the war Mogelson tells us about. Can’t you just cut the anxiety in Cadet’s laugh with a knife?

I have to mention some wonderful touches in Mogelson’s report because they are superlative writing of the kind that is too rare these days. Of the soldier firing that Maxim gun: “The gun’s operator, a rawboned soccer hooligan with brass knuckles tattooed on his hand, spoke of the Maxim like a car enthusiast lauding the performance of a vintage Mustang.” Describing an unwieldy personnel carrier of Vietnam vintage, Mogelson tells us: “It looked like a green metal box on tracks… The maxed-out machine sounded like a blender full of silverware.”

Did Gellhorn do any better as she covered the Spanish Civil War for Colliers?

Mogelson shows us the war a few independent journalists have written of but a war we have not heretofore read about in mainstream media. This is the war the propaganda machine has kept from us. And now we know that what correspondents reporting for independent media have been describing is by and large the war as it is.

Among much else we can now see the obvious indifference the Kiev regime and its Western backers display for those doing the fighting — who, Mogelson tells us, are now working-class Ukrainians, the more privileged having dodged the draft or otherwise avoided service.

Mogelson reported this piece in March, and we can justly assume conditions on the front line of this war are now three months’ worth of worse. His report makes me want to bang my shoe on the table, Khrushchev-style, in equal measure for the disgraceful conduct of mainstreamers reenacting the work of correspondents, for the senseless loss of Ukrainian lives in the service of the presented war and for the AFU soldiers — veterans and the untrained draftees they command — who the Kiev regime has not quite but nearly abandoned.

Why Now?

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The New Yorker mascot Eustace Tilley by Tim Needles. (Flickr, Attribution CC BY 2.0)

The obvious question is why this piece appears now in The New Yorker, a magazine thoroughly committed to every liberal orthodoxy you can think of, including the wisdom of this war and the certainty of an AFU victory. Hell broke loose last year, you will recall, when Amnesty International and then CBS News lifted the lid on the realities of the Ukraine conflict. What is different now?

This is hard to say. But the larger picture suggests publication of this eye– and mind-opening piece reflects a creeping recognition in all sorts of places —among the policy cliques, at the Pentagon, in corporate media — that Ukraine is not going to win this war and the time has come to prepare for this eventuality.

The new drift on the vaunted counteroffensive is that it is not going to make much difference. There is more talk now about the conditions necessary to begin negotiations. NATO officials, per Steven Erlanger, the Times’ Brussels correspondent, are now thinking about doing in Ukraine what the allies did in postwar Germany: Divide it such that the West joins the alliance and the east is left to the East, so to say.

Mogelson’s intent, surely, was to do good work, full stop, and he has. But read in this larger context, its publication looks to me the start of an effort to get all those people with blue-and-yellow flags on their front porches ready for a dose of the reality from which they have been shielded all these months. The Wall Street Journal, The New York Post, Business Insider, Forbes: They have all recently run pieces not nearly as good as Mogelson’s but in the let’s-get-real line.

If I am right, the real war and the presented war will eventually be one. About time, I would say. Not that mainstream media are about to ’fess up to their sins and disgraces in their pitiful coverage of this war. They never will. Let us not get carried away on this point.

Patrick Lawrence, a correspondent abroad for many years, chiefly for the International Herald Tribune, is a columnist, essayist, lecturer and author, most recently of Time No Longer: Americans After the American Century. His new book Journalists and Their Shadows, is forthcoming from Clarity Press. His Twitter account, @thefloutist, has been permanently censored. His web site is Patrick Lawrence. Support his work via his Patreon site. His web site is Patrick Lawrence. Support his work via his Patreon site.

This article is from ScheerPost.

https://consortiumnews.com/2023/06/01/p ... ed-to-see/

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The imperialism-compatible left’s big lie: that being pro-Russia is a reactionary stance

BY RAINER SHEA
JUNE 2, 2023

Russiagate has impacted the thinking of leftists, and even many who call themselves communists, in more ways than they’d like to believe. Everyone with at least some awareness of the Democratic Party’s corruption and hypocrisy has recognized how deranged liberals have become about Russia during the last decade. So leftists have tried to distance themselves from Russiagate, with its embarassing conspiratorial thinking. Yet because the left is predominantly opportunistic, it hasn’t been willing to give up Russiagate’s core belief: that if somebody is serious about challenging U.S. imperialism, and thereby supports Russia’s actions to weaken Washington’s hegemony, then they’re a reactionary.

This was the idea that came from the effort to politically police Donald Trump, where the Democrats, the corporate media, and their neocon allies accused the Trump campaign of Russian collusion to pressure him into going along with the new cold war. When Trump’s opportunism incentivized him to comply, and he became a more dangerously anti-Russian president than Obama, the imperialist narrative managers kept promoting the collusion story. Because even though they had successfully made the new cold war bipartisan, they needed to maintain a myth that justified this and all their other vile policies. The idea that our “democratic institutions” are under threat from a foreign menace, and that these institutions therefore are genuinely worthy of being called democratic, was the perfect myth. One the narrative managers still haven’t let go of.

“The myth of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election provides a convenient escape hatch from the political, social, cultural and economic rot that plagues the U.S.,” wrote Chris Hedges this year. “The liberal class, by clinging to this conspiracy theory, is as disconnected from reality as the QAnon theorists and election deniers that support Trump. The retreat by huge segments of the population into non-reality-based belief systems leaves a polarized nation unable to communicate. Neither side speaks a language rooted in verifiable fact. This bifurcation, one I witnessed in the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, fuels the distrust and hatred between antagonistic demographics. It accelerates political disintegration and dysfunction. It is used to justify, as was true with the F.B.I. investigation of Trump, gross abuses of power.”

Because the default liberal view has come to be that Russia is a globally subversive bad actor, one which couldn’t possibly have a good reason for wanting to demilitarize a modern Nazi state, the left opportunists have had to also adopt this neocon stance in order to effectively tail the Democrats. They’ve tacitly accepted the narrative that the GOP has “sold out to Putin,” and therefore that anyone who opposes U.S. hegemony is an asset for reactionary politics.

This narrative is supported by two notions. One, that Russia’s war against Ukrainian fascism and wider pattern of defying U.S. hegemony can be attributed to Vladimir Putin as a personality. The reactionary politicians and commentators who praise Putin as an anti-woke strongman provide the liberals with a rhetorical basis for this. Because both of the partisan sides Hedges talks about share that false perception about how Russia’s anti-American turn was Putin’s idea. When you look at the historical context behind Russia’s break from Washington, you see that Putin did not set out to do this. He was originally supposed to continue Yeltsin’s project to keep Russia a U.S. client state, and he for a time wanted Russia to join NATO. Then the circumstances mandated that he become an anti-American leader, or else become unpopular among a Russian society that’s overwhelmingly anti-imperialist. This isn’t Putin’s war, it’s the Russian people’s war, a war that he did everything to delay until he could avoid doing the responsible thing no longer.

The profit interests of the Russian bourgeoisie in this war only momentarily coincide with those of the wider Russian people, who seek to combat Nazism after it took 27 million of their relatives in World War II. In the long term, Operation Z is against the favor of the country’s capitalist class, as it’s accelerating class conflict and giving the communists more influence. Besides, if your priority is anti-imperialism, the correct stance is to support an action by a non-imperialist, non-fascist country that weakens U.S. hegemony. To engage with the shallow commentary from the reactionaries who reduce this conflict to Putin, and not repudiate this personality-focused narrative, is to frame the matter in a deceptively simplistic way. A way that makes it easy to create a dichotomy between “those who oppose Putin” and “those who support Putin.” Putin is not the point. What kind of person Putin is has no relevance to whether anti-imperialists should support the special operation, our concern is whether it represents a progressive historical event (which it does).

The other notion the imperialism-compatible left operates off of is that because the pro-Russia stance of us anti-imperialists overlaps with the views on Russia of many conservatives, particularly the libertarian kinds of conservatives, for us to take this stance is to create a “red-brown alliance.” This is the argument they used to try to discredit the Rage Against the War Machine coalition, whose communist organizations are appropriately all pro-Russian. What it comes from is the idea that only those who are on the left are worth reaching out to. That if somebody doesn’t share all the “right” ideas (which according to these left gatekeepers include many liberal ideas that aren’t even compatible with genuine Marxism), then they should be discarded.

By this logic, anybody who calls themselves a libertarian shouldn’t be worked with under any circumstances, as everyone in this category is supposedly a threat towards the socialist cause whatever the context. Which is ironic coming from the same types of left sectarians who work obsessively to harm anti-imperialists, something we haven’t seen from libertarians especially during recent times. By this logic, we should make no effort to distinguish between the culture war-obsessed types of conservatives, and the ones who’ve moreso been going in an anti-imperialist direction. Even though there are plenty of communists today who in 2016 would have voted Trump, as well as many who used to be libertarians. Bernie Sanders voters are not the only types of people who’ve been coming to Marxism throughout the last decade. To pretend like they are would be to willingly make the communist movement insular, and divided to an unnecessary degree.

What the imperialism-compatible left seeks to do is drive a wedge between those who came to socialism after being liberals, and the ones who came to it after being libertarians or conservatives. Bringing these two groups to unity, and adopting a shared synthesis that includes principled anti-imperialism, doesn’t have to mean tolerating the elements that refuse to give up their reactionary beliefs.

I’ll always denounce the anti-gay and anti-trans stances of these elements, for instance, as well as their blanket rejection of the concept of tribal sovereignty. What I’ve learned is that many of the types who’ve been won over by Parenti’s proletarian patriotism argument—an argument I don’t embrace, unless it’s a broader kind of “patriotism” that’s not tied to the USA—are also repulsed by these culture warrior edgelords. How can you create a red-brown alliance with people who, by any honest argument, aren’t fascist or fascist-adjacent? There’s a difference between a fascist, and someone who doesn’t share all of your ideas at the moment. To discard anyone who has contradictions is foolish from the perspective of wanting to win the people, yet this is what the left opportunists tell us to do.

The obstinate reactionaries are a fringe, one that’s not capable of winning the people. The pro-Russian element of the communist movement is predominantly made up of actually serious Marxists, ones who reject the culture war obsession of the reactionaries in favor of prioritizing anti-imperialism above all. Because it’s obvious to them that fighting the information war against the empire’s psyops is the most meaningful thing communists can do at this stage in the class struggle.

We in this ideological element have two key differences from the right-wingers who love Putin: one, we understand that Russia’s efforts to stand up to the war machine have been carried out in spite of Putin rather than because of him, meaning it doesn’t make sense from an anti-imperialist perspective to idolize him. Especially not for a communist, as Putin is a bourgeois leader. (Putin also accomodates the anti-gay politics of the Russian Orthodox Church, a kind of practice that most communists in the 21st century have rightly come to reject.) Two, we’re not fixated on the culture war, and we encourage anyone who still is to get out of that unhealthy mindset. Our foremost priority is to combat U.S. hegemony, which entails narratively aiding Russia’s efforts to weaken it.

This does not mean we view multipolarity as the end goal, that’s another strawman the imperialism-compatible left uses against us. We view multipolarity as one of the indispensable steps towards full global victory for the working class, based on how U.S. imperialism is the globe’s primary contradiction and has to be defeated as our foremost objective. We in the core can help realize this step by disrupting the war machine’s narrative management operations, thereby making Washington’s efforts to delay the rise of multipolarity untenable.

https://newswiththeory.com/the-imperial ... ry-stance/

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Ukraine, Human Rights, and International Law, With Alfred De Zayas
JUNE 3, 2023

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MintCast thumbnail art featuring Mnar Adley (left), Alan MacLeod (center) and Alfred de Zayas (right). Photo: MintPress News.

By Alan MacLeod – Jun 1, 2023

You can indict Vladimir Putin over war crimes in Ukraine. But if you do, you’d better indict Joe Biden as well. That is the message that Professor Alfred de Zayas, world-renowned human rights and international law expert, gave “MintCast” host Alan MacLeod on today’s episode of the series.

A Swiss-American lawyer, academic and United Nations official with over 50 years’ experience in the field of human rights, de Zayas joins us for a wide-ranging discussion about international law and Ukraine, U.S. sanctions, whistleblowers, the successes and failures of the United Nations and its bodies, and the growth of a new and cynical “human rights industry” that weaponizes the concept to attack foreign governments.

“The double standards [with regard to Russia] are absolutely breathtaking” de Zayas said, noting how British International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor Karim Khan had discontinued all investigations into NATO war crimes in Afghanistan but continued those into the Taliban against NATO. Now the ICC has issued an arrest warrant against Putin, another one-sided decision that de Zayas claims has made the organization a joke:

“There is no question that here, the crime of aggression has been committed, and certainly Russian troops have committed crimes in Ukraine. But you cannot prosecute one side and let the other side off scot-free. If you are going to indict a serving head of state [like Putin], then you would have to indict Joe Biden.”

The United States and NATO, he says, have been carrying out dangerous provocations in Ukraine for years, supplying weapons to militias who use them against civilians, while also carrying out similar crimes to Russia in Afghanistan, meaning that anyone with a semblance of balance or neutrality would conclude that American leaders need to be held accountable, too.

After graduating from Harvard University in 1970, de Zayas practiced law in New York and Florida. For many years, he served in various human rights organizations and as a senior official at the United Nations. From 2010 to 2013 he was editor-in-chief of Ex Tempore, the United Nations’ literary journal. Until 2018, he was UN Independent Expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order. In addition to this, he has taught law at academic institutions across the world, including the University of Geneva, the University of Trier, the Human Rights Institute at the Irish National University and DePaul University.

De Zayas is also a prolific author and thinker attempting to construct the framework for a better world. Among his recent works include “Building a Just World Order” (2021), “Countering Mainstream Narratives,” (2022) and his latest book, “The Human Rights Industry” (2023).

De Zayas has been a leading international critic of U.S. sanctions, which, he points out, should really be referred to as “unilateral coercive measures,” as the former conveys some legitimacy to them. “It’s important not to use the term ‘sanctions,’ because ‘sanctions’ implies that the country imposing them somehow has a legal or moral authority to do so and the targeted country has somehow violated international law,” he told MacLeod. In fact, he notes, it is the U.S. that regularly flouts international law, and it can get away with it because its overwhelming power has allowed it a foster “culture of impunity” for its actions, internationally.

In 2020, after travelling to the country, de Zayas described U.S. sanctions against Venezuela as akin to a medieval siege and estimated that they had killed 100,000 innocent people.

From there, the esteemed diplomat casts his ire on the mainstream, corporate media, who he claims are complicit in Western war crimes, on the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which as “lost its credibility” going along with the U.S. on Syria and on those who keep Julian Assange in confinement because of his services to journalism.

https://orinocotribune.com/ukraine-huma ... -de-zayas/

*******

War in Ukraine. 06/04/2023
June 4, 22:38

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War in Ukraine. 06/04/2023

1. During the day, the enemy made active attempts to conduct reconnaissance in force on a number of sectors of the Zaporozhye and South-Donetsk directions, using a large number of armored vehicles. The main attacks were carried out in the area of ​​Gulyaipol, the Vremievsky ledge, in the area of ​​​​Ugledar and in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bAvdeevka.

2. Initially, the enemy managed to achieve small tactical successes in the area of ​​​​the Vremyevskiy salient, including the occupation of two small villages on the border of the gray zone, but after suffering losses (more than 20 tanks and armored combat vehicles), the enemy was forced to retreat, even despite the introduction of his reserves into battle. In most other areas, the enemy had no success. The ratio of losses per day turned out to be strongly not in favor of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

3. Nevertheless, there is a concentration and regrouping of enemy forces in order to continue the offensive activity of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the area of ​​the Vremievsky ledge, Vogledar and Vodyany. Probably tomorrow will be attempt number 2. It is possible that this activity is designed to distract our command from the Kamenskoye-Orekhov-Gulyaipole sector, where a blow could probably be struck in order to reach Tokmak and the subsequent movement to Melitopol, coupled with auxiliary landing forces across the Dnieper.

4. Under Artyomovsk as a whole, no changes. There is local enemy activity in the private sector to the southwest of the city, as well as to the northwest.
The RF Armed Forces cover the concentration of enemy forces in Slavyansk, Kramatorsk, Konstantinovka and Chasov Yar. Tomorrow the rotation of our group in Artemovsk will be completed.

5. In the Belgorod direction, the enemy today continued to actively shell the border areas, and also continued to attempt to break through the DRG into our territory. These actions are aimed primarily at solving information problems, as well as diverting attention from the main sectors of the front. Among the hopes of the enemy command is to provoke the RF Armed Forces to transfer additional forces here from the main directions. To do this, they try to inflate the panic as much as possible. Nevertheless, the situation requires the command to take more decisive measures to transfer hostilities to the northern regions of the Kharkos and Sumy regions in order to make it difficult for the enemy to implement his tactics.

Online broadcast of hostilities in Ukraine continues in telegram https://t.me/boris_rozhin (if you are interested, subscribe)

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8403709.html

The enemy launched a large-scale offensive on 5 sectors of the front
June 5, 1:33 am

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The Ministry of Defense about the attempts of the enemy to go on the offensive in the Zaporozhye direction.

On the morning of June 4, the enemy launched a large-scale offensive in 5 sectors of the front in the YuzhnoDonetsk direction with the introduction of the 23rd and 31st mechanized brigades from the strategic reserves of the Armed Forces of Ukraine with the support of other military units and subunits.

In total, 6 mechanized and 2 enemy tank battalions were involved.

The enemy's goal was to break through our defenses on the most vulnerable, in his opinion, sector of the front. The enemy did not achieve his tasks, he had no success.

As a result of skillful and competent actions of the Eastern Group of Forces, the losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine amounted to more than 250 personnel, 16 tanks, 3 infantry fighting vehicles, 21 armored fighting vehicles.

The commander of the united group of troops, Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation Gerasimov during this period was at one of the forward command posts in this direction.

https://t.me/boris_rozhin/87934 - zinc
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8403826.html

Google Translator

*********

From Cassad's Telegram account:

Colonelcassad

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Mass reconnaissance in combat in the Zaporozhye direction,
the situation by the end of June 4, 2023

Simultaneously with the activation of Ukrainian formations in the Kharkiv and South-Donetsk directions, today in the afternoon, the Armed Forces of Ukraine launched an attack from Malaya Tokmachka near Orekhov .

▪️The assault detachment conducted a sortie to the positions of the RF Armed Forces with the support of several units of armored vehicles. According to some reports, the Armed Forces of Ukraine managed to break through, but subsequently the attack was repulsed, and control was restored.

▪️On the Vremyevsky ledge , according to the Archangel of the Special Forces , in the Bolshaya Novoselka area, the enemy launched an attack with forces of 10 tanks and more than 20 AFVs , which was ultimately repulsed.

❗️All these sorties are more like reconnaissance in combat and an assessment of the capabilities of both the Russian troops and the Ukrainian formations themselves, which operate as part of combined assault formations.

In the Marun tactical group , which, apparently, will form the backbone of the offensive forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the organization of communications and the combat control system between the air assault formations (46 oambr, 82 airborne brigade, 71 ebr and 132 reconnaissance battalions) is now being debugged.

Most likely, the next attempts, and more massive ones , will be made in the near future. Ukrainian formations at the forefront today were given additional batteries, ammunition and uniforms, they are ready for active hostilities.

***

Colonelcassad

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The situation in the South-Donetsk direction
as of 14.00 June 5, 2023

🔻On the border of the Zaporozhye region and the DPR, in the area of ​​​​the Vremievsky ledge, the Armed Forces of Ukraine resumed the assault on Russian positions. Yesterday, by the end of the day, the RF Armed Forces recaptured the lost territories, including Novodarovka .

▪️Ukrainian formations (according to some reports, the forces of the 23rd and 31st Ombre are involved in the battles) attack in two directions: near Novodarovka and Rivnopol .

▪️By noon, Russian units repelled an attack by six tanks and infantry at Novodarovka. And from the direction of Novoselka, the offensive continues - reserves are brought in two kilometers west of Neskuchny .

▪️Also in the morning, there was an attempt to storm the positions of the RF Armed Forces near Neskuchnoye and Storozhevoy by marines of the new 37th Marine Brigade on several armored combat vehicles. The attack was repulsed.

🔻The main fighting took place in the Novodonetsk region . This morning, a convoy of 30 AFVs of the 37th Marine Corps of the Ukrainian Navy, including Kirpi and MaxxPRO, attacked the positions of the Russian Armed Forces near the village. As a result, the enemy entrenched himself on the outskirts of the settlement.

Now the fighting continues under heavy artillery fire. Soldiers of the 36th Army of the RF Armed Forces are trying to drive out the Ukrainian marines. At the moment, about half of the village is under the control of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. At the same time , a convoy of 20 armored vehicles is moving southeast

from the Bolshaya Novoselka area, most likely to strengthen positions in Novodonetskoye.


***

Colonelcassad
Regarding messages from the enemy that "there is no offensive."

Since so far the enemy has not been able to capture significant settlements in the course of attacks, he has already laid a straw for himself in advance if he cannot take anything significant. In this case, after the failure of the offensive, it will be possible to say that we did not declare an offensive, therefore we did not capture anything. But if they can take something, then they will later declare that this is where the offensive took place.

The enemy simply does not want to step on the same rake as with the "counteroffensive near Artemovsk", which lasted from May 10 to June 1 and did not lead to the occupation of at least one village. Here, the Armed Forces of Ukraine turned out to be hostages of their own propaganda, which rattled incessantly for several weeks about the "counterattack near Bakhmut" and which later turned out to have nothing to show against the backdrop of defeat in the battles for the city.

***

Colonelcassad
About the battles on the Vremievsky ledge by 12-00 06/05/2023

In the area of ​​​​the Vremevsky ledge, the enemy is trying to conduct an offensive with the forces of 23 and 31 ombr, in three directions

: up to 2 tank platoons (up to 6 tanks).

2. The Novoselka line - the mound Grave Watchtower - 23 ombr is advancing, forces up to reinforced MPR, the goal is mastering the dominant height.

3. The OTF line - the Shaitanka River - was advancing by 37 infantry regiments, with forces up to a platoon, the first attack was repulsed, 3 AFVs were destroyed, 2 AFVs managed to retreat.

Also, in the Shakhtyorsk direction, the 37th infantry regiment with forces up to the RTGR storms our defenses along the Zolotaya Niva - Novodonetskoye line.
Previously, the enemy managed to gain a foothold on the northern outskirts of the settlement of Novodonetskoye, in this case the battle continues, artillery and the Russian Aerospace Forces strike at the enemy.


https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Tue Jun 06, 2023 11:46 am

"Offensive Actions"
POSTED BY @NSANZO ⋅ 06/06/2023

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Yesterday, after more than 24 hours of evident fighting with a much higher intensity than what had been observed on the front lines in recent months, Ukraine confirmed that its troops are carrying out "offensive actions". On Sunday, Russia claimed to have defeated a first breakout attempt in the Zaporozhye region, but throughout yesterday, Russian sources admitted local Ukrainian successes on various sectors of the front, so the start of the breakout is taken for granted. the expected Ukrainian offensive. This moment is also the beginning of greater uncertainty in all fields, including information. Although the propaganda and censorship of war are present in each phase of a war conflict, the intensification of the battle supposes completely contradictory control maps, crazy numbers of casualties from the enemy side and denial of their own casualties and different types of misinformation. kyiv had already started at the weekend, with pro-Ukrainian sources claiming that theRussian partisans , actually employees of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, had managed to capture the town of Shebekino, a message spread by related media and even by a former Estonian president. The presence of the Russian press in a place is proof enough to refute Ukrainian control and yesterday, Komsomolskaya Pravda published a report from the town. The disinformation has only just begun and the first clear case is going to be the destruction - it is not yet clear whether partial or total - of the Kajovka press that has occurred in the last few hours. While waiting for its consequences in terms of flooding the Kherson region, the parties are already accusing each other of having blown up the dam.

For the moment, the Ukrainian attacks have come in expected and foreseeable directions. On the one hand, the attacks on Belgorod, including the taking of hostages, were one of Budanov's plans announced months ago in the Pentagon paper leaks. However, that direction is a simple attempt to force Russia to divert resources from the main front and thus exploit the numerical superiority that Ukraine maintains even despite last fall's Russian mobilization. The main front continues to be Zaporozhye, although the main direction is still unclear. The first movements point to an attempt to advance towards Volnovaja-Mariupol, although it is foreseeable that the attempt to advance to Melitopol will also be activated. To this main front we must add a secondary one that has already intensified: the one around Donetsk. It is not a secret that the city is one of the targets of Ukraine and of the most radical sectors of its armed forces.

A first analysis from the Russian point of view
Original Article: Vzglyad

The opponent is applying pressure along the entire front to create a home advantage, identify Russian weaknesses and try to develop an offense there. Military analyst Mikhail Onufrienko has discussed with Vzglyad the strong Ukrainian attempts to launch a counteroffensive. “For political reasons, the Ukrainian command has chosen the southern sector of the front as the most active for the offensive - the Zaporozhye region. Right now, we see activity on five fronts. However, I do not rule out the possibility that, in the future, the figure will be even higher," said Onufrienko.

“The two brigades of an offensive nature that the Ukrainian Armed Forces formed for the spring offensive that was not [in Russia and Ukraine, June 1 is considered the first day of summer, so the offensive would not even be spring anymore] participate. -summer, but summer offensive- Ed]. With forces somewhere between the size of a company to a battalion, the enemy is attempting to break through the front line. In addition, it is shelling the road to Vasilevka to cut off our supply routes. Attacks in the rear have intensified. At the same time, the Ukrainian Armed Forces are trying to prevent our attempts to cut the road from Orekhov [Zaporizhia] to Avdeevka [outskirts of Donetsk]. There are battles south of Ugledar and east of Guliaipole."

“The most successful strike for the Armed Forces of Ukraine has been in the area of ​​the Vremevsky bulge, west of Ugledar. They have managed to advance, occupy several strong points and now heavy battles continue. However, I would not exaggerate its importance, since it is not going to give advantages to the opponent. According to the information at our disposal, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have used several dozen armored vehicles and a battalion of personnel in this area. At the same time, the enemy suffers casualties because we, for our part, were preparing for the coup. The chief of the Defense General Staff Valery Gerasimov is also in the Zaporozhye sector, which confirms our readiness, ”he added.

“In general, the opponent is applying pressure along the entire front, striking to create local advantages in tight spots, and then sending reinforcements in the directions where the main force has been most successful. I think that this is how they want to break through the line of defense of the troops of the Russian Federation and develop the offensive,” Onufrienko believes. “Attention must also be paid to the fact that attempts to break through the front north and south of Artyomovsk have been blocked. Our forces are trying to advance in the Dvurechnaya area, where a bridgehead has been fortified on the right bank of the Oskol. To the north of Dvurechnaya, we have taken the town of Novomlinsk. And in Marinka, west of Donetsk, the Ajmat battalion is fighting in the single-family housing quarters, ”he added.

“We can expect the enemy to use additional forces over the next month, as only two of the twelve brigades formed are currently being used. In addition, the opponent is trying to divert our attention and stretch our forces in the direction of Belgorod. That is why there are constant bombardments and drone raids there. Drones regularly operate also in the Kursk region and other Russian regions, something that confirms the attempt to stretch the forces of the Russian Federation, ”he concluded.

On Monday morning, the chairman of the “Together with Russia” movement Vladimir Rogov claimed that active hostilities had resumed in the Vremevsky salient in the Zaporozhie area. According to Rogov, the Ukrainian Armed Forces launched an even stronger attack than on Sunday and attempted a full-scale breakthrough. Later, the DPR claimed that Ukrainian troops had intensified actions in a number of sectors of the line of contact in the direction of Donetsk. The situation is especially difficult in Marinka, Ugledar and Avdeevka.

https://slavyangrad.es/2023/06/06/27441/#more-27441

**********

Google Translator


Russian Armed Forces repel large-scale Ukrainian offensive

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Ukraine's president signaled on Saturday that kyiv was ready to launch a long-planned counter-offensive. | Photo: @MundoEConflicto
Posted June 5, 2023 (5 hours 31 minutes ago)

Losses for the Ukrainian Army were 250 personnel, 16 tanks, three infantry fighting vehicles, and 21 armored vehicles.

The Russian Defense Ministry reported on Sunday that the Ukrainian Armed Forces carried out an unsuccessful attempt at a large-scale offensive on five sectors of the front in the direction south of Donetsk.

The Ukrainian forces "introduced into the battle the 23rd and 31st mechanized brigades of the strategic reserves of the Armed Forces of Ukraine with the support of other military units and subunits." "In total, six mechanized battalions and two enemy tank battalions participated," the ministry said.

"The enemy's objective was to break through our defenses in what they assumed was the most vulnerable sector of the front. The enemy did not achieve its tasks, it was not successful," authorities said.


Losses for the Ukrainian army were 250 troops, 16 tanks, three infantry fighting vehicles and 21 armored vehicles, according to official information.

The commander of the combined group of forces, the chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Valeriy Gerasimov, was at the time of the offensive at one of the advanced command posts in this direction.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky signaled on Saturday that kyiv was ready to launch a long-planned counter-offensive. However, the deputy head of his office, Igor Zhovkva, said the same day that his country still received enough weapons and ammunition to mount a successful operation.

The Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Jens Stoltenberg, announced in late April that the organization had delivered more than 98 percent of promised equipment to Ukraine, including around 1,550 armored vehicles, 230 tanks and " vast" quantities of ammunition.

According to Stoltenberg, NATO trained more than 30,000 soldiers, allowing Ukraine to form nine brigades of combat forces.

https://www.telesurtv.net/news/rusia-re ... -0001.html

Russia begins naval exercises in the Pacific and Baltic

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Between the two naval exercises that began this day, more than 100 military ships participated. | Photo: Sputnik
Posted June 5, 2023 (5 hours 11 minutes ago)

The commander of the Pacific Fleet, Víctor Liína, indicated that the exercise will take place until June 20.

The Russian Ministry of Defense reported on Monday that the Pacific and Baltic Fleets belonging to the Russian Navy began independent naval exercises in the seas of Japan and Okhotsk, as well as in the Baltic Sea.

The commander of the Pacific Fleet, Admiral Víctor Liína, indicated through a statement that the combined operational exercise will take place until June 20.

According to the military authority, more than 60 warships and auxiliaries, 35 naval aircraft, coast guard units and more than 11,000 troops will participate in it.


The objective of the exercise is to strengthen training in the detection of submarines, for which firing practices with missiles and artillery weapons will be carried out against air and surface targets.

For its part, the Baltic Fleet reported that it began a series of naval exercises in which 40 warships, boats and auxiliary vessels, 3,500 troops, 25 aircraft and 500 military equipment will participate.


"In the framework of the maneuvers, tactical groups of ships left their bases and deployed in designated areas of the Baltic Sea to carry out training tasks," the statement said.

The exercises under the direction of the commander of the Baltic Fleet, Vice Admiral Vladimir Vorobiov, will continue until June 15 in the area and in polygons of the Kaliningrad region.

https://www.telesurtv.net/news/armada-r ... -0009.html

Google Translator

'polygons'?

*******

Ukraine Launches Its Counterattack

The long announced Ukrainian counter offensive has started. New Ukrainian units, never seen before, have come to the front.

The attack was launched by Ukraine for political reasons under pressure from its 'western' sponsors. Militarily it is unlikely to become successful but it will eat away at whatever is left of Ukraine's military capabilities.

Attacks happened all around the front. In the north towards Belgograd, to the east and, with the most forces, towards the south. There was so far little to no success in any of the attacks.

The daily report by the Russian Ministry of Defense list as Ukrainian losses over the last 24 hours 910 soldiers, 16 tanks, 33 armored combat vehicles/infantry fighting vehicle and some 30 trucks.

So far only the most forward positions of Russian troops have been attacked. There are two to three well organized defense lines behind those. The Russians can fall back whenever needed and let the artillery and air force destroy their oncoming enemies.

As I wrote previously about any attacks in the direction of Tokmak and Melitopol:

From the point of strategic value the chosen target is the right one. However, it is also the one where the Russian military has prepared its strongest defense lines.

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Source: @Inkvisiit, Scribblemaps

In military books this is know as 'echeloned defense' with three lines of well prepared positions ten kilometer apart from each other. Each line consists of tank obstacles, mine belts, prepared anti-tank positions to monitor and counter potential breach attempts and well prepared artillery support from behind the next defense line.

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To crack such a nut without air support and without significant artillery advantage is nearly impossible.


There may still come larger attacks in other directions. But how many could there be?

As a former Swedish officer notes:

June 4th UkrAF scaled up offensive operations on the Southern Front, but the losses are too high for long time success. Earlier operations were mainly reconnaissance in force with platoon and company sized combat groups. Yesterday the Ukrainian forces seemed to be battalion sized combat groups. According to Russian MoD 8 UkrAF battalions was involved in offensive operations SE of Mala Tokmachka (1), at the Vremivka salient (2) and East of Vuhledar towards Velikonovoselovka (3). The fighting was intense, but on most places Ukrainian forces was turned back, mainly by intense Russian artillery and air attacks. On some places UkrAF succeeded in capturing a couple of hundred meters.
...
[If the Russian numbers are true], the prospects for a Ukrainian counteroffensive looks very dim. This is even if we don't take into account the ongoing intense Russian air and artillery offensive against UkrAF troop concentrations, ammunition and fuel depots.

With losses of over 1000 KIA and WIA that means that a Ukrainian brigade of 4000 man lost at least 25 percent of its manpower. That's on the brink of making a brigade unusable. Two days fighting with such losses would destroy a brigade's battle capability. 24 days with such losses would in effect destroy the entire fist of 12 brigades UkrAF has gathered for the counteroffensive. With losses of around 12 brigades, 25 000 KIA/WIA, 250 tanks and 1000 IFVs/APCs all the strategic reserves UkrAF has built during the last 6 months would be gone. In exchange the Ukrainian side could have advanced maybe 10 km on some places or more generally 2-3 km along maybe half the southern front.

Once again, IF the Russian claims are true, RuAF must feel relieved and UkrAF very worried by the results of the fighting on the Southern front June 4th.


Image

I strongly suspect that the Russian military will let the Ukrainian attacks run their course to then launch its own larger scale attacks against weakened Ukrainian defenses.

Posted by b on June 5, 2023 at 13:04 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/06/u ... .html#more

Yeah, that's what I suspect too, classic.

US Anti-Tank Weapons Shipped to Kiev by Mexican Gangs(Bad translation?)
JUNE 5, 2023

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A US Army soldier with a Javelin missile.

A video footage broadcast in a Mexican news report has shown a Mexican gang member carrying a US-made Javelin anti-tank missile launcher, thousands of which were shipped to Ukraine for use against Russian forces.

The report broadcast by Mexico’s Milenio TV on Thursday pointed to the image of a man carrying what it described as the Javelin anti-tank weapon, identifying him as a member of the Gulf Cartel based in Matamorous, Mexico, noting that such weapons were shipped to Ukraine months ago.

Milenio identified the weapon as a Raytheon-made FGM-148, believed to be a Javelin missile launcher supplied to Ukraine in large quantities by the US military.

The footage shows the man decked out in CDG patches, armed with a Kalashnikov assault rifle, and carrying the anti-tank rocket launcher.

A Milenio host noted on Twitter that the Javelin launcher has a significant value on the black market, ranging from $20,000 to $60,000, while each missile costs roughly $30,000.


Over the past year, more than 10,000 Javelin missiles have been shipped from US military stockpiles to Ukraine, depleting resources for the US’s own armed services.

Some military experts who closely scrutinized the Milenio footage also suggested that the weapon depicted may actually be the AT-4, a Swedish-made disposable anti-tank launcher, also used by the US military and supplied to Ukraine.

Russia has consistently warned the United States and its allies against saturating Ukraine with weapons and ammunition, as it poses the risk of direct conflict and the possibility of these weapons falling into the hands of criminal networks due to inadequate controls.

A previous investigation in July 2022 revealed various Western-supplied weapons, including anti-tank missiles, being sold on the “dark web.”

Months later, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova issued a warning saying that Western arms worth $1 billion a month were being supplied to terrorists, extremists, and criminal groups in the Middle East, Central Africa, and Southeast Asia.

Kiev dismissed the warning as “propaganda” and claimed that everyone was properly identified.

The Gulf Cartel is located in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, specifically in the border town of Matamoros, across the Rio Grande from Brownsville, Texas.

The cartel has a long history dating back to the 1930s, but gained considerable notoriety in the late 1990s when it formed a notorious militia called Los Zetas, which has since operated independently.

Although primarily known as a drug-trafficking organization, Gulf Cartel has been accused of involvement in racketeering, kidnapping, money-laundering, and trafficking of individuals, sex slaves, and weapons.

In March, the cartel apologized for the kidnapping of four Americans by one of its gangs, which left two victims dead. The cartel claimed it was a case of mistaken identity and subsequently handed five members of the faction over to Mexican police.

https://orinocotribune.com/us-anti-tank ... can-gangs/

*************

Image
If a Ukrainian can afford to pay $5,000 a month, he can simply buy a deferment each time and go on with his usual life.

Class and nation in the conflict in Ukraine
Originally published: Al Mayadeen on June 2, 2023 by Dmitri Kovalevich (more by Al Mayadeen) | (Posted Jun 03, 2023)

Every military conflict these days has a class component; the soldiers directly involved in hostilities are usually drawn or conscripted from poorer social classes. The current conflict in Ukraine is no exception to this.

There are also differences in approaches between Ukraine and Russia to military staffing and individual freedom from military service. This difference is primarily due to the difference in the economic potential and human resources of the two countries.

This past Sunday in a village in the Kiev region, I saw about 100 conscripted young men gathered on the grounds of a kindergarten. Some were already in the uniform of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, some were still in civilian clothes. A pack of cigarettes was enough to get them talking. Soldiers rarely have cigarettes these days and ask for them from passersby.

I learned that many of the conscripts were taken from their workplaces by military conscriptors. “I was working at the Epicenter hypermarket,” one man told me. “Two military men came in with the police, and the senior manager then pointed out a few people. They were taken, including me,” His other colleagues turned out to be construction workers, marketplaces sellers, and workers at a local furniture factory.

In Ukraine, the conscription of men between the ages of 18 and 60 has been in full swing since last year. Since February 24, 2022, all Ukrainian males as well as females of certain professions (military and medical personnel), have been prohibited from leaving the country. The only exceptions are employees of Western NGOs, some IT specialists, and critical infrastructure workers who cannot be replaced by women. Men who do not want to fight either hide or cross the Ukraine border illegally at night. Even those previously recognized as restricted from military service, for example, due to handicap, are being subject to conscription.

There are various corrupt schemes for helping men to escape to EU countries or to obtain forged papers. The rates for such services vary from 5,000 to 12,000 euros (one euro equals US$1.09). Ukraine is the poorest country on the European continent; only its wealthy citizens can pay such money. Consequently, the trenches at the military fronts are filled with inhabitants of the poorer regions of Ukraine.

Farmers are particularly valued for military service in Ukraine because of their experience in operating tractors and agricultural machinery. They can be more easily trained to operate tanks and other military vehicles.

If a Ukrainian can afford to pay $5,000 every six months, he can simply buy a deferment each time and go on with his usual life. Medical boards check his health condition and decide if the man is eligible for military service. Having a treatable disease gets six months of deferment.

Travel outside of the country is allowed for several categories of residents of Ukraine, including those who work for Western NGOs, those working on collecting financial donations abroad for the Ukrainian army, and fathers of at least three underage children. Forged papers for such categories are bought; especially valuable are those bought from those working for Western NGOs.

The other day in Odessa, the head of the military registration and enlistment office, Yevgeny Borisov, was detained. He is accused of corruption by the State Bureau of Investigation for giving instructions to subordinates not to touch certain people, ie those who had paid bribes to avoid military service. Earlier, regional media reported that Borisov owned a car worth $250,000, imported to Ukraine under the guise of humanitarian aid and that his retired mother has purchased a residential property worth more than $3 million in the Spanish resort town of Marbella. She purchased the property last December. In fact, many Ukrainian military commissars are becoming like landlords, collecting tribute from enslaved Ukrainian men.

Many wealthy Ukrainian celebrities, including famous actors and singers, regularly pose for photos in military uniforms, but we hardly ever hear of such people being injured or killed. Rather than directly serve, most of them are assigned to raise funds and other aid to the AFU, where their status is more useful. Thus we see that having a high social status as well as high income earned from theatre performance, musical recordings and music concerts more or less automatically exempts a person from being drafted into the army. Some celebrities have also been able to illegally evacuate their children from Ukraine by paying large sums of money. For example, the grandson of People’s Artist of Ukraine Sofia Rotaru was detained last year while trying to cross the Dniester River by boat to Moldova. Despite being detained, the grandson still managed to end up in France, having found a different way to escape Ukraine.

Full-time students are also exempt from conscription, as are students of European universities. In Ukraine, however, only the middle and upper classes can now afford to send a son or daughter to university.

One of the most de-motivating factors against service in the Ukrainian Armed Forces that is becoming more and more visible has been the spread of cemeteries in the country. Long rows of standardized graves of fallen AFU stretch out. Videos of these graves and cemeteries are going viral, discouraging the enthusiasm of potential Ukrainian servicemen. Although both sides in the conflict guard their casualty numbers as classified information, the Russian army is using five times as many shells every day, according to the secretary general of NATO. This obviously affects the corresponding casualty rate of the AFU. Just recently, at the end of April, the Kiev city council decided to set aside 100 hectares for a new military cemetery in the city in which 50,000 people could be buried, not counting the columbarium (a structure used in cemeteries to store and often display urns containing cremated remains, typically a wall). This will add to the already-overcrowded military cemeteries.

In Russia, meanwhile, according to Russian comrades and to Ukrainians traveling there to whom I have spoken, the situation for ordinary citizens is almost unchanged. In Moscow or Novosibirsk, there is no indication that Russian soldiers are fighting somewhere. In a large country, this effect is blurred rather than concentrated as in Ukraine. Last year, Russia announced partial conscription, after which thousands of Russian men left for neighboring countries (Georgia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan) and did so quite legally and freely. Many of them remain there today. Most of them were from the middle classes in Moscow and St. Petersburg –IT specialists, media workers, some small and medium-sized entrepreneurs.

Pavel Pryanikov, a Russian opposition journalist and critic of the current Russian government, argues in his blog ‘The Tolkovatel’ that the main fear of Russians’ is not the military situation in Ukraine but the possibility of a return to the years of the economic collapse of the 1990s. Pryanikov writes, “All sociological studies and general observations show that the main fear of Russians is not the country’s Special Military Operation in Ukraine but the fear of a return to the empty shelves of the late Soviet Union. They fear total impoverishment and, in general, a return to the terrible 1990s.” He stresses that Russians intuitively sense the likelihood of a return to that terrible, neoliberal period of economic collapse should they lose in the current conflict in Ukraine.

The Russian military presence in Ukraine is dominated by people from the poorer regions of the Russian Federation – the republics of the North Caucasus, the Far East, and Transbaikalia. In the Russian Federation, the level of average salaries varies greatly from region to region. The level of salaries paid to contracted or conscripted soldiers in the conflict in Ukraine is much higher than the salaries they would earn in their own regions. The high income earned by the Russian Federation from the export and sale of its natural resources covers military expenditure by the government. This is not the case in Ukraine.

The minimum, monthly salary of an ordinary Russian soldier serving in the military zone is about 200,000 rubles (2,375 euros, or US$2,600). There are additional bonuses available for those with specialized military skills. This is several times higher than the salary of a Russian soldier posted to Siberia or elsewhere in the Russian Far East. In other words, the Russian Federation relies more on financial motivation of its servicemen rather than coercion, although, as in Ukraine, poor people are more likely to end up at the warfront.

By comparison, in Ukraine, a conscripted private is entitled to 20,000 hryvnias (about 500 euros). On February 1, salaries were cut by 30 percent at the request of the IMF, as one means to fight the country’s budget deficit. The pay cuts caused discontent among many Ukrainian servicemen. Ukrainian General Mikhailo Zabrodsky says in a recent interview that there is simply no room for additional funds to permit a return of salaries to their previous levels.

NATO countries, primarily the U.S., regularly allocate billions of dollars to Ukraine for military needs. These funds maintain the Ukrainian army and state. A significant part of the funds allocated by the U.S. under the description “aid to Ukraine” does not actually leave the U.S. at all. It is serving to replenish the U.S.’ own arsenals from what is supplied to Ukraine and to maintain and build the facilities of the U.S. military-industrial complex. In other words, it can hardly be considered to be aid to Ukraine.

As shown by their online comments, many Russian servicemen are convinced they are fighting a proxy war against NATO and in favour of a multipolar world. They believe that when Ukraine’s forces are exhausted, NATO will throw in soldiers from Poland, Romania and other countries of eastern Europe. Russian servicemen more often perceive their actions in Ukraine as a regular job. They don’t voice bitterness, but neither do they express much enthusiasm.

A minority of Ukrainian armed forces personnel–holding ultranationalist views– believe they are fighting to defend Europe from Asian hordes coming from Russia. But ordinary soldiers tend to view the military hostilities as a kind of fate – they were unlucky and did not have time to hide, but fate can still help them survive if they are lucky enough to find a basement to hide somewhere on the front line.

I am sure that after the cessation of hostilities, the ordinary masses of Ukrainian soldiers (not the ultranationalists) will quickly and easily find common ground again with their Russian compatriots in struggling for a better country and better world. This will not even require a long period to heal moral wounds.

https://mronline.org/2023/06/03/class-a ... n-ukraine/

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Reducing the population of Ukraine. 1991-2023
June 5, 17:30

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Reducing the population of Ukraine. 1991-2023

The population of Ukraine during the "independence" has halved

1. ~ 52 million - residents of the Ukrainian SSR at the time of the collapse of the Union;
2. ~48.5 million - recorded by the 2001 census;
3. ~45.2 million - the population of the former Ukrainian SSR (within the borders of 1991) at the beginning of 2014, before the Russian Spring;
4. ~34 million - the population of the former Ukrainian SSR (excluding Crimea, DPR and LPR) at the beginning of 2022, DO SVO;
5. ~24-26 million - the population of the former Ukrainian SSR (excluding Crimea, Donbass, part of the Kherson region and part of Zaporozhye) at the beginning of 2023. It is

noteworthy that:

- Since the 2000s. sane demographic statistics were simply not kept in Ukraine. All calculations are exclusively "approximate", no one really counted people with a Ukrainian passport.
- In 2021, 271.9 thousand children were born in Ukraine with 714.2 thousand deaths (2.62 times more deaths than were born). This is the worst indicator in the world. There was no SVO back then.
- Compare these 272 thousand with 520.7 thousand born in 2012 "under Yanukovych" (the maximum number of births was in the years of "nezalezhnas").

Here to comment only to spoil.

https://t.me/rusfleet/8561 - zinc

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8405388.html

The Russian Foreign Ministry sees no prospects for extending the grain deal.
June 5, 16:22

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The Russian Foreign Ministry sees no prospects for extending the grain deal.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it sees no prospects for extending the grain deal.
This is not surprising, given that the key requirements of the Russian Federation are not being met as expected, and the factor of indirect support for Erdogan in the elections has already been removed from the agenda.

It is also worth noting that the number of ships sent under the grain deal dropped very sharply back in May, which is due to Russia slowing down checks when ships pass through the Bosphorus. Hopes for the opening of an ammonia pipeline seem to be a sophisticated form of masochism, like waiting for the implementation of the Minsk agreements.

The issue of withdrawing from the grain deal and concluding a new agreement with the Turks without the participation of Ukraine seems promising, which would allow Turkey to implement its plans for a food hub, and the Russian Federation to use Turkey as one of the channels for supplying food and fertilizers abroad.

Well, immediately after the exit from the grain deal, it is necessary to increase the blows to the port infrastructure of Odessa and Nikolaev.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8405020.html

Google Translator

*********

From Cassad's Telegram account:

Colonelcassad
The Kremlin considers the explosion of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station a deliberate terrorist attack by Ukraine.

Russia resolutely denies accusations of undermining the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric
power station, the Ukrainian authorities bear full responsibility.

A presidential spokesman noted that this could have potentially dire consequences for several tens of thousands of residents of the region. According to Peskov, the purpose of the sabotage is to deprive Crimea of ​​water.

Putin receives reports on what is happening around the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station.

One of the goals of Ukraine’s sabotage at the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station is to deprive Crimea of ​​water, the supply of water to the North Crimean Canal is being reduced.
161.3Kviews
Boris Rozhin
,
06:12

Colonelcassad
forwarded from
Kotsnews
“...Major General of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Kovalchuk thought about flooding the river. The Ukrainians, he said, even carried out a test strike with HIMARS on one of the locks of the Novokakhovskaya dam, piercing three holes in the metal to see if the waters of the Dnieper could rise enough to block Russian crossings without flooding nearby areas. villages.

Test was successful, Kovalchuk said…”

Washington Post, 12/29/2022.

***

Colonelcassad
After the most powerful artillery preparation, the enemy threw armored groups on the flanks near Artyomovsk into the offensive
▪️From the night of 06/05/23, the enemy began a powerful artillery preparation along almost the entire front on the flanks of Artyomovsk. The fighters say that they don’t remember this in the entire NWO.
▪️Around 4:00 in the area of ​​Soledar, Kleshcheevka and Berkhovka, armored groups and assault companies of the Armed Forces of Ukraine launched an offensive
▪️Our landing immediately burned 1 tank and 2 infantry fighting vehicles, dispersing the infantry, who ran away to hide in the landings. Artillery hit her, finishing off the enemy.
❗️In the Berkhovka area, the enemy reached the advanced positions, fierce battles ensued, positions here were held, including by our mobilized fighters. The enemy was unable to occupy the settlement despite the fakes on the Web.
▪️On the southern flank near Kleshcheevka, the enemy covered the offensive with tactical smoke, but ran into a warm welcome from the BARS.
▪️At one of the sites, 2 tanks, 3 infantry fighting vehicles and 50 Azov militants entered our positions, having received a response from artillery and losing 1 tank and infantry fighting vehicles also retreated.
▪️Fierce fighting on the flanks of Artyomovsk has subsided in some places, and in some places continues, we are processing information from the fighters from the field.
t.me/RVvoenkor

https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator

*******

Destroyed Kakhovskaya HPP
June 6, 7:34 am

Image

At night they blew up the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station.
The dam has received severe damage, there is an uncontrolled spill of water downstream and flooding of the islands.
In the territories of the Kherson region occupied by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the enemy announced an evacuation.
According to the Zaporizhzhya HPP, it is stated that there is no direct threat to the plant's water supply.

(Videos at link.)

The consequences are not yet clear enough. Toward evening the picture will become clearer.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8406705.html

Ukraine was preparing to detonate a "dirty bomb" on the territory of the Russian Federation
June 6, 8:54 am

Image

The FSB announced the plans of the GUR to prepare for the detonation of a dirty bomb in Russia.

In the main intelligence department of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, a service was created, which included light aircraft to supply saboteurs and bomb attacks on energy facilities.

The coordination of the use of this aircraft was entrusted to military unit No. 3449 with the code name "Legion".

There, a plan was developed to deliver and plant dirty bombs with timers - to undermine and render the area unusable for living.

Since the beginning of the year, this unit has carried out 5 sorties on the territory of Russia, two pilots were detained and gave confessions about the committed and planned terrorist attacks.

I remind you that the GUR in Russia has not yet been recognized as a terrorist organization.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8406919.html

Google Translator

(There is a video taped confession in Russian: https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8407373.html)
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

User avatar
blindpig
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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Tue Jun 06, 2023 3:15 pm

Nova Kakhova Dam Breach - Updated (12:15 UTC)
Updated throughout (12:15 UTC)

A few hours ago an alleged explosion blew up the Nova Kakhova dam in Ukraine.

Image

It was either that or structural damage from previous strikes.

Geoff Brumfiel @gbrumfiel - 6:31 UTC · Jun 6, 2023
The dam was already under enormous strain and damaged.
Then things got worse. On 2 June, it looks like a road over the dam failed. That could be indicative of a larger structural failure.

...

In consequence the huge reservoir behind the dam is now flooding lower level land south of Kherson (Xepcoh). The pictures show the before and after of potential flooding due to the breach:

Image

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Previously the Russian army had pulled back its troops from the northern part of Kherson oblast because a dam breach would endanger their supply route.

We do not know yet how much of the dam has been damaged. How much water will be flowing out of it depends on the part of the wall that is still standing below the current water level.

Of note is that the Ukraine had previously filled the upstream dams on the Dnieper to the brim to increase the potential damage. Those waters were released in early May. Notice the date of the following tweet.

ZOKA @200_zoka - 14:12 UTC · May 4, 2023
Water level in Kakhovka reservoir in Zaporozhye region risen by 17 m and almost reached critical level. Under threat of destruction of dam in Kamenka Dneprovskaya, dozens of villages may be flooded.
Kyiv opened the floodgates in Dnepropetrovsk and Zaporozhye.
Embedded video


The Ukrainian propagandists are claiming that the Russian blew up the dam. That is however unlikely.

On October 21 2022 Vasily Nebenzya, the Permanent Representative of Russia to the UN, sent a letter to the UN Secretary General about the plans of the Kiev regime to destroy the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station.

In a report about last years Kherson counteroffensive the Washington Post reported of Ukrainian plans and attempts to blow up the dam:

[Maj. Gen. Andriy] Kovalchuk considered flooding the river. The Ukrainians, he said, even conducted a test strike with a HIMARS launcher on one of the floodgates at the Nova Kakhovka dam, making three holes in the metal to see if the Dnieper’s water could be raised enough to stymie Russian crossings but not flood nearby villages.
The test was a success, Kovalchuk said, but the step remained a last resort. He held off.


Destroying its own infrastructure is nothing new for Ukrainian servicemen. In April 2022 the New York Times already noted this:

What happened in Demydiv was not an outlier. Since the war’s early days, Ukraine has been swift and effective in wreaking havoc on its own territory, often by destroying infrastructure, as a way to foil a Russian army with superior numbers and weaponry.
Demydiv was flooded when troops opened a nearby dam and sent water surging into the countryside. Elsewhere in Ukraine, the military has, without hesitation, blown up bridges, bombed roads and disabled rail lines and airports. The goal has been to slow Russian advances, channel enemy troops into traps and force tank columns onto less favorable terrain.


Quoting the above Washington Post piece Andrew Korybko points to a possible motive for today's demolishing of the dam:

[Kovalchuk's] remark about how “the step remained a last resort” is pertinent to recall at present considering that the first phase of Kiev’s NATO-backed counteroffensive completely failed on Monday according to the Russian Ministry of Defense. Just like Ukraine launched its proxy invasion of Russia in late May to distract from its loss in the Battle of Artyomovsk, so too might does it seem to have gone through with Kovalchuk’s planned war crime to distract from this most recent embarrassment as well.

The most recent embarrassment was the failure of yesterday's attack near Novodarovka and Levadnoye. As the Russian Ministry of Defense noted in a special statement:

As a result of active and self-sacrificing actions of the Vostok Group of Forces, which displayed courage and heroism, the enemy has been stopped, and the set tasks haven’t been achieved. The AFU formations and military units suffered significant losses.
Total AFU losses in South Donetsk direction were over 1,500 Ukrainian servicemen, 28 tanks, including FRG-manufactured 8 Leopard tanks, three French-manufactured AMX-10 wheeled tanks, and 109 armoured fighting vehicles.

(I have seen pictures of the destroyed AMX-10 reconnaissance tanks but not yet of any destroyed Leopard.)

Interestingly the 'western' media, pressed into compliance by the Ukrainian government, were thanked for their pro-Ukrainian reporting on the issue around the time the dam was breached:

Michael Tracey @mtracey - 9:42 UTC · Jun 6, 2023
Top advisor of Zelensky thanks journalists in advance today for helping the Ukraine government win the "diplomatic and informational battle" around the bombing of the Nova Kakhovka dam. Helpful reminder of the state imperatives these journalists are expected to abide by Image


The attached image of the top advisor's Telegram post has a 3:03 timestamp.

The destruction of the dam is certainly not to Russia's favor. As the 'western' aligned Moscow Times noted six months ago (link corrected):

In a catastrophic scenario, destroying the dam could send a highly destructive flood wave down the Dnipro River, causing severe flooding in large areas of southern Ukraine. Backswell would also likely flood the Inhulets River, a tributary of the Dnipro.
However, terrain levels mean the flooding would likely be worse on the Russian-held left bank of the Dnipro, making a detonation of explosives on the dam an unlikely move for Moscow.

"[Destroying the dam] would mean Russia essentially blowing its own foot off,” military analyst Michael Kofman said on the War on the Rocks podcast last month.

“[It] would flood the Russian-controlled part of Kherson [region]… much more than the western part that Ukrainians are likely to liberate."

And the secondary effects of blowing the dam could be just as severe for Russia.

Lowering the river level behind the dam threatens both water supplies to Moscow-annexed Crimea and risks cutting off access to cooling water for the Russian-controlled nuclear power plant in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region.


Water from the dam was also used to irrigate the southern Kherson oblast. The lack of water will disable the power generation at the dam which supplied the south.

The flood is likely to dissipate in a week or two but that does not change the major damages to the parts that Russia claims as its own.

The water will then have destroyed Russian mine fields on the left bank (seen from the spring) of the river. This will open routes for Ukrainian troops to cross the river and to attack into the southern Kherson oblast towards Crimea. There have previously reports that the Ukraine received bridging and ferry equipment for exactly this purpose.

Posted by b on June 6, 2023 at 8:24 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/06/n ... l#comments

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Where, oh where is Chinese support for Russia’s Special Military Operation in Ukraine?

At the very outset of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, I was sparring with one of my good friends in the States over the importance of Chinese President Xi’s support to Vladimir Putin for the pending military action when they met in Beijing during the Winter Olympics.

My good friend believed that Xi’s ‘go ahead’ made the whole venture possible.

I was skeptical that it was a decisive influence. Putin is a Realist in international affairs. And the school of Realism teaches that nations have interests, they do not have friends. I found it incredible that Putin would put the fate of his nation at risk on a wink and a nod from the big Chinese neighbor to the East. I saw the decisive factors in Putin’s decision to go to war as being within straightforward opportunity and threats analysis of Russia standing alone.

Surely nothing was more important in his thinking than the window of opportunity presented by Russia’s present technological advantage over the USA and over the rest of the world in latest generation strategic and tactical weapons, in particular the hypersonic missile Kinzhal and other unstoppable missiles being deployed on land, in the air and at sea. Putin said openly that this was the first time in its history that Russia was one generation ahead of the rest of the world in armaments, not running behind and trying to catch up. Owning such weapons gave assurance that the USA would have to be restrained in its military response to Russia’s intervention in Ukraine.

Then there was the threats side of the equation. Ukraine was getting stronger by the day, was being armed and being prepared with offensive weapons systems from NATO which were making it a de facto if not de jure member of the alliance. These were strong arguments in favor of solving the Ukrainian problem once and for all right now.

That these background thoughts led to a military strike precisely in the last week of February 2022 can be explained by indications suggesting that the Ukrainian army was preparing a massive attack on Donbas. From the spring of 2022 this threat had led Russia to assemble a similar scale force of men at arms at the border with Ukraine to give a clear signal to Kiev and Washington that Moscow would not tolerate the slaughter of the Russian speaking population of Donbas. A further contributing factor in this complex web of causality was also the peremptory US and NATO refusal in December 2021-January 2022 to enter into negotiations with Russia over a review and revision of the overall security architecture in Europe, meaning a roll-back of NATO to its pre-1997 borders.

Having in the foregoing set out all the reasons why what the Chinese leader may have said to Putin in February 2022 was not uniquely important, I now am ready to acknowledge that Xi’s words may have had more weight than I ascribed to them. The question is what kind of assurances could Xi have given to Putin? What kind of scenarios of joint action could they have discussed?

To be sure, China’s assistance to Russia since the onset of the SMO has been very modest. There are no indications that China has supplied any military hardware to Russia. Perhaps they have shipped some dual use microchips, but that is not clear. What we can see is that they substantially raised their purchases of Russian oil. But they have taken the big discounts that Russia was obliged to give to any and all buyers following imposition of Western sanctions on its hydrocarbons. So it is an open question of who was doing whom favors in that domain.

There is reason to believe that the real test of China’s readiness to help Russia in what is now effectively a war with the whole of NATO will come in the next two weeks or so.

In a rather alarmist article issued on 21 May, John Helmer, a Russia expert and blogger living in Moscow for decades, tells us that the Air Defender 23 exercises that begin on 12 June may be used by Washington and its NATO allies to cover and protect what will be called raids by Ukrainian piloted F16s into the Donbas and perhaps further into the Russian Federation itself. This daring and perhaps very violent “exercise” would be a provocation inviting Russian counter attack on the bases in Germany and elsewhere in NATO member states from which the attacking aircraft took off. And there you have it, the casus belli for WWIII.

Where do the Chinese fit into this scenario? For that we have to consider what took place in the South China Sea last week during the annual Shangri-la Dialogue defense summit in Singapore. The United States issued loud complaints over “irresponsible” maneuvers by Chinese naval vessels that nearly collided with a U.S. Navy vessel. The Chinese responded with an angry denunciation of the ‘naval hegemony’ that the U.S. pretends to exercise in what China considers its own seas.

Let us remember that it was the Chinese who initiated this clash. I find it entirely thinkable that if the United States tries to use the Air Defender events to cover an attack on Russia there will be some attention getting action by the Chinese in their zone of activity. Will they sink a ship or two?

The point is that U.S. aggression does not rest on adequate appreciation of its adversaries and of their possible understandings on mutual defense. Remember, the Chinese – Russian relationship is “stronger than an alliance.”

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023

https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/06/05/ ... n-ukraine/

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THE FOOD WAR, THE GRAIN DEAL, AND THE REAL DEAL

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By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with

The longest lasting of the false-flag operations conducted against Russia since the Special Military Operation started in February 2022 has been flying the flag of the United Nations (UN).

The chief flag-bearer has been the Secretary-General of the UN, Antonio Guterres, a Portuguese (lead image, left); he has manipulated, plotted, and lied his way through the Ukrainian hostage-taking at Azovstal, during the Battle of Mariupol; the Ukrainian attacks on the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant; and Ukrainian attempts to break the ports blockade with what the UN has been calling its “Black Sea Grain Initiative”.

Reinforcing Guterres in these schemes of deceit have been his spokesman, American and Frenchman Stéphane Dujarric (Rothschild), Italian Rafael Grossi, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); and the negotiator of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, British lawyer Martin Griffiths (lead image, right) and https://twitter.com/. Griffiths came to his UN job from a Geneva organization funded by the anti-Russian governments of Norway, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, Canada, Denmark, the UK, Australia, Ireland, and Switzerland. It calls itself “The Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue”.

Guterres’s bluff was called a year ago, on April 26, at the long-table incident in Moscow when President Vladimir Putin told Guterres he was wrong on the facts, biased in his public statements, and acting in violation of his UN authority.

“You can call it whatever name you like and have whatever bias in favour of those who did it, “ Putin told Guterres after getting him to confirm that the earphone to his interpreter was working. “But this was really an anti-constitutional coup. Unfortunately, our colleagues in the West preferred to ignore all this. After we recognised the independence of these states [Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics], they asked us to render them military aid because they were subjected to military actions, an armed aggression. In accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter, Chapter VII, we were forced to do this by launching a special military operation…[About the Battle of Mariupol and the Azovstal hostages] Mr Secretary-General, you have been misled…The simplest thing for military personnel or members of the nationalist battalions is to release the civilians. It is a crime to keep civilians, if there are any there, as human shields.”

Putin did not shake hands to greet Guterres; he placed him further away than any head of state had ever been seated in conversation at the Kremlin before; Guterres squirmed. To CNN a day later in Kiev, Guterres lied about what had been said at the meeting. Later, when asked in New York to say what and when he knew of the foreign combatants at Azovstal, and the use of civilian hostage shields in the battle, Guterres refused to answer.

The Russian Foreign Ministry has been more explicit in its condemnation of Guterres than of any UN secretary-general before him. “Contrary to the requirements in the UN Charter,” the Foreign Ministry spokesman declared last July, “the [Guterres’ staff] Secretariat is not taking an equidistant position, as one would expect from a Secretariat of the most authoritative international organisation that is designed, among other things, to promote the settlement of disputes.”

“I would like to remind our esteemed colleagues from the UN Secretariat”, according to Maria Zakharova at the ministry, “that their job is not to take sides in situations of dispute, but to help maintain peace and stability. This is what they are paid for and this is their mandate.”

On September 29, the Foreign Ministry announced: “The relevant functions do not give the Managing Director [Guterres] of the UN Secretariat the right to make biased political statements on behalf of the entire [UN] Organization. Nor is such a person authorized to interpret the norms of the Charter and documents of the General Assembly, including the 1970 Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation between States in Accordance with the UN Charter… Obviously, A[ntonio] Guterres has not only exceeded his authority, but actually taken sides with the collective West, again resorting to a selective approach in the interpretation of the unfolding events.”

“We consider unacceptable the fact that the UN Secretary-General has become an instrument of propaganda and pressure on Member States at a time when he should be guided by the UN Charter in its entirety.”

The defeat of the Ukrainian and NATO forces on the battlefield has gradually diminished the value to the US and NATO of the role of the UN Security Council and of Secretary-General Guterres. This has left Grossi exposed as playing the role of spokesman for Kiev when war operations caused the biggest radiation release so far into the atmosphere on May 13 as Ukrainian army stocks of depleted uranium shells were blown up at Khmelnitsky.

In the war over food stocks – the attempt to stop Russia exporting grain and crop fertilizers, and to use Ukrainian grain exports to recover Black Sea ports and to conceal attacks on Russian targets – the role of Griffiths as the UN go-between has failed comprehensively, and for the same reason that Guterres and Grossi have failed. Griffiths told the UN on May 23 that the Ukraine is the victim of Russian attacks based on Kiev press releases. “The biggest challenge remains the impediments to reaching all areas in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia currently under the military control of the Russian Federation.”

Griffiths also claimed that “in recent weeks, we have engaged in intensive discussions with the parties to the Black Sea Initiative, to secure agreement on its extension and the improvements needed for it to operate effectively and predictably. This will continue over the coming days.”

In fact, Griffiths and UN officials cannot “engage” with the Russian side because they are no longer trusted. Griffiths’ claim that he and his staff have “continued to deliver a wide range of support with concrete results under the Memorandum of Understanding on the facilitation of Russian food and fertilizer exports” is false.

The Russian response is that Grossi and Griffiths have been following “illegal instructions to his subordinates” from Guterres.

The Russian government has repeatedly accused the UN and the Ukrainians of refusing to honour the reciprocal export provisions of the food export initiative, so that Russian grain and fertilizers will not be blocked in the European ports, or at sea where vessels carrying the Russian cargoes have been denied Anglo-American insurance. The UN publications, statements and press releases published by Guterres’s staff have reported the full 26-paragraph text of the grain agreement; they have omitted the text of the fertilizer agreement. The combination of the two makes the difference between the grain deal and the real deal: for the Russians the latter was the precondition for their agreement to the former.

Guterres’s office has acknowledged that the real deal was more than the grain deal, and that compliance also required the US, the UK and the European Union (EU) states to lift the sanctions they have imposed on Russian shipping, port access, vessel insurance, and commodity exports. “An agreement was also reached with the Russian Federation,” Guterres’s press office announced on July 22, 2022, “on the scope of engagement of the United Nations to facilitate the unimpeded exports to world markets of Russian food and fertilizer – including the raw materials required to produce fertilizers. This agreement is based on the principle that measures imposed on the Russian Federation do not apply to these products. Simultaneously, the Russian Federation has committed to facilitate the unimpeded export of food, sunflower oil and fertilizers from Ukrainian controlled Black Sea ports.”

Of the 43 releases which have followed from Guterres’s office since last July, not a single statement, press release, report, or update identifies the terms of agreement on Russian grain and fertilizer exports, or acknowledges Russian protests against Ukrainian, UN, EU, and US non-compliance.

On March 23, Griffiths announced he had met Russian officials, and claimed: “The discussions focused on the implementation of the two agreements signed on 22 July 2022: the Black Sea Grain Initiative between the Russian Federation, Türkiye, Ukraine and the United Nations; and the Memorandum of Understanding between the Russian Federation and the UN, to facilitate unimpeded exports of food and fertilizer. The UN Secretary-General expressed today that the UN remains fully committed to the Black Sea Grain Initiative, as well as to efforts to facilitate the export of Russian food and fertilizer.”

Griffith’s last sentence was lying. The Russians had told him they would agree to extend the grain deal until July on condition Guterres and Griffiths did what they promised they were doing. They didn’t.


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Source: https://www.un.org/

Pivdennyi is the Ukrainian name applied to Yuzhny port since 20017. The grain shipping operations there have been blocked since the last extension of the agreement started in April. The UN figures indicate that shipments of grain from Yuzhny have amounted to 10.1 million tonnes, 33% of the 31.1 million tonne total since the agreement commenced.

Because Guterres and Griffiths refused, Russian officials have announced that the current 120-day extension of the grain deal to July 17 will be the last. In the meantime, because Russian ammonia exports are still stopped, Ukrainian grain cargoes have been blocked from Odessa and Chernomorsk, and restricted to Yuzhny (aka Pivdennyi). In retaliation, the Ukrainians have attacked the new ammonia and LPG export terminals at Taman with drones.

On June 1, Guterres and Griffiths acknowledged the ammonia restriction, but they refuse to reveal publicly their role in preventing the removal of the fertilizer blockade. “The Russian Federation has informed the JCC [Joint Coordination Centre] of its decision to limit registrations to the port of Yuzhny/Pivdennyi as long as ammonia is not exported. And currently, it is not. Since 24 May, the number of inspection teams at the JCC has been reduced from three to two. The limited registrations and reduced inspection teams contributed to the drop of the average daily inspection rate down to three. This is a very serious situation. We need to move forward. The Initiative is bound for renewal on 17 July. Global hunger hotspots are increasing — as we have been notifying you on a regular basis — and the spectre of food inflation and market volatility lurks in all countries.”

This new UN statement also concealed that Ukrainian officials in Kiev were attempting to change the terms of the July 22, 2022, deal, adding ports and other commodities to the original terms.

This was a serious violation of the July 2022 agreement, and it threatened the negotiations for a new extension of the grain deal. Russia dismissed it peremptorily. On May 24, Zakharova was asked at her weekly ministry briefing to comment on a Reuters news agency report that “Ukraine would unblock Russian ammonia transit only if the grain deal was expanded. In particular, the source mentioned expansion of the list of goods to be exported and increasing the number of ports. Is Russia considering an option of expanding the deal format taking into account guarantees to unblock ammonia transit?”

Zakharova replied: “I can say that in the context that you mentioned, the Russian side has repeatedly made its position known to other stakeholders during expert meetings that expanding these two categories [the list of goods and the number of ports] is out of the question.”

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Left: Maria Zakharova of the Russian Foreign Ministry. Right: Abdullah Abdul Samad Dashti whom Guterres appointed coordinator of the grain initiative operation last December. Trained in the UK and US, Dashti has served as a senior Kuwait naval officer. His last active appointment before retirement was as Kuwait’s military representative to NATO. Before Dashti took over, an American Frederick Kenney and a Briton Amir Mahmoud Abdulla had been picked by Guterres to run the operation.

On June 1, Sergei Vershinin, the Russian Foreign Ministry counterpart for Griffiths, told the press: “Our position remains unchanged – ammonia exports are part of the existing agreements and were supposed to start simultaneously with Ukrainian grain shipping. This fully corresponds to Mr Guterres’s announced goals on ensuring global food security, and there is no room for any additional demands in this respect. We have repeatedly explained this position to UN officials, as well as to the representatives of Türkiye and Ukraine as the parties to the Black Sea Initiative, including at the Istanbul meeting on May 10-11. It is even more surprising that being fully aware of our position, the UN Secretariat continues to exploit the ammonia issue in a bid to create a semblance of some new effort and contact. Moreover, the lack of any result is obvious – the ammonia pipeline has not been operating. Without resolving this problem and the four others I mentioned, there is no way to continue the Black Sea Initiative after July 17, not to mention any discussion of additional ports or the expansion of the range of Ukrainian exports.”

To date, Russian officials have not commented on the weaponization of the appointments Guterres and Griffiths have made to the Black Sea Grain Initiative; the Russians have concentrated their fire on Guterres. He has ignored them; he was reappointed to a second term as secretary-general from January 2022 until December 2026, and cannot run for a third term.

Preoccupied by the battlefield developments and the sanctions war, the Russian media have largely ignored the food war. Without Russian bloggers to rely on, the alternative media in the US have also missed what Guterres and Griffiths have been doing. What follows is a rare analysis in Russian, published last week, of the new moves the Russian government will make in the food war. It appeared in Vzglyad, the bellwether of Russian security analysts; the translation is verbatim, without editing. Illustrations have been added.

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Source: https://vz.ru/


June 2, 2023

Russia has begun to punish Ukraine for the failure of the grain deal
The ammonia pipeline from Russia to Odessa will soon become meaningless
Supplies of Ukrainian grain to Europe bring profits to Kiev, but not to Moscow

By Dmitry Skvortsov

It seems that for the first time Russia has done something which proves Moscow’s real intentions to end the so-called grain deal. At least, the UN claims that “restrictions have been introduced in the registration of ships heading to the Ukrainian port of Yuzhny.” This directly contradicts everything that Ukraine recently demanded. What does the Togliatti–Odessa ammonia pipeline have to do with it and the possibility of resuming active offensive actions as part of a special operation?

Russia has notified the Joint Coordination Center (JCC) in Istanbul about the restriction of registration of vessels heading to the Ukrainian port of Yuzhny as part of the grain deal. This was stated by the representative of the UN Secretary-General, Stephane Dujarric. This measure will be in effect, according to the UN representative, “until the export of ammonia is carried out.”

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Left: Dmitry Skvortsov; centre, Stephane Dujarric de la Riviere, a US television reporter before he joined the UN, Dujarric is a member of the Rothschild family through his mother; Right, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Defense Minister Hulusi Akar at the signing of the two food war agreements in Istanbul on July 22, 2022. Ukrainian grain deliveries at discount price to Turkey have kept the price of Turkish flour and bread down during Erdogan’s presidential election campaign which culminated on May 14. Turkey has taken 3.1 million tonnes, 10% of the Ukrainian grain shipped so far, according to the UN data. This is the third largest volume after China and Spain, and ranks ahead of Italy, The Netherlands and Egypt.


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The needy-country share of the Ukrainian export total, 625,000 tonnes of 31.1 million tonnes, amounts to just 2%.

Meanwhile, until recently, Ukraine demanded exactly the opposite. In Kiev, they acknowledged that they would allow the export of ammonia from Russia, but they set their own conditions for this. “If the deal includes an ammonia pipeline, then Ukraine should receive additional things that will serve our national interests,” they said in Kiev. – This is an expansion of the geography of the agreement and the list of goods (for export).” The Russian Foreign Ministry immediately rejected this – and now, it seems, Russia has begun to use its own tools to fulfill the terms of the grain deal.

The grain deal was concluded on July 22, 2022 in Istanbul with the mediation of the UN and Turkey and provided for permission to pass through the corridor agreed with Russia (after inspection in Turkey) of transport vessels for the export of Ukrainian grain from the Ukrainian ports Odessa, Chernomorsk and Yuzhny. In exchange for this, the UN promised to achieve the lifting of restrictions by the EU and the United States on the insurance of Russian vessels and Russian freight on foreign ships, the lifting of bans on Russian agricultural exports and fertilizer exports, the unfreezing of accounts of Russian companies exporting agricultural products, the lifting of sanctions on exports to Russia of spare parts for agricultural machinery, and re-connection to the SWIFT system of the Rosselkhoznadzor. The fifth condition was the resumption of operation of the Togliatti–Odessa ammonia pipeline.

The deal provided for limiting the military activities of the parties at sea, clearing sea lanes and providing grain carriers with a corridor for safe passage to and from the Bosphorus.

Such a corridor for transport vessels was created, and the export of Ukrainian grain by sea was uninterrupted until recently. Nevertheless, in the part concerning Russian agricultural exports, the terms of the transaction were not fulfilled.

Detained Russian ships with grain and mineral fertilizers have remained in European ports. Only some of them managed to be rescued in order to send their cargo to the poorest countries for free (European countries said they did not want to ‘let Putin earn money to wage war’).

As for Ukrainian grain, the bulk of Ukrainian grain exported since August 2022 (more than 30 million tonnes) was sent mainly to well-fed EU countries. The needy African states, with the assistance of the World Food Program, got only 2.5%.

For Ukraine, exports were important both for maintaining the efficiency of the agricultural sector and for obtaining foreign exchange earnings in a declining economy. It was also important for Europe that Ukraine could pay for part of the necessary imports “from its own money”, and not from the tranches of financial assistance transferred to it.

For Turkey, the deal not only ensured the growth of Erdogan’s authority, but also provided the Turkish flour milling industry with inexpensive raw materials. This allowed Ankara to maintain domestic bread prices at an acceptable level in conditions of inflation and increase flour exports to neighbouring countries.

But only Russia received next to nothing from the deal.

The rationale for concluding a grain deal had been statements about the need to prevent famine in the poorest countries, which would suffer from the disappearance of large volumes of grain from the market. In 2020-21, for example, Russia and Ukraine, together, exported 56.5 million tonnes of wheat – more than the third and fourth largest wheat exports of the United States and Canada combined. The withdrawal of such volumes of grain from the market inevitably led to an increase in food prices. Wheat futures on Western exchanges have risen by about one and a half times since January 2022. The deal allowed prices to stabilize, and in 2023 they even went down.

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Chicago exchange wheat futures trajectory of price, July 2022 to June 2023, with volume at bottom of chart. Click to enlarge view: https://www.barchart.com/

In fairness, it should be said that the grain deal partly helped in this. If European countries had not received the cheap Ukrainian grain, they would not have gone hungry. But their purchases of grain would inevitably have caused the price to rise on world markets, and that would have hit the poorest grain–importing countries hard. Russian grain supplies did not have a strong impact on the market, as they did not go through exchange trading and had almost no effect on pricing.

With fertilizers, everything was exactly the opposite. The rise in gas prices has sharply increased the costs of European fertilizer producers. And in these conditions, their export from Russia was blocked: Uralchem had about 262,000 tonnes blocked in the ports of Estonia, Latvia, Belgium and the Netherlands; Akron – 52,000 tonnes, and Eurochem – almost 100,000 tonnes. This caused an increase in prices, which partially compensated for the losses of the European chemical industry.

How the rise in fertilizer prices affected the poorest countries has not been widely discussed. But, for example, not so poor Brazil, in order to support its agricultural sector, had to make titanic efforts to ensure the supply of fertilizers from other sources after the reduction of Russian exports. But nonetheless, world coffee prices rose by 18.8% for Arabica and 6.6% for robusta in 2022. In 2023, growth [in the Brazilian coffee crop price], according to Bloomberg, continued hitting a 20-year high.

The Togliatti-Odessa ammonia pipeline with a length of 2,417 kilometres was built in the late 1970s. It connects the production located in the city of Togliatti, Samara region, with the port terminal in the port of Yuzhny (Ukraine). On the territory of Russia, it is served by PJSC Transammiak. UGP Ukrhimtransammiak is engaged in servicing the Ukrainian site. Before the start of the special military operation, about 2.5 million tonnes of raw materials were handled annually through the pipeline. Transit was stopped on February 24, 2022.

Russian manufacturers also shipped liquid ammonia for export through the ports of Estonia and Latvia. Until recently, Russia itself did not have such port terminals.

As long as it was possible to use the legacy of the USSR – the port facilities of the neighbouring republics, there was no great problem. But, nevertheless, in 2003 JSC Tolyattiazot in 2003 had begun design and survey work for the construction of an alternative ammonia pipeline to the port of Taman and a port terminal. After the company came under the control of Uralchem in 2008, construction was suspended.

The Crimean spring of 2014 and the first anti-Russian sanctions forced the management of Uralchem to resume work on the project. In 2018, when the design work was already completed, the volume of investments in the construction of the pipeline and terminal was estimated at 40 billion rubles, and the completion of the work was planned for 2025. In 2022, it was decided to accelerate the work so that the commissioning would take place in 2023.

AMMONIA PIPELINE BETWEEN TOGLIATTI AND ODESSA

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Source: https://www.ft.com/

The publicity which the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas export pipelines has attracted has ignored the parallel sabotage of the Togliatti ammonia pipeline and the attempted sabotage of its replacement at Taman.

What is behind the Russian decision on the grain deal?

Russia has threatened several times to suspend its participation in the grain deal. On several occasions the reason for such statements was the actions of Ukraine (for example, the attack of naval drones on Sevastopol). With reason, the Russian side noted that the safe corridor should not be used for Ukraine to conduct operations against Russia.

Russia’s actions are dictated, among other things, by economic logic and the desire to achieve the fulfillment of the grain deal in terms of lifting sanctions on Russian grain exports and fertilizer exports. Now, after Erdogan’s victory, Russia is no longer afraid to negatively affect the election results with its actions – the elections have already taken place. Moreover, even Europe has had enough of Ukrainian grain, and a number of Eastern European countries have already closed off their importation.

Simply put, it appears Russia does not intend to extend the deal, because it has not received anything from it. “Without solving this problem… we are not talking about adding ports and expanding the range of Ukrainian exports, but also about the further continuation in principle of the ‘Black Sea grain initiative’ after July 17,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a recent statement.

The launch of the Tolyatti–Taman ammonia pipeline in the near future will also make the ammonia pipeline to Odessa unnecessary. But why not take advantage of the Ukrainian persistence in refusing to unblock it?

Finally, it is possible that Russia is preparing for decisive action at the front. If the Russian command plans to advance along the Black Sea coast in order to liberate not only Nikolaev, but also Odessa, the resumption of hostilities at sea is inevitable. And the safe transport corridor of the grain transaction will only be a hindrance to this.



NOTE: Will Ukraine be able to export grain if Russia withdraws from the deal? Yekaterina Entina, Professor and Head of the Department of Black Sea-Mediterranean Studies at the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences responded on June 3: “If we turn to the original agreements, we remember that Kiev mined the Black Sea so that the Russian Navy could not carry out attacks from the sea against its territories. And so when the grain deal was signed for the first time, a specific corridor was cleared, the parameters of which, as it is believed, only Kiev knows for the course of civilian vessels. Accordingly, if we assess a scenario in which Russia withdraws from the grain deal as a result of the inability to agree and as a result of Kiev's position containing a certain set of threats, then this also removes the need to comply with the agreement that the Russian Navy does not use this corridor for military purposes. It seems to me that this scenario is quite obvious and it should be obvious to the Euro-Atlantic partners and also to Kiev itself."

https://johnhelmer.net/the-food-war-the ... more-88094

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From Cassad's Telegram account:

Colonelcassad
After the most powerful artillery preparation, the enemy threw armored groups on the flanks near Artyomovsk into the offensive
▪️From the night of 06/05/23, the enemy began a powerful artillery preparation along almost the entire front on the flanks of Artyomovsk. The fighters say that they don’t remember this in the entire NWO.
▪️Around 4:00 in the area of ​​Soledar, Kleshcheevka and Berkhovka, armored groups and assault companies of the Armed Forces of Ukraine launched an offensive
▪️Our landing immediately burned 1 tank and 2 infantry fighting vehicles, dispersing the infantry, who ran away to hide in the landings. Artillery hit her, finishing off the enemy.
❗️In the Berkhovka area, the enemy reached the advanced positions, fierce battles ensued, positions here were held, including by our mobilized fighters. The enemy was unable to occupy the settlement despite the fakes on the Web.
▪️On the southern flank near Kleshcheevka, the enemy covered the offensive with tactical smoke, but ran into a warm welcome from the BARS.
▪️At one of the sites, 2 tanks, 3 infantry fighting vehicles and 50 Azov militants entered our positions, having received a response from artillery and losing 1 tank and infantry fighting vehicles also retreated.
▪️Fierce fighting on the flanks of Artyomovsk has subsided in some places, and in some places continues, we are processing information from the fighters from the field.
t.me/RVvoenkor

***

Colonelcassad

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Kherson direction
situation by the end of June 5, 2023

Against the backdrop of the activation of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in several sectors of the front, events in the Kherson direction fell out of coverage . In the past few days, active fighting has been going on there in the Dach area and near the islands near Kherson - Ukrainian formations already have a stable foothold on some of them.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine are firing indiscriminately at the positions of the 80th Motorized Rifle Brigade of the RF Armed Forces with large-caliber mortars and artillery. Target designation is provided by Bayraktar copters and drones from Dolgintsevo and Voznesensk airfields .

🔻The number of speedboats has increased in the Dnieper basin. Just yesterday, two boats with a landing force were destroyed near the island of Kruglik , which were trying to land on the shore with a swoop. In addition, the other day, two small boats Metal Shark and Galaxy were delivered to Kherson , along with two groups of OTs MTR "South" , which may indicate preparations for more active operations near Kherson. Also, detachments of Georgian mercenaries were deployed to the Shirokaya Balka-Kizomys line . And at the training grounds Ternovsky and Shirokiy Lan, there are still 21 and 22 ombr, as well as 38 obrmp. The 37th brigade is already participating in the battles in the Vremievsky sector.

❗️Diverting attention and stretching Russian troops along the front is the main task of the Armed Forces of Ukraine at this stage of the ongoing offensive. And local attempts to force the Dnieper fit into this plan.

(This report obviously superseded by ongoing events.bp)

***

Colonelcassad
The 127th division launched a counterattack on the Vremievsky ledge, destroying and driving back the enemy

▪️Our friends from one of the hottest sectors of the front now got in touch and told us the details of the latest battles at the junction of the Zaporozhye and South Donetsk fronts, which began yesterday and continued today.
▪️The guys assure - Neskuchnoe is not taken, ours are there and they get in touch every 2 hours.
▪️During the offensive in the Neskuchny area, the enemy, after losing equipment in the minefields, was able to enter our forward positions, but ran into a fierce rebuff from tanks and infantry, covered by artillery and aviation fire.
▪️Having got stuck, the Ukrainian Nazis brought up the reserves of the 28th Ombre and 31st Ombre of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
▪️Army aviation came to the rescue: "Alligators" and "Night hunters" attacked armored groups of the Armed Forces of Ukraine with guided missiles.
▪️Russian artillery began to work from the entire range of weapons against the advancing forces: D-30, D-20, self-propelled guns and MLRS.
▪️After artillery preparation, units of the 127th division of the RF Armed Forces launched a counterattack. Russian fighters put Ukrainian fighters to flight.
▪️Preliminary losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine: 20 tanks, 41 armored personnel carriers, 16 armored vehicles, 4 artillery installations and more than 300 people wounded and killed personnel.
▪️Right now, the enemy has pulled up new armored groups and is trying to bring them into battle, fire damage is inflicted on the places of accumulation, the fighting continues.

***

Colonelcassad
About the battles in the Soledar direction.

Our teammate of the DMV, who is at the front, has just transmitted data:

Direction Seversk-Soledar, Razdolovka area.

Enemy destroyed:
5 tanks (t-80)
8 infantry fighting vehicles
Approximately:
20 - 200 (10 were encircled)
30 - 300.
There were two waves, we are waiting further.

The enemy did not use electronic warfare, there was no fpv either. There were two waves of dji with resets and one fury entry for reconnaissance. Fury suppressed, copters partially planted


Goodwill Revenge

PS. Even during the battle for Artemovsk, the enemy accumulated reserves on the Seversky ledge and is now trying to use them for attacks in the Soledar direction.

***

forwarded from
NGP exploration
⚠️Summary of the situation on the Zaporozhye front. Vremievsky performance.

The enemy was advancing along the line of the settlement. Olgovskoe - Levadnoye with forces up to the MPV (23 Ombr) - was stopped at the forefront of defense, suffered losses and retreated.

Along the line Olgovskoe - Ravnopol with forces up to the MPV (23 Ombr) - he had no success, was stopped at the forefront of defense, suffered losses and retreated.

Along the line Novopol - Novodarovka, with the forces of 24 OMB, managed to gain a foothold in the settlement. Novodarovka. However, as a result of a counterattack, the RF Armed Forces retreated from the settlement.

Along the line Velikaya Novoselka - Harvest, forces up to the rtgr 31 ombr tried to conduct an offensive on the northern outskirts of the settlement. Harvest, had no success, pushed back to the area of ​​the settlement. Great Novoselka.

At the same time, he made an attempt to gain a foothold in the settlement again. Novodonetskoe, with forces up to 2 rtg 37 obrmp, 68 oebr - had no success, suffered losses and retreated from the settlement. At 2 km. Northeast of the settlement

In the area of ​​N. p. Neskuchnoye - the enemy with the forces of 2 rtgr 31 ombr holds the previously occupied positions 2 km west of the settlement.

***

Colonelcassad
Russian Defense Minister Shoigu on the blowing up of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station.

At night, the Kiev regime committed another terrorist crime: the constructions of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station were blown up, which led to the flooding of large areas.

The purpose of these actions is as follows: having not achieved success in the offensive, Kyiv intends to transfer units from the Kherson direction to the area of ​​offensive operations, thereby weakening its positions in the Kherson direction.

Also, Kiev began to build defensive positions on the right bank of the Dnieper, which indicates its intention to go on the defensive here.

The discharge of water from the Dnepropetrovsk hydroelectric power station has been significantly increased, which leads to even more flooding of the territories, which indicates that a large-scale sabotage was planned by Kiev in advance.

***

Colonelcassad
Regarding the comical statements that it was the RF Armed Forces themselves that blew up the Kakhovskaya HPP, then:

1. During the war, the Armed Forces of Ukraine repeatedly fired at the Kakhovskaya HPP, including the collapsed fragments of the dam, inflicting direct damage to them with various types of MLRS.

2. The command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine openly stated that it was shelling the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station in order to destroy it and flood the territory of the Kherson region for military purposes.

3. Ukrainian propaganda openly threatened for many months with the destruction of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, in order to flood the left bank of the Dnieper and cut off the water supply to Crimea. Previously, the terrorist regime in Kyiv carried out a water blockade of Crimea for 7 years. Now these threats are shamefully wiped from the Internet.

4. Ukraine several times deliberately dumped water from the Zaporizhzhya hydroelectric power station, which led to an increase in the water level in the Kakhovka reservoir. In particular, last fall, when there was a lot of talk about a possible undermining of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, and literally on the eve of the destruction of the hydroelectric power station on the night of June 6th.

5. From a military point of view, flooding will create more problems for the RF Armed Forces than for the Armed Forces of Ukraine, because the RF Armed Forces will lose part of the defensive ground and minefields that will have to be created in the second circle after flooding.

6. Against the backdrop of the loss of Artemivsk and the failure of attempts to attack in the area of ​​the Vremievsky ledge, Ukraine urgently needed another "bucha" in order to shift the focus from recent military failures.

7. The destruction of the Kakhovskaya HPP will not bring special benefits to Russia, because if the activity of the DRG on the islands in the Kherson region is difficult due to flooding, the situation on the coast of the Dnieper north of the Kakhovskaya HPP, where the Armed Forces of Ukraine can also carry out attacks in the interests of supporting offensive attempts on the Zaporozhye offensive, especially if the goal is to capture the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant. Moreover, the enemy had previously made unsuccessful landing attempts in the Energodar region in order to capture the ZNPP.

In this case, we have a motive, opportunities, proven facts of previous attacks of the Kakhovskaya HPP and documented confessions of the criminals that they are planning to commit a terrorist act by destroying the Kakhovskaya HPP.

***

forwarded from
War on fakes

The problems with water in Crimea that the Ukrainian media talk about exist only in their heads. At the moment, according to local authorities, the reservoirs are 80% full .

Numerous fakes appear that the water is polluted. However, they are illustrated with old photos and videos from Donetsk, Rostov and Taganrog.

Residents of Crimea and Sevastopol share numerous videos that show that there is no shortage of water in the taps, all parameters are normal.

https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator

******

Image
Image

Kakhovskaya HPP. Before and after
Satellite view.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8408250.html

American biolaboratories in the territory of the former USSR
June 6, 14:38

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American biolaboratories on the territory of the former USSR.
Another legacy of Perestroika and the "holy 90s" with long-term consequences.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8407725.html
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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blindpig
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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Wed Jun 07, 2023 11:45 am

About the Kakhovka dam

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POSTED BY @NSANZO ⋅ 06/07/2023 Yesterday morning, just a few hours after the first serious Ukrainian attacks against Russian positions began in various areas of the Donbass and Zaporozhi fronts, a prelude to the great offensive that Ukraine has been announcing for months, the bursting of the Kakhovka dam it immediately diverted the focus of attention from the alleged Ukrainian advances to the part of the southern territories furthest from the battle. Novaya Kakhovka and the Soviet dam built in the times of Stalin and Khrushchev are already familiar to those who have closely followed the course of the war. In the initial phase of the Russian intervention at the end of February 2022, the Ukrainian command prioritized the defense of kyiv and sacrificed territorial battalions in areas of secondary importance such as the southern front, where the Russian advance came with virtually no resistance. From Crimea, Russian troops reached the Dnieper in just a few days and shortly after captured the city of Kherson, on the right bank of the river, which they would lose after their defense became impossible in the autumn of that year.

Throughout the summer, Ukraine had begun preparing the ground for a counteroffensive to regain control of Russia's most vulnerable territories: those north of the Dnieper, whose defense was made impossible by destroying the infrastructure linking both banks of the Dnieper. river. Target of the newly arrived American HIMARS, the Antonovsky bridge was at that time one of the major targets, but not the only one. The bombardments of Novaya Kakhovka were not spontaneous or sporadic, but a planned destruction strategy to make the situation of Russian troops at key strategic points untenable. The same can be said of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, located in the town of Energodar, also south of the Dnieper, and still under Russian control.

The partial collapse of the dam yesterday has led to the flooding of a whole series of towns and cities in the area. In the morning, the mayor of Novaya Kakhovka reported that the rise in the water level exceeded 12 centimeters per hour. The water affected the city of Kherson, the most populated town in the area, although in a clearly less serious way than other cities. In Novaya Kajovka, a few hours after the dam breached, water rose up the pedestal of the Lenin statue and swans glided through the empty center of the flooded city in a post-apocalyptic scene about the effects of war in the post-Soviet world.

The crossed accusations were not long in coming and both Russia and Ukraine alleged sabotage on the other side. Ukraine put in place the mechanisms both to react to what happened and evacuate the population from the affected towns, and to achieve the maximum possible political and informational benefit. Without having to wait for a minimal study on whether the dam had collapsed due to deliberate demolition or the effects of previous bombings, the Western press and political class en bloc took Russia's guilt for granted. In the same way as with what happened after the Nord Stream explosions, the media and politicians of all countries and ideologies began to look for why it was in Russia's interest to blow up the dam. Thus, the argument of last autumn was recovered, when the possibility of the humanitarian and environmental catastrophe that occurred yesterday was first raised publicly. At the time, Russia accused Ukraine of planning its destruction, an argument that was denounced by Ukraine and its partners as a nonsensical conspiracy theory. The aim, according to Russia, would have been to flood the lands on the left bank of the Dnieper under Russian control and force Russian troops back or drown in their positions. Ukraine, for its part, accused Russia of planning to blow up the dam to prevent its troops from advancing on that territory. Unlike the Russian accusation, the Ukrainian one, although nonsensical, since the Russian troops were preparing trenches in that area of ​​the Dnieper at that time, was disseminated by the press, giving it credibility.

Something similar happened yesterday and the nuances or clarifications such as "the BBCit has been unable to verify either the Russian or Ukrainian allegations” were the exception rather than the rule. And it is that, for the moment, it has not even been possible to confirm if the collapse was due to an attempted sabotage, to the consequences of the usual Ukrainian bombings or simply to the accumulation of damage in recent months. Since the Russian withdrawal from the territories on the right bank of the Dnieper, which provided protection for the territories on the left bank as they kept Ukrainian troops at a greater distance, the safety of the dam and its workers has been compromised, for what is naive to think that a work of reconstruction and repair of the damages of the Ukrainian bombings could be carried out. Blaming Russia for the collapse due to poor conservation - without taking into account the circumstances and the Ukrainian bombing - has been one of the four main positions shown throughout yesterday. This posture can be customized, for example, in David Puente,Italian verifier and collaborator of Facebook in that verification task, who made this argument just as he did last September about the Nord Stream explosion. Also then Russia was guilty because of the lack of maintenance of the gas pipeline.

The second position, maintained by Ukraine and the Western political class, have limited themselves to taking Russia's guilt for granted and arguing that it is a scorched-earth policy in the face of alleged Ukrainian advances on the front, although, in this area, there has not been such advances. “It is the children, women and men of Ukraine who will suffer the consequences of the terrible destruction of the Nova Kakhovka hydroelectric plant,” wrote the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, adding that “it is an act against humanity. A war crime that cannot go unanswered. Today, more than ever, Ukraine needs our help." Even clearer in her message, Ursula von der Leyen stated that “Russia will have to pay for the crimes committed in Ukraine. The destruction of the dam,

"It is not yet clear what caused the dam to collapse," the BBC admitted yesterday . However, politicians and journalists from all over the European continent have already passed sentence. Forgetting its supposed neutrality, the Ukrainian Red Cross accused Russia of a war crime in messages that it was later forced to delete. Without accusing either side, the International Committee of the Red Cross recalled that "the dams enjoy special international protection under international humanitarian law, since they contain dangerous forceswhich, if released, can lead to severe suffering for the civilian population.” Thousands of people on both sides of the Dnieper are being affected right now. As Dmitry Steshin recalled, the territories under Russian control are at a lower altitude, so it is that area on the southern bank of the Dnieper that will be most affected. Russia has mobilized its resources to also evacuate thousands of people affected in localities in the area, some of whom, like Aleshka, are difficult to access and have a very complicated situation. The explosions that showed several videos taken by the population of the area, spontaneous explosions of the mines displaced by the flooding of the river, show another of the dangers of what happened.

Without the need for any investigation or assessment of the damage and with the absolute certainty that Russia is always guilty, journalists like Paul Mason quickly showed their anger, the third of the four positions that were repeated throughout yesterday. "Russia has blown up the huge dam on Kherson, risking a catastrophe at the Zaporozhi nuclear power plant," wrote the journalist, who appears to have believed Zelensky's claim that the nuclear power plant is in imminent danger and not that of the Agency's director. International Atomic Energy, whose representatives have access to the area, which stated that this danger does not exist at the moment. The plant requires water from the Kajovka reservoir, although the risk does not exist in the short term. Going beyond assignment of blame and future effects,lasexta.com : "Stalin already used water as a weapon of war in Zaporizhia in 1941: the USSR destroyed the Dneprostoy dam and caused more than 20,000 deaths."

Finally, there were also those who yesterday wanted to see the good side of things. Professional hawk Carl Bildt lamented that the destruction of the dam "will cause extensive flooding primarily on the left bank of the Dnieper," he wrote, describing the part of the river under Russian control, "complicating any military operation," that is, the Ukrainian advance, "but, I suppose, it also deprives the Crimean canal of its water." That the Crimean canal is drying up again after a year after the demolition of the wall built by Ukraine to deprive the peninsula of running water seems to be the positive part of what happened for certain sectors of the establishment European. In Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov confirmed that, given that possibility, the peninsula had proceeded to fill the canal to its limits. Crimea may have to live without that supply again in the coming months, just as it did during the years when Kiev used its flow control of the Dnieper as collective punishment against the population.

None of the four positions mentioned - lack of maintenance, prosecution by default, anger or the search for benefits for Ukraine - take into account the precedents of recent months, in which Ukraine has not hesitated to attack and endanger critical civil infrastructure. It has also been preferred to forget something that, despite having gone unnoticed at the time of its publication, became relevant yesterday. In December 2022, The Washington Post Published a report in which the commander of the Ukrainian forces in the Kherson region confirmed that Ukraine had considered blowing up the Kakhovka dam. “Kovalchuk considered the possibility of flooding the river. The Ukrainians, he claimed, even conducted a test strike with a HIMARS launcher against the gates of the Nova Kakhovka dam, punching three holes in the metal to see if the Dnieper water could rise high enough to destroy the Russian crossings without flooding the nearby towns. The outlet not only confirmed that the Russian accusations were not a conspiracy theory but the Ukrainian attacks, which have continued ever since and could have caused the damage necessary for the collapse without the need for sabotage.

https://slavyangrad.es/2023/06/07/sobre ... more-27451

Google Translator

******

About who destroyed the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station
June 6, 18:56

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Regarding the comical statements that it was the RF Armed Forces themselves that blew up the Kakhovskaya HPP, then:

1. During the war, the Armed Forces of Ukraine repeatedly fired at the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, including the collapsed fragments of the dam, inflicting direct damage on them with various types of MLRS.

2. The command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine openly stated that it was shelling the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station in order to destroy it and flood the territory of the Kherson region for military purposes.

3. Ukrainian propaganda openly threatened for many months with the destruction of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, in order to flood the left bank of the Dnieper and cut off the water supply to Crimea. Previously, the terrorist regime in Kyiv carried out a water blockade of Crimea for 7 years. Now these threats are shamefully wiped from the Internet.

4. Ukraine several times deliberately dumped water from the Zaporizhzhya hydroelectric power station, which led to an increase in the water level in the Kakhovka reservoir. In particular, last fall, when there was a lot of talk about a possible undermining of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, and literally on the eve of the destruction of the hydroelectric power station on the night of June 6th.

5. From a military point of view, flooding will create more problems for the RF Armed Forces than for the Armed Forces of Ukraine, because the RF Armed Forces will lose part of the defensive ground and minefields that will have to be created in the second circle after flooding.

6. Against the backdrop of the loss of Artemivsk and the failure of attempts to attack in the area of ​​the Vremievsky ledge, Ukraine urgently needed another "bucha" in order to shift the focus from recent military failures.

7. The destruction of the Kakhovskaya HPP will not bring special benefits to Russia, because if the activity of the DRG on the islands in the Kherson region is difficult due to flooding, the situation on the coast of the Dnieper north of the Kakhovskaya HPP, where the Armed Forces of Ukraine can also carry out attacks in the interests of supporting offensive attempts on the Zaporozhye offensive, especially if the goal is to capture the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant. Moreover, the enemy had previously made unsuccessful landing attempts in the Energodar region in order to capture the ZNPP.

In this case, we have a motive, opportunities, proven facts of previous attacks of the Kakhovskaya HPP and documented confessions of the criminals that they are planning to commit a terrorist act by destroying the Kakhovskaya HPP.

Naturally, the sponsors of the Nazi regime in Kiev will do that they do not know who blew up the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station or directly blame Russia for this, just like they did during the blowing up of the Nord Stream. These are the same people. Therefore, the facts there, of course, are of no interest to anyone. We are talking about the implementation of its policy by terrorist methods.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8408527.html

Google Translator

*************

From Cassad's Telegram account:

Colonelcassad

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Vremyevsky ledge
situation as of 18.00 June 6, 2023

After the liberation of Novodonetsk by our troops and a few hours of calm, the Armed Forces of Ukraine regrouped and began a new assault on our positions in the village. Now four Ukrainian tanks have entered the northern outskirts of Novodonetsk from the side of the dam.

From the west, several armored fighting vehicles, most likely Kirpi or MaxxPRO, landed infantry and marked another tank. And in the forest belt in the reserve is a column of armored vehicles.

Now a battle has begun in Novodonetsk. Russian units are defending the settlement, and artillerymen are firing at the areas where the APU formations are advancing.

***

forwarded from
NGP exploration
⚠️Summary of the situation on the Zaporozhye front. Vremievsky performance.

The enemy was advancing along the line of the settlement. Olgovskoe - Levadnoye with forces up to the MPV (23 Ombr) - was stopped at the forefront of defense, suffered losses and retreated.

Along the line Olgovskoe - Ravnopol with forces up to the MPV (23 Ombr) - he had no success, was stopped at the forefront of defense, suffered losses and retreated.

Along the line Novopol - Novodarovka, with the forces of 24 OMB, managed to gain a foothold in the settlement. Novodarovka. However, as a result of a counterattack, the RF Armed Forces retreated from the settlement.

Along the line Velikaya Novoselka - Harvest, forces up to the rtgr 31 ombr tried to conduct an offensive on the northern outskirts of the settlement. Harvest, had no success, pushed back to the area of ​​the settlement. Great Novoselka.

At the same time, he made an attempt to gain a foothold in the settlement again. Novodonetskoe, with forces up to 2 rtg 37 obrmp, 68 oebr - had no success, suffered losses and retreated from the settlement. At 2 km. Northeast of the settlement

In the area of ​​N. p. Neskuchnoye - the enemy with the forces of 2 rtgr 31 ombr holds the previously occupied positions 2 km west of the settlement.

***

Colonelcassad
While the focus is on the flooding downstream of the Kakhovka dam and the combat situation in the region, the long-term damage to the huge agricultural sector of the Kherson and Zaporizhia regions is of particular concern.
Thousands of farms rely on 4 canals flowing from the (soon former) Kakhovka Reservoir.

Photo 2. Krivoy Rog "Southern Reservoir" is fed by the artificial flood of the Kakhovka Reservoir and provides water for household, industrial and agricultural needs. The lake itself is used for breeding commercial fish species. Thus, a Ukrainian attack on the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station will cause enormous damage to Krivoy Rog as well.

Photo 3. The Verkhne-Gachinsky canal provides drinking water and irrigation to fields in the north of the Zaporozhye region.

Photo 4. The South Ukrainian (Kakhovsky) Canal irrigates most of the seemingly endless agricultural fields of the Kherson region, and also supplies drinking water to people living in hundreds of towns and villages along its path. The canal is used to irrigate 326,000 hectares in two oblasts, and water from the Kakhovka Canal is fed into the water supply system of Berdyansk via the 175-kilometer R-9 conduit.

Photo 5. Finally, the famous North Crimean Canal supplies water to western Kherson, as well as Crimea itself. After the destruction of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station and the subsequent drop in the water level in the Kakhovka reservoir, it is possible to stop the supply of Dnieper water to the canal.

***

Colonelcassad
At 11 pm, the enemy continued to attack:

1. On the Vremevsky ledge, where the Armed Forces of Ukraine are again trying to cling to Novodonetskoye. The fighting continued into the evening.
2. On the Kupyansky direction, in the Sinkovka area. The enemy attacks were repulsed.
3. On the Donetsk direction south of Avdiivka. Fights at Nevelskoy, Vodyanoy, Experienced. By night they were still going on.

The enemy is far from having exhausted his reserves, despite the failures of recent days, and intends to continue to attack.

***

Colonelcassad
Reflection of the first stage of the offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. I

Colonel K. Zalessky especially for the channel Voenkor Kotenok Z @voenkorKotenok :

According to information from the battle formations of the 5th and 36th combined arms armies, we are restoring the chronology of the enemy’s attack on the Vostok grouping and the reasons for its failure.

For those unfamiliar with the war, let us explain: it is believed that the attackers lose three times as many defenders, but at the same time, having brought down the entire power of the advancing grouping on a narrow sector of defense, they gain a multiple advantage on it, breaking through the front. The defenders, not knowing where the main blow will fall, are forced to spread their forces and means over the entire LBS. So it was in March 2000, when Gelaev's militants entered Komsomolskoye, so it was last autumn in the Kharkov region, when the Armed Forces of Ukraine collapsed the front of the Western Military District. The enemy was counting on this and continues to count on it now.

1st strike - on the so-called. Vremievsky ledge - on June 4, the Armed Forces of Ukraine inflicted many times superior forces on the battle formations of the 5th combined arms army - on the 60th brigade and three regiments of the 127th division (143 infantry regiments, 114 infantry infantry regiments, 394 infantry infantry regiments). In a large-scale offensive that began, according to Nazi tradition, at 4 in the morning, foreign armored combat vehicles of various types, Bradley infantry fighting vehicles and T-64 tanks (turret and weapon system, like the T-72) took part. Taking advantage of the advantage in strength, the enemy, attacking with columns of equipment, wedged into our defenses (from 200 m to 1 km) in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bNeskuchnoye, Ravnopol, Novodarovka and Levadnoe, while suffering significant losses that did not allow him to go beyond the 2nd line of our trenches .

On June 5, the Armed Forces of Ukraine unsuccessfully tried to develop an offensive against the 5th Army, but, being stopped by a fire defeat, went over to the defensive.

***

Colonelcassad
Reflection of the first stage of the offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. II

Colonel K. Zalessky especially for the channel Voenkor Kotenok Z @voenkorKotenok :

On the same day (June 5), the Armed Forces of Ukraine launched an offensive in the Shakhtyorsk direction from the Velikaya Novoselka - Novodonetskoye line. In addition to the tank battalions on the T-64, “NATO” brigades trained in the EU and the USA went into battle on the same AFVs, wheeled French AMX tanks, German Leopards with white crosses. The main blow fell on the 37th brigade, rifle units of the DPR and the obtf of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the DPR. The 37th brigade, which received the main blow, retreated to the 2nd line of defense, but the Donetsk arrows, the Dikiy obtf and the artillery that had effectively worked out did not allow the enemy to build on the success.

Having a numerical superiority, the enemy occupied Novodonetskoye and the Oktyabr state farm, but on the evening of June 6, Novodonetskoye was recaptured, and battles were going on for Oktyabr. Also on June 6, the enemy launched a smaller-scale and unsuccessful offensive in the defense zone of the 29th Army in the Pavlovka area.

The main factor stopping the NATO offensive was the courage of our fighters. But an equally important role, according to high-ranking officers of the UGV(s), was played by the construction of the defense, organized in "manual mode" 2 weeks before the offensive by the deputy commander of the UGV(s) for military operations, Colonel-General Mikhail Teplinsky.

“We met the NATO members with dignity! - The Commander of the Airborne Forces and the Deputy Commander for the United Forces (c), Colonel-General Teplinskiy, noted the confident actions of the military leaders who led the defense. - On June 4, the commander of the 5th Army, Lieutenant General Alexei Podivilov, showed himself great in the Vremievsky direction, and on June 5, in the Mining direction, the commander of the 36th Army, Major General Grigory Tyurin. Real Russian officers! They did not flinch in front of the superior forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, they broke the back of their long-awaited offensive, inflicting on the enemy, in addition to material damage, also significant moral damage.

Not all military leaders of the VVO (according to Teplinsky) showed themselves as boldly as Tyurin and Podivilov, someone had to be encouraged to take a more active part in the defense.

***

Colonelcassad
More than 10 times the Armed Forces of Ukraine shelled the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station over the past year

❗️The Kakhovskaya HPP came under the control of the RF Armed Forces on the first day of the Northern Military District on February 24. Since then, the city of Novaya Kakhovka and the station itself have been subjected to regular shelling by the Ukrainian Armed Forces. There were over 10 HPP attacks , mostly from American HIMARS. Vladislav Nazarov, spokesman of the Yug Operational Command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and Major General of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Andrei Kovalchuk confessed to the shelling.

⏺July 8, 2022 Ukrainian troops launched a missile attack on the hydroelectric power station. Air defense managed to repel the attack, but there were victims, said Kirill Stremousov, deputy head of the Kherson VGA.

⏺July 18, 2022 As a result of an attack on the hydroelectric power station, the control room of the lock was damaged. Fragments broke the gas pipeline, in connection with which half of the right bank of the Kherson region. was left without gas, said the press secretary of the CAA of the Kakhovka district of the Kherson region. Viktor Vasiliev.

⏺On July 23, 2022, the Armed Forces of Ukraine fired 7 shells at the HPP, which was damaged, at the area of ​​the Kakhovskaya HPP, the CAA of the Kakhovka District reported .

⏺On July 24, 2022, the hydroelectric power station was fired again from HIMARS, the infrastructure was damaged, - said the head of the district, Vladimir Leontiev.

⏺July 30, 2022 On the night of July 29-30, the HPP was attacked again from HIMARS. The air defense system repelled all shells, Leontiev said .

⏺August 12, 2022 New shelling occurred when a bus with civilians was approaching the station. 3 out of 6 turbines are out of order, according to the report of Russia-1. The hydroelectric power station was transferred to work in emergency mode and only 1/2 of its capacity. “We work in a very dangerous mode. The fighting threatens not only the lower reaches of the Dnieper, but also the upper reaches , ”said Arseniy Zelensky, deputy director of the Kakhovskaya HPP.
✔️The representative of the "South" command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Vladislav Nazarov, confirmed the strikes on the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station in order to destroy the bridge.

⏺On September 8, 2022 , the regional authorities announced that the Kakhovskaya HPP and the access roads to it were under attack by the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

⏺On September 10, 2022, the Armed Forces of Ukraine fired at Novaya Kakhovka and the hydroelectric power station from HIMARS. The air defense systems shot down the missiles, there were no hits, the city's VGA reported on the TG channel.

✔️ October 18, 2022 “The Antonovsky bridge and the dam of the Kakhovskaya HPP were damaged by hits from HIMARS rockets,” Sergei Surovikin said on October 18. Kiev is preparing "to strike at the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station," he added.

✔️ On October 21, 2022, Russia called on the UN Security Council to prevent Ukraine's provocation to destroy the hydroelectric power station. “APU for 5 months. shelling the city of Novaya Kakhovka. Up to 120 missiles arrive per day,” the statement said .

⏺On October 24, 2022, the Armed Forces of Ukraine shelled Novaya Kakhovka with 19 HIMARS and Alder missiles. Part of the missiles were shot down, three hit the hydroelectric power station, the emergency services of the Kherson region told reporters.

⏺November 6, 2022 Ukrainian troops fired on the HPP with 6 HIMARS missiles. 5 rockets were shot down, 1 hit the lock of the dam, which was damaged, said a representative of the emergency services of the Kherson region.

✔️ On December 29, 2022, Major General Andrey Kovalchuk, who commanded the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Kherson region, also admitted to shelling the hydroelectric power station. “Ukrainians made a test strike with HIMARS on one of the locks of the Novokakhovskaya dam, making three holes in the metal to see if the waters of the Dnieper could rise enough to block Russian crossings, but not flood the nearby areas of the village. The test was successful , ” The Washington Post quoted him.

✔️March 14, 2023 Kakhovskaya HPP is not only regularly shelled by artillery, but also attacked by snipers. DRG of the Armed Forces of Ukraine tried to penetrate the territory, Leontiev said . “HPPs are constantly under attack ,” he added.

✔️ April-May 2023 The water level in the Kakhovka reservoir rose unusually sharply from 14 to 17.5 m, according to Theia-land data .

✔️May 28-June 5, 2023. A span of the road collapsed due to water pressure and previous destruction, NYT, WP and FT journalists noted, citing satellite images ( [ 1 ] , [ 2 ] and [ 3 ] ).

⏺June 6, 2023 Water pressure, accumulated damage and new explosions led to a disaster. 11 out of 28 spans of the station collapsed . Water began to be uncontrollably discharged, and its level reached such a level that it flooded the station.

https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator

***********

MAY 29, 2023 BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR
Erdogan’s mediatory role on Ukraine cannot be wished away

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Jubilant crowds outside the Presidential Complex to celebrate President Recep Erdogan’s election victory, Ankara, May 28, 2023

Among the host of implications for international security stemming out of Turkish President Recep Erdogan’s election victory in the runoff on Sunday — be it in the Black Sea, Eastern Mediterranean, Transcaucasus, West Asia or Eurasian integration — what stands out is his mediatory role in the Ukraine conflict.

The international community puts China as the frontrunner in the race for peacemaking in Ukraine but don’t be surprised if Erdogan overtakes Xi Jinping to the finishing line. The Japanese government in its congratulatory message to Erdogan expressed the hope for cooperation to bring closer a peaceful solution to the Ukraine conflict and ensure security in the region.

Moscow walked the fine line during the Turkish election campaign, which is a tacit recognition of the fact that Erdogan is a strong ruler. Russia will need to be watchful since Erdogan can also be fiercely independent and stubborn. Equally, it is wrong to assume that Turkiye’s transatlantic bridge has broken down. Erdogan is at the peak of his power and Washington is acutely conscious of it. Thus, in the Turkish-US-Russian triangle, Erdogan has the upper hand currently.

Significantly, a high-ranking Russian diplomat in the Russian Foreign Ministry reiterated on the eve of the Turkish election that Ankara’s continued weapons supplies to Ukraine dented its credentials to be a mediator between Moscow and Kiev.

As the diplomat put it, “Ankara has repeatedly declared its intent to secure a speedy ceasefire in Ukraine and revive the negotiating process through its mediation. Arms and military equipment supplies to the Kiev regime directly contradict such intentions and are at odds with the role of a mediator.”

Indeed, a Turkish company, Baykar Makina, which is owned by a relative of Erdogan, has supplied the Ukrainian forces with its Bayraktar TB2 strike and reconnaissance drones in the early phases of the conflict. There was even talk that the Turkish company was setting up a factory to produce the advanced drone in Ukraine and that the detailed design phase for the plant has been completed.

Turkiye and Ukraine last year also signed a deal to establish a second manufacturing plant in Ukraine after the two countries deepened their cooperation in the defence industry for the co-production of crucial engines for aerial vehicles and tech transfer. Baykar’s Bayraktar TB2 drones have a proven track record of success in conflicts in Libya, Syria, and Nagorno-Karabakh.

Ukraine features prominently in Baykar’s supply chain, especially with the new heavy-lifter drone, Akinci, and the unmanned fighter jet, Kizilelma, or “Golden Apple”. Both use Ukrainian engines from Motor Sich MSICH.UAX and from Ivchenko-Progress. Baykar expected to net around $1bn in export revenues last year, about 50 percent higher than in 2021 ($650m), and a further 50 percent growth is expected in 2023. Again, since August last year, Ankara has also been provided Kiev with ‘Kipri’ mine-resistant armoured vehicles to the Ukraine military.

Yet, Moscow is far from in any threatening mood. Instead, the Russian approach is to put rings of engagement around Erdogan and make him a captive of the optics of a great friendship between the two presidents. In his congratulatory message to Erdogan, Putin called him “dear friend”.

Turkiye hosted peace talks in Istanbul between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in March last year, a month after Moscow’s special military operation began. It resulted in a deal. But Washington and London got so flustered that a massive information war was triggered by MI6 on an alleged “massacre” of civilians in Bucha near Kiev by the Russian troops. The then UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson rushed to meet Zelensky with an offer that Ukraine had a far better option to take western military help and defeat Russia.

Of course, all that is history now. But there is no question that if Zelensky changes his mind, Erdogan will step in. By the way, Turkey rejects Russia’s annexation of Crimea. The collapse of the Istanbul deal didn’t discourage Ankara from mediating a grain deal between Moscow and Kiev together with the UN last summer, which is still working.

Turkiye has repeatedly called for peace talks to be revived, offering its services as mediator. As recently as in late March, Erdogan said peace in Ukraine could be achieved through “serious, determined mediation.” Meanwhile, Erdogan’s “special relationship” with Putin helped secure the latest extension of the grain deal.

Erdogan advocates a “balanced approach” toward Russia, and he frequently interacts with Putin. Turkiye is the only NATO member country that refuses to impose sanctions against Russia. That said, Erdogan also keeps the line open to President Biden. On his part, Biden conveyed his greetings to Erdogan within hours of the election results on Sunday. Biden called for cooperation to meet “global challenges.”

Washington played safe on Turkish election saying it would deal with whoever won. Clearly, Washington realises that Erdogan will be heading a strong presidency and will not be a pushover, and the US cannot afford to alienate Turkiye, as the Ukraine crisis is reaching a criticality. Turkish-American relationship has never been easy but both sides are used to keeping it in equilibrium. Without Turkey, NATO loses traction in Eastern Mediterranean, while Turkey needs the West to balance its strategic autonomy. Washington’s priority at the moment will be to dissuade Turkey from helping Russia to circumvent the sanctions.

The big question is whether Zelensky will be willing to return to the peace talks. Compared to the situation last year at the Istanbul talks, Zelensky holds a weak hand. Russia has gained the upper hand in the battlefield. Russia’s “new territories” — Lugansk, Donetsk, Zaporozhye and Kherson oblasts — are new facts on the ground.

Therefore, peace talks has become a paradigm of complex probability that is inherently multi-dimensional and, one may say, a shift in that direction on Zelensky’s part will depend on his observing, understanding, and interacting with the radical change in the ground situation as well as in the power play within his own camp.

The factionalism in the power structure in Kiev has lately aggravated. The unexplained “disappearance” from public view of the commander-in-chief General Valery Zaluzhny for the past few weeks since April 13; the ascendance of the intelligence chief Kyrylo Budano (who enjoys American backing); the hollowing out of the Ukrainian military which suffered a series of reverses lately; the procrastination in launching the “counter-offensive” — all this suggests that serious disaffection is building up within the military against Zelensky’s leadership.

Consequently, the prospects of peace talks have receded. But that will not stop Erdogan and Putin from deepening the Turkish-Russian cooperation, which is rich in content and wide-ranging. Different perceptions or viewpoints have not discouraged the two leaders who are fundamentally committed to the “win-win’ relationship.

Therefore, if and when the climate for peace talks on Ukraine improves, Erdogan is certain to be the early bird to position himself for a mediatory role.

https://www.indianpunchline.com/erdogan ... shed-away/

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The Ukrainian Army is run not by the Generals but by the PR Department

What can you expect from a government headed by a comic actor named Zelensky? We see the answer to that question day by day in the way the Ukrainian armed forces are carrying out their much-anticipated spring counter-offensive: it is being stage managed by the Public Relations team with scant regard for their cannon fodder army.

Why do I say this? Because each of the latest military setbacks if not outright fiascos of military operations is being covered up by sensational side-shows intended to divert public attention at home and especially abroad from what is going on in the battlefield.

In the past couple of weeks, Zelensky was under enormous pressure from Washington to finally launch the much heralded counter-offensive. Notwithstanding his complaints that insufficient new military hardware had arrived to date and his demands on NATO countries to step up deliveries of tanks and F16 fighter jets, the Pentagon was insisting that the Ukrainians were now well equipped and should prove on the battlefield that this investment by the Americans and Europeans was justified, to prove that they can indeed push back the Russians and free all the occupied territory.

Yet, on the battlefield all that we saw was positional fighting and probing for weak spots in the Russian defense lines. There was no sign of a massive counter offensive until a day ago. What we saw instead were incursions of Ukrainian special forces, mostly said to be mercenaries from Poland and elsewhere, across the border from the Ukrainian held Kharkov oblast into the neighboring RF oblast of Belgorod. And then, about four days ago, we saw the start of a destructive artillery and rocket attack on the border town of Shebekino, where 400 or 600 strikes on residential neighborhoods have been recorded in 24 hour periods. As we now see daily on Russian television, the whole population on the Russian side of the border across from Kharkov city is being evacuated and media there are discussing why their government has not done more to protect the frontier and to hit back.

Of course, if the Kremlin were to do so it would fall into the trap of withdrawing forces from the front lines and weakening preparedness for whatever mass counter offensive may yet lie ahead. But it would be more appropriate to see in the border attacks on Belgorod not a military tactical purpose but a PR dimension, to capture the airwaves and divert attention from the still delayed massive offensive by providing some highly photogenic developments for the news crews.

Today’s number one item on Euronews is the destruction of part of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant in the southern region of Kherson to one side of the Dnepr river, with the consequence that water from the reservoir to feed the plant now is pouring out in uncontrolled fashion into the Dnepr. Let us remember that here the right (western) bank of the Dnepr, with the homonymous former capital town of the Kherson oblast, is held by the Ukrainians and the left (eastern) bank is held by the Russians.

Threats to the large Kakhovka reservoir were discussed widely in local and global media more than eight months ago when the Russians abandoned Kherson city and withdrew all forces to the left bank of the Dnepr. At that time already, the Russians anticipated a possible breach of the dam with the consequence of dangerous, life threatening flooding downstream. They pulled back the local population from areas deemed to be most at danger. Moreover, as CNN reminds us, the shutdown of the hydroelectric power plant which ran on water from the reservoir might put at risk the not too distant Zaporozhie nuclear power plant, where critical equipment for its operation run on electricity generated by the Kakhovka plant. So the nuclear danger once again raises its ugly head.

Why was the functioning of the reservoir crippled now and who was responsible, the Russians or the Ukrainians? CNN this morning puts on a mien of objective journalism by saying that both sides are pointing the finger at the other, and perhaps we will never know who is the guilty party. However, that feigned objectivity is phony from the get-go.

To understand unfailingly who unleashed the Kakhovka reservoir to flood the nearby region you have to look further afield to other news of the day coming from the battlefield and that, in turn, directs us to the PR Department of the Ukrainian armed forces. The Kakhovka blow-out was surely meant to divert attention from the results of yesterday’s first Ukrainian attempt at massive attack on the battlefield in southern Donetsk. According to Russian reports, their own Vostok units with assistance from air cover and artillery “destroyed” (the current euphemism for “slaughtered”)1500 Ukrainian “live personnel” (current euphemism for “troops”) and destroyed 17 tanks, including 7 German Leopards, as well as armored personnel carriers and other vehicles and field weapons. This was a scandalous defeat and loss of human life in a hopeless offensive being waged only for the purpose of shaking out more money and arms from the Western sponsors of the Kiev regime. As the stories of flooding near Kakhovka and further downstream are amplified by our media, there is the hope that no one will notice the military defeat.

And what are the practical consequences of a military campaign run by the PR Department? The answer is the shocking loss of Ukrainian men at arms. Yesterday Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. who is campaigning against Joe Biden for the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party in the 2024 U.S. elections publicly announced that approximately 350,000 Ukrainian combatants have died in the area of Russia’s Special Military Operation so far. Judging by yesterday’s massacre during the first big attack by the Ukrainians in the southern Donetsk oblast, the death toll will accelerate in the days ahead. Are any people of conscience listening in Europe or the USA?

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023

https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/06/06/ ... epartment/

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New Nord Stream Cover-Up Story Is Based On Dubious 'Leak'

On April 10 some briefing slides for the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff appeared on the internet. They seemed to be genuine. But later a second larger batch was claimed to have come into the hands of so called journalist. I had and still have strong doubts about that second round:

When media reported on the first batch of 'leaked' Pentagon briefing slides they also published pictures of the originals.

Then came a second round which conveniently was more about bashing Russia than on the releases itself. Those leaks were labeled as new or from a previously unknown source. Among those stories were: ...
...
We have pictures of the first stash of the files. The briefing slides seem real to me. The language is correct Pentagon lingo. The abbreviations used are typical. But some of the information therein, like the casualty numbers, is dubious. Do the Joint Chiefs of Staff really get briefed with Ukrainian defense ministry numbers that are know to be mere fantasies? The Pentagon and/or the CIA certainly have their own casualty estimates. Why not brief those?

We have seen no picture of any slide that the additional stories are based on. Why were those not published?

A plausible explanation is that the first release was a real leak but that someone is now pushing new 'leaks' to dedicated outlets that are only half true or mere propaganda.


Another 'exclusive' in today's Washington Post, allegedly based on the same leak, only increases my doubt about that alleged second stash of documents:

U.S. had intelligence of detailed Ukrainian plan to attack Nord Stream pipeline

Three months before saboteurs bombed the Nord Stream natural gas pipeline, the Biden administration learned from a close ally that the Ukrainian military had planned a covert attack on the undersea network, using a small team of divers who reported directly to the commander in chief of the Ukrainian armed forces.
Details about the plan, which have not been previously reported, were collected by a European intelligence service and shared with the CIA in June 2022. They provide some of the most specific evidence to date linking the government of Ukraine to the eventual attack in the Baltic Sea, which U.S. and Western officials have called a brazen and dangerous act of sabotage on Europe’s energy infrastructure.

The European intelligence reporting was shared on the chat platform Discord, allegedly by Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira. The Washington Post obtained a copy from one of Teixeira’s online friends.


How convenient!

The U.S. had motives and means in place to blow up the pipeline. Seymour Hersh has sources who claim the U.S. did it.

But now WaPo gets its hands on a 'leaked document' that says Ukraine's General Zaluzny was the man in charge of the issue:

The European intelligence made clear that the would-be attackers were not rogue operatives. All those involved reported directly to Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, the country’s highest-ranking military officer, who was put in charge so that Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, wouldn’t know about the operation, the intelligence report said.

Zaluzny is in charge of Ukrainian military. He is busy and not the man to run secret missions and to get direct reports from everyone involved in them.

Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine’s military intelligence chief, or the SBU, the civil intelligence service of Ukraine, would be in charge of such a mission.

(Budanov probably died on May 30 during a Russian attack on the bunker of the Military Intelligence headquarter in Kiev. He hasn't been seen or heard of since.)

The claim that Zaluzny was involved thus makes me even more skeptical.

I am not the only one who has doubts about the new 'leak':

Aaron Maté @aaronjmate - 15:34 UTC · Jun 6, 2023
The CIA gave its first Nord Stream cover-up story to the NYT, only fair to give their follow-up cover-up story to the Washington Post.
(https://mate.substack.com/p/in-nord-str ... -officials)

I will file the Washington Post report in the same 'nonsense' folder as this:

Image

A 'Russian soldier' ... with a beard?

According to the Chapter 8 Article 344 of the Charter of the Armed Forces servicemen are obliged ‘to regularly bath, brush teeth, cut nails, hair and shave clean’.

Just two months ago that order was reinforced:

The commander of Russia’s forces in Ukraine has ordered soldiers to cut their hair and shave, sparking a row with his bearded Chechen and mercenary allies.
...
Western intelligence said that General Valery Gerasimov, appointed overall commander of Russia’s forces earlier in January by Vladimir Putin, was trying to promote more discipline in the Russian army.


The 'Russian soldier' claim is as real as the WaPo's claim about the Ukrainian involvement in the Nord Stream case.

The person in Kiev who tweeted the above clip has probably filmed his neighbor.

Posted by b on June 6, 2023 at 16:32 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/06/a ... .html#more

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MOSCOW ACCUSES KYIV OF TERRORIST ATTACK ON THE KAKHOVKA DAM
June 6, 2023 , 10:32 a.m.

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Satellite images of the Kajovka dam in November 2022 (Photo: Maxar/Getty Images)

This Tuesday, June 6, the Russian authorities reported that the dam of the Kajovka hydroelectric power station was attacked with missiles and has released millions of tons of fresh water from its reservoir and threatens to cause a regional catastrophe that will affect settlements throughout the Dnepr River, wildlife and the Zaporozye Nuclear Power Plant.

The Kakhovka hydroelectric power station is located in the town of Novaya Kakhovka in the Kherson region, which came under the control of Russian forces in March 2022. Kiev regime troops have shelled the Novaya Kakhovka dam for the past year as part of deliberately targeted attacks against Russian civilian infrastructure.

Ukrainian authorities ordered their own mass evacuations and blamed Russia for the terror attack. Moscow rejected these accusations and stressed that kyiv must bear full responsibility.

The Kremlin stated that the Ukrainian missile attack in the morning against the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station was a deliberate act of sabotage by kyiv, and could have serious consequences for local residents and the environment.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov also called it unequivocal that one of the goals of this act of sabotage was to deprive Crimea of ​​water: "The water level in the reservoir is falling, therefore the water supply to the canal [of North Crimea] is drastically reduced."

"Apparently, this sabotage is also due to the fact that, having launched large-scale offensive operations two days ago, the Ukrainian armed forces have not been able to achieve their objectives. Their operations are stalled," the spokesman said.

Multiple local settlements have been completely flooded, and authorities in the Russian city of Kherson have carried out evacuations and declared a state of emergency. The Crimean authorities have also taken measures to guarantee the supply of fresh water at the risk of the North Crimean canal losing much of its reserves.

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, expressed concern about the situation, stating that the damage to the dam has caused a "significant reduction in the level of the reservoir used to supply cooling water."

Kiev's Western backers ignored Russian warnings about attacks on the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station and its dam for more than 15 months, turning a deaf ear to concerns about the consequences that would be unleashed if it failed.

https://misionverdad.com/moscu-acusa-ki ... sa-kajovka

Google Translator

***********

Russia and Ukraine: Who is to blame for the destruction of the dam?
By Milena Bravo
June 6, 2023

Russia and Ukraine blamed each other for the destruction of valves at the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station in Russia's Kherson province.

The Russian authorities assured that the bombardments carried out by the Ukrainian Army, early Tuesday morning, caused serious damage to the environment of the region.

In this sense, the mayor of the city of Nóvaya Kajovka, Vladimir Leóntiev , expressed: "The environmental damage is gigantic, both upstream and downstream . "


For her part, Russian senator Olga Kovitidi predicts that the destruction of the dam will cause "colossal" damage to the ecosystem ; as well as the economy and society of the region.

"The legacy of the Soviet era, the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station has unfortunately been destroyed as a result of continuous attacks by the Armed Forces of Ukraine ," Kovitidi said.

While, the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitri Peskov , stated that the destruction of the hydroelectric plant is the result of "deliberate sabotage by the Ukrainian side" .

Meanwhile, he categorically denied claims that Russian forces were behind the attack on the dam. Kakhovka dam. " One of the objectives of the Kiev regime's shelling of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station is to deprive Crimea of ​​water ," he said.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said: "This morning the Kiev regime has committed another terrorist crime by blowing up the facilities of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station , which caused large areas to be flooded .

Image

Ukraine blamed Russia
However, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, after bombing innocent civilians for months, called the attack "terrorist" ; so his foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, called for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council.

Western powers also blamed Russia for the damage to the Kakhovka dam. "There is only one person responsible for this environmental catastrophe : Russia's criminal war of aggression against Ukraine ," said German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock.

Finally, it is important to note that the dam, built in the Soviet era, sits on the Dnieper River, which supplies cooling water to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. The flooding revived fears for the safety of this Russian-controlled plant, located some 150 kilometers from the dam.

https://redradiove.com/rusia-y-ucrania- ... a-represa/
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Thu Jun 08, 2023 12:11 pm

water as a weapon
POSTED BY @NSANZO ⋅ 06/08/2023

Image

One day after the partial collapse of the Kakhovka dam, which caused a major flood that will have serious consequences for the civilian population and the troops on both banks of the Dnieper and especially on the islands, which had become the front line , the water level seems to have started to drop. This was confirmed, at least, by the mayor of Novaya Kajovka, possibly the most directly affected town. On both banks of the river, troops and rescue teams mobilized resources to evacuate the most vulnerable civilian population. And although throughout the day the level of certainty of the media and the political class about the Russian authorship of an alleged sabotage also decreased - which has not even been confirmed, since there is currently no way to confirm the cause of the collapse -,

The collapse of the Kajovka dam and the consequent flooding coincided in time with the publication of the most recent leaks of Pentagon documents, which the press is slowly and controlled exploiting. On Tuesday, The Washington Post , which claims to have obtained the documents from the online community in which the member of the National Guard published them, claimed to have concrete evidence about the authorship of the attacks against Nord Stream 1 and 2 on the past 26 of September. Then, too, the adjudication of blame - Russia is always guilty - was swift and unequivocal. It took several months and an alternative theory, that of Seymour Hersh, for the press to begin to openly consider why there was still no evidence to confirm Moscow's hand.. The latest information published not only points directly to Kiev, but does so, not to a plot outside the government, but with the knowledge of the Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Valery Zaluzhny, supposedly the figure used to avoid implicating President Volodymyr Zelensky. According to the US media, intelligence from a European country that the article does not specify for security reasons warned the United States about the Ukrainian plans last June, three months before the explosions finally took place.

What was published by The Washington Post , like Seymour Hersh's theory, does not prove authorship or the methods used, but they do confirm that the Russian trackIt has never been supported by any evidence. Aware of plans to blow up critical infrastructures co-owned by a European country and an ally as important as Germany, Western countries not only did not act to prevent the attack -which, regardless of their authorship, occurred after verifying the existence of a danger -, but they used sabotage to create the image of their enemy's guilt. In that task, kyiv and its European and North American allies walked hand in hand, taking aim at Moscow and accusing their enemy of committing an attack. The time that has elapsed and the fact that all the theories about what happened point to opponents of Russia should have undermined the credibility of both kyiv and its partners. However, silence has continued to be the norm and there have been no great demands for an independent and real investigation into the events or their consequences. Not even the ecological damage that necessarily had to be caused by the gas leak has caused major protests in the supposedly ecological Europe.

Contrary to the case of the Nord Stream, ecological concerns are being considered in the case of the collapse of the Kajovka dam, which will affect both agriculture in the area, located in an area of ​​extremely fertile black earth, as for the ecosystem. As if the script was prepared in advance - the possibility of a catastrophe in Novaya Kajovka began to appear in the media last October, so it should not necessarily be considered suspicious that the consequences of the collapse had already been studied - President Zelesnky warned of the dumping of toxic substances that had occurred in the Dnieper River. Throughout yesterday, the version of ecocide continued to take shape. Anton Gerashenko, well-known adviser to the Ministry of the Interior and whose credibility should have been questioned a long time ago -among one of his many hoaxes, the one who was Arsen Avakov's right-hand man stated that in Russia mass arrests of military authorities had begun in what seemed to herald a coup d'état - stated that the Kajovka reservoir will disappear in a few days. The message is clear and it involves accusing Russia, without even needing to prove its guilt, of an ecological crime.

Following the usual line of considering any statement from Moscow as a mere allegation and giving credibility to every message that comes from Kiev, it is not surprising that Ukraine has easily managed to install its official version throughout the press. The mainstream media have not considered it necessary to carry out a critical analysis of the precedents of what happened and neither the Ukrainian plans to blow up the dam that The Washington Post cited in December nor the bombings that have been confirmed in these months have been mentioned. but neither a previous precedent. In April 2022, The New York Timeshe mentioned the example of an area flooded by the Ukraine to prevent the Russian advance. In this case, the action was not only justified, but also openly praised by the media.

None of these aspects, nor the other moments in which Ukraine has used lies and manipulation to achieve its objectives - as happened, for example, when Kiev alleged a deliberate attack by Russia against Poland in the episode in which a missile projectile Ukrainian air defenses hit a border village, killing two civilians - has succeeded in undermining Kiev's credibility. Yesterday, an article published by Newsweek, similar to many others published by other Western media, referred to the consequences of the partial collapse of the Kajovka dam. The headline of the article stated that “kyiv Adviser: Crimea Faces Decades Without Water After Dam Collapses”. Along the same lines, Anton Gerashenko also expressed himself, writing that "the drying up of the North Crimean canal will lead to problems with drinking water in Crimea and will be critical for agriculture on the peninsula."

Suddenly, the question of water supply to the Crimea has returned to the present day. People like Carl Bildt have viewed the possibility of Crimea being left without running water as a positive resulting from the tragedy. Other representatives have considered the possibility of a disaster on the peninsula as evidence that exculpates Ukraine: kyiv would not endanger the water supply in this territory that they assume it will recover.

Interestingly, those who now use the argument of the water supply to Crimea or the consequences on its agriculture ignored it during the years when Ukraine deliberately prevented the passage of water from the Dnieper to the North Crimean canal that they are now concerned about. Curiously, only the most radical, such as Bildt, maintain consistency. During the seven years in which Kiev, by means of a wall that prevented the passage of water, stopped the supply, there was no demand on the part of Ukraine's partners, aware of the collective punishment that their ally inflicted on the civilian population , which he condemned to a shortage of drinking water and the ruin of his agriculture because of his disloyalty. Crimea risks a decade of water shortages, Newsweek recallsciting an apparently concerned Tetyana Tymochko, adviser to the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources.

Seven years passed between the time Kiev blocked the waterway and the time Russia blew up the barrier that prevented the water supply, more than five years in which Ukraine deliberately destroyed that very agriculture for which Ukraine and his partners say they worry now. As Newsweek cynically recalls without clarifying the reason why the Ukrainian authorities decided to prevent the passage of water, until then, "the canal had supplied 85% of the peninsula's water, much of which was used for agriculture." That deliberate move by Ukraine was as damaging as kyiv expects the current flooding to be. And only now are leaders like Kaja Kallas, Prime Minister of Estonia, denouncing the “use of water as a weapon”.

https://slavyangrad.es/2023/06/08/el-ag ... more-27460

Google Translator

*********

No - Such Propaganda Delusions Will Not Win The War

I do not know what Washington Post columnist David Ignatius or the Biden administration officials he is talking to are smoking, but it must be extraordinary strong stuff:

Administration officials were encouraged by better-than-expected progress Monday, as Ukrainian units pushed through heavily mined areas to advance between five and 10 kilometers in some areas of the long front. That raised hopes that Ukrainian forces can keep thrusting toward Mariupol, Melitopol and other Russian-held places along the coast — severing the land bridge.

The 'thrust' was against a small Russian held salient in the front line near Velyka Novosilka at the center of this map.

Image

Zooming in we see the current frontline as depicted by the Ukraine friendly LiveUAmap.

Image

Using the 'Time' feature of that map we can see the front line in the same area one week ago.

Image

Using the scale at the bottom right of the map we can tell that the sole total 'progress' of the Ukrainian forces on the upper left was about two kilometers deep on a four kilometer wide front. They conquered two tree lines between open fields. Not one settlement of farm was 'liberated' by those forces.

Here is the same place depicted on the map of the pro-Ukrainian neoconservative Institute for the Study of War.

Image

It shows the same story. Again the 'progress' of the Ukrainian forces was limited to some treelines between flat open fields.

It came at enormous cost:

During the three days of combat operations in all directions Ukraine lost up to 3,715 men, 52 tanks and 207 armored combat vehicles, 134 trucks, 48 field artillery guns, as well as five aircraft, two helicopters and 53 drones.

Russia’s losses were immeasurably smaller: "Altogether 71 servicemen of the combined group of forces were killed and 210 others wounded while repulsing the enemy offensive. Fifteen tanks, nine infantry fighting vehicles, two trucks and nine guns were taken out."


That's Russian propaganda you say? Yes, you may want to cut those numbers in half to get to the real ones. They are still enormous.

Gilbert Doctorow notes that The Ukrainian Army is run not by the Generals but by the PR Department. Accordingly the demolition of Kakhovka dam is a diversion from the disastrous losses of the last few days.

The Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said that the dam damage was done to allow for the transfer of Ukrainian forces (machine translation):

"Tonight, the Kiev regime committed another terrorist crime: the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station was blown up, which led to the flooding of large areas," he said.

The minister added that the purpose of undermining the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station by Kiev is to transfer units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) from the Kherson direction to the offensive area.

He pointed out that the Kiev regime had blown up the structures of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station. "The purpose of these actions, according to available data, is as follows. Having not achieved success in offensive operations, in order to strengthen its potential, the enemy intends to transfer units and equipment from the Kherson direction to the area of ​​its offensive operations, thus significantly weakening its positions in the Kherson direction," Shoigu said.


I have a different reading of the situation. With the dam intact any large crossing of the lower Dnieper would be endangered by the ability of the other side to release water from the dam. With the dam blown up flooding will, for a week or two, turn the area along the river into a swamp. But after two weeks or so the water will be gone and a large crossing, without the danger of being flooded, will become possible. This reading is based on several reports of ferrying and bridging units being transferred to Ukraine:

Russia has depended upon unbridged waterways and other geographical features for a measure of security. As Ukrainian armored bridging units begin to emerge in battle, Russia will be challenged by the sudden emergence of fast-moving Ukrainian units in lightly-defended areas.

Bridging units are really some of the last few pieces Ukraine requires to take the offensive. The fact that they are getting donated now can only be interpreted as a sign that American experts feel confident that Ukraine is finally ready to employ their new, highly-mobile equipment effectively, at scale, and in large offensive operations.


Then again - Shoigu will surely have better access to battlefield information than I do.

Back to Ignatius class delusions:

It might take weeks before the results of the Ukrainian campaign are clear, but Kyiv has already succeeded in expanding the stalemated fighting in Bakhmut, the bitterly contested eastern city that was ground zero throughout the winter.

Ahem - Ukraine was utterly defeated in Bakhmut and no longer holds any ground within that city.

If it wants to expand on that the Russians will surely welcome it to do so.

Posted by b on June 7, 2023 at 11:14 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/06/n ... .html#more

**********

According to mainstream media...
June 7, 14:41

Image

American radio host Garland Nixon.

According to mainstream media, Russia:

1. Attacked its own pipelines
2. Blew up the Crimean bridge
3. Attacked its own nuclear power plant
4. Attacked the Crimean bridge
5. Blew up its own dam
6. Attacked the Kremlin with

PS drones. the fact that the lies of the American media are not much different from the lies about "exploding air conditioners in Luhansk", for which Ukraine is now paying with rivers of blood.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8409701.html

The problem of canals and land reclamation after the explosion of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station
June 7, 16:31

Image

While the focus is on the flooding downstream of the Kakhovka dam and the combat situation in the region, the long-term damage to the huge agricultural sector of the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions is of particular concern.
Thousands of farms rely on 4 canals flowing from the (soon former) Kakhovka Reservoir.

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Photo 2. Krivoy Rog "Southern Reservoir" is fed by the artificial flood of the Kakhovka Reservoir and provides water for household, industrial and agricultural needs. The lake itself is used for breeding commercial fish species. Thus, a Ukrainian attack on the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station will cause enormous damage to Krivoy Rog as well.

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Photo 3. The Verkhne-Gachinsky canal provides drinking water and irrigation to fields in the north of the Zaporozhye region.

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Photo 4. The South Ukrainian (Kakhovsky) Canal irrigates most of the seemingly endless agricultural fields of the Kherson region, and also supplies drinking water to people living in hundreds of towns and villages along its path. The canal is used to irrigate 326,000 hectares in two oblasts, and water from the Kakhovka Canal is fed into the water supply system of Berdyansk via the 175-kilometer R-9 conduit.

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Photo 5. Finally, the famous North Crimean Canal supplies water to western Kherson, as well as Crimea itself. After the destruction of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station and the subsequent drop in the water level in the Kakhovka reservoir, it is possible to stop the supply of Dnieper water to the canal.

@genshtab24 - zinc

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8409916.html

We turned Ukraine into a slaughterhouse that killed 350,000 young Ukrainians
June 7, 18:42

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What we are doing now in Ukraine is just mass violence against Ukrainians. We just dragged Ukraine into a proxy war against the Soviets. And they are being devoured by these geopolitical machinations of the neocons in the White House, who depict what is happening in the war in the form of comics that many Americans have swallowed. We turned Ukraine into a slaughterhouse that killed 350,000 young Ukrainians. They lie about how many people died. They hide it from us. The Pentagon is hiding this from the American people. Ukraine hides this from its people. But 350 thousand people died. The Russians are killing Ukrainians at a 7 to 1 ratio. And we have turned this poor little country into a killing ground for these idealistic young guys to advance a geopolitical agenda that has nothing to do with Ukraine.(c) Robert Kennedy, Jr.

Not for the first time. Not so long ago, the same thing was done in Libya, Syria and Afghanistan. Ukraine is just another country that was allowed to be minced meat.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8410280.html

Washington Post report
June 7, 20:22

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Another memory pill.

On December 29, 2022, General of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Kovalchuk, who commanded the battles in the Kherson direction, reports on the pages of the Washington Post ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... n-donetsk/ ) about the HIMARS strikes on the gates of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station in order to find out how this will harm the Russian supply through the dam.

https://t.me/vatfor/8627 - zinc

It is worth noting that earlier the United States directly stated that they determine the coordinates for the operation of HIMARS.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8410617.html

Polish Wishlist for reparations.
June 7, 22:25

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Polish Wishlist for reparations.

If Poland's ruling Law and Justice party remains in power after parliamentary elections, Germany will pay reparations to Poland for the damage caused during World War II (1939-1945). This was announced on Tuesday to the PAP agency by Deputy Foreign Minister of Poland and government representative for reparations Arkadiusz Mulyarchik.

"I am convinced that if we are in power for another term, Germany will pay reparations to Poland," he said.

The diplomat noted that he was satisfied with the results of a sociological survey published on Monday, according to which 54% of Polish citizens believe that Poland should seek reparations from Germany.

"I am satisfied, but I would like to see 99% support for this," Mulyarchik said.

On September 1, the Polish authorities presented a three-volume report on the losses suffered by Poland as a result of the attack by Nazi Germany and the German occupation in 1939-1945. The declared total amount was PLN 6.2 trillion (about 1.3 - 1.5 trillion dollars).

The German government has repeatedly indicated that they see no reason for any payments, since in 1953 Poland officially refused reparations https://t.me/Belarus_VPO/41765


- zinc

Germany, Poland in a fit of delirium is going to demand compensation from Russia. Of course, in neither case will Poland get anything.
It is also worth noting that Israel itself is now demanding compensation from Poland for the complicity of the Poles in the destruction of Polish Jews. In this case, Poland does not want to pay compensation for complicity in the genocide.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8410725.html

Google Translator

***********

Flooding in Kakhovka as a cover-up for the disastrous first days of the Ukrainian ‘counter-offensive’

No doubt some readers of my essay yesterday were wondering how I could know that it was the Ukrainians who were responsible for destroying the Kakhovka hydroelectric plant and consequent flooding of the adjacent settlements on both banks of the Dnepr and further downstream. Where is the proof someone wrote to me in the Comments section of my website. Where is the photo showing how the breach was made?

Sticklers like these are the same folks who always argue that we simple people never can know what is really going on. Only the “big boys” have all the facts.

I never have accepted such argumentation in favor of total passivity of the population and blind obedience to authorities who, as we so often discover, are neither as intelligent nor as well-meaning as what you were told in kindergarten. I am quite satisfied that application of normal reasoning processes like cui bono and identification of flagrant contradictions in the narratives of one or another side, of flagrant contradictions within mainstream reporting are sufficient to arrive at the truth independently and without reliance on insider information or wild speculation.

In the given instance it was quite sufficient to rely on the Marxist thinking processes differentiating between “subjective” and “objective” causality. And the “subjective” approach leaves no doubt about what happened on 5 June at the Kakhovka dam.

Why do I say that? Because even today as I watched the BBC morning news there was extensive video coverage of the flooding along the lower reaches of the Dnepr river, but not a peep about the military fiasco of the Ukrainian army in the previous three days of its long awaited counter-offensive. Indeed, other news channels even made reference to a new commitment by Joe Biden to provide assistance to Ukraine in light of the destruction of the reservoir at Kakhovka.

Meanwhile, yesterday all Russian news outlets gave primary attention to a speech by Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu in which he set out in detail the results on the battlefield over the previous three days of fierce engagement of Russian and Ukrainian military forces along several points of the line of confrontation, in particular in southern Donetsk. This is a summary of his report in today’s Fontanka.ru :

In the words of the minister, on 4 June the 23rd and 31st mechanized brigades of the Armed Forces of Ukraine undertook an attempted attack in five areas but did not achieve success in any of them. On 5 June, the Ukrainian army attempted an attack in seven areas deploying the forces of five brigades. Shoigu stated that the attempted attacks were stopped, ‘and the enemy did not achieve his objectives while bearing considerable and incomparable losses.’

As Shoigu reported, over the course of three days of military action in all areas Ukraine lost up to 3715 soldiers, 52 tanks, 207 armored vehicles, 134 automobiles, 5 airplanes, 2 helicopters, 48 field artillery pieces and 53 drones.

The minister also named the losses of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation: in the course of repelling the attack 71 soldiers died and 210 were wounded. They lost 15 tanks, 9 troop carriers, 2 automobiles and 9 artillery pieces.

As the host of the Evening with Vladimir Solovyov talk show remarked last night, this is the first time in the armed conflict that the Russians have officially reported the losses of both sides. Comparing directly the 71 Russian soldiers who died with the 3715 Ukrainians said to have lost their lives tells the whole story of the way the Ukrainian “counter-offensive” is playing out. This is a massacre that in a just world would justify immediate cessation of all further arms deliveries to Ukraine and insistent demand for capitulation to end the senseless bloodshed.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023

https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/06/07/ ... offensive/

******

From Cassad's Telegram account:

Colonelcassad
🇬🇧⚔️🇺🇦The enemy is advancing on the Zaporozhye Front: the heavy battle on the positions of the heroic company of the 291st regiment does not stop
▪️The armored fist of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has been trying for 12 hours to break through the defenses of our troops near the town of Orekhov in the Rabotino-Verbove area.
▪️Armored groups of the Armed Forces of Ukraine are attacking the junction between two company strongholds, having managed to occupy only one height of 178.2 in half a day of fighting.
▪️Our fighters of the heroic company of the 291st regiment, under strong pressure, withdrew from the front line of the trenches to reserve positions, the enemy continuously hit these trenches even 3 hours before the offensive from all types of weapons.
▪️The fighters of the company of the 291st regiment, with the support of neighbors from the 70th regiment, intelligence soldiers of the 42nd Motor Rifle Division and 22 special forces brigades, are holding the next opornik, this maneuver was planned in advance to deter just such a powerful offensive, the enemy broke off his teeth on the first opornik for many hours and now breaks them on the second .
💀According to preliminary data, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have already lost up to 16 tanks and 15 other units of other equipment.
▪️Help is coming to our guys from neighboring areas.
▪️The heavy battle does not stop for many hours, the artillery on both sides does not stop.

***

Colonelcassad
A brief summary of the situation in the Artyomovskoye direction.

Contrary to the victorious reports of the enemy, adventures in this direction do not end without losses.
Only our fighters have destroyed in recent days: 3 enemy wheeled vehicles, 3 armored combat vehicles, including 2 M113 units.

Also, according to our information, the reports of the enemy bot farm about the defeat of our forces in the area of ​​the settlement of Chasov Yar are a hoax - the RF Armed Forces did not take assault actions in this area.

***

forwarded from
NGP exploration
⚠️ Brief summary of the situation in the south.

Zaporozhye direction.

The enemy does not leave attempts to storm our forward positions in the area of ​​​​the Orekhov settlement, after a short lull, at 04:07, assault attempts were resumed in the area of ​​the Malaya Tokmachka settlement, enemy forces: up to 10 units of tanks and other armored combat vehicles, and up to 2 infantry companies .

The tactics are the same: the intention is to cling to several advantageous positions and create a bridgehead for a further offensive to the south.

As a result of attempts to attack on 07.06, the enemy had partial success only in 1 of the five directions, namely: by the forces of the rtgr from the composition of the 31st brigade, he managed to gain a foothold at a height of 178.2.
At the moment, in this area, the enemy is concentrating forces of 4mr 2mb 31ombr, to storm the nearby forest belt, in order to advance to height 178.3.

In parallel, the enemy is preparing to deliver distracting strikes in the Maryinsky direction, with the forces of the 79th airborne assault and 59th motorized infantry brigades, as well as in the Avdeevsky direction with the forces of the 53rd brigade.
We emphasize that these directions are not the main ones for the enemy, these are distracting strikes, pursuing more psychological effect than tactical goals.

https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator

*****

From the SlavyangradTelegram account:

Slavyangrad
NabrezhnyeIntel:

📌 From June 4th to June 8th, the enemy has lost close to 400 armored vehicles, 115 tanks and close to 5,000 personnel on the Zaporozhye, Artemovsk, and Southwest Donetsk Tactical Regions. The intensity of the enemy attacks have decreased, however, a whole army in the reserve is waiting to attack. This will not be the end of their attacks; so far, no settlements have been lost (some changed hands but are back under the control of the Russian Armed Forces).

🔻Importantly, in no instance, has even the first line of defense been breached, and remember, on the Zaporozhye and Southwest Donetsk fronts, there are 5 lines of defense. The enemy is targeting areas west of the Ugledarisky Tactical Region (nearby to the Velkya Novoselivka Tactical Region); as these regions are the least defended, however, geographically hard to conquer. This is primarily around the villages of Novodonetskoye and the Vremika Ledge.

🔻 To compensate for failures, the AFU attempted a counteroffensive on the Artemovsk (Berkhovka) area; they were subsequently wiped out. Enemy militants now resort to shelling of residential areas of the Belgorod Region.

👉 It is likely that the enemy will attempt to cross the Left Bank of the Kherson River under the backdrop of the New Kakhovka Hydroelectric Dam being undermined; they have strengthened groupings with fresh reserves from Lvov and Zhytomr, Russian forces are pre-emptively striking accumulations of enemy manpower.

https://t.me/NabrezhnyeIntel/1510

***

Slavyangrad
Enemy attacks on Zaporozhye front: heavy fighting does not stop

▪️ AFU has been trying for 11 hours to break the defence of our troops close to Orekhov, near Rabotino-Verbovoye.

▪️ The AFU armoured groups are attacking the junction between two company strongholds, having managed to take only one height 178.2 in 11 hours.

▪️ Our fighters of the heroic 291 Regiment company retreated from the front line of trenches to reserve positions under heavy pressure, these trenches were continuously hit by the enemy for another 3 hours before the offensive with all kinds of weapons.

▪️ Soldiers from a company of the 291st regiment supported by neighbours from the 70th regiment, reconnaissance men from the 42nd motorized rifle division and the 22nd special forces brigade hold the next strongpoint. This manoeuvre was planned in advance to hold back such a powerful attack.

▪️ According to preliminary data, the AFU has already lost up to 16 tanks and 15 other units of other equipment.

▪️ Support is breaking through to our guys from neighbouring areas.

▪️ Heavy fighting has not stopped for many hours, artillery is working from both sides

***

Pool N3
“Putin has lost power”: Zelensky convinces Western partners that Putin is no longer the same, and the main thing now is not to stop and continue to give money and weapons.

“I feel like things are changing. And I think that his [Putin's] business partners have lost faith in him. And this affects both the military and many other things. Putin has lost the power he once had.
✔️In war there is never enough of this or that weapon, there is never enough ammunition. Because even if you don't counterattack, you keep fighting.
✔️[Is Ukraine involved in the attacks on Nord Stream?] I am the President and I issue the relevant orders. Ukraine did nothing of the kind. I would never do that. I didn't know anything at all. 100 percent. If our military should have done this, then show us the evidence.
✔️Of course, Ukraine would like to attend the NATO summit in Vilnius, but if NATO does not see us as a future member, why should we go there?”

***

Slavyangrad
NATO troops could become involved in the conflict in Ukraine, former Alliance secretary-general Anders Fogh Rasmussen has said.

"If NATO cannot come up with a clear way forward for Ukraine, there is a serious possibility that some countries will take action individually," he said.

According to Rasmussen, if Kiev gets nothing at the NATO summit in Vilnius in July, Poland and the Baltic states could deploy their forces in Ukraine.

Earlier, acting NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that only members of the alliance could count on full guarantees and that decisions taken at the summit would only allow Ukrainian forces to come closer to NATO standards.

***

Slavyangrad
India did not invite Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to take part in the G20 summit to be held in New Delhi in September . This was stated at a briefing for the Indian media by the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.

“In our opinion, the G20 summit is attended by the G20 member states and the countries and organizations that we invited. We announced the list of invitees immediately after we took over the G20 chairmanship,” Jaishankar said.

He stressed that "this is not the issue that was being reviewed."

***

Slavyangrad
1:37
⚡️ Destruction of HIMARS shells in the Lisichansk area and disruption of the attack of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Alexander-Kalinovsky direction: the latest data on the situation in the zone of responsibility of the "Center" and "South" groups

▪️In the Krasnolimansky direction in the areas of Nevsky and Chervonopopovka, the "Center" group disrupted the rotation of personnel of the 66th mechanized brigade and the 25th airborne brigade of Ukrainian troops;

▪️The positions of the 67th mechanized brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine were hit by the fire of an artillery battery under the control of the commander with the call sign Burya in the area of Serebryansky forestry;

▪️Air defense systems destroyed 2 HIMARS MLRS shells in the Lisichansk area, as well as UAVs of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Kremennaya area;

▪️Attack aviation of the "Southern" group of forces delivered strikes at the places of concentration of enemy manpower in the areas of Disputed, Vesele, and Kurdyumovka;

▪️As part of a counter-battery fight, the artillery of the group destroyed howitzers D-20 and D-30 of nationalists in the area of Zvanovka and Serebryanka, self-propelled guns 2S1 "Gvozdika" in the area and a 120-mm mortar in the area of Belaya Gora, a 122-mm gun near Krasnohorivka;

▪️A volley from the Solntsepek TOS hit the strongholds of the 24th separate mechanized brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Kirovo and Druzhba area;

▪️The crews of the Osa-AKM air defense system shot down 2 reconnaissance UAVs "Leleka-100";

▪️The units of the group thwarted one attack of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Alexander-Kalinovsky direction, the enemy suffered losses in weapons, manpower, and equipment

***

Slavyangrad
From the field, it is reported that the APU from the right bank purposefully open fire on evacuating civilians from flooded areas — in the "Hola Prystan", at least two people were killed, evacuation was suspended.

Having arranged the demolition of the dam and the flooding of the left-bank Kherson region, the APU went even further and continue to cynically kill civilians. In their "best traditions" today, war criminals opened fire on the area of the "Hola Prystan", from where they were taking people out for evacuation. The bus was covered by the shelling, two people were killed, several were injured.

A pregnant woman wounded in the shelling — her arm was torn off — died. In connection with the shelling, the evacuation was suspended by the decision of the acting governor of the region, Vladimir Saldo.

https://t.me/s/Slavyangrad
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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blindpig
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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Thu Jun 08, 2023 8:12 pm

JUNE 8, 2023 BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR
Kakhovka dam breach is a perfect crime

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Quiet flows the Dnieper: Water runs through a breach in the Nova Kakhovka hydro-electric dam, Kherson, Ukraine, June 6, 2023

The breach in the Nova Kakhovka dam on the Dnieper River in war-ravaged Ukraine on Tuesday is no doubt a catastrophe of colossal proportions, a veritable ecological and human disaster that may outlive the war itself.

However, the striking thing about the White House reaction to the event from John Kirby, Coordinator for Strategic Communications at the National Security Council, is that he tactfully avoided endorsing Ukraine President Vladimir Zelensky’s finger-pointing at the Russians.

Kirby said, “We’ve seen the reports that Russia was responsible… We’re doing the best we can to assess those reports. And we are working with the Ukrainians to gather more information. But we cannot say conclusively what happened at this point…”

Kirby wouldn’t be drawn onto a turf that fools only enter, where angels fear to tread. And, interestingly, his remark has been on similar lines as UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s also — “it’s too early to say definitively.” Sunak, who was en route to Washington on June 6, said the UK defence intelligence is to “thoroughly investigate” with the aim of establishing who was responsible for the catastrophe.

Of course, it is entirely conceivable that Britain will eventually find a way to somehow put the blame on Russia. But for the present, it has nothing concrete in hand to vilify Moscow.

Indeed, what complicates matters is that by the classical Latin canon cui bono (for whose benefit?) about identifying crime suspects, both Ukraine and Russia can be deemed as “winners” or “losers” alike. This needs explaining.

Take Ukraine first. It is a winner as Russia apparently shot itself in the foot by destroying the dam, since the topography of the place is such that it is the lower eastern side of the Dnieper in the Kherson region, which the Russians held, that are more affected by the flood. Second, the flood has washed away the mines and much of the fortifications Russians had painstakingly prepared to prevent a large-scale Ukrainian offensive. The Ukrainian forces would now get an open path, arguably, when the flood abates.

Third, it is a huge propaganda stunt for Kiev to drum-beat, with able help from western media, that Russians committed a war crime. Zelensky wrote on Facebook: “Russian terrorists. The destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant dam only confirms for the whole world that they must be expelled from every corner of Ukrainian land. Not a single meter should be left to them, because they use every meter for terror. It’s only Ukraine’s victory that will return security. And this victory will come. The terrorists will not be able to stop Ukraine with water, missiles or anything else.”

This big psychological victory also coincides with the launch of Kiev’s expected “spring offensive.” Besides, Kiev is a big-time winner if the destruction of the Kakhovka dam affects the cooling system of the reactor(s) in the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant (which would make it a first-rate European crisis) and/or imperil water supply for the Crimean peninsula (which could alienate Russian public opinion.) Equally, Kakhovka dam was a hydro-electric plant, and there could be power shortage in the Russian-held areas.

But the biggest “win-win” for Kiev will be that there is nothing stopping its future amphibious assaults in the strategic Kherson region once the water levels out, since Russia has already used the trump card of engineering floods from the Kakhovka dam to wash away the Ukrainian landing forces on the eastern bank of the Dnieper.

On the other hand, when it comes to Russia, the big question that begs an answer is: Why would it want to destroy the dam when it always had the easier option to create huge floods to drown the Ukrainian deployments by simply lifting the floodgates at any point?

In a rare statement of its kind, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu offered an explanation that after having suffered very heavy losses in the first 2-3 days of the ongoing Ukrainian offensive in the Donetsk direction, Kiev has an urgent need to “redeploy the units and hardware from Kherson direction to its offensive area” in the north and resorted to the terrorist act to flood the region “to prevent Russia’s offensive actions.”

It is a logical explanation but there is a contradiction insofar as by thinning out the deployment in the Kherson front, especially the positions inside the marshy islands in the Dnieper river where force multipliers like drone repeaters and relays were deployed, Ukrainian forces have placed themselves at a disadvantage, which the Russian side can always take advantage of once the flood subsides.

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Clearly, Russia is the winner if it decides to cross the Dnieper in Kherson Oblast and liberate the historic Odessa region (and link up just beyond with the Russian troops isolated in Transnistria, Moldova), now that there is no more dam for the Ukrainian side to flood the region and impede the Russian march westward!

Second, it is a net gain that the floods have submerged all the ammunition depots the Ukrainians had been building up in Kherson for an offensive in the southern region. Third, the current floods prevent any amphibious assaults by Ukrainian forces, which enables the Russian military to take its eyes off Kherson front and concentrate instead on the northern front where the main thrust of the Ukrainian offensive seems to be developing.

Meanwhile, according to Russian media reports citing expert opinion:

Mass evacuation of Novaya Kakhovka town due to the destruction of the dam will not be necessary, as the bulk of the population had left the city in the fall during the regrouping of troops from the Kherson direction;
The water level is expected to drop to normal within 72 hours;
The water level in the North Crimean Canal is not affected in any way, thanks to additional reservoirs that had been built during the 2014-2022 period when Kiev had imposed a “water blockade” on Crimea;
Russian military had anticipated the present events in Kherson and had prepared layered defence fortifications behind which the troops are now positioning.
A Russian military expert, Col. Vitaly Kiselyov said on TV: “Our guys, our experts, foresaw the risk that not only Kakhovka reservoir but also the Kiev one and some others may be prone to blasts and sabotage… As regards changes to our defensive fortifications, yes, to some extent, they will have to be moved. But this is not critical. It is also not critical that the enemy may try to attack in this area.”

Incredible as it may seem, in a meticulous, insightful “post-mortem” of the Kakhovka dam breach, the well-known blogger Simplicius the Thinker offers a novel “natural theory, which is that the dam collapsed on its own.”

Here is a dam that already took so much battering from Ukrainian and Russian militaries through the past year and was in serious disrepair, with satellite photos in the days leading up to the breach already showing that it was leaking massively at the centre. Perhaps, the dam, which had seen glorious days in the Soviet era, couldn’t take it anymore. The breach actually “looks like a clean break.”

The unkindest cut of all is that Kiev, which controls several other dams upriver — such as a hydro plant in Zaporozhye city and in Dnipro city — also began playing with their water levels and filling up the Kakhovka reservoir, putting immense pressure on the 67-year old dam. That is to say, “the dam collapsed on its own rather than direct fire or explosives sabotage, but it was still pushed into collapsing by direct action from the Kiev regime.” Read the masterly analysis here. https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/por ... dium=email

https://www.indianpunchline.com/kakhovk ... ect-crime/

************

Zelensky will be murdered by his military command

This is the punch line that I was allowed to deliver last night on air at the conclusion of a twenty-minute panel discussion of the destruction of the Kakhovka dam on “The Spotlight,” Press TV (Iran).

http://www.urmedium.net/c/presstv/124434

My logic in saying this is that the current rate of loss of men and materiel in the ongoing Ukrainian “counter-offensive” is unsustainable and is bleeding their armed forces white.

Two days ago Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu reported to the nation on the results of the first three days of that counter-offensive: 3,615 Ukrainian soldiers were dead and large quantities of tanks, including the newly arrived German Leopards, aircraft, helicopters, armored personnel carriers were destroyed. The Russians lost a total of 72 dead and 130 wounded. That juxtaposition of losses tells us that for the Russian side this was like shooting herrings in a barrel.

Yesterday, Russian armed forces spokesman General Konashenkov announced that the results of the latest day of battle were another 750 dead Ukrainians.

All of this brings us back to the Russian calculations at the very outset of the Special Military Operation that the Ukrainian military would respond by throwing off the yoke of the neo-Nazi controlled civilian government in order to save the nation.

That initial assumption immediately proved to be false, as we know. To their pain, the Russians found that the radical nationalists had a chokehold on the military, which they had infiltrated when the Azov battalion and other radical paramilitaries were incorporated into the main army.

However, many of these neo-Nazis and other radical nationalists died in the defense of Mariupol and in other lost causes over the past year. And now the senior professional military in Ukraine is faced with a threat not to the nation but to the continued existence of an army as it is being slaughtered in a hopeless “counter-offensive” thrust upon it by Zelensky and his Western backers to justify further funding and arms deliveries.

This is not tenable.

Zelensky may have US security guards around him, but nothing can hold back a palace coup.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023

https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/06/08/ ... y-command/

.**********

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U.S. prefers frozen Germany over one not aiding Ukraine: Seymour Hersh
Originally published: U.S. prefers frozen Germany over one not aiding Ukraine: Seymour Hersh on February 15, 2023 by Berliner Zeitung (more by U.S. prefers frozen Germany over one not aiding Ukraine: Seymour Hersh) (Posted Jun 08, 2023)

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told a press conference days after the Nord Stream pipelines were blown up that an important factor of Russia’s power had been taken away from President Vladimir Putin’s hand, famed U.S. investigative journalist and Pulitzer award winner Seymour Hersh told German newspaper Berliner Zeitung in an interview published on Tuesday.

Hersh recalled how Blinken said destroying the pipelines was a tremendous opportunity to deprive Russia of its ability to use its pipelines as a weapon, and it would no longer be able to use the pipelines to pressure Western Europe to end U.S. support of Ukraine in the war.

Additionally, Victoria Nuland, the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, said that “the [US] administration is very gratified to know that Nord Stream 2” would no longer be operational.

The reason for this decision, Hersh told the German daily, was that the war was not going well for the West, and the U.S. was scared that the cold winter would push Germany into lifting the sanctions imposed on the Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline, which was put on hold by Berlin in the wake of the Ukraine war.

Asked about the motives of the attack on the pipelines, Hersh underlined how the United States was against the pipeline for various reasons since the early stages, with some saying it was opposed because Washington wanted to weaken Russia or its relations with Western Europe, especially Germany. Meanwhile, others said Washington sought to undermine the German economy, a competitor of the U.S. economy.

“I don’t think they’ve thought this through thoroughly. I know that sounds strange. I don’t think Secretary of State Blinken and some others in the government are profound thinkers,” the journalist said.

There are certainly people in American business who like the idea that we are becoming more competitive. We sell liquefied natural gas (LNG) at extremely high profits, and we make a lot of money from it.

He said those in the White House were obsessed with re-election and wanted Ukraine to win the war, however. He also noted that certain parties might have thought that the German economy being weak would benefit the U.S. economy.

I think we got caught up in something that won’t work. The war won’t end well for this government.

Asked about how he thought the war could end, Hersh told the German daily that his thoughts on the matter did not count.

What I know is that there is no way this war will end the way we want it to, and I don’t know what we will do as we look further into the future.

He expressed his awe at President Joe Biden authorizing an attack of this sort, stressing that those carrying out the mission were aware of what Biden was doing to the people in Germany and how he was “punishing them” for a war that was not going according to plan.

The White House, Hersh told the German newspaper, was scared that the war might be lost and that Germany and Western Europe would stop supplying the weapons Washington asks them to, with Berlin giving the green light to the pipeline again.

The operation was top secret and the President wasn’t supposed to tell anyone about our ability, “but he likes to chat. He sometimes says things he shouldn’t say,” Hersh said about Biden.

Finally, the investigative journalist talked about the attacks he was subjected to once his story about the United States carrying out the Nord Stream bombing was reported on, as he only had one source who was both anonymous and “unreliable”. He wondered:

How could I talk about my source?

I have written many stories based on uncredited sources. If I named anyone they would be fired or worse, jailed. The law is very strict. I’ve never unmasked anyone, and of course, when I write I say, as I’ve done in this article, that it’s a source, period.


Furthermore, he dismissed the attacks on him as “missing the point,” which is that Biden decided to “let the Germans freeze this winter.”

Hersh accused Biden of preferring a frozen-over Germany rather than a Germany that does not offer support to Ukraine. He said this was “devastating” for the Biden administration.

“The people involved in the operation saw that the President wanted to freeze Germany for his short-term political goals, and that horrified them,” Hersh told the newspaper.

“The CIA, as I put in my article, works for power, not the constitution,” he concluded.

The Pulitzer winner had said last week that U.S. Navy divers had planted explosives to destroy the Nord Stream pipelines in late 2022.

“Last June, the Navy divers, operating under the cover of a widely publicized mid-summer NATO exercise known as BALTOPS 22, planted the remotely triggered explosives that, three months later, destroyed three of the four Nord Stream pipelines, according to a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning,” Hersh wrote in his Substack newsletter.

The White House responded and dismissed the claims as “false and complete fiction.”

Hersh later confirmed to the Russian news agency Sputnik that he authored the investigative report in question.

“Of course,” Hersh told Sputnik when asked whether he authored the article published on a Substack account created shortly before its publication.

Flightradar24 data showed in late September that U.S. military helicopters habitually and on numerous occasions circled for hours over the site of the Nord Stream pipeline incident near Bornholm Island.

A U.S. Navy Sikorsky MH-60R Seahawk helicopter spent hours loitering over the location of the damaged natural gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea near Bornholm for several days in a row, September 1, 2, and 3, in particular.

According to the article, the United States decided to sabotage the pipelines after a lengthy debate that lasted more than nine months inside the U.S. national security community.

“Last June, the Navy divers, operating under the cover of a widely publicized mid-summer NATO exercise known as BALTOPS 22, planted the remotely triggered explosives that, three months later, destroyed three of the four Nord Stream pipelines, according to a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning,” the report read.

The explosions occurred on September 26 at three of the four strings of Nord Stream 1 and 2 underwater pipelines, which are designed to transport a total of 110 billion cubic meters of Russian gas to Europe each year.

Separate investigations were launched by Germany, Denmark, and Sweden into the suspected sabotage, with German media reporting trust issues among the three EU nations. The Russian prosecutor’s office announced an investigation into possible international terrorism.

However, Denmark and Sweden have barred Russia from investigating the attack. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said this exclusion highlighted the West’s double standards.

Additionally, Russian Ambassador to Denmark Vladimir Barbin said Denmark does not provide any information on the progress and results of the investigation into the explosions at the Nord Stream gas pipelines, which raises concerns.

Barbin said that the Danish side was currently not providing any information on the progress and results of the investigation into gas pipeline sabotage.

With the anniversary of the Ukraine war nearing, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was asked about Russia’s plans to mark this date. The Foreign Minister noted that there were many things that need to be remembered and demonstrated that would depict how the U.S. establishes its hegemony.

“We are preparing a sort of a report of what happened this year, what we managed to discover, and this is not only the U.S. military biological programs, from which they are trying to disown, they lie, as always, and not only the direct participation of the United States in the explosions at Nord Stream,” Lavrov said.

https://mronline.org/2023/06/08/u-s-pre ... our-hersh/

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Brawling on the brink: Berlin Bulletin no. 211, June 7, 2023
By Victor Grossman (Posted Jun 07, 2023)

What excited Berliners most in May? Surely soccer! But the reaction was split between “Wessies” and “Ossies”! When a second-to-last-minute goal pushed West Berlin’s legendary “Hertha” team (founded 1892) out of the “top 18” league and down into the second league, with less TV-time, less endorsements, tickets and profits, two-thirds of Berlin groaned. Then East Berlin’s “Union” (no labor union ties but once a GDR team) finally reached so close to the top in that top league (4th) that it can now compete in the European Championships. Thus huge joy, more TV time, more fans, more €€€€!

A different split divided people with a Turkish background (many have dual citizenship), with one and a half million voting at their consulates in Germany for the Turkish elections. Two-thirds, with roots in conservative, religious Anatolian villages, helped Erdogan win while in Berlin, with many professionals, exiles and Kurds, it was fifty-fifty. The vote often reflected less interest in distant politics than a protest at discrimination against those with Turkish names in job hunts, housing or in general.

On a happy note, the 25th “Carnival of Cultures” parade returned to Berlin after a 3-year covid break. Fantastically-costumed dancers, musicians, drummers from twenty nationalities (and from disability groups) snaked, banged or shimmied through Kreuzberg, the most international borough. Lots of color, lots of imagination, no lack of visibly well-shaped bodies (also some less well-shaped) were admired by a few 100,000 on the sunny Sunday. The parades oppose racism, hatred of foreigners, environmental destruction and barbed-wire , tear gas barricading of Europe’s outer borders.

But the weekend was not marked solely by what Germans satirize as “Friede, Freude, Eierkuchen” (“peace, joy, griddle cakes”)! The right to demonstrate peacefully is guaranteed under German law; barely-disguised fascistic marches are not just permitted but protected. But when Palestinians applied for a Berlin rally to commemorate Naqba, the brutal expulsion of at least 750,000 Arabs from their homes and villages in 1948 and all the years since, most recently in East Jerusalem, permission was denied; “It might result in violence or anti-Israel slogans and shouts which could be construed as anti-Semitic.” A small protest rally of Jewish Berliners, many from the Linke party, favoring Palestinian rights, was first permitted (perhaps by mistake), then brutally disrupted by the police and blamed in the media on the befriended (and peaceable) Palestinian guests, misconstruing them as hostile.

Two weeks ago Roger Waters (from the band “Pink Floyd”) gave a big concert in Berlin after failed attempts to prevent him from singing in Frankfurt and Munich based on false, malicious distortions about “a Jewish star on a pig balloon” or his use of a uniform mocking the Nazis. The attacks were really because he opposes Israeli repression of Palestinians and U.S. policies generally. Defying the hypocrisy involved, he countered:

The elements of my performance which were questioned are quite clearly a statement in opposition to fascism, injustice, and bigotry in all its forms… My parents fought the Nazis in World War II, with my father paying the ultimate price.

The concert was sold out!

If not Roger Waters, Berlin’s new Christian Democrat-Social Democrat government could easily find other villains. Avid young adherents of the “Last Generation,” determined to confront the world about continuing destruction of air, earth and water, about climate change and suffocation under mountains of plastic rubble, used methods which angered people instead of winning them, like throwing soup at (glass-protected) masterpieces, smearing buildings or, most upsetting to many, blocking traffic by gluing their hands to the pavement, forcing cops to cut them free. Despite their decision to switch to less anger-provoking methods, cops charged into 15 of their offices in 7 states, also Berlin, hunting for evidence that they were “forming or supporting a criminal organization” (with alarming demands—like lowering speed limits and cheaper rail tickets). Were the raids inspired by Bavarian politicians intent on rescuing their “Christian” party from defeat in their October state elections or one more omen of tightening reins for rougher times ahead? Last Generation’s defiant rejoinder was: “When will they raid the lobby structures and seize the government’s fossil fuel money?”

Tensions were sharply increasing on the national level. The largest member of the governing coalition, the Social Democratic Party, led by Chancellor Olaf Scholz, is torn between seeming socially conscious enough to win back lost working-class support but also proving itself a faithful ally of NATO-USA policy by approving, step by step, every escalation of weaponry and warfare in the Ukraine.

Adding spice with Scholz is a re-awakened scandal about how, as mayor of Hamburg in 2016, he allegedly tipped off the big Warburg bank regarding its tricking the government out of tax money. Was it € 47 mill, € 169 mill—maybe far more? Scholz’ memory somehow failed him about his chats with the head of the bank, but others seem to have better memories, and evidence, which might yet force a skeleton or two out of a cozy closet. Or even a chancellor?

The Greens in the coalition are also trying to revive sagging poll results. Their rescue-the-environment exertions, which meant ending Russian oil and gas imports in favor of far more expensive liquefied gas from North America and costly switches to renewable energy heating systems in most homes are far behind schedule but also hotly attacked as inadequate, overdone or just confused. Nor have their loudest-of-all demands for more and bigger weapons for Ukraine won them many voters. And then their Robert Habeck, who is deputy chancellor, was caught in his own little scandal when it was revealed that his pal, heading a key department job, had lovingly appointed family or friends to other rewarding jobs, with or maybe without Habeck’s knowledge. He may yet survive—to stave off coalition collapse.

The third rub-a-dub-dub man in this leaky tub, Finance Minister Lindner, is head of the smallest partner, the big-biz Free Democrats. He faces no scandals I know of thus far but is strong in black mail pressure against the other two. “Do what we demand or we quit,” he hints, while playing footsie under the table with the Christians, who hope the triple house of cards will fall apart and they can jump in as the winners, just like in Berlin. Their common goal is: “Aid the wealthy, soak the poor!”

But the biggest scandal involves a “Christian”—a privately-managed deal between European Union president Ursula von der Leyen and Pfizer boss Albert Bourla to buy boatloads of anti-corvid vaccine, far too much and now wasting away, but which the EU must pay for. Somehow neither Ursula v.d.L. nor Bourla can find any documents regarding the trifling sum—€ 1.8 billion! Or if they can they’re keeping them well hidden (or shredded). And lurking somewhere in the background is her husband, an expert somehow mysteriously involved with the vaccine market. President Ursula v. d. Leyen could yet land in a Belgian courtroom—or worse. But then, such folks rarely get locked up. That fate is reserved for people like Mumia Abu-Jamal, Leonard Peltier or Julian Assange.

But however these parties, in or out of government, may quarrel and compete, they are quite united in supporting Zelensky’s efforts—and not simply those aimed at defending his country from the Russian invasion.

The Green chair and foreign minister Annalena Baerbock, always aiming to “ruin Russia” made it clearer:

We are fighting a war against Russia…We will hit Putin where the Russian regime must be hit, not only economically and financially but in its power center.

Olaf Scholz again, after urging all-out support for such efforts, stressed that, until victory was won, “We of the European Council must maintain bridges to the representatives of another Russia, another Belarus, and thus the perspective for a democratic, peaceful future for both countries.”

Only rare, unfriendly observers might be heard muttering about “regime change” history or earlier bridges with “peaceful futures“ in places like Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan—or Maidan Square. Such cynics, or hopeless “old leftists,” unmindful of Zelensky-enthusiasm wherever he shows up, worry less about massive government corruption in Kiev than about heroization of wartime killer Stepan Bandera. When Andriy Melnyk, ambassador to Germany, was presented with a Bandera leaflet calling for the annihilation of ”Muscovites, Jews, Poles and Hungarians” and could no longer deny it he snapped: “I am not going to distance myself from it here today. And that’s that!” This was going too far and he had to be recalled from Germany, but was soon appointed Deputy Foreign Minister in Kiev—where the 23-ft heroic statue of Bandera never seems to show up in video reports on visiting dignitaries.

Other items rarely found in the media are references to happy folk like James D. Taiclet, new CEO of Lockheed Martin, whose net worth, estimated at about $360 M, is heading upwards, or Northrup Grumman’s Kathy Warden, whose annual salary already tops $36 million. Not far behind In the second row are Germany‘s armament masters, preservers of long old traditions.

While such men and women rub their hands and grin on the way to the bank (or to background wheelers and dealers like Vanguard and BlackStone), the Ukraine is being wrecked, now flooded! Thousands are dying, millions are suffering and the war is already expanding, with metal and explosives beginning to fly in all directions. The old Ukrainian lady I saw in a recent video said with tears: “We want peace!” The invasion—and the killing—must be stopped! And above all the atomic war danger, ignored by too many good citizens, must be banned! Soon!

Somehow the war dangers are being ignored less in eastern Germany, where perhaps decades of contact with the Soviets, including visits and exchanges, meant that far fewer succumb to mounting campaigns of confrontation ¬¬and pressure to get more deeply involved in a war which “must end in victory,” no matter how much suffering and menace that involves.

But the party which has profited from this unexpected difference is the far-right, quasi-fascist Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has soared up to 18% in national polls, tying with the Social Democrats, ahead of the Greens, while it has achieved top rating at 28% in Saxony and Thuringia and over 25% in the other three eastern, former GDR states. (It is weaker only in Berlin). And elections are looming ahead in three of them.

These far-right gains have various causes: hard times, worsened since Covid by horrific price increases for foods and fuel, lack of affordable homes, soaring rent costs, uncertain job markets, indeed, general disappointment and worry about outlooks for their children, all nourished by distrust of the established parties and their broken promises and demeaning treatment as “poor cousins” from the start—and all augmented by growing fears of possible war.

It has been the AfD which stepped in and made points, advancing itself as the party of protest, of resistance against an “Establishment” which excluded it, and which it opposed in almost everything, even in its sharp anti-Russian development, which had it far easier in West Germany, always built on Russophobia. It also developed local ties in sports groups, volunteer fire departments, jolly concerts, often tolerated or assisted in its violent outliers by local sheriffs, mayors, judges. And always hostile to immigrants, especially non-whites. But it favored a big army, even conscription—and low taxes for the wealthy.

And the Linke? Where was it? Valiant Linke activists put up good fights on some issues, many were active in opposing fascists. But too many, especially those who obtained official positions, had lost militancy and become, for much of the population, just one more wing of the Establishment. Its faithful base, the devoted old-timers who had toiled to build the GDR and regretted its downfall, were dying out by the dozen and polls in East German states, which once gave the Linke over 20%, now stood at about 10%. Even in Thuringia, its stronghold, where it once triumphed with 40%, it is now trembling at 22% and has been overtaken by the most rabid AfD group in all Germany. Except for a freak exception in western Bremen, Germany’s smallest state, where the Linke held on to its long-standing inclusion in coalition rule, the all-German level of the party, hardly 5%, threatens its further existence.

Why, why, why? From the start its pride lay in its being the “one and only party of peace.” This meant voting against sending troops, ships or warplanes to fight in Serbia, Afghanistan, Mali—or any Bundeswehr deployment outside Germany. It meant demanding that the martial, expanding NATO be replaced by a peace alignment extending from Lisbon to Vladivostok.

But over the years it was this issue above all (exacerbated by personal animosities and ambitions) which divided Linke leaders. Too many longed to become respected members of a leftish-leaning national coalition, with Social Democrats , with Greens (and with cabinet seats). The chances for that were never strong, but were non-existent unless the Linke dropped its opposition to NATO and foreign deployments.

Some, like government head Bodo Ramelow in Thuringia and Berlin city leaders, said: “After all, in politics compromises are sometimes necessary.” The left opposition in the party said:

No! Such a retreat breaks with our basic stand; that German policy, especially foreign policy, is still being determined by the same giant forces which waged World War One, built up Hitler and waged World War Two, also in unity with similar forces elsewhere and above all in the USA. Compromises on these basic issues would deprive the Linke of its status as a socialist party, opposed to German imperialism, indeed of its entire meaning. They are impossible!

Some daring souls even pointed to names like Krupp, Siemens, Bayer and BASF, Daimler, BMW, Allianz Insurance and Deutsche Bank and recalled the words of the socialist Karl Liebknecht in 1915, during World War One: “The main enemy is in your own country!” (Four years later, like Rosa Luxemburg, he was murdered for such radical views and actions.)

With internal dissension already dividing the Linke and detracting from street-level militancy on basic working-class issues, the war in Ukraine sent it really spinning! At last year’s party congress the “reformers” won most leadership positions and, with a 60-40 % majority, basically approved Germany’s course, joining Washington and NATO in full support of Zelensky and a continuation of the war until Putin is forced back to pre-2014 positions. It did not succeed in canceling the LINKE program point rejecting weapons shipments, but Ramelow and his friends try to forget or ignore it.

A major breaking point arrived in February, when the party’s best orator, its most popular and most controversial figure, Sahra Wagenknecht, joined with Germany’s most famous feminist, Alice Schwarzer, to frame a manifesto calling on both sides for a cease-fire and peace negotiations in Ukraine. It soon had over 750,000 signatures and led to a rally at Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, which amazed friend and foe by drawing an enthusiastic crowd, most likely over 50,000.

But, just as amazingly, or disgracefully, the Linke leadership nationally and in Berlin not only refused to join in but advised members (luckily in vain) neither to sign nor take part. Why? Like most of the media they charged that leaders of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) also supported the manifesto and the rally. True enough, some far rightists do support Putin and oppose aid to Zelensky, also in France and elsewhere, either to oppose any and every official line, to win over pro-peace voters in East Germany, possibly even to discredit any active peace movement. Who knows? Wagenknecht and Schwarzer welcomed all people wanting peace, rejected any support from the far right, but could hardly forbid “undesirables” from adding their names to the 750,000 signing a public manifesto or from joining a huge outdoor rally. At the latter, a small group of rightists at one far corner of the crowd were peaceably blocked off and isolated. Totally unnoticed by the giant majority, they were headlined by the hostile press and even magnified by “reformer-Linke,” who had organized no peace rallies at all but used their ink or vocal power to distance themselves from this rally because of allegedly invasive fascists and their supposed “toleration” by the organizers. The real reason, without doubt: Such a manifesto and rally would alienate potential Green and Social Democratic partners!

Dismayed members of the Linke responded differently to the twisted opposition to this biggest peace rally in decades. Not a few, some of them prominent, simply quit the party. There were countless angry letters to the few left or leftish periodicals. But far more dramatically, Sahra Wagenknecht raised the possibility of breaking away, of forming a new party to fight militantly for workers’ rights, for peace and a new foreign policy. A newspaper poll found surprisingly that large percentages of Linke voters, but also people from other parties, even in West Germany, even many who had switched to the AfD, might consider voting for a party with Sahra.

Others, like Gregor Gysi, the party’s first leader, in fact its savior in 1989, warned that with none of the offices, resources and connections of the existing party and without even a rudimentary organization, such a break-away would almost certainly mean the demise of both old and new left parties, leaving Germany’s rulers in total, unchallenged control—with no real organized opposition.

At a meeting on May 6th in Hannover about 250 angry delegates met to debate strategy, with Sahra speaking to them briefly per video. Despite many hot-headed demands for a break, there was enough realism present to put off any decision but try to establish a network of leftists genuinely opposed to German imperialism, militarism, expansion and monopoly rule. They would prioritize pressure for negotiations in Ukraine—and against any and every escalation.

There are signs that some party leaders, including both chairpersons and the two Linke caucus chairs in the Bundestag, awed by the Berlin rally and facing fears of a total, fatal split, are trying to reach some kind of truce, at least until the elections to the European Parliament a year from now.

But a decision is due earlier, quite likely at the party congress in November. And while various leftist platforms, circles and groups seek common ground while leaving the door ajar for the always mysterious Sahra, who still avoids concrete plans (and said, perhaps in jest, that she might even retire from active politics), the other side has not been idle. About 40 from the “reformer” wing, deceptively calling themselves “Network of Progressive Leftists,” met on June 3rd in Berlin. No doubt still alarmed by the angry response to their rebuff of the peace rally, and by reports on Wagenknecht’s popularity, their meeting was devoted to nipping all such threats in the bud.

During all the years of disagreement and quarrelling and despite bitter losses in nearly every election in east or west, these same people persistently avoided any in-depth analyses but instead blamed only “stubborn old leftists,” “GDR-apologists” or “outdated Marxists” who reject coalitions, denounce NATO and currently stress peace negotiations instead, like everybody else, of demanding the defeat of Putin’s imperialism. As always their attacks centered on Sahra, with some demanding that she give up her seat in the Bundestag or that she and her backers, whom they mislabel, again deceptively, as the “left conservative camp,” should somehow be punished or excluded before the party congress. Such extreme demands were not maintained but it was clear; the months ahead can be tough and confrontational. It is they whose hold on most leadership positions, offices, publications, websites and financial resources provide a strong position. But so many members are dissatisfied with the leaders’ lack of militancy or principles and fear further catastrophic election defeats that the tables could be turned. In which case it could be the reformers who do the quitting.

Can the party be saved? As with leftist parties in other countries, its problems are closely related to world events, above all the war in Ukraine, and to the success or failure of China, Brazil and countries of the south to defy all the warriors and move toward peace, hopefully aided by growing grassroots pressure in Europe and America.

Starting June 12th, 250 war planes from 20 countries, including F-35 jet fighters manned by 10,000 soldiers from the USA will be roaring and zooming over East German fields and forests. The largest air maneuvers in NATO history will be to “test how quickly American war planes can be deployed to Europe” and to practice “the defense of NATO air space.” That explains why the maneuver is named “Air Defender 2023”. Can any sane person read this item without foreboding—and fear of where such a “defense exercise” can be leading?

How proper it would be to organize at least one or two protests, even modest ones, but with all sides of the Linke, with many groups and grouplets in the peace movement, and many, many unorganized people turning not to fear but to determination! Yes, I know, I am an eternal optimist.

P.S. Just before mailing out this Bulletin, I read that Die Linke has officially called for demonstrations against the maneuvers, and adding that the planned protest will be visible from the sky. Christine Buchholz, a member of its executive committee, writes:

Threatening gestures against a nuclear power on the brink of a terrible war are risky and extremely dangerous. A major war would bring immeasurable suffering to large parts of the world. We stand with those who are suffering from war and its consequences all over the world. War is always part of the problem, not the solution. The Left calls for a ceasefire as soon as possible and the withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukrainian territory. NATO’s escalation is NATO’s wrong response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its continued escalation. NATO’s aim is to strengthen its position in the face of global shifts in power. The war in Ukraine is being used by its member states as a pretext to push ahead with the militarization of politics and set in motion a new arms race.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I also watched the latest reports from Ukraine—including today’s statement by Janine Wissler, co-chair of the Left, condemning the horrifying Dnepr dam destruction and calling for humanitarian aid and increased efforts for peace. She is evidently convinced that the Russians are to blame.

The destruction of the Kakhovka Dam means a further escalation in a terrible war in which the Russian army continues to attack Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure. With this attack, the death of thousands of civilians was at least approvingly accepted. This is a terrible war crime. The Russian army must immediately stop attacks on infrastructure and withdraw troops. What is needed now is rapid humanitarian aid. Everything must be done now to end this war as soon as possible. First of all, we need to negotiate protection zones to protect nuclear power plants, dams, hospitals and other civilian infrastructure and to prevent humanitarian, ecological and nuclear disasters.

When will we know the truth?

Here are some random older and contradictory quotations which still might be seen as relevant:

Pres. John F. Kennedy, June 10 1963 (exactly 60 years ago):

Above all, while defending our own vital interests, nuclear powers must avert those confrontations which bring an adversary to a choice of either a humiliating retreat or a nuclear war. To adopt that kind of course in the nuclear age would be evidence only of the bankruptcy of our policy—or of a collective death-wish for the world.

***

Williams J. Burns, Ambassador to Russia, now CIA-director, February 1, 2008 /secret cable):

Ukraine and Georgia’s NATO aspirations not only touch a raw nerve in Russia, they engender serious concerns about the consequences for stability in the region. Not only does Russia perceive encirclement, and efforts to undermine Russia’s influence in the region, but it also fears unpredictable and uncontrolled consequences which would seriously affect Russian security interests. Experts tell us that Russia is particularly worried that the strong divisions in Ukraine over NATO membership, with much of the ethnic-Russian community against membership, could lead to a major split, involving violence or at worst, civil war. In that eventuality, Russia would have to decide whether to intervene; a decision Russia does not want to have to face.

***

Pres. William J. Clinton, June 1, 1997 (at WestPoint):

The bottom line to me is clear; expanding NATO will enhance our security. It is the right thing to do. We must not fail history’s challenge at this moment to build a Europe peaceful, democratic, undivided, allied with us to face the new security threats of a new century… NATO enlargement is in our national interests… But because it is not without cost and risk, it is appropriate to have an open, full, national I firmly believe NATO enlargement is in our national interests. But because it is not without cost and risk, it is appropriate to have an open, full, national discussion before proceeding.

***

Petition to Pres. William J. Clinton, June 26, 1997: Signed by 44 prominent retirees, including cabinet secretaries like Robert McNamara, ex-CIA boss Stansfield Turner, senators like Sam Nunn (D.) and Gordon Humphrey (R.), ambassadors, generals, governors and professors, as well as noted anti-Communists like Richard Pipes and Paul H. Nitze:

Dear Mr. President, We, the undersigned, believe that the current U.S. led effort to expand NATO, the focus of the recent Helsinki and Paris Summits, is a policy error of historic proportions. We believe that NATO expansion will decrease allied security and unsettle European stability … will involve U.S. security guarantees to countries with serious border and national minority problems, and unevenly developed systems of democratic government…

Russia does not now pose a threat to its western neighbors and the nations of Central and Eastern Europe are not in danger. For this reason, and the others cited above, we believe that NATO expansion is neither necessary nor desirable and that this ill-conceived policy can and should be put on hold….


***

Mairead Maguire, Irish Nobel Peace Prize Winner, July 9, 2022:

NATO—the U.S.-dominated global war machine—whose policy is ‘full dominance spectrum,’ contrary to its claims, is not a defensive organization. Its purpose has been to act as an instrument for U.S. world domination and to prevent all challenges to U.S. hegemony. It should have been disbanded in 1991 after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, but instead expanded into 15 new countries…

This relentless eastward expansion of NATO during the past decade has been an existential threat to a nuclear armed Russia and the main cause of the present military conflict in Ukraine. Russia’s military intervention into Ukraine should never have happened and the suffering inflicted upon the Ukrainian people (and Russian) has been horrific and it is right all those who have suffered so much should be helped. However, sending arms into Ukraine only adds fuel to the fire.


***

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, February 19, 1998, Washington:

It is the threat of the use of force and our line-up there (in Iraq) that is going to put force behind the diplomacy. But if we have to use force, it is because we are America; we are the indispensable nation. We stand tall and we see further than other countries into the future, and we see the danger here to all of us. I know that the American men and women in uniform are always prepared to sacrifice for freedom, democracy and the American way of life.

https://mronline.org/2023/06/07/brawlin ... ne-7-2023/

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Weapons cargo bound for Ukraine is loaded onto a C-17 Globemaster III during a security assistance mission at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware, Aug. 19, 2022. The Department of Defense is providing Ukraine with critical capabilities to defend against Russian aggression under the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative. (U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Cydney Lee)

How weapons firms influence the Ukraine debate
Originally published: Responsible Statecraft on June 1, 2023 by Ben Freeman (more by Responsible Statecraft) (Posted Jun 08, 2023)

“To be brutal about it, we need to see masses of Russians fleeing, deserting, shooting their officers, taken captive, or dead. The Russian defeat must be an unmistakably big, bloody shambles.…To that end, with the utmost urgency, the West should give everything that Ukraine could possibly use,” argues Eliot Cohen in The Atlantic.

What neither Cohen, who also famously pushed for the U.S. invasion of Iraq, nor The Atlantic acknowledge in the article is that most of the weapons Cohen mentions in the article–including long-range missiles, F-16s, and even F-35s–are made by funders of Cohen’s employer, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

While this might seem like a glaring conflict of interest that, at the very least, should be disclosed in the article, a new Quincy Institute brief that I authored, “Defense Contractor Funded Think Tanks Dominate Ukraine Debate,” shows that this article isn’t an exception; it’s the norm. America’s top foreign policy think tanks are awash in funding from the defense industry. They’ve dominated the media market related to the Ukraine war, and they seldom, if ever, disclose that many of the weapons they’re recommending the U.S. give to Ukraine are made by their funders.

In short, when you hear a think tank scholar comment on the Ukraine war, chances are you’re hearing from someone whose employer is funded by those who profit from war, but you’ll probably never know it. That’s because 78 percent of the top ranked foreign policy think tanks in the U.S. receive funding from the Pentagon or its contractors, as documented in the new brief.

At the very top, defense industry influence is even greater: every single one of the top 10 ranked foreign policy think tanks receives funding from the defense sector. And, for many think tanks, the amount of defense funding is enormous. For example, CSIS, the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), and The Atlantic Council all reported receiving more than a million dollars a year from the defense sector.

These and other think tanks that receive considerable defense sector funding have publicly advocated for more militarized U.S. responses to the Ukraine war and, compared to their counterparts at think tanks that accept little or no defense sector funding, have dominated the media landscape related to the Ukraine war.

The new brief analyzed mentions of these top ranked foreign policy think tanks in Ukraine war related articles that appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. This analysis revealed that media outlets were more than seven times as likely to cite a think tank with defense sector support as they were to cite a think tank without it. Of the 1,247 think tank media mentions we tracked for the brief, 1,064 (or 85 percent) were mentions of think tanks with defense sector funding. And, the two most mentioned think tanks in Ukraine war related articles were think tanks flooded with defense sector dollars: CSIS and The Atlantic Council.

Yet, we only know the extent of CSIS and the Atlantic Council’s funding from the defense sector because both think tanks are commendably transparent about their donors and list all funders, within funding ranges, on their websites. Unfortunately, many of the nation’s top think tanks aren’t as forthcoming. In fact, the new brief found that nearly one third of the top U.S. foreign policy think tanks do not publicly disclose their donors. This included some of the most mentioned think tanks in media articles about the Ukraine war, like the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Though AEI scholars have disclosed at public events that the organization receives funding from defense contractors, the organization does not list its donors on its website.

Media outlets were, similarly, not transparent about the conflicts of interest of the experts they were citing. In fact, none of the media mentions analyzed in the brief were accompanied by disclosures of defense industry funding of think tanks that were, at times, recommending policies that could financially benefit their funders.

All of this points to several clear recommendations for reform.

First, Congress should mandate that think tanks disclose their funders. Given think tanks’ prominent role in the policymaking process and the enormous amounts of money they receive from the defense industry, foreign governments, and other special interests, it’s imperative that the public and policymakers know who is funding the think tank expert they’re hearing from.

Second, media outlets should report any potential conflicts of interest with sources they’re citing about major U.S. foreign policy decisions. As the brief notes,

By not providing this information media outlets are deceiving their readers, listeners, or viewers.

Given the growing chorus of research documenting how think tank funding influences think tank work, the very least media outlets can do is let their readers know when a source might be biased, especially when they’re commenting on questions of war and peace.

https://mronline.org/2023/06/08/how-wea ... ne-debate/
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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Fri Jun 09, 2023 11:47 am

The GUR in Belgorod oblast
POSTED BY @NSANZO ⋅ 06/09/2023

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A post uploaded to the Facebook profile of the General Directorate of Military Intelligence of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense of Ukraine (GUR) on June 6 highlights the approaches that inspire the action of the volunteer battalions, both Ukrainian and foreign, acting under its command.

One of the main concerns of the GUR is to provoke, in an absolutely artificial way, a political-military conflict within the Russian Federation. According to the accidental spokesman for the GUR now that Budanov seems to have disappeared from the media space, Andriy Yusov, representing Ukrainian military intelligence, now " the Kremlin uses the internal reserves of its army to suppress the rebels, but it is no longer possible to hide this conflict ”. This is the answer given on Ukrainian television to a question about events that could occur in the future in Russia.

Furthering his theorization of the internal bankruptcy of the Russian Federation, Yusov describes the situation as follows: « In recent months, these events have only gained momentum. The geography of rebel activities is increasing, the number of participants in these actions is increasing, and finally we have to consider not only individual events in the Belgorod region. Taken together, the so-called Russian Federation is today an incapable state with a large number of conflicts . Yusov, like Podolyak in his usual mentions of the exploits in Belgorod, prefers to ignore that these rebel activities are directed, organized, financed and armed by, from and for Ukraine.

In its strategy of creating an internal confrontation in the Russian Federation, the GUR, as Yusov points out, tries to take advantage of the fact that Ukraine is fighting with all its mobilized forces, plus the support of groups of foreign volunteers, all of them with Western weapons, against a country that tries to face the war without resorting to a general mobilization. The GUR representative thus reflects the contradiction from which he benefits so much: “ The central government is inadequate and the events in the Belgorod region prove it. All that is capable of combat is concentrated in the occupied Ukrainian territories…. the Kremlin is currently not transferring troops from Ukraine, but is trying to limit itself to the internal resources of the Russian Federation”. The result, according to Yusov, is that in " on the territory of Russia itself [there is] disorder, chaos, lawlessness and lawlessness ." That is why he hopes that this type of conflict could spread " in different parts of this territory that is now called the Russian Federation ", including " the capital region of Russia ".

The lawlessness and disorder that exists in the Belgorod region, and that Ukraine aspires to recreate in other regions, is simply what Kiev has sent there in the form of armed groups on Western equipment and the "lawlessness" is simply the absence of military garrisons in civilian villages in the border area which Ukraine attacks using even artillery. The militarization of society that has occurred in Ukraine over the past decade has not been replicated in Russia, something Kiev is now taking advantage of by using these GUR-led rebel militias .

The ultimate goal of the GUR goes beyond, in any case, the momentum of the confrontation in Russia. The intention is to force the return to the Russian Federation of part of the forces present in the disputed territories in Ukraine to face the new Ukrainian incursions. According to Yusov, “ the fact that they are already using their own armed forces, including army aviation and artillery, is already a proven fact and, consequently, the Putin regime simply cannot continue to hide that nothing is happening” . As was the case in 2014 and has been since then, Ukraine blames the Ukrainian artillery attacks on Russia, which is again attacking itself as it has done in Donbass during the DPR and PRL war years.

What Yusov describes, at least in relation to the events observed in the Belgorod region, is nothing but the activity of the personnel at the service of Ukrainian intelligence. Since the start of the full-scale war in February 2022, this activity has grown in crescendo, moving from ad hoc and covert reconnaissance and sabotage actions to structured penetration initiatives into the Russian Federation, designed to gain a presence in and control the territory. . It counts for this with certain special forces, made up of battalions of foreign volunteers, including at least the Russian RDK and Freedom Legion, the Belarusian BDK and the Polish PKO. Battalions of Ukrainian volunteers work alongside them, such as Bratstvo or Stugna, who also stand out for having their own foreign legion .

Precisely, a novelty of the recent attacks on the Belgorod oblast by the GUR is the direct presence of soldiers of the Polish PKO (Polski Korpus Ochotniczy). The PKO published a series of videos on its Telegram, later deleted, in which its presence is clear among the groups of soldiers who entered the Kozinka-Gráivoron area of ​​the Russian Federation at the end of May. Some of the images show that the group was able to participate under the RDK banner, but with the PKO insignia clearly visible on the uniforms. Images of the PKO at the border checkpoint, on the Russian side, confirm their presence in Russia. According to credible sources, it would be the first assault group of the PKO (with other groups in Artyomovsk).

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Part of one of the videos uploaded by the PKO to its Telegram, with images of the soldiers of the Polish Corps, their insignia visible. These videos show the action of the GUR groups around the Russian control building in the border part of Kozinka-Gráivoron

There are also indications of the presence in the performance in Belgorod of regular fighters in the actions of the GUR such as Commander Ivanov, of the Belarusian BDK, or of Ukrainian militants such as the Commander of Bratstvo, Oleksyi, and his partner Vita Zaveruja, a well-known person. for those who have followed the story of the war in Ukraine since 2014.

According to Yusov , in the areas occupied by his special forces, they would have assumed the role of "armed self-defense" of their fellow citizens against the regime , a mockery to define what in reality is nothing more than an army of sabotage and destruction. The GUR discourse goes through affirming that support for the rebels would be increasing " among local residents who ask for protection " , a support that exists only in the minds of Ukrainian propagandists as a psychological weapon of destabilization. The latest images and messages on behalf of the RDK in Novaya Travolzhanka lead to questions about whether this implies the possible resort to summary executions of soldiers from the Russian Federation.

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Ukrainian forces before the body of a Russian soldier in a "ditch".

According to Russian sources, the apparently final battle with the GUR special forces around Novaya Tavolzhanka would have concluded on the 6th with the withdrawal of all Ukrainian troops from Belgorod Oblast, according to Governor Gladkov. In fact, on the 7th, Ria Novosti was present in the village, basically deserted and with great damage caused by the Ukrainian artillery. Ukraine also does not control, as these days media related to the most radical groups of Ukrainian nationalism have claimed, a part of the Belgorod region.

But the final combat on days 4 to 6 reflects the military cost that Ukraine is willing to make the Russian Federation pay with the penetration actions that it has planned and that, in all probability, will continue. Available information shows that, despite the recovery of Russian control over much of the terrain (with a residual presence of GUR military personnel in the forests near the border), the action of Ukrainian artillery in the Shebekino-Novaya area Tavolzhanka is not finished. As long as the means provided by Western partners flow, Ukraine will continue its activity on all fronts. That of the Russian Federation seems to have been left open without its allies having conveyed any substantial criticism.



Google Translator

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Independent Nord Stream Expedition Discovers Clue Missed by Official Investigators
JUNE 7, 2023

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Drone footage of a black and orange boot that resembles a model used by both US Navy and commercial divers. Photo: The Grayzone.

By Jeffrey Brodsky – Jun 5, 2023

The Grayzone participated in what appears to be the first independent expedition investigating the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines. Near one of the blast sites, we discovered a diving boot used by US Navy divers. How did Swedish investigators miss this?
(video at link)
Video above by Agnes Andersson.

On the evening of May 24, 2023, I stood aboard a small ship called the Baltic Explorer. With sun still high overhead in the Baltic Sea, our boat sat anchored thirty-one nautical miles from the coast of Denmark, and directly above the ruptured Nord Stream 2 pipeline in the exclusive economic zone of Sweden.

For several minutes, I stared at a live video feed from an underwater drone showing never-before-seen footage of the ruptures in the pipeline. Suddenly, a strange object appeared on the screen. It was a black and orange diver’s boot.

The Grayzone has identified a model which closely resembles this boot, and is used by both US Navy and commercial divers. Ukrainian Navy divers have also been seen wearing similar boots.

We have also learned that the boot’s presence had been previously reported to investigators, yet they have not collected it or divulged its existence.



(video at link)
Video of the boot filmed by drone from the Baltic Explorer.

A new clue on the Baltic Sea floor
What took place on September 26, 2022 shattered the placid atmosphere that usually prevails on the Baltic Sea. On that day, as the war in Ukraine deepened, four explosions ruptured the $23 billion Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines that carried natural gas from Russia to Europe. It was the most severe act of industrial sabotage in human history, severing the main artery for affordable energy from Russia to Germany – cheap energy that was critical to maintaining Germany’s industrial base.

Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 each consist of two pipes. Three of them were ruptured. One line of Nord Stream 2 remains intact.

Sweden, Denmark and Germany have conducted investigations, but with the exception of an early Swedish assessment that the explosions were probably caused by ​“gross sabotage,” their findings have yet to publicized.

Now, more than eight months later, a new clue has been revealed in one of the most urgent geopolitical mysteries of the century.

The boot spotted on our expedition bears a striking resemblance to those worn by US Navy divers.

Ukraine’s US-trained Navy divers have also been spotted using the same model, or one which is virtually identical. It should be noted, however, that boots of similar appearance appear to be commercially available as well.

Does this offer a clue about the identity of the perpetrators of the Nord Stream attack? Obviously, further investigation into the boot’s provenance is required, but its location and brand appear to be significant.

In late May, Swedish engineer Erik Andersson obtained access to blast sites along both the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines, in both the exclusive economic zones of Sweden and Denmark. In the course of our expedition to the blast sites, The Grayzone has obtained sonar images and underwater drone images and videos that have never been seen by the public before.

Swedish and Danish maritime authorities were notified about the expedition. As a precautionary measure, the organizer of the expedition filed an application with the Swedish Defense Authority for permission to publish the expedition’s never-before-seen high-resolution sonar images.

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Fig. 1. The path of the Baltic Explorer, the expedition’s boat. The red symbols indicate the Nord Stream blast sites. Source: MarineTraffic. Photo: The Grayzone.
The boot was spotted approximately five meters from the small leak site in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline in the Swedish exclusive economic zone. It was a few minutes before 7:00 p.m on May 24, 2023 when our expedition’s underwater drone caught sight of it.

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Fig. 2 The boot spotted by the expedition’s drone. Photo: The Grayzone.

It is unknown for how long the boot had been exposed on the seafloor (as seen in Fig. 2). Andersson, the organizer of the expedition, believes it is possible the boot was previously covered by sediment or mud which may have been moved by underwater currents or the blasts. Otherwise, it is unclear how investigators could have missed it.

The boot closely resembles the Thor diver overboot produced by Northern Diver, a British company whose products are produced in China.

“This looks like a Thor overboot,” Neil Tordoff, the military and commercial sales director at Northern Diver, stated after viewing a photo of the boot sent by The Grayzone. “I can’t be 100% sure.”

Tordoff said Northern Diver no longer manufactures this boot due to disruptions in production brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic.

“If it’s the Thor over boot, this was used and is still used in the oil and gas industry for divers. It’s part of a dry-diving suit that would normally be used in contaminated water to keep the diver safe,” Tordoff explained.

“This item is used worldwide,” he added.

The owner of the boot may have been a diver who lost it while planting the bombs. Alternatively, the boot may belong to a diver ordered back to the crime scene to retrieve the unexploded charge meant for the intact line of Nord Stream 2 – a theory proposed by Seymour Hersh. Or perhaps it belonged to a commercial diver.

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Fig. 3. A US Navy diver wearing the boots in a training exercise. Photo: The Grayzone.

The organizer of the expedition, Andersson, contacted the Nord Stream 2 AG company (NS2 AG) to inquire about the boot. A representative of the company confirmed the presence of the object.

“I had a long conversation [with NS2 AG on May 30],” Andersson explained. They “clearly deny that there had ever been any diving for construction or pipe maintenance in the area.”

Andersson was also told by NS2 AG that the company had “discovered the boot in February and reported it to the Swedish investigators.”

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Fig. 4. A close-up of the US Navy diver boot (left) and the boot spotted on the expedition (right). Photo: The Grayzone.

The HMS Belos, a submarine rescue and diving vessel of the Swedish navy, scoured the leak sites in October 2022. For more than eight hours, on two separate days, in early and then late October, the ship sat stationary over the location where the boot was spotted.
Why have the Swedish investigators neglected to collect the boot or even mention it in any of their public statements? At the time of publication, The Grayzone has received no response to an email requesting clarification from them.

A source in contact with The Grayzone spoke with a Belos diver who denied that the boot had been worn by any of their divers. The diver reportedly said it is possible that its wearer might not have noticed its absence.

A Belos diver involved in the Swedish investigation and NS2 AG representatives maintain they played no role in the boot’s appearance.

Who bombed Nord Stream?
This February, veteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh cited a “a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning” of a covert operation conducted by the CIA in partnership with Norway, a key NATO partner state, to destroy the Nord Stream pipelines. A handful of self-described open-source intelligence (OSINT) researchers claimed to have “debunked” the revelations in Hersh’s report, but it’s since become apparent that some of the claims initially made by OSINT researchers may have been exaggerated.

Sweden’s Expressen reported in May 2023 that the relevance of the observed Russian vessels had been “dismissed,” and is “no longer considered interesting for the German investigators.” According to Expressen, the ships’ “positions have been mapped and the conclusion must be that they have not been in such a place that they could have carried out the deed.”

For now, German investigators seem to be focused on the Andromeda, a private yacht which they suspect was rented by a small team of pro-Ukrainian militants to transport explosives to the Nord Stream pipelines.

Through our expedition to the sites of the Nord Stream pipelines attack, The Grayzone has obtained images and videos that have never been seen by the public. The sonar images and underwater drone videos and images may offer insight into the amount of explosives used in the sabotage and their placement.

For now, we are left to wonder why Swedish investigators have yet to publicly demonstrate any interest in a boot found close to a Nord Stream blast site. It remains to be seen whether the item might offer a clue into the identity of the attack’s perpetrators.

(The Grayzone)

https://orinocotribune.com/independent- ... stigators/

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HOW AMERICAN BANKS AND INVESTMENT FUNDS MAKE MONEY IN UKRAINE
June 6, 2023 , 4:38 p.m.

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Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky met with senior members of the world's largest investment bank, JP Morgan (Photo: Ukrainian Presidency)

In February 2023, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky met with the leadership of JP Morgan, one of the largest investment banks in the United States and the world. The parties discussed financing for the "recovery" of Ukraine.

As with the BlackRock fund , JP Morgan's activities in that country are an effective scheme to embezzle state assets and exploit them in the interests of Western countries.

In 2019, an investment bank directly lent about $350 million to the cash-strapped Ukrainian government by buying back the country's Eurobonds. Now we are talking about creating an investment platform, which implies a much higher volume of business.

The bonds are collateralized by state assets, that is, infrastructure facilities, thermal and nuclear power plants, agricultural and manufacturing companies.

Given the current state of the economy, Ukrainian Eurobonds are not redeemable, which is what big investors like JP Morgan take advantage of. If the Ukrainian government does not pay the Eurobonds, the state assets will become the property of the bank. And this is a very likely scenario as the Slavic country's budget deficit is now covered by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Who else is involved in the purchase of Ukrainian state assets? The American private investment fund management company Vanguard Group is buying them under the pretext of financial aid to the kyiv regime.

At the end of April 2023, news began to arrive that the Ukrainian state-owned oil and natural gas production, transportation and processing company, Naftogaz, was in talks with the giants Chevron, ExxonMobil and Halliburton to sell their assets . As a result, control of that nation's entire oil and gas sector will fall into the hands of these companies.

Despite the appearance of competition, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Halliburton are united by the Vanguard finance company, which owns a majority of the shares of the first three and, in fact, controls and directs their activities. After acquiring the assets of Ukrainian energy companies, Vanguard will become a monopoly in the country's oil and gas sector.

Vanguard is not the first time trying to enter the Ukrainian market. Between 2020 – when Zelensky signed the law that opened up the land market – and 2022, Monsanto, Cargill and Dupont, whose main shareholders are Vanguard along with Blackrock, seized almost 17 million hectares of arable land in Ukraine, approximately 52 % of all agricultural land in the country.

https://misionverdad.com/como-los-banco ... en-ucrania

FBI HELPS UKRAINE SPY ON AND CENSOR TWITTER USERS
Jun 7, 2023 , 4:10 p.m.

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Of the 163 accounts named by the SBU, 34 were suspended and 20 no longer exist (Photo: Reuters)

A report by Aaron Maté , a journalist for The Grayzone , reveals that the FBI works in collusion with Ukrainian intelligence to censor social media users and obtain their personal information.

According to leaked emails from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, in March last year, when the war was just beginning, a special agent of the US agency sent a list of "suspected fear-mongers" to Twitter on behalf of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). ), Ukraine's main intelligence agency.

In an attached memo, the SBU asked Twitter to remove the accounts and hand over their user data. That list included the journalist from The Grayzone who wrote the story. In response, Twitter agreed to review the accounts for "inauthenticity" but expressed concern about the inclusion of me and other "American and Canadian journalists."

Maté argues that this FBI move is among the most overt censorship requests to date of the notorious Twitter Files , a cache of leaked communications from the social media giant.

Their investigation revealed that the FBI blacklisting request was transmitted in an email dated March 27, 2022, by FBI Special Agent Aleksandr Kobzanets, Deputy Legal Attache at the US Embassy. Of the 163 accounts named by the SBU, 34 were suspended and 20 no longer exist

It is shown that the persecution went beyond the Ukrainian borders as the telephone number, date of birth and email address of politicians and independent journalists from the Western narrative who covered the war were requested.

https://misionverdad.com/fbi-ayuda-ucra ... de-twitter

Google Translator

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From Cassad's telegram account:

Colonelcassad
Sergei Kiriyenko, First Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration of the Russian Federation, visited the Zaporizhzhya NPP and personally made sure that the plant is functioning normally - there is no threat to its further operation. The water intake and cooling system are operating normally.

The undermining of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station led to instability in the information environment - the TsIPSO began to weave intrigues around "potential threats" to the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, trying to inject fakes among citizens. The station was visited by Sergey Kiriyenko, First Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration of the Russian Federation - he personally made sure that the water intake and cooling of the station were operating normally.

Kiriyenko also spoke with employees and experts, who explained that in case of any of the potential situations, he had long ago provided an answer - there is a filled reservoir near the Zaporizhzhya NPP in case of urgent need. In the reservoir itself, the water has already ceased to decrease. This is another reason why all statements about alleged threats to the operation of the Zaporizhzhya NPP due to the destruction of the Kakhovskaya HPP should be treated with skepticism.

***

Colonelcassad
0:39

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On the destruction of the radar of the IRIS-T complex Last evening, the

previously announced video of the defeat of the TRML-4D radar from the IRIS-T anti-aircraft missile system with the Lancet loitering ammunition appeared on the Web . The footage shows the arrival of a drone in the upper part of the station's lattice box.

Coordinates: Although the defeat of the SAM launcher with missile containers would be more striking, a hit on the detection system is no less effective and at least partially disables the entire IRIS-T battery . It is the radar that is responsible for searching, identifying and indicating targets. Without it, the launcher, in the absence of a backup station or a full-fledged layered air defense, is actually blind. It is curious that the position of the complex was near the settlement46.932486, 32.796120

***

Colonelcassad
Over the past day, the situation remained tense in the Bakhmutsky ( Artemovsky ) direction, where from the side of the right flank, in the Berkhovka area , the enemy continued active offensive operations in the direction of the section of the E40 highway . Despite the statements of the Russian Ministry of Defense that "the Armed Forces of Ukraine unsuccessfully tried to break through the defense of the RF Armed Forces near Bakhmut" , the situation in this area is more than complicated.

Having carried out reconnaissance in force in the strip from Velikaya Novoselovka to Ugledar , the enemy continued to draw up reserves, using the railway message channel for transferring ( no comment, as they say, the voice has already broken on this account). And in this sense, our worst forecasts are confirmed by the words of the head of the Wagner Group PMC, E.V. Prigozhin, that the attack of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the direction of Mariupol has already begun.

In the Zaporozhye direction , despite the repulsed attacks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Orekhovsky sector , the enemy continues to wedge into the depths of our defense with the forces of units of the 10th Army Corps ( as part of the 115th, 116th, 117th and 118th separate mechanized brigades ), trying to secure a foothold for the deployment of the main forces. Obviously, in case of success and a breach of the first line of defense, he will be able to start moving towards Tokmak and Melitopol , with the prospect of a strike towards Berdyansk . APU concentrates the blow preciselyin the Orekhovskoye direction , trying to provoke the command of the RF Armed Forces to pull additional forces here from other sectors.

The Western press understands that the official sources of information in Russia have discredited themselves in the eyes of the broad masses and do not want ( or can no longer ) get out of this trend. Therefore, the media in the US and EU countries continue to reassure us in the style of a bioenergy therapist, popularizing the idea that “things are going very badly with the counteroffensive in Kiev” .

At the same time, yesterday a number of publications, including The Washington Post, emphasized that if the Armed Forces of Ukraine are defeated, the NATO command does not exclude the possibility of sending its contingent to the territory of Ukraine.

Nevertheless, the information that comes from the field, as well as the analysis of the nature of the actions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, give every reason to predict the further development of the offensive by the enemy.

***

Colonelcassad
What is known about the offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine at the moment: analysis of the military chronicle

Ukrainian troops are conducting offensive operations for the fourth day, but it is still premature to say that the fighting has reached its peak.

Is this already an offensive or is it still reconnaissance in force?

As a rule, the combat formations of troops are covered by air defense forces. For the Armed Forces of Ukraine, as for an army of the post-Soviet type, where ground forces are of decisive importance, the protection of troops by air defense forces is the key to successful operations both in defense and in attack. The movement of air defense systems became one of the clear signs of preparation for the offensive. In recent weeks, Soviet-style short-range air defense systems (for example, Osa-AKM) have come into motion. A little later, the appearance (and further defeat by drones and aircraft) of medium-range air defense systems S-300 in the front-line zone was recorded.

Immediately before the offensive, more modern NATO weapons appeared on the front. June 6 is near from the front (about 25 km from the LBS), the German IRIS-T SLM air defense system was destroyed, transferred to Ukraine to organize air defense over Kiev.

The missile launch range of this air defense system is about 40 km, which means that in order to control at least part of the airspace over the positions of the Russian Armed Forces, Ukrainian troops deployed it in the immediate vicinity of the front. The transfer of the air defense system and its deployment were recorded from the air, and Lancet drones flew into the German air defense system almost immediately.

What is unusual about this attack?

A significant part of the equipment, including the Leopard 2A4 and Leopard 2A6 tanks, is used in the Zaporozhye direction in an extremely strange and ill-conceived way. The Armed Forces of Ukraine operate in small scattered armored groups of mixed composition. In some cases, wheeled armored vehicles (MRAP, armored personnel carriers) go on the attack without the support of artillery or tanks; groups with a ratio of light wheeled armored vehicles and tanks of 10 to 1 were recorded.

At the same time, the mechanized groups of the Armed Forces of Ukraine do not include engineering equipment for mine clearance, and the Leopards themselves were initially transferred to the Armed Forces of Ukraine without minesweepers, which are critically needed during the offensive.

In a number of cases, the Armed Forces of Ukraine manage to break through only a narrow corridor, at the entrance to which about eight to ten pieces of equipment accumulate. Such a large and clearly visible target from the air is almost instantly hit by artillery, ATGM crews or Ka-52 army aviation helicopters.

In addition, it is known that enemy armored groups prefer to move along roads, which limits their maneuverability and makes them an easy target for artillery and army aviation.

According to preliminary data, due to the lack of engineering equipment and engineering reconnaissance before the onset, the loss of Ukrainian equipment in four days exceeds 300 units.

What can be concluded?

A defensive line of several dozen lines was invented by the General Staff and General Surovikin for good reason. It works - and it works well. At the same time, most of the Ukrainian troops involved to date have either been transferred from other areas, or formed from mobilized ones. The motivation of such units, to put it mildly, is low, which directly affects the result of the offensive.

A colossal work has been done in terms of communication. The units of the RF Armed Forces have it, the enemy has serious problems from the first days. GPS signals, UAV control channels are jammed.

When planning the operation, the Armed Forces of Ukraine clearly expected to quickly slip through the minefields and break into the defense, pulling up reserves. It did not work out to wedge in - and now the Ukrainian command has to improvise.

One of the results of such improvisation was an attempt to use the M142 HIMARS jet systems in the advanced fortified areas of the RF Armed Forces. Apparently, expensive missile systems are used in some cases due to the lack of Soviet-style long-range rocket artillery, which indirectly indicates difficulties with ammunition and supplies for the offensive as a whole.

***

Colonelcassad
Summary of the situation at the front. Avdeevskoe direction.

The enemy plans to go on the offensive in the Avdeevsky direction, with the forces of up to two RTGs of the 1st mechanized battalion of the 53rd brigade in the direction of the Experimental settlement - the Khimik station.
The task of the enemy: to take possession of the village of Experienced and go on the offensive in the direction of the village of Rozovka - Novobakhmutovka.
To this end, the enemy prepared an assault detachment of the MTR "Vostok" numbering up to a platoon, as well as up to 6 units of armored combat vehicles (Presumably, this is a "Humvee" with ATGMs and heavy machine guns installed on board).
Since these forces are clearly not enough to successfully break through the defense, the enemy prepared a fire support company from the 24th Ombre, reinforced by 2 rifle platoons of the 418th Osb.
It is traditionally planned to "soften positions" and clear mines by the defense forces: units of the 106th and 109th brigades.
Also, the forces of the 1st brigade are planning to attack along the line of the settlement Novokalinovka - Bortsy - Novobakhmutovka, traditionally, it is planned to involve the 129th brigade of the defense for the meat assault.

Thus, the enemy plans to regain some of the previously lost positions, temporarily eliminate the threat of encirclement of Avdiivka and, under favorable circumstances, reach the western outskirts of Donetsk.
It is noteworthy that, as in all other directions, the enemy is not going to reckon with the losses of the territorial defense units, throwing them to storm the prepared defensive positions of the RF Armed Forces, trying to "clear" the way for personnel units.

https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator

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The offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Zaporozhye direction. 06/07/2023
June 8, 17:31

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Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on the offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Zaporozhye direction.

At night, the Armed Forces of Ukraine made an attempt to break through the defense of the RF Armed Forces in the Zaporozhye direction with forces of up to 1,500 people and 150 armored vehicles.

The enemy was detected in time, a preventive strike was delivered by artillery, aviation and anti-tank weapons.

The enemy was stopped in all four directions and retreated with heavy losses.

As a result of a two-hour battle, the enemy lost 30 tanks, 11 infantry fighting vehicles, and up to 350 personnel.

The Ukrainian reserve forces, specially trained for the implementation of the breakthrough, did not fulfill their task.

The total losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine for June 7 in the Zaporozhye direction were:

Tanks - 33
infantry fighting vehicles - 28
armored combat vehicles - 38
self-propelled guns - 3
Personnel - 945

The broadcast of hostilities in Ukraine, including the current attempts to attack the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Zaporizhia direction, as usual, is covered in Telegram - https://t.me/boris_rozhin - if you are interested, subscribe

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8412374.html

Ukrainian response to the "stupid ford"
June 8, 15:26

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In the Zaporozhye region, the Armed Forces of Ukraine are specifically raked in this way, losing dozens of pieces of equipment every day, including Western ones.
The latest attacks have become a "Ukrainian response" to our "stupid ford" and "Ugledar column".
There is only one people - the mowers in the army mow the same way. The price in people and mat. parts is appropriate.

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https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8411713.html

Google Translator

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From Telegram account of Slavyangrad:

Slavyangrad
@DontStopWar reports:

1) 4 Leopards kaput today. One—using artillery. Three—ATGMs.

2) Second wave of Ukrainian attack in Zaporozhye had begun about an hour ago. Battle engagement confirmed.

3) Zaporozhye front should expect a surprise. Very soon.

***

Slavyangrad
2:38
‼️🇬🇧“Flanking meat grinder”: the 200th brigade burns the advancing armored vehicles and infantry of the Armed Forces of Ukraine
▪️Heavy fighting on the northern flank of Artyomovsk (Bakhmut) does not stop.
▪️So, an armored group of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on infantry fighting vehicles and tanks went on the attack in the area of the Berkhovsky reservoir, a fragment of this battle is on the video from the UAV.
▪️During the attempt of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to attack our positions, the fighters of a separate guards motorized rifle brigade of the Northern Fleet met the enemy with fire, destroying two armored vehicles along with infantry with ATGMs, the tank was also hit, but was able to crawl away.
▪️ The enemy does not spare armor, soldiers and ammunition at all in an attempt to break through the flanks, the battles go on without ceasing.

***

Slavyangrad
The opinion of Topaz on the current state of the Ukrainian "counteroink":

Overnight and in the morning, the enemy threw unprecedentedly large numbers of infantry and equipment on the Zaporozhye direction in an attempt to break through our army's defences. The Ukrainian forces suffered very heavy losses and made no progress in their offensive.

But it’s too early to exhale: The Ukrainian authorities wish to bury Ukrainian soldiers with the zeal that the most hardened and enraged commanders of our army would envy.

The Ukrainians announced the offensive, shot pretty videos, sent prostitute-collaborators across the border to run around, sent drones to Moscow, received a lot of Western dough and equipment, and, in general, painted themselves a picture of an imminent and quick victory, but it all ended up in hundreds of dead AFU soldiers and burning equipment. Damn!

I'm still inclined to believe that these meat-grinder attacks on the Zaporozhye front may be a diversionary tactic meant to tie up the Russian Army in battle and force them to draw reserves from neighbouring directions, weakening the sections of the front where the main attack from the AFU will come. I cannot believe that Ukraine's military leadership has seriously decided to attempt to gnaw on the quality echeloned defences of our troops in the Zaporozhye direction, especially given that our artillerymen are no longer experiencing a shell famine on the critical scale that they were before, which allows them to destroy the enemy before they even enter combat. [GB: Who would have thunk? Maybe reducing Wagner’s profligate spending of ammo in Artyomovsk was not the worst idea after all? Once again, Russian military planning no longer appears naïve, does it? This is the reason why I, personally, washed my hands entirely off the whole Wagner-MOD "Give us Shells or Give us Death" performance.]

Another important point is that our artillery has begun to work ten times better than it did at the beginning of the operation. Remember the fields almost completely black with shell craters? Did you notice that there are now far less of them? This is due not only to the reduction of the intensity of the fire, but also to the increase of its effectiveness.

The level of suicidal absurdity of the Ukrainian attack parallels the notorious marching columns of equipment, with which our troops entered the fortified Ukrainian cities at the beginning of the SMO, as if they were going to a parade, not to an assault. Except that the enemy has decided to ride in such columns over open fields.

***Slavyangrad
I was saying that they are planning two breakthroughs, to make a breach in defensive lines and insert armored reserves in an attempted pincer movement into our operational depth. It's a classic Soviet deep battle doctrine (also, a form of Blitzkrieg with creating Schwerpunkts, the main point of impact with heavy armor to make a hole)Although the amount of force is impressive (nothing is seen like this since Israeli- Arab wars, maybe even since WW2), the results are bad. I don't want to bring bad luck with this writing but I don't think Ua can sustain this magnitude of these attacks for more than 4-5 days, tops. They have plenty of troops to waste, but the hardware list is getting smaller. They will have to make a painful compromise, continuing the offensive with this loss ratio, or saving something for defense. If tempo annihilation continues like this, we could easily deny them the headache to choose. Someone will break, but that ain't gonna be us.

***

Slavyangrad
Igor Strelkov's opinion of the Ukrainian offensive is provided below.

It is probably safe to say now that the AFU offensive started 5-6 days ago.

It began with an auxiliary strike west of Ugledar in the Volnovakha direction. At the same time demonstration attacks (“an attack or show of force on a front where a decision is not sought, made with the aim of deceiving the enemy”) with tactical objectives were launched on the Donetsk front in the Vodyanoye-Opytnoye area and tactical attacks were launched in the Artyomovsk (Bakhmut) sector.

The day before yesterday an offensive was launched in the main direction—near Orekhovo, in the direction of Melitopol. As of today: auxiliary attacks by the AFU did not lead to any results except for heavy losses. Novodonetskoye was not taken, in other areas there were at best small tactical successes measured in a few kilometres of the "grey zone" and a few hundred metres deep into our forward positions. Near Donetsk—no change. Near Artyomovsk (Bakhmut)—small (and insignificant from all points of view) tactical advances by the AFU.

In the main direction, the enemy is going "all-out", persistently attacking our positions in order to break through the frontline. At the moment—after 24 hours of continuous fighting—we have indirect information about insignificant incursions, without any breakthroughs. But they have sustained heavy casualties. A considerable part of these losses is on minefields in the "grey zone" and as a result of strikes by our frontline aircraft.

Suddenly it turned out that our air force is ready for such a development as a massed night attack, can shoot guided missiles at night no worse than during the day, and had prepared in advance for the attack of the enemy. Now the Ukrainians have two choices: to stop burning their reserves in frontal assaults, to crawl back and regroup (in fact, to wind up the offensive at its very beginning), or all the same to try—using their significant advantage in the number of men and frontline units—to first push through the front line and then try to break through it (as they did last year at Davydov Brod in the Kherson region).

I assume that the ongoing attacks will not be stopped by the enemy, they will not change the plans on the move, and a long bloody battle is waiting for us. Depending on the success of the enemy, it may last from several days (4-5) to 2-3 weeks. If the enemy manages to achieve at least a minimum of encouraging success, it will strike and strike in the hope of a breakthrough. If not, the attacks will gradually fade as the losses increase.

Once again, it should be stated that the obvious direction of the enemy's main attacks did not allow the enemy to achieve operational surprise or to force the Russian Army to divert reserves to secondary targets and direct them to the Belgorod front to repel DRG attacks. Even in the most optimistic scenario we should not expect the Russian Army’s counter-offensive after the repulsion of the enemy's offensive—even after the defeat, the enemy would still have serious superiority in manpower and the number of frontline combined arms units.

Without extensive mobilisation and the creation of new armies and corps (300,000 troops at a minimum), the Russian Army will not be able to conduct a successful offensive with the strategic goal of crushing the enemy.

https://t.me/s/Slavyangrad

******

From MoA's comments:

From Mikael Valtersson, a former officer Swedish Armed Forces/Air Defence, former defence politician and chief of staff Sweden Democrats. Current political and military analyst.

Mikael Valtersson @MikaelValterss1 - 4:23 UTC · Jun 8, 2023
ANALYSIS UKRAINIAN TACTICS MORNING JUNE 8

I must say that I'm both a bit confused and disappointed in the Ukrainian Armed Forces and their behaviour on the battlefield on the Southern front. There might be an hidden tactic that will be seen in the coming days, but what we have seen since June 4th doesn't look good.

I was very disappointed in the Russian Armed Forces in the beginning of the war and surprised of the combat prowess of the ukrainian forces. While awaiting the ukrainian counteroffensive I expected ukrainian forces to act and perform better than they have. I wonder if it's a case of underestimating the russian enemy. It seems like the ukrainian forces expected the russians to buckle under pressure and just abandon their positions. I can't explain the ukrainian tactic otherwise. They are attacking with wave after wave straight into minefields and russian kill zones.

Russians are often accused of using human waves while attacking, but now it seems that the ukrainians do the same against the russian defences. That's suicide if the enemy stays and fight. Even if ukrainian forces succeed in breaking through one defenceline due to local superiority in soldiers and weaponry they are losing the bigger game with horrendous losses. They must understand that, I'm sure of it. So the only explanation is that they underestimated their russian adversary and expected them to flee.

This underestimation is probably based on the successful information war from Kiev and the west claiming that russians are worthless fighters. That narrative seems to been so successful that ukrainian planners was convinced by their own propaganda that they just to kick in the door, then the entire rotten russian house would fall apart. This might have cost Ukraine any chance of victory this summer. But the chock of reality might cost Ukraine much popular support for the war effort, both in the West and even within Ukraine.

It's a bit ironic that Ukraine seems to repeat Russia's underestimating of Ukrainian capabilities and willpower from February 2022.

The picture shows 42 video confirmed ukrainian losses the last days. Sorry for the disparaging figure, it came with the picture.
Posted by: b | Jun 8 2023 13:11 utc | 1

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/06/u ... l#comments
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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Fri Jun 09, 2023 5:37 pm

Media: One Side "Says" - The Other "Provides No Evidence"

The recent reporting on the conflict in Ukraine in 'western' media has reveled a deceiving scheme in which baseless claims from Kiev are taken for granted while everything Moscow says, even when based on facts, is put into doubt.

Here are a few examples:

White House dismisses ‘ludicrous’ Russian claims US planned Kremlin drone strikes - Guardian - May 4, 2023

Asked about an accusation by the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, that Washington had ordered Wednesday’s strike, John Kirby, the US National Security Council spokesman, said: “One thing I can tell you for certain is that the US did not have any involvement with this incident, contrary to Mr Peskov’s lies, and that’s just what they are: lies.”
...
Earlier on Thursday, Peskov claimed the US had “dictated” the plan of what Russia said was a drone attack on the Kremlin intended to kill Vladimir Putin. Peskov did not provide any evidence to support the allegations.


What evidence did the U.S. provide?

Ukrainian forces advance on Russians, deny ‘counteroffensive’ has begun - Washington Post - June 5, 2023

Ukraine’s military made gains against Russian forces in multiple locations along the eastern front, the country’s deputy defense minister said Monday, as an increasing cadence in combat operations raised speculation that the much-anticipated counteroffensive was finally imminent.
Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar wrote on Telegram that troops conducted multiple “offensive actions” in the eastern Donetsk region despite “stiff resistance and the enemy’s attempts to hold the occupied lines and positions.”

But Ukrainian officials denied claims by Moscow that they had launched the counteroffensive — and that Russian troops had thwarted it.

A spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry said Ukrainian forces had started the counteroffensive by trying to push through five areas of the Russian line in Donetsk but had been repelled. The statement by Lt. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, in a video posted by the Russian state-owned news agency RIA Novosti, could not be verified.


The piece repeats the claims of "gains" made by the Ukrainian side but puts the Russian claim into doubt. How many of Ukrainian claims of victories "could not be verified" but were senselessly repeated?

Ukrainian Armed Forces say they have no information on “large scale offensive” in Donetsk region - CNN - June 5, 2023

Ukraine does “not have information” on the “large-scale offensive” that Russian claims was launched against them in Donetsk region, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian armed forces Bohdan Senyk, told CNN.
On Monday, Russia claimed they have repelled, killed and captured multiple Ukrainian units in the region, but did not provide any evidence of the fact.


Next case:

Key Ukrainian dam blown up, Kyiv blames Russia - Politico - June 6, 2023

Ukraine blamed Russia for explosions at a key dam, which unleashed massive flooding and threatened 80 settlements in what Kyiv says is a last-ditch attempt to derail its counteroffensive.
In a statement, Ukraine's Southern Operational Command said "Russian occupation troops blew up the dam" at Nova Kakhovka, in the Kherson region in eastern Ukraine.
...
The Russian-installed mayor of Nova Kakhovka, Vladimir Leontiev, denied allegations the dam had been sabotaged by the Kremlin's forces and claimed Ukraine was responsible for the damage, according to Russian state media. Leontiev did not provide any evidence for his claims.


Neither did Ukraine for its claims but there is not even a hint in the piece that Kiev may be lying.

And another one:

Ukraine Mounts Multiple Attacks on Russian Occupiers - New York Times - June 8, 2023

On one side - just flat out statements taken for granted:

Three senior U.S. officials, as well as military analysts, said that a long-awaited major Ukrainian counteroffensive appeared to be underway, after months spent mobilizing and training new units, and arming them with advanced Western weapons.
...
Kyiv said little about the intensified fighting, neither confirming nor denying Russian claims, and Ukrainian officials have said they will not discuss details for reasons of operational secrecy.
...
A Ukrainian deputy defense minister, Hanna Malyar, said a battle was underway in the area of a larger town about 10 miles away in the neighboring Donetsk region, Velyka Novosilka, but it was unclear if she was referring to the same clash.


The other side's claims are depicted as dubious:

The Russian war bloggers, who have become a major source of information from the front lines, said Ukraine’s forces had suffered heavy losses, though such claims could not be confirmed and in the past have often been exaggerated.
...
The Russian account, like most claims about what was happening at the front, could not be confirmed independently, but videos verified by The New York Times showed a Ukrainian armored vehicle near Velyka Novosilka hitting a land mine.


I could add a dozen more pieces that follow the scheme. Ukrainian or U.S. claims lead the piece without being put into doubt. Russian counterclaims come a few paragraphs down and are immediately said to lack any evidence.

By the way: What the New York Times claims to have confirmed via video is just one of many screw ups on the Ukrainian side that can be seen these days.

Over the last 48 hours I have watched half a dozen drone videos of Ukrainian vehicles rumbling in tight columns over open fields, without minesweepers, without smokescreen or artillery cover, only to get blown up in minefields and massacred by anti-tank missiles.

No seasoned platoon or company leader would plan and execute attacks like that but, watching those videos, I doubt that the Ukraine still has any of those.

The we have this:

Ukrainian forces have suffered losses in heavy equipment and soldiers as they met greater than expected resistance from Russian forces in their first attempt to breach Russian lines in the east of the country in recent days, two senior US officials tell CNN.

One US official described the losses – which include US supplied MRAP armored personnel vehicles as “significant.”


Did any of the U.S. or NATO leaders really think that the Ukrainian forces would have a f***ing chance by senselessly running into well prepared Russian defenses? Really???

Posted by b on June 9, 2023 at 8:25 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/06/m ... .html#more

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IAEA Issues Warning About Europe’s Largest Nuclear Plant
JUNE 8, 2023

Image
Zaporozhye nuclear power plant in Energodar, Russia, March 29, 2023. Photo: Sputnik.

The UN is sending more observers to Zaporozhye after the Kakhovka dam disaster

It is “critical” for the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant to have continued access to water in order to prevent a reactor meltdown, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director-general Rafael Grossi said on Wednesday.

Europe’s largest atomic power station relies on the Kakhovka reservoir for water to cool its six reactors. However, the water levels have dropped by 2.8 meters since the Kakhovka dam broke early on Tuesday. Once the water level is below 12.7 meters, the ZNPP will no longer be able to pump water from the reservoir, Grossi warned.

“As the full extent of the dam’s damage remains unknown, it is not possible to predict if and when this might happen,” the IAEA director said, but at the current rate of 5-7 centimeters per hour, that could be “within the next two days.”

ZNPP is building up water reserves while it still can, Grossi noted, citing reports from the IAEA experts who are on site. He intends to visit ZNPP next week and bring additional observers to strengthen the agency’s presence at the facility.

“Now more than ever, the IAEA’s reinforced presence at the [ZNPP] is of vital importance to help prevent the danger of a nuclear accident and its potential consequences for the people and the environment at a time of increased military activity in the region,” Grossi said.

The possible loss of the plant’s main source of cooling water further complicates an already extremely difficult and challenging nuclear safety and security situation.

The Zaporozhye NPP is Europe’s largest atomic power station, with six reactor cores capable of generating a gigawatt of electricity each. Russian troops have controlled it since March last year. The region in which it is located voted to join Russia in September 2022, though Ukraine claims it is illegally occupied.

Russia has accused Ukraine of destroying the Kakhovka dam and causing widespread flooding in Kherson Region. President Vladimir Putin called it a “barbaric act” amounting to terrorism. Moscow says that Kiev is trying to secure the flank of its forces so it can bring up reserves after a series of failed assaults on the Zaporozhye front.

The IAEA deployed an observer mission at the ZNPP in September 2022. Prior to that, the station and its environs had been repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian artillery, which Kiev admitted at one point. Just before the IAEA mission arrived, Ukrainian commandos also attempted to seize the facility but were driven back. Russia has provided evidence of Ukrainian attacks to the UN, which has stubbornly avoided assigning blame.

In part due to the Ukrainian artillery activity, five of the six reactors at ZNPP have been shut down, with one continuing to operate at a low level to maintain power to the facility. They all require continued cooling to prevent a fuel meltdown and possible radioactive release.

https://orinocotribune.com/iaea-issues- ... ear-plant/

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US Prevents Ukraine From Settling Conflict With Russia

Image
Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev. Jun. 8, 2023. | Photo: Twitter/@DailyWorld24

Published 8 June 2023 (13 hours 59 minutes ago)

The Ukrainian government withdrew from peace talks because of U.S. pressure, according to Nikolay Patrushev.


Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev said Thursday that the U.S. and the U.K. have prevented Ukraine from settling the conflict with Russia.

"There are interested parties in this conflict," Patrushev told a press conference in Belarus, referring to "the United States and the United Kingdom," who seek to prolong the current hostilities.

"They don't care about people dying, because it is not their people, they are not waging war on their own soil," the Russian diplomat said.

According to Patrushev, at negotiations held in Türkiye in early March last year, "even the Ukrainian leadership itself was ready to sign a peace treaty and handed Russia written proposals that we, in principle, approved."


Ukraine proposed to commit to neutrality in exchange for security guarantees. However, the Ukrainian government withdrew from the peace talks, leaving negotiations for a peaceful settlement completely frozen.

"Had it not been for U.S. pressure on those whom they installed at the helm of Ukraine, this situation would not have arisen," Patrushev said, noting that with the conflict in Ukraine, Western countries aim to preserve their hegemony in the world.

"Russia is not the ultimate goal (...) their ultimate goal is China. They [intend] to dominate the world, but that is unacceptable and will not happen," the Russian Security Council secretary said.

His remarks came during a visit to the Belarusian capital Minsk to attend a meeting of security chiefs of the members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a regional mutual defense bloc.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/US- ... -0018.html

*********

Image

An Interview with Benjamin Abelow, M.D., author of ‘How the West Brought War to Ukraine’
Originally published: American Committee for U.S.-Russia Accord (ACURA) on June 7, 2023 by QuotidianoWeb (more by American Committee for U.S.-Russia Accord (ACURA)) (Posted Jun 09, 2023)

The following is a revised and expanded version of an interview with Benjamin Abelow, author of How the West Brought War to Ukraine: Understanding How U.S. and NATO Policies Led to Crisis, War, and the Risk of Nuclear Catastrophe, originally published in Italian translation by the Italian news and commentary site, QuotidianoWeb.

Question: In your book on the Ukraine war, you say that the United States and NATO provoked the war. How do you understand this word, “provoked”?

Abelow: To say that the U.S. and NATO provoked the war could mean two different things. Do I mean that they wanted a war, and that they knew their actions would start one? That is one possible meaning of “provoked.”

But “provoked” can also mean that their actions caused the war unintentionally. In fact, one can provoke a war while trying to avoid war. Although it is possible that some in the U.S. foreign policy elite wanted this war, I believe that most did not. I think that most were honestly trying to stabilize the peace. In English we have an idiom, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” I think this expression applies to the role of the United States and NATO in creating this war.

Question: In your book, you challenge readers to view U.S. and NATO actions through Russian eyes. You suggest that this will help them understand the origins of the war. Can you offer an example?

Abelow: One telling example occurred in 2021, the year before Russia invaded Ukraine. In that year, NATO carried out a live-fire training exercise in Estonia, a NATO country on Russia’s northwestern border. NATO fired 24 missiles. The launch sites were just 70 miles from Russia, and the missiles had a range of 185 miles. The purpose of this exercise was to practice destroying air defense targets inside Russia. The missiles did not enter Russian airspace, and NATO was not planning to attack Russia. It was trying to figure out how to react if Russia invaded one of the Baltic nations—Estonia, Latvia, or Lithuania. Destroying air defense targets was part of an overall deterrent or protective strategy. But this exercise could have been perceived by Russian leaders as preparation for an offensive attack. In fact, the same exercises could be used to train for that purpose.

Now let’s picture the converse of this situation. Imagine that the United States and Canada underwent a rift in their relations, and that Russia and Canada developed close political and military ties. Now imagine that, using a training site in Canada, Russia launched missiles, 70 miles from the U.S. border, to practice destroying air defense sites inside the United States. How would U.S. politicians and the foreign policy elite, military planners, and ordinary citizens in the United States react? Would they have accepted Russian claims that their actions were only defensive? No. They would have had enough uncertainty that they would consider the exercises a threat, possibly even a prelude to war. U.S. leaders would have demanded that the exercises cease and that the missiles be removed. It is likely they would have required the Russian military to leave Canada altogether. And if Russia refused, the U.S. probably would have gone to war. If the situation required it, U.S. military planners might even have threatened to use tactical nuclear weapons.

Keep in mind that we are not simply talking about Canada having its own military. We are talking about a country, in this example Russia, coming from far away—outside our hemisphere, in fact—and practicing with its missiles right on the U.S. border. This is exactly what the United States and NATO did with respect to Russia during their exercise in Estonia. Their actions showed a deep disregard for what risks Russia might have perceived. It also shows a lack of understanding about how easily NATO’s behavior could decrease Western security, rather than increase it, by provoking a Russian response.

Question: What lessons can be drawn from this example?

Abelow: This example illustrates what political scientists and international relations scholars call a “security dilemma.” This term refers to the idea that an action which is intended to be defensive can also have offensive potential and be perceived by another country as a threat. The result can be a spiral of action and reaction that ends in war. The dilemma is that a country wants to increase its security, but it makes decisions that have the opposite effect, by provoking defensive moves from the other side.

This example also illustrates how important it is to be able to imagine how another country, especially a potential opponent, perceives things. This ability is sometimes called “strategic empathy.” It requires an ability to step outside of one’s own limited perspective and to (so to speak) stand in the shoes of another. It requires us to recognize that—whatever else we may think about a potential opponent—the other country’s leadership consists of human beings who have some of the same security concerns and fears that we do.

The missile exercise in Estonia was just one of many NATO exercises conducted near Russia’s border. In fact, NATO carried out a very similar missile exercise in 2020, also in Estonia. All of these exercises, to one extent or another, created a security dilemma for Russia. Each was intended as part of a defensive preparation and a form of deterrence. But each exercise could also be used as part of an offensive strategy. While some people in the U.S. or Europe may laugh at the idea that NATO is a threat, from Russia’s perspective it is no joke. NATO is first and foremost a military organization. In fact, it is the most powerful military organization that has ever existed in the history of the world. And long before this war started, it was pointing at Russia.

The simple and sad fact is that the United States and NATO, as they have gone about their own efforts at security, have not adequately taken Russia’s security concerns into account. As a result, they created a situation that Russian leaders very naturally perceived to be a military threat.

Question: Do you think Putin and the Russian leadership are paranoid?

Abelow: No. I think they are dealing with legitimate security concerns of the same sort that preoccupy many national governments, including those of the United States.

Nonetheless, the way leaders view things does get shaped and modified by the historical experiences of their countries. In the case of Russia, it’s important to remember that the country has repeatedly been invaded from the West through the territory of Ukraine. The last time this happened, during Nazi Germany’s Operation Barbarossa, one out of every seven Russian citizens died. That’s 13 percent of the entire Russian population. Not 13 percent of the military. Thirteen percent of the whole Russian citizenry. As one example of the awesome destruction the country experienced, St. Petersburg—then called Leningrad—Russia’s second largest city, was put under siege for over two years and its inhabitants forced into cannibalism. Russian citizens, in the country’s second largest city, were literally eating the dead bodies of their neighbors.

We in the United States, and I dare say in most of Europe, cannot even begin to imagine such a thing. It would be as if Los Angeles or New York had been put under siege and reduced to cannibalism. The whole thing is inconceivable to us. But it is very much a part of Russian historical memory. And that siege is just one example of what Russian citizens endured within its borders. In a single battle, that of Stalingrad, which turned the tide of the Nazi invasion, close to 1,000,000 soldiers and 40,000 civilians died.

These and other wartime events are not an historical abstraction for the Russians who are alive today. The events affected nearly every family. In Putin’s case, his parents barely survived disease and near-fatal wounds, and his older brother and several uncles died. We need to take all this, and the psychological outlook it contributed to, into account. It is one important factor we must consider when we think about strategic empathy and security dilemmas.

Question: You write about the Cuban missile crisis. Why?

Abelow: In 1962, the Soviet Union placed missiles with nuclear warheads in Cuba, about 90 miles off Florida’s coast and 1,000 miles from Washington, DC. The United States almost got into a nuclear war to compel the Soviets to remove them. This episode can be instructive for Americans because in that case it was the United States that was on the receiving end of a security dilemma. Some of the same things that we experienced then can be compared to what we did to Russia before the outbreak of the war in Ukraine. Most importantly, Russia was demanding that we not bring Ukraine into NATO. Ukraine shares a 1,200-mile border with Russia, which at certain points is just 400 miles from Moscow. Some have argued that what the West did to Russia was a kind of Cuban missile crisis in reverse. I think there is much truth to that view.

We can learn other things, too. One of the main reasons there was no nuclear war during the crisis is that President John F. Kennedy was a man of boldness and wisdom in his relationship with the Soviet Union. Although he came into office as a cold warrior, he nonetheless established a personal relationship with his Soviet counterpart, Nikita Khrushchev, exchanging letters through a private diplomatic backchannel. As a result, when the crisis occurred there was some element of trust, some ability to work together to keep the crisis from escalating to nuclear war.

Unfortunately, our current leaders seem to have no such wisdom. Mr. Biden has insulted Mr. Putin repeatedly and personally. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, our nation’s top diplomat, and our current Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Victoria Nuland, seem not to know what diplomacy means. There is nothing but insult, hostility, and demands coming from Washington. There is much less chance that an acute crisis could be diffused the way it was during the Cuban missile crisis.

There is one additional lesson that we can learn. Contrary to the popular notion, the Cuban missile crisis was not resolved by Kennedy staring down Khrushchev in an eyeball-to-eyeball game of nuclear chicken. Rather, a secret deal was struck in which, in exchange for the removal of the Cuban missiles, Kennedy agreed to remove intermediate-range nuclear missiles from Italy and Turkey. In fact, the placement of those missiles in 1960 and 1961 by the United States was one of the reasons Khrushchev placed missiles in Cuba. The resolution of the crisis reveals the potential for win-win diplomatic solutions to militarily intractable problems.

Question: It is difficult to talk to people about this war. People often say there is an aggressor, Russia, and a victim, Ukraine, and that nothing else matters. What do you say to these people?

Abelow: These people may be thinking something like this: “Okay, the U.S. and NATO made mistakes, but we now must deal with the current reality. What does it matter how we got here?” This sounds good on the surface, but we must understand why the war started if we want to bring it to an end with a minimum of additional destruction and risk.

My formal training is not only in history but in medicine. In medicine, we understand that if we diagnose a problem incorrectly, and then try to treat it, we will be using the wrong therapy and may make the situation worse. In fact, we may kill the patient. This is exactly what is happening now. People in Washington and the European Union, and in the various capitals of Europe, have misdiagnosed the problem. As a result, the “treatment” they prescribed—and are continuing to prescribe—is like pouring gasoline onto a fire. This fire could easily get out of control and lead to a catastrophe. It could result not only in the destruction of Ukraine and its complete termination as a functioning society, but in a direct NATO-Russia confrontation, which could lead to a nuclear war.

Some people look at this war and they think of World War II. They think of Hitler. It appears to them that Russia is trying to expand and reestablish the Soviet Union or a tsarist empire. This is nonsense. The actual reason for this war is what I described: a security dilemma resulting from the expansion of NATO to Russia’s borders. But if you think you are fighting Hitler, that is, someone who wants to take over the world, someone who has no rational security concerns but only a desire to kill and expand, then it might be reasonable to keep fighting. It might make sense then to view negotiation as appeasement. That seems to be what our leaders think—and with the help of a compliant mass media, they have propagandized the populations of the United States and Europe to think the same thing.

Let me address your question directly. You asked what to say to people who think the origins of the war don’t matter. The answer is simple: You explain why the origins matter a lot. You explain how an incorrect understanding of why the war started will lead to a bad and possibly catastrophic outcome. Ideas are the most powerful things in the world. Wrong ideas are among the most dangerous. It is currently our task to replace bad ideas with good ones, by which I mean ideas that better reflect the reality of the situation.

Question: What about the security concerns of central and eastern Europe? You’ve not said anything about them.

Abelow: I’ve focused on Russia’s security concerns because it is those concerns, and their disregard by the United States and NATO, that caused this war. And this war is what we are trying to understand. But you are right to mention Eastern and Central Europe. They have legitimate concerns too, of course. While modern Russia is absolutely not the Soviet Union, we can still understand why Eastern and Central Europeans might be fearful as a result of their own terrible histories with Moscow. These fears need to be considered.

The question is: How do you address those fears and security concerns? Do you do it by redrawing the lines of division in Europe, pushing a U.S.-dominated military alliance to Russia’s borders, and putting Russia into a massive security dilemma? Do you then act as if Putin were crazy, a paranoid madman and an inconsequential fool, even to worry about NATO and missile exercises on Russia’s border? That is what we did—and it was, and still is, an ill-conceived and very dangerous way to proceed. It was threatening to Russia, humiliating to its leaders, and it was asking for trouble. We’re seeing the results of that now in Ukraine, a country that, in terms of NATO expansion, has long been a red line for Russia.

What is needed is a security architecture for Europe and Russia that takes into account the needs of all parties. This should have been worked out decades ago. And in fact, this is exactly what Putin has been asking for—sometimes pleading, sometimes demanding—at least since 2007. But we in the West have not wanted to listen. Nobody should be surprised by this war. The leaders of the United States and NATO say the war was unprovoked for a very simple reason: to hide the fact that they provoked it.

Question: What can we expect from our leaders now?

Abelow: Many people are waiting for their elected and unelected leaders—in Washington, Brussels, and the European capitals—to recognize their mistakes. Some people probably think that, if what I’m saying were correct, our leaders would recognize their errors and try to undo them. I believe this is unlikely, for two reasons. These reasons are important to understand, because if we don’t understand them, we may continue to wait indefinitely for our leaders to fix the situation.

The first reason is that our leaders seem to be locked into a “Putin-equals-Hitler” mindset. They appear to be incapable or unwilling to apply strategic empathy, to see things through Russian eyes, and to grasp the actual causes of this war. While I believe that most of our leaders genuinely want what is best for their countries, political communities, and the world, they are dangerously limited in their outlook.

The second reason is that many of our leaders and institutions are the same ones that created the problem in the first place. They are the ones who pushed for NATO expansion. As a result, they backed not only Russia but also themselves into a corner. Think how hard it is for most of us to admit when we are wrong about something important. It can seem an overwhelming humiliation, truly shameful, to recognize and publicly acknowledge that we were wrong, especially when we have been outspoken with our views in the past. Our leaders, instead of recognizing their mistakes and making appropriate adjustments, are doubling down. They are pushing the same destructive policies even harder.

Imagine how the people who run NATO and set NATO policy feel. It must be very difficult for them to even consider the possibility that their failures of judgement destabilized European security and led to war. Ironically, the problem can be even worse if these people are fundamentally good but internally weak. Imagine what kind of inner honesty and strength of character would be required to recognize and acknowledge that, because of one’s errors, hundreds of thousands of people died and were maimed, millions have been traumatized and displaced, and now the whole world is at risk of nuclear war. In this circumstance, it would take an extraordinary person, someone of exceptional clarity and character, to be able to acknowledge their error, even to themselves.

That is why the people of Europe and the people of the United States must take action. It should be peaceful action, democratic action but powerful action nonetheless. It is up to us to see what is happening, to educate people, and to develop a mass movement that encompasses the entire political spectrum. Not just the left. Not just the right. Not just those on the fringes. Everyone. This issue is far too important to be about partisan politics. All that must be set aside. We must deal with the reality that we now face. This reality includes a risk of a direct NATO-Russia conflict and a growing possibility of nuclear war.

Question: You describe in your book how, as the Soviet Union was coming to an end, the Western countries assured Moscow that NATO would not expand eastward. Moscow made a serious mistake in not getting this assurance in writing. Do you think Moscow has made other mistakes?

Abelow: The assurances you mention were part of an arrangement by which Moscow would remove its 400,000 troops from East Germany. The goal was to let the divided Germany, East and West, reunify under NATO auspices. In exchange, NATO would not expand eastward. At that time, NATO was positioned no further east than the middle of Germany, about a thousand miles from Russia’s border. This was all agreed to verbally. We have written evidence of the process, but the understanding was never instantiated in a formal treaty. Moscow removed its troops, but the West did not carry through. As you say, this was a serious mistake by Moscow.

But in reality, when we say this was a mistake, we are really saying that Moscow was foolish to trust us. What kind of nations are we that do not abide by our word and live up to what we say we will do? Here it is worth pointing out that when Kennedy and Khrushchev prevented nuclear Armageddon by trading away Soviet missiles in Cuba for American missiles in Italy and Turkey, the deal was not instantiated in a treaty. It was done privately, through a backchannel. Trust was an essential component, especially since Kennedy, according to the terms of the deal, was not required to remove the American missiles until six months after Khrushchev removed the Soviet ones.

Coming to your question, you asked if Russia and its leaders made other mistakes. Yes, they did. And first among them was this: Russia invaded Ukraine. Even for Russia, the invasion is a disaster. It is true that NATO backed Russia into a corner, and Russia decided to come out fighting. We bear great responsibility for that and must now find a way to deal honestly with the reality we created. But still, Russia started the war. It is the moral obligation of a country and its leaders to explore every possible avenue for peace before taking such a step. The killing of innocents is unacceptable. One must walk the extra mile to avoid this. One must walk an extra ten miles. I am not convinced that Mr. Putin did that before launching this war.

And yet, because so few people seem to know it, I must emphasize that Putin tried many times to avoid this war. He tried in 2007, when he spoke out at the Munich Security Conference, emphasizing that European security must address the needs of all parties simultaneously. He tried in 2014 and 2015, during the Minsk process, which was Putin’s attempt to resolve the crisis in the Donbas, in Eastern Ukraine, where a war had broken out on Russia’s border. Putin tried again in December 2021, when he sought to negotiate the question of Ukraine’s membership in NATO. But the West, especially the United States, would not even discuss it. The American message to Russia was, in essence: NATO is none of your business, even on your border.

Also, in March 2022—just weeks after Russia invaded, at a time when Russia’s military action was still limited and had not yet caused massive destruction of Ukrainian infrastructure—Putin tried to reach a peace agreement with Ukraine. Even then he sought to avoid further war by getting Ukraine to renounce NATO membership. It seems that the basic features of an agreement were worked out, and that the war would have been brought to an end. But the West sabotaged that peace process. We know this from multiple sources, including a Ukrainian publication, from the ex-prime minister of Israel, from Turkish sources, and from two scholars writing in the journal Foreign Affairs. Apparently, the United States and Britain wanted to extend the war to punish Putin and weaken Russia.

Despite Putin’s many attempts to avoid this war and limit its extent, I still cannot view Russia’s invasion as anything but a wrongful act and a terrible mistake. I cannot justify it. I cannot accept the idea that there was nothing left for Putin to try.

Question: You discuss self-fulfilling prophecies and their role in this war. Are you referring to a metaphysical concept, something mystical in nature, perhaps something pertaining to fate, inevitability, or predestination?

Abelow: When I speak about self-fulfilling prophecies, I’m not referring to a mystical notion. I’m thinking concretely about the creation of an escalating cycle of action and reaction.

How does a self-fulfilling prophecy work? Think again of the security dilemma. Let’s say that country A is overly fearful of country B. Country A believes that country B wants to expand aggressively and must be checked by intense military pressure. Country A is convinced that only this military pressure will do any good. Country A intends this pressure to be a deterrent, a defensive action, a way to prevent a war. But country B perceives these military moves as a threat, and it responds with its own actions. Country A then perceives these actions as offensive threats—and the cycle continues. In the end, country B really does attack—just like country A was convinced it would from the start. The “prophecy” of attack is fulfilled.

This description has parallels with the war we are now witnessing. The very thing that NATO feared—a highly aggressive Russia—it made happen. The United States and NATO were so convinced that Russia was aggressive that they took actions that eventually led to Russia’s aggression.

Here, I think of a line from the British scholar Richard Sakwa, a professor at the University of Kent, England, which encapsulates much of what I’m talking about. It comes from his excellent book Frontline Ukraine. It bears directly on the concept of self-fulfilling prophecy and wonderfully captures the perverse circularity of the situation:

In the end, NATO’s existence became justified by the need to manage the security threats provoked by its enlargement.

I should add that, in response to this fulfilled prophecy, NATO is now enlarging further. The new round of NATO expansion is intended defensively but will be perceived by Russia as a threat. The cycle is continuing. What will the result be? Where will this end? Unless the cycle can be interrupted, it is hard to be optimistic.

Question: It seems that this war, like many others, may not have any real winners. Hundreds of thousands on both sides will be killed and injured. Countless people, both combatants and civilians, will be scarred emotionally for life, and that harm will be passed on for generations. There is a real chance of nuclear war. The whole thing seems so irrational—yet this is typical of the human pattern. How can we explain it? Do humans have an innate drive to make war? Are unconscious influences at play?

Abelow: You’re raising questions that many have pondered, and to which they have given diverse answers. Freud and his followers have claimed there is a violent unconscious “id” and even proposed that humans have a death instinct. Christians sometimes assert that wars occur because humanity has fallen away from God. Evolutionary biologists argue that natural selection favored the survival of communities with strong in-group bonds and a tendency toward fear and violence directed at other groups.

I have a different perspective, one that arises from my study of psychological trauma, and in particular trauma during childhood. I do not discuss this in my book, and I don’t know if my ideas will resonate with those who read this interview. But perhaps some will find these ideas worth considering.

For most of history, in many cultures, and sometimes still, children have been reared with corporal punishment, especially beatings. During such a beating, what goes on in the mind of a child? The child naturally experiences fear and rage but is required to submit. If the child fights back or shows anger, even by an involuntary facial expression, the child may be viewed as insubordinate and disobedient—and the beating will be made more severe. As a result, the child is effectively forbidden to express his or her rage. That rage must be stuffed down, kept inside, and never be expressed.

But when the child grows into adulthood, those suppressed feelings can surface, because the individual is no longer small, weak, and afraid. The long-buried rage seeks a target and directs itself toward an enemy, real or imagined. Xenophobia, a desire for revenge, and ultimately war—these all provide remarkably efficient outlets for the emotions. These unconscious influences arising from childhood can merge with conscious, practical, real-world causes for conflict. They can exacerbate the situation, turning a potential conflict into actual conflict, and a small conflict into a large one. Sometimes they can create a conflict from nothing, from a situation where no conflict need exist at all.

I am speaking in very general and somewhat abstract terms. Let me make things more concrete by suggesting how these ideas can play out in practice. My comments pertain to the influence of violent, extremist groups—including the far-right, ultranationalist groups that are active in both Ukraine and Russia.

I believe that persons who are drawn to these violent, politically extreme groups have endured especially harsh childhoods—frequent or severe beatings, a lack of parental empathy, verbal mistreatment, inadequate nurture, and the like. In fact, I view members of these groups as being essentially very wounded children. They have grown into adults but remained preoccupied with the fear, rage, and sense of victimization from their early experiences. In some cases, they are fighting battles that do not exist in reality. Yet the violence they inflict, and the consequences of their emotional indifference and brutal aggression, are very real.

Let me give an example. I have studied the childrearing practices that were imposed on German children during the generations before the rise of Nazism. When one looks at the brutality these children endured, and compares it with the brutality that they, as adults, inflicted on their victims, the entire situation becomes much clearer. No longer do we feel ourselves confronted by a great mystery about the origins of their violence. Instead, we see how “trauma begets trauma”—a situation in which children who were traumatized grow into adults who inflict traumas on others.

I consider Nazi Germany to be a prototypical example of a general pattern. I think the lessons we can learn from it apply to other countries and situations where ultranationalist groups are active and use violence to impose their will on others.

Question: Speaking of the far right, you refer in your book to the role of Ukrainian ultranationalists during the lead-up to the current war. What are you referring to?

Abelow: We in the West hear a lot about fascist and ultranationalist influences in Russia, but much less about these groups in Ukraine. The subject is verboten. And we continually hear that their numbers are relatively small, which is true. However, Ukrainian ultra-nationalists, neo-Nazis, and others on the far right are well organized and willing to use violence. As a result, they have exerted an outsized influence on decision-making in Ukraine. In fact, the far right has exerted a “coercive veto” over Ukrainian policy.

A prime example pertains to Ukraine’s president, Voldomyr Zelensky. He was elected in 2019 on a peace platform. He won with a 73 percent majority vote, giving him a huge mandate. He wanted to resolve the conflict in the Donbas, in eastern Ukraine, where a civil war had been going on since 2014. Although Russia had lent support to the ethnic Russians and Russian speakers who were seeking greater autonomy, or actual separation from Ukraine, the conflict was fundamentally internal to Ukraine. In his inaugural address, Zelensky said he was willing to lose his office if that were the result of seeking peace. But just one week later, a leader of the far right stated in a published interview that if Zelensky carried out his plans he would lose not his office, but his life. Zelensky, he said, would hang on a tree.

Threats of violence against Zelensky and his government continued. These included direct threats on Zelensky’s life, and violent ultranationalist and neo-Nazi demonstrations that defaced the presidential building. Over time, Zelensky capitulated. He gave up on his peace platform and adopted policies acceptable to the far right. He began to assert that the Donbas crisis was, in fact, not a civil conflict but was entirely the result of Russian meddling and intervention. That was the position espoused by the far right. The Minsk accords—a pair of previously signed agreements that could have peacefully resolved the Donbas crisis—were never implemented. Jack Matlock, Jr., who was the second-to-last U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union, has stated that if the Minsk accords had been implemented, Russia probably would not have invaded Ukraine.

Most people in the West know little about this history. In fact, my impression is that Western governments have deliberately concealed it, because it does not fit with the story they want to tell.

Question: You say that Zelensky “capitulated” to the far right. That is not how he is usually portrayed in the West. Is it proper to speak this way when Ukraine has been invaded and is at war?

Abelow: When I say that Zelensky “capitulated” to the far right, I am repeating a word used by the Ukrainian-Canadian scholar Ivan Katchanovski, a political scientist at the University of Ottawa. He is one of the world’s most knowledgeable experts about many aspects of Ukraine’s recent political history. It’s not possible to understand what is happening in Ukraine without reading Katchanovski’s work (much of it is posted online and freely available at the Academia.edu and ResearchGate websites).

In addition to his research on the far right, Katchanovski has studied how the United States intervened in Ukrainian politics. He has described how, starting with the “Maidan” protests and overthrow of President Viktor Yanukovych in 2014, the United States gained extraordinary influence in the selection of key figures in Ukraine’s government, as well as in the setting of its policies. At times, the control has been essentially dictatorial. According to Katchanovski, the United States gained so much control that, using the technical definitions of political science, Ukraine became a “client state” of the U.S. The United States has used its power to position Ukraine as a pawn in a geo-strategic game to exert pressure on Russia.

Because Ukraine was attacked, there is a natural tendency to not criticize its leaders. Our governments and the media reinforce that tendency. They say, in effect: “After the war is over you may say these things, but not now.” However, because of Zelensky’s capitulation, his policies are deepening and prolonging this war. He advocates maximalist negotiating positions, which are complete non-starters. He uses aggressive rhetoric. To remain silent about Zelensky, to treat him with kid gloves, is to support the war by default.

We in the West are given to believe that Zelensky has the universal backing of his people. But how can we know this? Opposition parties and opposition media in Ukraine have been banned. Men of military age—the range has been defined broadly, as between 18 and 60—are arrested if they try to leave the country. Young men are being grabbed off the street and sent against their will into the meat grinder at the front. Such measures would not be needed if everyone were eager to fight. Ukrainians who are outspoken in opposing the continuation of the war risk being killed by the far right. I have personally heard reports about how frightened some Ukrainians are to speak, even anonymously.

Question: For many in the West, Zelensky has become the face of Ukraine and the personification of a just cause. He is seen as a model and an inspiration. How do you view Zelensky?

Abelow: Zelensky is seen in the West as a great hero, a new Churchill, a bold and brave warrior. I think this portrayal is nearly the opposite of the truth. It obscures the reality of a man who, under pressure, defaulted on his greatest value and objective: to make peace in the Donbas and end Ukraine’s civil strife. As a result, the Donbas war continued and contributed to the onset of the current, broader war.

Rather than heroic, I view Zelensky as a tragic figure. He faced a great trial. Could he put the interests of his country ahead of his personal safety and his desire to maintain power? He failed utterly. But this failure is understandable, and perhaps it was inevitable. In 2019, shortly after Zelensky was elected, the late Princeton and New York University professor Stephen F. Cohen said that unless the United States protected Zelensky from the far right, his peace efforts would fail. If the U.S. didn’t have Zelensky’s back, Cohen said, he wouldn’t stand a chance. Zelensky never received that support.

Further—and this speaks volumes about the influence of the far right in Ukraine—those who threatened Zelensky’s life were not prosecuted. Neither did the police and courts protect Zelensky’s supporters and colleagues when they advocated for peace. Tellingly, Zelensky’s friend Sergei Sivokho, whom Zelensky chose to play a key role in seeking peace and reconciliation within Ukraine, was physically attacked.

Just as troubling, the Ukrainian people did not rise up to demand that the police, courts, and other state institutions provide adequate protection for Zelensky. At first glance, this is hard to understand, given his large electoral mandate and the fact that, at the time of his election, there were at least 70 pro-peace groups active in Ukraine. This background is described in an important new book by Professor Nicolai Petro of the University of Rhode Island , The Tragedy of Ukraine. Why did this popular support for peace not translate into democratic pressure to protect Zelensky and his government from violence? A major factor, no doubt, was that many people feared the far right. They knew that speaking out could put their lives in jeopardy. The coercive veto of the far right extended to the citizenry.

But the problem runs deeper than that. Many in Ukraine have an ambivalent relationship with the far right. During parts of the 1940s, armed nationalist groups headed by Stephan Bandera and Roman Shukhevych fought against the Soviets in Ukraine. Because they are cast as fighters for Ukrainian independence, Bandera and Shukhevych are esteemed by many in Ukraine today. Streets and schools are named after them, and the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory has promoted them as full-blown heroes. However, to fight the Soviets, Bandera’s faction of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists collaborated openly with the Nazis when they invaded Ukraine in 1941, helping them carry out their totalitarian and genocidal policies. And the group headed by Shukhevych, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, committed mass murder against civilians. Not only did this group kill ethnic Ukrainians who opposed their policies, they murdered tens of thousands of Poles and Jews. Yet because Bandera and Shukhevych fought for the nationalist cause, many Ukrainians continue to hold them in high regard. As a result, when those who stand in the ideological lineage of these violent nationalist groups—the modern far right—threatened Zelensky’s life and government, the Ukrainian people did not rise to support him.

Further, few in Ukraine have seriously grappled with a central fact of the country’s recent political history: that the overthrow of the Yanukovych government in 2014, which came after several months of popular protest, was a violent right-wing coup. During that coup, ultra-nationalists, neo-Nazis, and others on the far right not only killed police and attempted to assassinate Yanukovych, they also—as a false flag attack—killed dozens of peaceful protesters. This mass killing, the so-called “snipers’ massacre” of February 20th, has frequently but incorrectly been blamed on Yanukovych. The massacre, and the erroneous presumption that Yanukovych was responsible, was the pivotal event that led the West to recognize the new Ukrainian government. None of those responsible for the massacre was ever tried. The far right also, and more generally, played a key role in fomenting violence during what otherwise would have been largely peaceful protests. This is all documented in the painstaking research of Ivan Katchanovski.

Thus, too few in Ukraine have paid adequate attention to either the country’s brutal nationalist past or the nature of the events that constituted its post-2014 political order. This lack of national reckoning helps explain the failure of the Ukrainian people to support Zelensky when the far right threatened his life and government. In the end, Zelensky really didn’t stand a chance. He genuinely wanted peace and, at least initially, he pursued his agenda bravely. But he ultimately lacked the courage, strength of character, and the necessary support from the West, as well as from his own people, to carry through. That is why I view Zelensky as a tragic figure.

However, we must also criticize Zelensky directly. If the investigative journalist Seymour Hersh is correct, Zelensky and his government have embezzled many millions of dollars of American aid since the war started. Yet, to my mind, that is not his greatest sin. I view Zelensky as a destroyer of his country. He is a man who, as Richard Sakwa has said, could have prevented this war by speaking just five words: “Ukraine will not join NATO.” Zelensky also bears responsibility for not persevering more courageously after his life was threatened. He could also have made peace in March and April, 2022, just weeks after the war started, when talks with Russia were underway and achieving success. But he caved in to Western pressure to terminate the negotiations—and so the war continued and escalated. The result has been that hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians have been killed or maimed, untold millions have been displaced and traumatized, and the physical country of Ukraine has been depopulated and lost almost twenty percent of its territory.

Question: Even if the result has been a prolonged war, might Zelensky be serving some higher purpose? Might the sacrifice that Ukrainians are making be justified as part of a wider struggle against authoritarianism? And in the most limited sense, might Zelensky be acting in ways that serve American and European interests?

Abelow: No, none of these purposes are being served. In fact, Zelensky is bringing great risks to the United States and Europe. He has taken steps that could draw NATO into a direct war with Russia. For example, when a Ukrainian air-defense missile crashed in Poland, a NATO ally covered by the Article 5 provision for collective defense, Zelensky claimed it was a deliberate Russian missile attack on Poland. It appears he was lying for the purpose of drawing NATO into direct combat with Russia. Here it must be noted that a direct NATO-Russia war carries an unacceptably high risk of nuclear escalation. This was the conclusion of a January 2023 study by the RAND Corporation. RAND is a think tank funded by the U.S. military. It does not issue such warnings lightly.

Moreover, in an address to an Australian think tank, the Lowy Institute, Zelensky made a recommendation that, if followed, would lead directly to nuclear war. He suggested that the West launch a preemptive attack on Russia’s nuclear arsenal. Here is a translation of Zelensky’s remarks made by Professor Nicolai Petro. Zelensky mangled his sentences, but his intent is clear enough:

What should NATO do to make the use of nuclear weapons by Russia impossible? What is important, I must again address the international community as before the 24th—preventive strikes, so that they know what will happen to them if they use [nuclear weapons], not wait for nuclear strikes by Russia and then say, “Well, you’ve done it, now here’s a taste of your own medicine.” Review the procedure of applying pressure. I believe what needs to be done is to review the order of the actions taken.

Zelensky wanted to “review the order of the actions taken” and implement a new order, one that would result in “preventive strikes.” This means to shift from a posture of assured retaliation, after a nuclear attack, to one of attacking first—nuclear preemption. Some have claimed that Zelensky was misunderstood, that he was advocating economic sanctions. But his own words tell otherwise. Incredibly, Zelensky really does seem to believe that attacking Russia’s nuclear forces would stabilize the nuclear peace. In actuality, such an attack would almost certainly lead immediately to a strategic nuclear exchange, which could then escalate to a full-scale thermonuclear war. Such a war would kill hundreds of millions or even billions of people.

The fact is, Zelensky is essentially a mouthpiece. He speaks for the foreign policy elite of the United States, which wants to keep the war going so that it can continue to weaponize Ukraine as a proxy to weaken Russia, using the land of Ukraine as a battlefield and Ukrainian citizens as cannon fodder. Yet the goal of weakening Russia, which is the pipe-dream of Washington’s foreign policy establishment, is not in the interest of American or European citizens. It is unlikely to be successful. It is harming the West economically and destroying Ukraine. And if the West ever starts to achieve its goal—the destruction of Russia as a great military power—the likely result would be the Russian use of battlefield nuclear weapons, which could readily escalate to strategic nuclear war.

Those in the United States, Ukraine, and Europe who see this conflict as a struggle of democracy against authoritarianism are misreading what is happening. Some may do so out of ignorance, others as willful deception in support of a geo-strategic agenda. The reality is that, in crucial respects, democracy in Ukraine was long ago subverted by Ukraine’s far right—and the United States.

Question: Much of what you say runs contrary to the Western narrative and conflicts with current American policies. You could be perceived as anti-American. Are you anti-American? Do you hate America?

Abelow: Absolutely not. My grandparents came to the United States to escape violence in other countries and to find a better life. Even now, two generations later, I continue to hold in my mind the image of America as a shining beacon of freedom and safety to the world.

Despite all that is happening, I continue to believe that, at its core, America is a great country. It helped give to humanity invaluable philosophical concepts about freedom, and about the rights of the individual. No doubt, it has sometimes failed badly to live up to these high values, but other times it has succeeded. And in any case the ideals stand on their own and have played a transformative role in the world. I also believe that the United States—along with the Soviet Union, which for all its great evil played a decisive role in defeating Hitler—may have literally saved the world from Nazism.

So, no, I am not anti-American. I see my comments here, as well as my book and my broader efforts regarding the Ukraine war, as an expression of American patriotism—an attempt to help realign U.S. policies with the true interests of the United States as a nation. These are my attempts to peacefully influence policies so that they better reflect the highest ethical values of the United States. To achieve this end, a hope which many share, we must face reality, even if that reality is uncomfortable. We must be willing to speak openly.

https://mronline.org/2023/06/09/an-inte ... o-ukraine/
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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Sat Jun 10, 2023 11:48 am

Increased military and political activity
POSTED BY @NSANZO ⋅ 06/10/2023

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The notable increase in activity on the front, although perhaps not yet that of the great land offensive in which Ukraine wants to definitively defeat Russia, has not meant a reduction in diplomatic activities, quite the contrary. This week, the envoy of Pope Francis held a meeting described as "productive" in kyiv. Little is known about this discreet Vatican mission that aspires to mediate between the two countries or, judging by the few statements about the meeting, to support Ukraine in certain humanitarian aspects. Installed in a dynamic of war, the situation simply does not favor any peace talk or approach of the parties to the negotiating table at this time. Nor is the attitude of Ukraine, which continues to bet on military victory,

On Thursday, referring to the negotiating proposals that have been put forward, Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov stated that these are essentially "countries that are not fully democratic." Ukraine, which since in 2015 passed a law to criminalize an entire ideology and ban the Communist Party, the only left-wing party with significant institutional representation, and has demonized, vetoed, banned, and expelled all kinds of political and media figures, parties and the media without even requiring judicial decisions, it allows itself the luxury of valuing the democratic credentials of countries that aspire to help their populations to recover life in peace. And although none of the countries that have been postulated as potential mediators have expressed a pro-Russian or pro-war position, the attempt to maintain neutrality precisely to be able to carry out that task is enough for the Ukrainian authorities to label them as "pro-Moscow". “This is why such mediation is not suitable for us. Because they are not a real independent mediator, so we will wait,” said Oleksiy Reznikov. Only the Western countries, which have already shown their willingness to negotiate on Ukraine's side, are sufficiently democratic and neutral to be accepted.

Last week, Indonesia joined a growing list of countries with peace proposals. In the mouth of its president Joko Widodo Indonesia proposed an immediate ceasefire, the demilitarization of the front line and referendums in the disputed territories. The comment drew the ire of Mikhailo Podolyak, who quickly took to social media to denounce the "friends of the country of Lenin and Dostoevsky," a curious adjective for a country firmly in the US sphere of influence since the Cold War and into the one that was savagely massacred, which at that time was the third most important communist party in the world, only behind the Soviet and the Chinese.

As the main and most consistent advocate of seeking immediate negotiation, Brazilian President Lula da Silva has caused Ukraine the most discomfort. kyiv has made clear its complaints about this attempt to mediate the conflict, a sentiment that seems to extend to Ukraine's Western allies. In a recent public speech, the German Foreign Minister, Annalena Baerbock, lamented the lack of interestby the war in the Latin American countries, more concerned about the increase in the prices of their basic products. In reality, the complaint of Baerbock, representative of one of the most warmongering political parties since the initial phase of the conflict in Donbass, is the same as that of Oleksiy Reznikov, Oleksiy Danilov or Volodymyr Zelensky: neither the Latin American countries nor a large part of the Countries beyond the Western bloc and their staunchest allies see the continuation of the war as the solution to all problems.

Just yesterday, the Ukrainian Defense Minister opened the door to a negotiation with Russia as long as Moscow renounces the objectives for which it began its military intervention, a new formulation of the Ukrainian maxim of demanding unilateral surrender as a prerequisite for a negotiation in which, in reality, would no longer be anything to decide. Ukraine clings to those ten points presented several months ago, when the preparations for the Ukrainian counteroffensive were already underway and that Volodymyr Zelensky has installed in the official discourse as his peace plan. In the plan, which openly calls for Russia's unilateral surrender of the entire territory of Ukraine along its 1991 borders, Zelensky does not even bother to promise guarantees of respect for the rights of the population of those territories that have openly expressed their interest in not returning under Kiev control. Ukraine has always refused to grant basic rights to the people of Donbass and although it was forced to sign that commitment in Minsk, it was able, with the support of its loyal allies, to avoid fulfilling the promise. Currently, there are neither internal nor external demands to guarantee the rights of the populations that have fought or are fighting against the Armed Forces of Ukraine, so it is not even necessary to maintain the fiction of promises. with the support of his faithful allies, to avoid fulfilling the promise.

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In recent days, the Ukrainian troops have significantly increased their military activity in the axes already planned. The configuration of the front and the evidence of the final objective, Crimea, make it impossible for kyiv to attack in an unexpected direction. With secondary attacks - although also important - in the area south of Donetsk and on the flanks of Artyomovsk, areas considered more vulnerable to Russian troops, the main attack is taking place in the Orejov area, in the Zaporozhie region. Days before, with a spotof high production value -not surprisingly, the bulk of the Ukrainian government was an audiovisual production company- and in which not only the famous Leopard tanks could be seen but also F16s that Kiev lacks, the Ukrainian authorities asked the population for silence , a key element not to give information to the opponent, but also to control the speech.

The ground attack, in the open field and without the necessary air cover, differs markedly from the two successful offensives carried out by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. In Kherson, Ukraine had the advantage of Russian logistical difficulties after the destruction of the bridges linking the two banks of the Dnieper, while in Kharkov, both the terrain and the poor Russian preparation for defense facilitated the rapid Ukrainian advance. None of these elements is currently on the central front, that of Zaporozhye, where Russian troops have been fortifying themselves for months. Yesterday, Vladimir Putin considered the Ukrainian counter-offensive started, which kyiv has not announced following his recommendation of silence. The images of the front already show armored columns and the first Leopard tanks and other heavy vehicles delivered over the last few months by the different Western countries have finally appeared. The attacks of the last few days do not seem, for the moment, the great offensive that Ukraine has promised, but they are not tentative moves either. And despite the fact that Ukraine talks of progress, there is no record beyond this war propaganda, of any break in the front. What's more, in recent days, the images have shown what some pro-Ukrainian media have been forced to admit.

As the front lines take shape and Ukraine tries to break through Russian defenses in one of the many directions in which it aspires to attack, the silence demanded by the Ukrainian authorities is limited to the military sphere. As active as ever on the media and political fronts, Ukrainian diplomacy continues its preparation for the July offensive: the demands for the NATO summit. Between demands and demands, Ukraine is now also throwing out warnings and, through one of its lobbyists, the former secretary general of the Alliance Anders Rasmussen, official adviser to President Zelensky, Kiev has wanted to launch into the media space the possibility that several member countries send troops to Ukraine, one more red line that the Ukrainian authorities aspire to cross. For the moment, those warnings are nothing more than wishes. Faced with its Western allies, Kiev does not cease its attempt to involve its NATO allies in the conflict, comfortable with a war contained in the territory of Ukraine, but in which they have shown no intention or interest in intervening. Of course, the United States is still interested in remaining the main supplier and financier of this war and yesterday announced a new military assistance package for Kiev, 2.1 billion dollars, which will include more ammunition for Patriot air defenses.

https://slavyangrad.es/2023/06/10/27475/#more-27475

Google Translator

*********

Ukraine Chief of Intelligence Drops the Mask on Forcible Reoccupation of Crimea and Partition of Russia
JUNE 8, 2023

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This isn’t Budanov’s map, but is similar. If you google US aim to partition Russia and click on images, you get a number of variations. Photo: Urban ramblings.

By Paul Atkin – May 26, 2023

The 26th May is the ninth anniversary of the beginning of the shelling of Donetsk by Ukrainian forces in 2014. For the Donbass Ukrainians that opposed the new Maidan regime this event marked the point of no return. It followed the burning alive of the anti-maidan protestors in Odessa on May 2nd 2014 and Ukrainian forces trying to storm Mariupol that same week. The shelling has continued daily ever since, including today, killing several people. Yet, listen to the news here and there is silence about that. The casualties caused by a Russian missile strike in Dnipro were reported however, and President Zelensky’s comment that this showed the Russians to be “fighters against everything humane and honest” was not put in the context of what his own forces are doing. An enemy of the United States would be accused of “shelling his own people”.

Nevertheless, most people who support the Ukraine Solidarity Campaign, or call for a Russian military withdrawal and restoration of the pre 2014 borders, sincerely assume that this would be a liberation for the people who live in the Donbass and Crimea; and that this is where the war would stop.

This interview with Kyrylo Budanov – the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence (the GRU) – by a journalist who has been making a film supporting the Ukrainian war effort released last week, shows that the Ukrainian high command (and journalists) have no such delusions.

Budanov says a number of interesting things in this interview, some of them revealing, some quite far fetched. He is, after all, an intelligence officer, so he has access to a lot of information; but, as an intelligence officer, a large part of his job is to spin false but instrumentally useful narratives. He is also a firm believer in the notion that if you will something hard enough, it will come to pass and that Ukraine will “win”, despite their succession of grinding defeats since the new year and the terrible cost in lives that is the price of carrying on.

At the same time, he is secure enough in the presumed support of his audience to describe what the sort of victory he wants would look like. In the same way that the Guardian is now so sure of the allegiance of its readers to Ukrainian nationalism that they can reveal that, when collaborating with the Nazis in WW2, they killed around 100,000 Poles, a massacre described as “genocide” by the Polish government as recently as 2016.

In the interview’s final section, about what would happen in Crimea if Ukraine’s war aims were achieved (starting 36:57 minutes in) he is quite blunt that “victory” in the sense of military reoccupation would only be the start of a “difficult” “multi year process” of “reintegrating” territories with a population that is actually hostile and does not want to be reoccupied. Three million people with, as he puts it “a completely different view of the world”*. The interviewer uses the euphemism “three million not very devoted people” and Budanov states that those people with an “altered psyche” who can be “re educated” should be – without specifying what should be done with those that can’t, though “physical elimination” is a phrase he uses elsewhere. This will have to be done with a carrot and a stick, as the two only work together; and with a “firm hand”. This will be “hard work” he says.

Many words can be used to describe this scenario. “Liberation” for those 3 million people is not one of them. If you believe in self determination, you can’t support this.

His comments at the end section about “a new security architecture in the world” are put in context by a section “About the Future of Russia” a little before this (at 32.45 minutes in). In this, the interviewer pulls across a map of the Russian Federation – “your famous map” with the partition borders – that Dick Cheney and Zbigniew Brzezinski originally proposed back in 1991 as a way to manage the “Post Soviet space” most amenably for the US – drawn in in thick blue felt tip lines; remarking that “its been shown a lot”. Not in the media here it hasn’t. It might make people wonder a bit.

Budanov uses a number of euphemisms about “unanimous transformation” of Russia and the prospective partition being “conceptual”, and speculates that the more defeats the RF suffers the more it will break up, starting with the Caucasus. His confirmation, when discussing the prospect that “new states” will be imposed on the wreck of the RF that, “Russians are well aware of this” gives a tacit recognition that the Russian security concerns raised in the run up to February 24th were real and existential.

His statement “we don’t need Russia in the form that it exists now”, underlines this and, given where the partition plan originated, cannot be defined as defensive.

*If you want an insight into why the people in Donbass might have a “completely different view of the world” – which Budanov suggests is a result of “propaganda” – consider these personal accounts from the day the Ukrainian army started shelling Donetsk city on May 26th 2014. These are from the Donetsk Anti Fascist site.

Marina Kharkova: “May 25 was the last day of peace in Donetsk, as the family celebrated the birthday of my father, a miner. The mood was anxious, restless and tense because of the general situation, but nothing yet seemed to portend tragedy. On the morning of 26, on my way to work, I heard the sounds of flying planes and distant explosions. Everyone had gathered in the largest office and was listening to an employee who lived near the railway station. She cried and told how Ukrainian planes and helicopters had bombed from the air, how their nine-storey building on Privokzalnoye had been shaking, how women killed by shells were lying directly on the pavement bleeding, how the minibus she was travelling in had hurtled away from the danger zone. She sat in silence, clutching her heads, trying to comprehend. Tanya was given water and sedatives – she was so sick. Then, by inertia, they tried to get on with their business. The rumble outside the window increased, though the office was far away from the airport. Ambulances and cars with militia were whizzing down the street. After three in the afternoon everyone decided to stop their pointless attempts to pretend to be busy and drove home. The understanding of what was happening came at once, although the consciousness was still trying to cling to yesterday’s peaceful day. The 26th of May was the point at which “it will never be the same again”.

EIena Hovhannisyan, a biology teacher: “At that time we kept up with the news from Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. We already knew how people had been martyred in Odessa, Mariupol and Krasnoarmeisk. I had forebodings of near disaster. It was already hovering over us, but we did not think how tragic, long, brutal, hopeless the events would be. Sometimes it seemed that it was just a bad dream, that I would wake up and everything would be like before. But no. It is an illusion that the war will not touch you. It will touch everyone, sooner or later. We were simply the first to be in the epicentre. And May 26th I will always remember. The warm, sunny weather and the roar of planes in the sky. From the balcony on the side of the airport black smoke could be seen, you could hear explosions constantly. The first shelling, deaths, destruction, grief and pain. Since that day, there would be no peace in Donetsk for another nine years. But we didn’t know it then. And that day was endless, filled with horror and pain. The phones were literally ringing off the hook – everyone was trying to find out what happened to their loved ones, whether they were alive or not. In the evening my son arrived from work; his office was a couple of blocks from the station. He told about the horror in the city, about the dead woman vendor from the station market, about the very young guy who worked as a valet. He was killed by shrapnel from a missile fired by a Ukrainian helicopter. People were falling, screaming, crying, calling for help. Passers-by tried to save the wounded, car alarms howled. The railway station area in any city is the most crowded place. In Donetsk on Privokzalnoye there are markets, shops, banks, the area was teeming with life. They say helicopters flew so low that you could see the pilots in the cockpit. And these pilots also saw that they hit peaceful people. This was not done by some Hitlerites, but by Ukrainians, with whom we lived in the same country. May 26 was the day that turned everything upside down. There is no and will not be our forgiveness for Ukraine. And there will be no return.

From the diary of a Donetsk woman who wanted to remain anonymous: 26 May 2014, from the balcony, I saw planes firing missiles. My husband, coming home from work, told me about the dead in the station square. At the same time as the airport was being bombed, the fighting moved into the city, on Kievsky Avenue linking the city and the airport. People who had lost their jobs or shelter, relatives or loved ones, went to volunteer for the militia. And every day there were more and more of them, including my acquaintances, as the war gradually touched everyone.

It is difficult to describe the sensations of trying to sleep to the sound of shelling outside your windows. The deafening and resounding explosions are somewhere close by. Your heart sinks each time, because no one knows where the next shell will land. But when you see the dawn, you realize that another night is behind you, all your loved ones are alive today.

In addition to the fighting at the airport and the aerial bombardment with unguided shells, Ukrainian snipers shelled the Putilovsky Bridge. This road was then called the “road of death”: civilian cars with people were burnt and shot, and in the Putilovsky Grove there lay the bodies of both civilians unluckily caught up in the active fighting and the militiamen trying to save people. For several days, the bodies were decomposing in the terrible heat: there was no opportunity to pick them up and bury them.

An ambulance was also shot up on the road to Donetsk airport. Its crew, Artem Kovalevsky, the ambulance driver, paramedic Sergei Kozhukharov and doctor Vladimir Vasilievich, miraculously survived and managed to get out of hell.

They told reporters from the local branch of Komsomolka in Donetsk how they managed to survive when Ukrainian snipers shot even those who had managed to run into the wooded area.

Victoria Sergeyevna, neurologist: I was on duty that day, the hospital was far away from the airport, but we all knew what was going on. In the evening, many people of different ages with strokes or suspected strokes were brought to our department. People’s chronic illnesses were exacerbated by the stress. The statistics of deaths from heart attacks and strokes during the war has increased dramatically compared to the peacetime. And these are also our victims of the war, just as innocent as the victims who died under shelling”.

https://orinocotribune.com/ukraine-chie ... of-russia/

**********

Silent death
June 9, 7:13

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Silent death

Minefields have always been the scourge of tanks, regardless of their country of manufacture, weight and thickness of armor. The combat losses of tanks of the Red Army in 1943-1945 by types of means of destruction were distributed approximately as follows: from artillery fire - 88-91%; from mines and land mines - 4-8%; from bombs and artillery fire of aviation - 4-5%. It is clear that this is the average temperature in the hospital, the Karelian Front in 1944 lost 35% of the combat losses of armored vehicles from mines.

But the real benefit of mine weapons was, of course, Kursk-43, almost 80 years ago. On the southern face on the first day of the Citadel on July 5, 1943, it was the mines of steel that immediately gathered a plentiful harvest. According to the report of the GA "South", in "Gross Germany" all 20 tanks and 5 assault guns were lost in minefields, in the 3rd Panzer Division, out of the seven PzKpfwIV lost per day, six became victims of mines, in the 8th heavy company "Tigers" of the two SS divisions "Das Reich", both were hit by mines, in the "Dead Head" division, all tanks and assault guns were lost on the first day when they hit the minefields. In one of the companies of the 503rd heavy battalion, which began on July 5 with 14 vehicles, by the end of the day there was only one left: 9 were blown up by mines, 4 were shot down.

"Panthers" were also massively knocked out in minefields. By the evening of July 11, 38 Panthers were combat-ready, 31 vehicles were listed as irretrievable losses and 131 needed repairs. Of the 131 vehicles that needed repair, 70 needed repair of the running gear, i. consequences of a mine explosion.

On the northern front, they tried to implement the “smart” option and use high technologies. These were the then "drones" - radio-controlled wedges "Borgvard" B.IV. In the band of the Soviet 81st Guards. sd due to the great depth of the minefield, as many as 12 pieces of B IV were spent on punching three passages. The passages made in this way were passed by advanced tanks without mine explosions.

However, the designation of the passages by sappers provided for in the order did not take place, due to the extremely strong artillery fire. Because of this, a hitch formed in the offensive. A large number of sultans of gaps on the battlefield prevented the Ferdinands from clearly recognizing the passages made by B IV, which were not marked in any way. On hard turf, the tracks of the B IV tankette were almost invisible. Therefore, despite the passages made, the Ferdinands of the 653rd battalion began to fail due to mine explosions. Already at the very beginning of the battle, 10 self-propelled guns were blown up. As a result, by 17.00 on July 5, only 12 Ferdinands out of 45 available at the beginning of the battle remained in service in the 653rd battalion. Despite the 200-mm armored forehead of self-propelled guns.

In the neighboring building, when approaching the designated area, one platoon of the Borgvard company fell into its own unknown minefield, as a result of which 4 tankettes failed. Another platoon, having used up 4 B IVs, was only able to make one pass through the Soviet minefield. Further, only one Soviet shell made complete devastation in the ranks of radio-controlled vehicles. An artillery shell hit the tankette, which was in its original positions. It shattered into pieces with a roar, and the explosion set fire to 2 more Borgward B IVs, which also detonated soon after. In addition, the Borgvards began to use anti-tank guns on positions. No wonder they ran out quickly. Having lost most of the Ferdinands to mines, the 654th battalion did not go far.

At the same time, one must understand that after the loss of a mass of tanks on mines, on the southern front, the Germans still made their way to Prokhorovka on the vehicles remaining in service.

(c) A.Isaev

https://t.me/iron_wind/538 - zinc

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8413132.html

Google Translator

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From Cassad's telegram account:

Colonelcassad
Lend-lease put on the back burner – US looking for ways to finance Kiev against the backdrop of a bogged down offensive by the Armed Forces of Ukraine

More than a year ago, the States loudly announced the Lend-Lease program for Ukraine. A law was hastily created that provided for the accelerated allocation of all kinds of military assistance to the country, which also excluded financial restrictions on such supplies and allowed the administration of the American president to bypass a number of bureaucratic delays. However, many months later, the document adopted under Biden's pathetic speeches did not enter into force.

The issues of financial and especially military support for the Kyiv regime from Washington are now closely tied to the success of the Ukrainian army on the battlefield -if the notorious counter-offensive does not achieve at least some results that allow the White House to sell the results of the UAF actions to Congress and voters as a “victory”, then the flow of dollars is in danger of being radically reduced. At the moment, only $2 billion of funds for Ukraine under the PDA program approved by the end of this fiscal year by congressmen in the course of, we recall, a rather tough inter-party struggle, remained only $ 2 billion. If an alternative source of funding is not found in the near future, then from September the Satisfaction of Zelensky's wishes will drop to $500 million - although a very impressive amount, it is still much less than the previous tranches.

However, it would be a mistake to assume that the White House will simply abandon its favorite toy -Biden will express support for Kyiv at least until the 2024 elections. As for funding, the United States is already looking for other ways to supply the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Thus, Bloomberg reports that Washington is ready to announce a new package of weapons for Kyiv worth over $2 billion through USAI. Unlike the PDA, this involves the transfer of weapons from the Pentagon's stockpile over a longer period of nine months to several years.

***

Colonelcassad
In total, during the failed attack in the Zaporozhye direction, the Armed Forces of Ukraine lost at least:

- 5 German tanks Leopard 2A6 and 2A4 (2 destroyed, 1 hit and abandoned, 3 abandoned)
- 6 American BMP M2A2 Bradley ODS-SA (all hit and abandoned)
- 3 American MRAP M1224 MaxxPro (all hit and abandoned)
- 1 Dutch YPR-765 armored personnel carrier (hit and abandoned)
- 1 Czech T-72M1 (destroyed) - 1 BMR-2
demining vehicle (hit and abandoned)
- 1 French VAB armored car (hit and abandoned).
- several burnt trucks

For the first time , Leopard 2 tanks and M2A2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles were destroyed .

***

Colonelcassad
Summary of the situation at the front.

According to the latest data, the command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine decided to disseminate among the personnel of 92 ombr (1, 2, 3 mbr, 1.2 sb, 22 ompb), currently operating in the Kuzemovsky direction, false information about the movement of the brigade to the point of permanent deployment, for recovery of combat capability, rest and rotation.
In fact, no one is going to provide any respite and restoration of the 92nd brigade. "out of the frying pan into the fire".

At the same time, it is planned to forcibly call up to 20,000 people in the temporarily occupied by Kiev territory of the Zaporozhye region, in parallel with this, in the Kirovohrad, Kharkiv, Dnepropetrovsk regions, efforts are being stepped up to issue subpoenas in crowded places and checkpoints.
The mobilized are supposed to be sent to the western regions of Ukraine for a short training program, with subsequent transfer to combat units.

Important: The Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine continues to prepare for attacks on cities in the border regions of the Russian Federation, it is planned to use, in particular, the Mujin-3 and Reis UAVs, while simultaneously using the Russian Volunteer Corps terrorist organization controlled by the Main Intelligence Directorate (Banned in Russia) on territories of the Belgorod, Bryansk and Kursk regions, to switch public attention from the failed start of the offensive on the Zaporozhye front.

These plans do not have the slightest tactical sense and pursue exclusively media goals.

***

Colonelcassad
Urgent update on the situation on the Zaporozhye front.

According to the latest data, the 10th Army Corps of the Strategic Reserve of the Armed Forces of Ukraine replenished the BC, built equipment into march formations and began to move.

Attacks are expected along the entire line of contact on the Zaporozhye front, primarily along the Rabotino-Verbove line, previously, the enemy began to attempt to deliver the main blow.

The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation are in full combat readiness, an unforgettable night awaits the enemy.

https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator

*****

From the Telegram account of Slavyangrad:

Slavyangrad
GB: I hope all of you understand why we, at @Slavyangrad, steered well clear of the spectacle of the “sordid infighting between Wagner and the MOD.” There never was any infighting. There never was any “artificial shell shortage” over which Prigozhin threatened to withdraw from Bakhmut. There never was any conflict. The Ukrainians (and many of those reading this now) have been had.

Wagner and the Russian Army are two sides of the same medal. Always have, always will be. The Ukrainians have been bettered at their own psyops game—the results of which we are now witnessing in Zaporozhye.

Prigozhin congratulates the Russian Army:

Evgeny Prigozhin praised the soldiers of the Russian Armed Forces, fighting now in the Zaporozhye direction.

"I want to congratulate from myself personally and from the staff of the PMC "Wagner", from the fighters and from the commanders, to congratulate those who in the Zaporozhye direction destroyed enemy equipment—the same "Leopards", which are now widely circulated in the media and social networks.

Thank you, guys! Well done! The 58th army, artillerymen, motorized riflemen who were striking the enemy from the trenches, killing them, and the air force of the Russian Federation that supported them from the air.

We still have a lot of work to do to bring back the former glory of the Russian army and the brilliance of Russian arms."

***

Slavyangrad
Pressing all over the field - why did the Russian Armed Forces attack the Ukrainian rear when the enemy is advancing on Zaporozhye

Night combined strikes on the territory of Ukraine amid the Ukrainian counter-offensive raised certain questions from some commentators. It would seem why to strike at the deep rear when it became really hot at the front.

But in reality, such an operation is justified.

First of all, the warehouses in the frontline zone are dispersed, they are smaller and less visible. Finding them is not at all a trivial task. Yes, from time to time the RF Armed Forces open and hit such targets, but much more often the Russian army achieves success by attacking large stationary targets.

But something else is far more important. By striking across the entire territory of Ukraine, Russian troops are forcing the enemy to keep the air defense in place and not pull it close to the front. The Armed Forces of Ukraine have a growing shortage of air defense systems - the allies do not have time to compensate for the losses and spent missiles. At the same time, for a successful offensive by the army of the Kiev regime, it is necessary to provide cover for its troops from air strikes, that is, the need for air defense systems increases even more.

Attacks on large logistics hubs force the Kiev regime to allocate air defense systems to cover its territory and not allow the release of resources to cover the attacking group.

Again, such "raids" in themselves regularly lead to the defeat of enemy warehouses. At the same time, enemy stocks of anti-aircraft missiles are also constantly depleted. Increasingly, despite the total censorship in Ukraine, we see the result of the use of unusable ammunition with an expired service life that falls immediately after launch. Considering that the enemy is placing air defense systems directly in residential areas, civilians are the first to suffer from this.

The moment is not far off when the last, even substandard stocks of still Soviet missiles will run out, and then the Kiev regime will find itself in an extremely difficult situation. After all, it will not be so easy to argue for additional deliveries of Western complexes, in conditions where they are constantly being destroyed by the RF Armed Forces.

https://t.me/s/Slavyangrad

******

Kursk 2.0?

Lazy and arguably biased as I am, I will just present the analysis (slightly edited) of the former Swedish officer and defense politician Mikael Valtersson:

ANALYSIS UKRAINIAN COUNTEROFFENSIVE ZAPORIZHIA AFTERNOON JUNE 9
Hard fighting continues along the Zaporizhia front, but with no Ukrainian breakthrough. Sometimes UkrAF makes small gains and then RuAF retakes the lost territories. But all fighting are still being conducted in the grey area in front of the Russian main defence lines.

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I will not go into details about attacks and counterattacks, but the main areas of fighting has been centred around Lobkove to the west, and Robotino to the south, of Orikhiv. Lobkove was captured a short while by Ukrainian forces, but later they retreated due to intense Russian bombardments.

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In Robotino Russian forces retreated to the second line of forward positions closer to the settlement, then Russian forces retook the lost positions and presently Ukrainian forces has taken them a second time and now Russian forces try to retake the first line a second time. But still the Ukrainians has not reached the settlement of Robotino and they are fighting an uphill battle in open terrain through Russian minefields and might have to withdraw a second time to their original positions.

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The Ukrainian forces don't seem to sweep mines in advance of the attack. They do it with a couple of mine clearing vehicles when they attack and behind them the Ukrainian armour advance in a column that is an easy target for Russian AT assets. In a way it resembles the Russian armour columns in the beginning of the war. Columns that took catastrophic losses to Ukrainian AT weapons, a history now repeated by the Ukrainians.
In advance of an offensive, the attacking side must secure air and artillery superiority, so they can shield their mine clearing operations and troop concentrations. And at the same time destroy the defenders command structures and logistical hubs. Finally when they attack their air and artillery superiority can be utilised to severely hurt and slow down enemy reserves to secure breakthroughs. This becomes even more important if the enemy has large reserves and a defence in depth.

On the Zaporizhia front the situation is the opposite, so Ukrainian forces hasn't many choices how to act. One method is to achieve strategic surprise as in the Kharkiv offensive last autumn. That option doesn't exist on the Zaporizhia front. In general I would say that an attack towards an enemy who has all the benefits RuAF has on the Zaporizhia front is suicidal.

The only way Ukrainian (and western) commanders even could have contemplated that such an offensive could succeed was if

western weapons were much superior to Russian weapons,
western trained soldiers much superior to Russian soldiers and
Russian morale was dismal.
If all these factors where true, UkrAF might have had a chance to succeed, but nothing seems to corroborate those assumptions.

Many on the Ukrainian and western side had anticipated hard initial resistance from RuAF, but after 2-3 days fighting and advances of around 6-8 km, they expected an increasing collapse of Russian morale and the real breakthroughs would come. Nothing of this seems to be other than wishful thinking, since fighting still are in the grey zone and Russian resistance are unbroken. At the same time Ukrainian forces take heavy casualties both in soldiers and vehicles.

The offensive isn't over yet and the main Ukrainian attack fist remains with probably over 600 tanks and as many IFVs around Orikhiv. But the future for the Ukrainian offensive looks bleak if their vanguard is destroyed before they reach the Russian main defence lines. The probability is large that Ukraine has to use up their main force to get through a couple of the Russian defencelines and then they will run out of forces to exploit any successes and be forced to withdraw.

To summarise, the most likely outcome of the Ukrainian offensive is minor territorial gains at a horrendous cost.

As I've said before it seems to be Kursk 2.0


I largely agree with the above assessment (even though Kursk 1.0 was much larger and way more balanced).

The biggest tactical mistake I see on the Ukrainian side is the bunching up of vehicles. The distance between combat vehicle on roads and in open fields should be 100 meter, not 10, 5 or 1 meter like in the picture below. The Ukrainian columns regularly get slaughtered by artillery strikes because they always(!) bunch up. Keeping distances is a basic training lecture for any combined arms warfare unit.

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Where are the air defenses? Ukraine has received 37 German Gepard (cheetah) air defense tanks. These are old but can keep the air clean, each within a 10 kilometer wide bubble. The Gepards were specifically designed to cover tank and mech-infantry battalions in battle. But judging from the number of drone videos the Russian can put out, there is not one Gepard in the whole area.

Also where are the electromagnetic measures. Why can Russian artillery directing drones fly over the combat zone but not Ukrainians?

Why are no fog grenades used by Ukrainian artillery to cover the approaches and breaching attempts by Ukrainian armor?

How are piecemeal commitments, wave after wave but hours apart, going to change anything when what is needed are massive consistent pushes to get through?

Folks, these are basics, not higher level operational or strategic issues. I have drilled these basics into conscripts. If you can't even get those right, after allegedly intense 'western' training, what hope is there to breach through seriously prepared Russian defense lines?

None.

Here is some of the damage done to last night's and today's morning attacks by an allegedly prime Ukrainian unit, the 43rd 'western' trained brigade, that uses prime 'western' equipment.


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Here is video of more. https://twitter.com/RWApodcast/status/1 ... 5450698752

The first serious probing attacks for the counter offensive started on June 5. I have listed the Ukrainian losses the Russian Ministry of Defense has since reported. Note that these numbers are mostly for the whole front, not just for the Zaporizhia region.

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These numbers are, like in most frontline reports, likely too high. But even if one only takes them at half or a third for real they are still frightening high.

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A whole brigade, more likely a third each of three brigades, has been wasted for zero gains.

Consider that we are five days in and the Ukrainian forces, despite using Leopards and Bradleys, their main forces, have hardly crossed the first contact line. The real Russian first defense lines are still miles away and there are three or more of those.

The History Legends Youtube channel calls this a disaster.

I agree with that too.

Posted by b on June 9, 2023 at 16:33 UTC | Permalink
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: Footnotes from the Ukrainian "Crisis"; New High-Points in Cynicism Part IV

Post by blindpig » Sat Jun 10, 2023 8:09 pm

"Let's Try This Again!"

Yesterday I posted a picture of a Leopard 2A6 tank, 4 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, and a Soviet era mine clearing vehicle all caught up next to each other in a minefield. There is now also better video of that scene as well as others.

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For unknown reasons the Ukrainian command later decided to add five more Bradleys to the scrap exposition:

Military Advisor @miladvisor - 18:06 UTC · Jun 9, 2023
⚡️👇9x 🇺🇸M2 Bradley,🇩🇪Leopard 2A6, armoured recovery vehicle lost by Ukrainian forces.
video https://twitter.com/miladvisor/status/1 ... 7963370498


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It is the same Leopard tank in the same position. I believe that the 'armoured recovery vehicle' @miladvisor mentions is an incorrect identification of the mine clearing vehicle that can also be seen in the previous picture.

All of those vehicles seem to have some mobility damage, i.e. they lost a track or two due to mine explosions. One of the added Bradleys seems to be on fire. Then its neighboring Bradley decides to also burn and explodes.

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Someone had sent half a company into a minefield where it was damaged and stopped. He then sent the second half of the company to the same place where it met the same fate.

"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results." (No, that is not an Einstein quote.)

Here is a first person view video from the Ukrainian side of what, I believe, is another group of four Bradleys in a minefield. Finally someone throws smoke grenades so some of the soldiers involved can be evacuated.



Simplicitus tries to put some rationality cover over the Ukrainian decision to attack the strongest defense position of the Russian forces:

This is all to say that Ukraine has almost no time left to make a big splash. They have no option apart from gaining one final big flashy triumph they can hail as a victory to be sold to their souring Western audience, whose support is slowly drying up, and who’s getting ready to throw in the towel.
And the only way for Ukraine to get such a huge and relatively ‘fast’ triumph is by severing the Crimean landbridge. It’s the only objective in the entire conflict where Ukraine can deal one big deathblow to Russia’s jugular in a very proportionately small amount of moves. No other possible combination of captures or assaults in Donbass can have such an effect.


I find that hard to accept. One attacks where one has the highest chance of success, not where some foreign political calendar tells one to go. How that is then (over-)sold to the 'western' public is a completely different question.

Throughout the last night the 47th brigade of the Ukrainian armed forces tried to attack the Russian lines.The 47th is supposed to be elite, as it was trained and armed by NATO countries.

Two columns of the brigade were hit and stopped before they could reach the line of contact. What was then left to attack failed to break through.

Posted by b on June 10, 2023 at 13:42 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/06/l ... .html#more

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Patrick Lawrence: Neo-Nazis in Ukraine? No, Yes, No–Yes
June 7, 2023

A New York Times’ reporter’s job this week is to persuade us that all those Ukrainian soldiers wearing Nazi insignia and marching through Kiev in Klan-like torch parades are not what you think.

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Stepan Bandera torchlight parade in Kiev, Jan. 1, 2020. (A1/Wikimedia Commons)

By Patrick Lawrence
Original to ScheerPost

I tell you, serving as a New York Times correspondent these days cannot be easy.

You have to convey utter nonsense to your readers while maintaining a straight face and a serious demeanor.

You have to suggest the Russians may have exploded a drone over the Kremlin, that they may have blown up their own gas pipeline, that their president is an out-of-touch psychotic, that their soldiers in Ukraine are drunkards using faulty equipment, that they attack with “human hordes” (Orientalism, anyone?) and on and on — all the while affecting the gravitas once associated with the traditional “Timesman.” You try it sometime.

I am reminded of that pithy passage in Daniel Boorstin’s regrettably overlooked book, The Image. “The reporter’s task,” Boorstin wrote in 1962, “is to find a way of weaving these threads of unreality into a fabric that the reader will not recognize as entirely unreal.”

Boorstin reflected on America’s resort to imagery, illusion and distortion as Washington geared up its gruesome follies in Vietnam. The reporter’s task is a whole lot harder now, given how much further we have wandered into illusion and distortion since Boorstin’s day.

And now we have the case of Thomas Gibbons–Neff, a square-jawed former Marine covering the Ukraine war for the Times — strictly to the extent the Kyiv regime permits him to do so, as he explains with admirable honesty. This guy is serious times 10, he and his newspaper want us to know.

Tom’s job this week is to persuade us that all those Ukrainian soldiers wearing Nazi insignia, idolizing Jew-murdering, Russophobic collaborators with the Third Reich, gathering ritually in Nazi-inspired cabals, marching through Kyiv in Klan-like torch parades are not what you think.

Nah, our Tom tells us. They look like neo–Nazis, they act like neo–Nazis, they dress like neo–Nazis, they profess Fascist and neo–Nazi ideologies, they wage this war with the Wehrmacht’s visceral hatred of Russians — O.K., but whyever would you think they are neo–Nazis?

They are just regular guys. They wear the Wolfsangel, the Schwarze sonne, the black sun, the Totenkopf, or Death’s Head — all Nazi symbols — because they are proud of themselves, and these are the kinds of things proud people wear. I was just wearing mine the other day.

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A march of Azov veterans and supporters in Kiev, 2019. (Goo3, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons)

The slipping and sliding starts early in “Nazi Symbols on Ukraine’s Front Lines Highlight Thorny Issues of History,” the piece Gibbons–Neff published in Monday’s editions.

He begins with three photographs of neo–Nazi Ukrainian soldiers, SS insignia plainly visible, that the Kyiv regime has posted on social media, “then quietly deleted,” since the Russian intervention began last year.

“The photographs, and their deletions,” Gibbons–Neff writes, “highlight the Ukrainian military’s complicated relationship with Nazi imagery, a relationship forged under both Soviet and German occupation during World War II.”

Complicated relationship with Nazi imagery? Stop right there, Mr. Semper fi. Ukraine’s neo–Nazi problem is not about a few indiscreetly displayed images. Sorry. The Ukrainian army’s “complicated relationship” is with a century of ultra-right ideology drawn from Mussolini’s Fascism and then the German Reich.

As is well-known and documented, the neo–Nazis who infest the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the AFU — among many other national institutions — have made idols of such figures as Stepan Bandera, the freakishly murderous nationalist who allied with the Nazi regime during the war.

Recorded History Aside

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The New York Times building. (Michal Osmenda, CC BY-SA 2.0, Wikimedia Commons)

This history is a matter of record, as briefly outlined here, but Gibbons–Neff alludes to none of it. It’s merely a matter of poor image-making, you see. In support of this offensive whitewash, Gibbons–Neff has the nerve to quote a source from none other than Bellingcat, which was long, long back exposed as a C.I.A. and MI6 cutout and which is now supported by the Atlantic Council, the NATO–funded, spook-infested think tank based in Washington.

“What worries me, in the Ukrainian context, is that people in Ukraine who are in leadership positions, either they don’t or they’re not willing to acknowledge and understand how these symbols are viewed outside of Ukraine,” a Bellingcat “researcher” named Michael Colborne tells Gibbons–Neff. “I think Ukrainians need to increasingly realize that these images undermine support for the country.”

Think about that. The presence of Nazi elements in the AFU is not a worry. The worry is merely whether clear signs of Nazi sympathies might cause some members of the Western alliance to decide they no longer want to support Nazi elements in the AFU.

I am reminded of that Public Broadcasting news segment last year, wherein a provincial governor is featured with a portrait of Bandera behind him. PBS simply blurred the photograph and ran the interview with another of the courageous, admirable Ukrainians to which we are regularly treated.

I hardly need remind paying-attention readers that the neo–Nazis-who-are-not-neo–Nazis were for years well-reported as simply neo–Nazis in the years after the U.S.–cultivated coup in 2014.

The Times, The Washington Post, PBS, CNN — the whole sorry lot — ran pieces on neo–Nazi elements in the AFU and elsewhere. In March 2018, Reuters published a commentary by Jeff Cohen under the headline “Ukraine’s Neo–Nazi Problem.”

Three months later The Atlantic Council, for heaven’s sake, published a paper, also written by Cohen, titled, “Ukraine’s Got a Real Problem with Far–Right Violence (And no, RT Didn’t Write This Headline).”

I recall, because it was so surprising coming from the council. The original head on that paper was “Ukraine’s Got a Neo–Nazi Problem,” but that version now seems lost to the blur of stealth editing.

Then came the Russian intervention, and Poof! There are no more neo–Nazis in Ukraine.

There are only these errant images that are of no special account.

And to assert there are neo–Nazis in Ukraine — to have some semblance of memory and a capacity to judge what is before one’s eyes — “plays into Russian propaganda,” Gibbons–Neff warns us.

It is to “give fuel to his”— Vladimir Putin’s — “false claims that Ukraine must be de–Nazified.” For good measure Gibbons–Neff gets out the old Volodymyr-Zelensky-is-Jewish chestnut, as if this is proof of… of something or other.

My mind goes to that lovely Donovan lyric from the Scottish singer’s Zen enlightenment phase. Remember “There Is a Mountain?” The famous lines went, “First there is a mountain/ Then there is no mountain/ Then there is.” There were neo–Nazis in Ukraine, then there were no neo–Nazis, and now there are neo–Nazis but they aren’t neo–Nazis after all.

A Few Considerations

There are a few things to think about as we consider Gibbons–Neff’s story, other than the fact that it is horse-droppings as a piece of journalism. For one thing, nowhere in it does he quote or reference any member of the AFU — no one wearing a uniform, no one sporting one of these troubling insignia.

Various image-managing officials speak to him about the neo–Nazis who-are-not-neo–Nazis, but we never hear from any neo–Nazi-who-is-not-a-neo–Nazi to explain things as a primary source, so to say.

I wager Gibbons–Neff never got within 20 miles of one: He wouldn’t dare, for then he would have to quote one of these insignia-sporting people saying that of course he was a neo–Nazi. Can’t you read, son?

For another, Gibbons–Neff resolutely avoids dilating his lens such that the larger phenomenon comes into view. It all comes down to those three unfortunate insignia in those three deleted photographs.

The parades, the corridors of neo–Nazi flags, the ever-present swastikas, the reenactments of all-night SS rituals, the glorification of Nazis and Nazi collaborators, the Russophobic blood lust: Sure, it can all be explained, except that our Timesman does not go anywhere near any of this.


Gibbons–Neff’s story follows by 10 days an even more contorted piece of pretzel-like rubbish published in The Kyiv Independent, a not-independent daily that has been supported by various Western governments. This is by one Illia Ponomarenko, a reporter much-lionized in the West, and appeared under the headline, “Why some Ukrainian soldiers use Nazi-related insignia.”

This is the kind of piece that is so bad it tips into fun. “No, Ukraine does not have ‘a Nazi problem,’” Ponomarenko states flatly, and this is the last flat sentence we get in this piece. “Just like in many places around the world, people with far-right and neo–Nazi views, driven by their ideology, are prone to joining the military and participating in conflicts,” he writes. And then this doozy, where begins a riot of irrationality:

“It is, of course, true that, for instance, the Azov Battalion was originally founded by neo–Nazi and far-right groups (as well as many soccer ultra-fans), which brought along with it the typical aesthetics — not only neo–Nazi insignia but also things like Pagan rituals or names like ‘The Black Corps,’ the official newspaper of Nazi Germany’s major paramilitary organization Schutzstaffel (SS).”

But worry not, readers. It is merely an aesthetic, part of a harmless, misunderstood “subculture”:

“In the oversimplified memory of some around the world, particularly within various militaristic subcultures, symbols representing the Wehrmacht, Nazi Germany’s Armed Forces, and the SS are seen to reflect a super-effective war machine, not the perpetrators of one of the greatest crimes against humanity in human history.”

But of course. SS insignia, Wehrmacht iconography: Seen it everywhere people admire super-effective war machines. Remember this logic next time some liberal flamer proposes to persecute a MAGA supporter who partakes of this “subculture.”

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Torchlight procession in honor of the 106 anniversary of the birthday of Stepan Bandera, Kiev, Jan. 1, 2015. (All-Ukrainian Union CC BY 3.0, Wikimedia Commons)

Has Tom Gibbons–Neff given us a rewrite job? Having been around the block for a good long time, I have seen this kind of thing often enough — correspondents scoring off the local dailies to look deep and penetrating back on the foreign desk.

It is also possible, assuming for a moment Gibbons–Neff’s editors still read other newspapers, that they asked him for just such a piece after seeing Ponomarenko’s. Either way, we get this in Ponomarenko’s recognizably illogical style:

“Questions over how to interpret such symbols are as divisive as they are persistent, and not just in Ukraine. In the American South, some have insisted that today, the Confederate flag symbolizes pride, not its history of racism and secession. The swastika was an important Hindu symbol before it was co-opted by the Nazis.”

If you are going to reach, Tom, may as well reach for the stars.

We have a New York Times correspondent quoting Ukraine’s Defense Ministry and Bellingcat, an intel cutout that is part of a NATO think tank, and then rather too closely, I would say, aping a Western-supported newspaper in Kyiv. Yes, Virginia, I believe we all got ourselves one of them-there echo chambers, just the way the Deep State likes ’em.

Last March, Gibbons–Neff was interviewed by The New York Times. Yes, they do this sort of thing down there on Eighth Avenue, where they simply cannot get enough of themselves.

It is enlightening. The unfortunate Times reporter assigned as the straight man asked, as our intrepid correspondent self-aggrandized, “What have been the biggest challenges in covering the war?” Gibbons–Neff’s reply is pricelessly revealing:

“’Wrestling with access and being allowed to go certain places to see things that you need the press officer for, or permission from the military unit,’ the fearless ex–Marine explains. ‘Ukrainians know how to manage the press fairly well. So navigating those parameters and not rubbing anyone the wrong way has always been tough.’”

Forget about bombs, missiles, gore, the fog of war, courageous sergeants, trench stench, grenades, or any of the other horrors of battle. Gibbons–Neff’s big problems as he pretends to cover the Ukraine war are maintaining access, getting the Kyiv gatekeepers’ permission to go someplace, and avoiding annoying the regime’s authorities.

Does this tell you everything you want to know about our Timesman or what?

It is always interesting to ask why a piece such as this appears when it does. Dead silence for months on the neo–Nazi question, and then suddenly a long explainer that does its best to avoid explaining anything. Always interesting to ask, never easy to answer.

It could be that a lot of stuff on these awful people is sifting out from under the carpet. Or maybe something big is on the way and this piece is preemptive. Or maybe either Gibbons–Neff or his editors saw the Ponomarenko piece as an opportunity to dispose of one of the Kyiv regime’s most embarrassing features.

Or maybe the larger context counts here. As mentioned in this space last week, the Times’ Steve Erlanger recently suggested from Brussels that NATO might do a postwar Germany job with Ukraine: Welcome the West of the country to the alliance and let the eastern provinces go for an indefinite period, unification the long-term objective.

Late last week Foreign Affairs ran a fantastical piece by Andriy Zagorodnyuk, formerly a Ukrainian defense minister and now, yes indeedy, a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council. It appeared under the headline, “To Protect Europe, Let Ukraine Join NATO—Right Now.”

Zagorodnyuk’s argument is as loopy as his subhead, “No Country Is Better at Stopping Russia.” But these kinds of assertions, dreamily hyperbolic as they may be, have a purpose. They serve to enlarge the field of acceptable discourse. They inch us closer to normalizing the thought that Ukraine must be accepted in the North Atlantic alliance for our sake, the sake of the West, no matter how provocative such a move will prove.

This suggest that Gibbons–Neff’s piece, along with the one he followed in the Kyiv paper, are by way of a cleanup job.

The Western press, working closely with intelligence agencies, did its best to prettify the savage jihadists attempting to bring down the Assad government in Damascus, you will recall. Remember the “moderate rebels?” Maybe Gibbons–Neff is on an equally dishonorable errand.

Semper fi, huh? Always faithful to what?

https://consortiumnews.com/2023/06/07/p ... es-no-yes/

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U.S. proxy war: Kakhova dam and the weaponization of water
June 9, 2023 Nahia Sanzo

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Kakhovka dam flooding.

June 7 — Tuesday morning, just a few hours after the first serious Ukrainian attacks against Russian positions began in various areas of the Donbass and Zaporozhye fronts, a prelude to the major offensive that Ukraine has been announcing for months, the bursting of the Kakhovka dam immediately diverted the focus of attention from the alleged Ukrainian advances to the part of the southern territories furthest from the battle.

Novaya Kakhovka and the Soviet dam built in the times of Stalin and Khrushchev are already familiar to those who have closely followed the course of the war. In the initial phase of the Russian intervention at the end of February 2022, the Ukrainian command prioritized the defense of Kiev and sacrificed territorial battalions in areas of secondary importance such as the southern front, where the Russian advance came with virtually no resistance. From Crimea, Russian troops reached the Dnieper River in just a few days and shortly after captured the city of Kherson, on the right bank of the river, which they would lose after their defense became impossible in the autumn of that year.

Throughout the summer, Ukraine had begun preparing the ground for a counteroffensive to regain control of Russia’s most vulnerable territories: those north of the Dnieper, whose defense was made impossible by destroying the infrastructure linking both banks of the Dnieper. Target of the newly arrived U.S. HIMARS [multiple rocket launchers], the Antonovsky bridge was at that time one of the major targets, but not the only one. The bombardments of Novaya Kakhovka were not spontaneous or sporadic, but a planned destruction strategy to make the situation of Russian troops at key strategic points untenable. The same can be said of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, located in the town of Energodar, also south of the Dnieper, and still under Russian control.

Cities and towns flooded

The partial collapse of the dam yesterday has led to the flooding of a whole series of towns and cities in the area. In the morning, the mayor of Novaya Kakhovka reported that the rise in the water level exceeded 12 centimeters per hour. The water affected the city of Kherson, the most populated town in the area, although in a clearly less serious way than other cities. In Novaya Kakhovka, a few hours after the dam breached, water rose up the pedestal of the Lenin statue, and swans glided through the empty center of the flooded city in a post-apocalyptic scene about the effects of war in the post-Soviet world.

The accusations were not long in coming and both Russia and Ukraine alleged sabotage on the other side. Ukraine put in place the mechanisms both to react to what happened and evacuate the population from the affected towns, and to achieve the maximum possible political and informational benefit. Without having to wait for a minimal study on whether the dam had collapsed due to deliberate demolition or the effects of previous bombings, the Western press and political class en masse took Russia’s guilt for granted. In the same way as with what happened after the Nord Stream explosions, the media and politicians of all countries and ideologies began to look for why it was in Russia’s interest to blow up the dam.

Thus, the argument of last autumn was revived, when the possibility of the humanitarian and environmental catastrophe that occurred yesterday was first raised publicly. At the time, Russia accused Ukraine of planning the dam’s destruction, an argument that was denounced by Ukraine and its partners as a nonsensical conspiracy theory. The aim, according to Russia, would have been to flood the lands on the left bank of the Dnieper under Russian control and force Russian troops back or drown in their positions. Ukraine, for its part, accused Russia of planning to blow up the dam to prevent its troops from advancing on that territory. Unlike the Russian accusation, the Ukrainian one, although nonsensical since the Russian troops were preparing trenches in that area of ​​the Dnieper at that time, was disseminated by the media, giving it credibility.

Something similar happened yesterday, and the nuances or clarifications, such as “the BBC has been unable to verify either the Russian or Ukrainian allegations,” were the exception rather than the rule. And for the moment, it has not even been possible to confirm if the collapse was due to an attempted sabotage, to the consequences of the usual Ukrainian bombings, or simply to the accumulation of damage in recent months.

Rush to judgment

Since the Russian withdrawal from the territories on the right bank of the Dnieper, which provided protection for the territories on the left bank as they kept Ukrainian troops at a greater distance, the safety of the dam and its workers has been compromised. What is naive is to think that the work of reconstruction and repair of the damage caused by the Ukrainian bombings could be carried out. Blaming Russia for the collapse due to poor conservation – without taking into account the circumstances and the Ukrainian bombing — has been one of the four main positions shown throughout the day yesterday.

This position can be seen in the person of David Puente, Italian “verifier” and collaborator of Facebook in that verification task, who made this argument just as he did last September about the Nord Stream explosion. Then also, Russia was guilty because of the lack of maintenance of the gas pipeline.

The second position, maintained by Ukraine and the Western political class, has limited itself to taking Russia’s guilt for granted and arguing that it is a scorched-earth policy in the face of alleged Ukrainian advances on the front, although, in this area, there have not been such advances. “It is the children, women and men of Ukraine who will suffer the consequences of the terrible destruction of the Nova Kakhovka hydroelectric plant,” wrote the president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, adding that “it is an act against humanity. A war crime that cannot go unanswered. Today, more than ever, Ukraine needs our help.”

Even clearer in her message, Ursula von der Leyen stated that “Russia will have to pay for the crimes committed in Ukraine. The destruction of the dam, an intolerable attack on civilian infrastructure, puts thousands of people in the Kherson region at risk,” she wrote, later pledging help through available civil protection mechanisms.

“It is not yet clear what caused the dam to collapse,” the BBC admitted yesterday. However, politicians and journalists from all over the European continent have already passed sentence.

Forgetting its supposed neutrality, the Ukrainian Red Cross accused Russia of a war crime in messages that it was later forced to delete. Without accusing either side, the International Committee of the Red Cross recalled that “the dams enjoy special international protection under international humanitarian law, since they contain dangerous forces which, if released, can lead to severe suffering for the civilian population.”

Thousands of people on both sides of the Dnieper are being affected right now. As Dmitry Steshin recalled, the territories under Russian control are at a lower altitude, so it is that area on the southern bank of the Dnieper that will be most affected. Russia has mobilized its resources to also evacuate thousands of people affected in localities in the area, some of which, like Aleshka, are difficult to access and have a very complicated situation. The explosions that appeared in several videos taken by the population of the area – spontaneous explosions in the mines displaced by the river’s rise – show another of the dangers of what happened.

Without the need for any investigation or assessment of the damage and with the absolute certainty that Russia is always guilty, journalists like Paul Mason quickly showed their anger, the third of the four positions that were repeated throughout yesterday. “Russia has blown up the huge dam on Kherson, risking a catastrophe at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant,” wrote the journalist, who appears to have believed Zelensky’s claim that the nuclear power plant is in imminent danger and not that of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s director. The IAEA, whose representatives have access to the area, stated that this danger does not exist at the moment. The plant requires water from the Kajovka reservoir, so the risk does not exist in the short term. Going beyond assignment of blame and future effects, lasexta.com said: “Stalin already used water as a weapon of war in Zaporizhia in 1941: the USSR destroyed the Dneprostoy dam and caused more than 20,000 deaths.”

Washington Post reported Ukraine test strike

Finally, there were also those who yesterday wanted to see the bright side of things. Carl Bildt, a professional hawk, lamented that the destruction of the dam “will cause extensive flooding mainly on the left bank of the Dnieper,” describing the part of the river under Russian control, “complicating any military operation,” that is, the Ukrainian advance. “But, I suppose, it also deprives the Crimean canal of its water.”

That the Crimean canal is drying up again a year after the demolition of the wall built by Ukraine to deprive the peninsula of running water seems to be the positive part of what happened for certain sectors of the European establishment. In Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov confirmed that, given that possibility, the peninsula had proceeded to fill the canal to its limits. Crimea may have to live without that supply again in the coming months, just as it did during the years when Kiev used its flow control of the Dnieper as collective punishment against the population.

None of the four positions mentioned – lack of maintenance, prosecution by default, anger or the search for benefits for Ukraine – take into account the precedents of recent months, in which Ukraine has not hesitated to attack and endanger critical civil infrastructure.

It’s also been convenient to forget something that, despite having gone unnoticed at the time of its publication, became relevant yesterday. In December 2022, the Washington Post published a report in which the commander of the Ukrainian forces in the Kherson region confirmed that Ukraine had considered blowing up the Kakhovka dam. “Kovalchuk considered the possibility of flooding the river. The Ukrainians, he claimed, even conducted a test strike with a HIMARS launcher against the gates of the Nova Kakhovka dam, punching three holes in the metal to see if the Dnieper water could rise high enough to destroy the Russian crossings without flooding the nearby towns.

The Washington Post not only confirmed that the Russian accusations were not a conspiracy theory, but that the Ukrainian attacks, which have continued ever since, could have caused the damage necessary for the collapse without the need for sabotage.

https://www.struggle-la-lucha.org/2023/ ... -of-water/

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The Ukraine proxy war has shrunken U.S. influence. If NATO’s plans are stopped, imperial power will fully collapse.

BY RAINER SHEA
JUNE 8, 2023

Speaking out against Washington’s hostile policies towards Cuba, Venezuela, and other Latin American countries isn’t as subversive as it used to be, however important it still is. This is because in the era of the Ukraine proxy war, where the United States has caused the prices of the oil it depends on to rise, it’s had to realize it needs to co-exist with Latin America in order to survive. This makes acting against NATO’s operations a more counter-hegemonic thing to do. To truly oppose imperialism’s violence against Latin America and other places, we must deal the most meaningful type of harm towards imperialism by fighting NATO’s psyops.

Washington’s recent softenings of its attacks against Cuba and Venezuela, and its willingness not to target Lula’s Brazil, aren’t indications that the governments of these countries lack interest in defying imperial control. They show that the imperialists, due to their own self-detrimental actions, are increasingly having to compromise. They continue to take whatever opportunities they can to meddle in Latin American politics. They’ve carried out a coup in Peru, are trying to do the same in Colombia, and wish they could do the same in Mexico if AMLO weren’t proving quite adept at thwarting regime change plots. Yet on a hemisphere-wide scale, they’ve lessened the severity of their pressure upon the region.

Brazil, the region’s biggest and perhaps most economically pivotal country, is the most meaningful example of this shift in Washington’s priorities regarding where it chooses to direct its war-making efforts. That the imperialists aren’t reacting to Lula’s efforts at building strong ties to China by trying to start a civil war in Brazil or sanctioning it, even though that’s what they’ve been doing to plenty of Asian and African countries which have become pro-PRC, shows there’s a growing limit to how much damage they can do. An ironic problem Washington has encountered throughout its sanction-expanding project over the last generation is that when you cut off market ties to a vast portion of the globe, your own economic vitality will suffer. All while that sanctioned portion builds an alternative economic network by necessity, one that gets stronger the more countries are forced to join it.

Washington does not want Latin America to become like Eurasia, where the majority of the hemisphere’s countries have become incentivized by U.S. economic warfare to partner in constructing their own infrastructure, international currency, and commerce projects. Projects that are obviously better options than staying dependent on Washington, with its practice of looting all the peripheral countries that it’s made into “partners.” Staying loyal to the U.S. empire is constraining, whereas embracing multipolarity is liberating. This has already been getting more and more apparent to Latin American countries, which overall are accepting the benefits that China, Russia, and Iran have to offer them. The same applies to a growing amount of the European countries, even though Germany for now has been taken over by obstinate NATO loyalists. Right after the imperialists succeeded at crushing Germany’s oil pipeline project with Russia, France’s leader declared that his country needs to reduce its dependence on the dollar.

For the U.S. to start declaring war against every one of these countries would be economic and diplomatic suicide, rendering the empire no longer a global force but a fully isolated rogue state. When it’s increasingly a practical necessity for the world to build a relationship with Washington’s rivals, there comes to be a barrier on how much of the world Washington can afford to go to war with. That barrier has been revealed to mainly be the Atlantic ocean. The thing that separates the African countries, where Washington continues to sow chaos to advance its new cold war, and the Latin American countries, which Washington fears to do the same thing to. There’s a reason why Pentagon strategists have been making plans to respond to global climatic disasters with military intervention: they know that if too many of the peripheral countries turn into failed states, neo-colonial extraction will become untenable.

This means the imperial structure is vulnerable, in a way that creates an unprecedented opportunity for us in the core to aid its weakening. We can do so by focusing our efforts on our enemy’s big point of vulnerability: the NATO psyops. If we can disrupt NATO’s narrative control too much for its activities to remain sustainable, the strategic gamble that Washington is taking by shifting its primary operations to Europe will come to be a failed gamble.

This is the truth that those who seek to be effective anti-imperialists must adjust their practice according to. There is great value in exposing the State Department’s present meddling efforts within Latin America; AFRICOM’s facilitation of war crimes and training local operatives in how to orchestrate coups; and Washington’s expanding occupation of southeast Asia so that China can be countered. What’s an even more pivotal front in the information war, and must be framed as such when talking about these other fronts, is NATO’s warmaking. For the moment, the biggest psyop within this category is the Ukraine psyop, with all of the anti-Russian narratives that it involves. Yet as the Ukraine proxy war continues failing to destabilize Russia, the anti-Serbia psyop is in the process of taking its place as the most significant one. The nature of this information war, and how we should rank our priorities, is fluid. Our job is to always keep updated on what’s the moment’s most meaningful issue within the discourse, so that we can most effectively combat the empire.

This is not to say that any one group of people who the empire is subjecting to violence matters less than another. My argument is only that given the constantly shifting targets of Washington’s psyops, in order to liberate all of these groups, we must make it our foremost priority to defend whichever group represents the primary target at a given moment. That’s why until we’ve sufficiently combated U.S. hegemony, which at present means countering the Ukraine and Serbia psyops most of all, we won’t be able to free the empire’s internal colonies. Those being the hundreds of occupied indigenous First Nations, and the Black communities that are still subject to enforced poverty, state violence, and de facto segregation.

To make combating imperialism’s psyops our foremost priority is not to devalue the liberation struggles of the internal colonies, as the imperialism-compatible left’s radlib elements have been alleging. It’s to do what’s best, at this stage in the class struggle, for ensuring these colonies can attain victory. When U.S. hegemony is the most significant thing keeping the imperial center’s state strong, fighting U.S. hegemony is paramount. It’s an essential step in the process of our revolution. And when NATO and its activities have become the most important thing for the empire to narratively aid in order to maintain this hegemony, NATO must be our biggest target.

https://newswiththeory.com/the-ukraine- ... -collapse/

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A Special Kind Of Gratitude
June 10, 12:48

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Hungary directly accused Ukraine of undermining its sovereignty.

Hungarian Foreign Ministry: Ukraine's calls to prevent the construction of the Paks-2 nuclear power plant violate the sovereignty and energy security of the country

State Secretary of the Hungarian Foreign Ministry for Bilateral Relations Tamas Menzer said on his social networks that Hungary perceives Ukraine's desire to prevent the construction of new power units of the Paks-2 nuclear power plant as an attack on its sovereignty and energy security.

According to Menzer, Paks-2 is a key condition for maintaining Hungarian energy security and reducing utility costs in the country. He pointed out that energy supply is a national competence, that is, a matter of sovereignty, and anyone who attacks Hungary's energy security is infringing on the country's sovereignty.

The Secretary of State of the Hungarian Foreign Ministry called it “unacceptable and shocking” that Kiev is attacking Hungary’s energy security, thereby jeopardizing the energy supply of the country’s people, when Hungary is conducting the largest humanitarian action in its history, helping Ukraine with all possible humanitarian means and hosting more than a million Ukrainians in the country refugees.

Mentzer added that in an attempt to prevent the construction of the nuclear power plant, Ukrainian Prime Minister Shmygal chose a “special kind of gratitude”, but Hungary will not allow this to anyone, including the head of the Ukrainian government, protecting the country’s energy security from all attacks and pressure.

https://info-balkan.ru/vengriya-obvinil ... iteta.html - zinc

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8414842.html

Failed advertising "Leopards"
June 10, 15:32

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The unsuccessful use of "Leopards" in Ukraine consolidated the downward trend in the shares of the manufacturer of the main German battle tank.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8415156.html

Google Translator

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Who blew up the Kakhovka dam?

With Ukraine’s ‘offensive’ failing, and the western psyop brigade keen to talk about everything except battlefield realities, it is not hard to see who benefits.
Proletarian writers

Friday 9 June 2023

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People navigate in a rubber dinghy through the flooded streets of Kherson city, 7 June 2023.

The collapse of Kakhovka dam (on the Dnieper river in the Kherson region that was recently reincorporated into Russia) and consequent release of a flood tide of water, swamping the area and causing great loss of life and widespread infrastructural damage, is the latest incident to be blamed on Russia by Washington and Kiev, as usual without a shred of evidence.

As with earlier sabotage of the Kerch bridge and the Nord Stream pipeline, the russophobic knee-jerk reaction from the west, blaming Moscow, was subsequently shown to be false, with the real culprits turning out to be Ukrainian terror outfits or Washington itself.

In the case of the bursting dam in Kakhovka, one explanation being put forward is that repeated exposure to incoming shelling from the Ukrainian side weakened the dam’s fabric, incrementally compromising its structure over a period of time. This is the view expressed by Kakhovka’s mayor, Vladimir Leontiev, who explained that the dam’s valves were destroyed.

The Financial Times, rowing in with the prevailing hysteria, has adopted a lofty moral tone, opining: “In a war that has produced countless acts of Russian barbarity, the destruction of the Kakhovka dam is one of the most egregious.” (Editorial: Dam disaster complicates Ukraine’s counteroffensive, 7 June 2023)

It would be interesting to hear from the FT just what it believes to be permissible or not in a war against fascism. What would it make of the famous WW2 destruction of a key dam in the Ruhr valley, inspiring the popular Dam Busters movie? Was this “an egregious act of barbarism” committed by the British RAF? Or was it a necessary sacrifice, striking at the heart of Nazi steel, coal and armament production?

As an article in History Today reminded us: “An estimated 1,600 civilians and prisoners of war, including female slave labourers from Poland, Russia and Ukraine, drowned in the flooding. Even Wing Commander Guy Gibson, the famed leader of the Dambusters immortalised in the movie by matinee idol Richard Todd, later mused how ‘the fact that people … might drown had not occurred to us’, and that ‘no one likes mass slaughter and we did not like being the authors of it’.

“One German civilian, Elizabeth Muller, would later recount how she saw ‘trees, roads, gardens’ all swept away before her eyes, while a Russian PoW named Antonio Ivanovna reported how ‘for two to three months we kept finding bodies – they had become fat and swollen with the water. It was awful.’” (Just how much of a strategic success was the Dambuster raid?, Sky History)

So much for western double-standards over what is and is not permissable in war.

But the fact remains that, as soon as we ask ourselves who benefits from this act, it becomes plain that there was no earthly reason for Russia to bomb infrastructure on its own territory – infrastructure that provides water, power and irrigation to its people – and to destroy the lives and livelihoods of its citizens into the bargain.

Russian defence minister General Sergei Shoigu has confirmed this view and placed the blame squarely on Ukraine, describing the Kiev junta’s reasoning as follows:

“Tonight, the Kiev regime committed another terrorist crime: the Kakhovka hydroelectric station facilities were blown up, flooding a large area. The purpose of these actions is reportedly as follows.

“Having failed to succeed in the offensive operations, the enemy intends to redeploy the units and hardware from Kherson direction to its offensive area in order to strengthen its potential, significantly weakening its position in Kherson direction. The enemy has begun building defensive positions on the right bank of the Dnieper river, which indicates the intention to turn to defence there.

“In order to prevent Russia’s offensive actions in this section of the front, the Kiev regime has carried out a sabotage, essentially a terrorist act, which has resulted in the flooding of significant areas and will have serious and long-lasting environmental consequences.

“In addition, the release of water from the Dnieper hydroelectric station, according to available data, has been significantly increased, leading to even greater flooding of areas.

“This fact [Ukraine sending more water from the dam it controls upsteam to worsen the flood in Kherson] proves that the large-scale diversion was planned in advance by the Kiev regime.” (Russian MoD statement, 6 June 2023)

With the Ukrainian army’s long-touted ‘spring’ offensive finally underway and spectacularly failing – with huge losses on every battlefront – the destruction of the dam, whether it was given a final push by yet another Ukrainian attack or simply succumbed to the build-up of pressure from previous bombing raids, has clear benefits for the imperialists and their proxies.

Indeed, right on cue, media and politicians all over the west are taking advantage of this fresh opportunity to spin Hollywood-esque ‘crazy madman Putin’ stories in their continuing psyop against their own people – and simultaneously to evade discussing what is actually happening on the battlefields.

Presumably the western authors of this crime are also hoping that finding the manpower and resources to aid civilians and repair the damage caused by the flood will weaken the Russian war effort. And perhaps the meting out of a nasty dose of collective punishment to the disobendient citizens of Crimea and Kherson is also providing a little balm to the wounded souls of the soon-to-be-losers in Washington, London and Kiev.

https://thecommunists.org/2023/06/09/ne ... hovka-dam/

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On NATO plans to invade Belarus and Ukraine
June 8, 2023
Rybar

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Former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said that if the US and other NATO countries refuse to provide guarantees to Ukraine at the upcoming summit in Vilnius , some members of the bloc may individually consider the option of sending troops to Ukraine.

Rasmussen clarified that we are talking about Poland and the Baltic republics, which "highly appreciate the Russian threat . " The announcement comes amid rumors that a plan is being prepared for a Russian military response for the first time since the Cold War .

So is NATO preparing to enter the war?
All-out war is not in the interests of the collective West , and, as Rasmussen noted, such an initiative is considered only by some countries. In Poland, there is indeed an active preparation of units in case of immediate engagement, and not only against Russia, but also against Belarus .

At the bases of Cologne and Grajevo , where the 16th mechanized division of the Polish army is now located, an operation is planned to invade Belarus. Units are equipped with the most modern weapons, preparing for such a scenario.

In the event of a command, Polish soldiers dressed in the uniform of the Armed Forces of Ukraine will begin provocations near the border to create a pretext for an attack. In addition, DRGs from citizens of Ukraine and Belarus have been trained in Britain, whose task will be to carry out sabotage at military facilities in Belarus / Russia.

Moreover, there will be attacks with a high degree of probability both from the Baltic states and from Ukraine. There is an active transfer of 52 modern infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine and Poland, most likely Swedish CV90s (we have published footage of their transportation more than once) , as well as a large amount of ammunition and small arms in two directions - south and north by rail from Poland.

Also, several repair and recovery vehicles were transferred from Sweden specifically for Swedish military equipment, equipped with the latest electronics. Crews work on it only under the clear guidance of foreign officers.

The warehouses of the "Foreign Legion" and the territorial defense of the Armed Forces of Ukraine were filled to the maximum with fuel and full sets of ammunition in the Sumy, Zhytomyr, Cherkasy and Dnepropetrovsk regions. Moreover, the choice fell on buildings and hangars that have already become the targets of strikes by the Russian Armed Forces - according to the Ukrainian command, Russian troops do not hit the same objects again.

Freight is transported at night along four routes: Zheshuv - Bila Tserkva, Zheshuv - Uman - Odessa, Zheshuv - Smela - Krivoy Rog, Zheshuv - Zhytomyr - Kyiv. And in the Lviv region in Mostisk and Krasnoe, a distribution point for equipment and weapons received from Europe has been organized.

In Poland, the main routes for the supply of Western equipment and weapons converge, and in Estonia, military columns were recently observed moving eastward towards the border with Russia. Cargo ships from the US Naval Airlift Command have also called there several times in recent weeks.

The entry of Poland and the Baltic countries into an armed conflict with Russia and Belarus looks very fantastic and unlikely, but the fact remains that these states are preparing for such an option. And increasingly bellicose statements are being made more frequently ahead of the July 11 NATO summit.

Rybar
Author: Rybar

https://rybar.ru/o-planirovanii-ataki-n ... -belarusi/

Google Translator

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From Cassad's Telegram account:

Colonelcassad
Servicemen of the 58th Army of the Southern Military District of the Russian Federation, located in the Zaporozhye region, with the support of the Russian Aerospace Forces, destroyed a large number of vaunted enemy Leopard 2A6 and 2A4 tanks, M2A2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, American armored vehicles and other equipment supplied to Ukraine by the NATO coalition. For the sixth day now, the entire "counteroffensive" of the enemy in this direction has been reduced to the fact that he is losing equipment and manpower hourly, and we are crushing him and liberating new territory. We are proud that the 42nd division from the Chechen Republic, which includes the regiments Akhmat-Russia, Akhmat-Chechnya, Sever-Akhmat, and the battalions Zapad-Akhmat ", "Vostok-AKHMAT" and "South-AKHMAT", consisting of Chechen fighters. The famous western technique burned very beautifully and brightly, set on fire by modest but powerful Russian shells. We will soon melt down this scrap metal at the Azovstal Mariupol plant that we have liberated.
In total, more than 6,000 Chechen fighters from the 42nd division are now directly in the Zaporozhye region and are destroying the enemy. "Leopards" and other European and American cats cannot resist the onslaught of our WOLVES!

By the way, I would like to note that I read with satisfaction yesterday’s statement by Yevgeny Prigozhin, who, on his own behalf, as well as on behalf of the fighters and commanders of the Wagner PMC, congratulated our legendary fighters, who valiantly destroyed all the chances of the Armed Forces of Ukraine for a successful counteroffensive, which was announced over the past months. This is how a camaraderie should be maintained.

We all need to leave our own ambitions, rally around our Supreme Commander-in-Chief Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, work for common goals and support our soldiers in every possible way. No one should pour water on the enemy's mill, which is about to finally collapse and bury the multibillion-dollar Western injections.

The Russian army is number one in the world! The worst times in their lives await the Kiev puppet regime, and the Chechen fighters, like all the heroic warriors of Russia, are eager to repay him in full!

At present, the 78th Special Purpose Motorized Regiment "North-Akhmat" named after Hero of Russia A.A. Kadyrov, who is part of the 42nd division, is participating in the fighting in the Maryinsky direction together with the Akhmat special forces, consisting of volunteers trained in the Chechen Republic. Along the entire line of contact there are also fighters of the Directorate of the Russian Guard in the Chechen Republic from the 94th and 96th regiments and the Akhmat-1 OMON.

In addition, in our region, two new regiments of the Ministry of Defense "AKHMAT-Russia" and "AKHMAT-Chechnya" were formed from experienced fighters, which will very soon go to the NVO zone and show everyone who doubted that AKHMAT is STRENGTH, RUSSIA is POWER !
ALLAH AKBAR!

@RKadyrov_95

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Colonelcassad

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After analyzing the photos and videos posted on the Web, Rybar's team compiled a map of the loss of APU equipment in the Zaporozhye direction over the past few days.

In total, Russian servicemen managed to disable 77 enemy tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers, armored vehicles in the areas near Orekhovy and Vremyevka. The list includes only those machines, the destruction or defeat of which is confirmed by materials from open sources: in reality, their number is clearly higher.

The map does not show vehicles whose location could not be unambiguously geolocated. In particular, it lacks one of the AMX-10RC wheeled tanks abandoned by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, three knocked out FPV drones Leopard 2A4, one M2A2 ODS Bradley and about a dozen other samples.

A significant part of enemy vehicles was hit on the way to Russian positions, which is the result of dense mining and good interaction with aviation and artillery. The complex defeat of the advancing columns also speaks in favor of the latter : the detected and standing equipment was destroyed by artillery, helicopters, anti-tank systems and FPV drones.

📌All this clearly confirms the high losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and refutes reports of allegedly “insignificant damage”. Although far from all the equipment was destroyed, a significant part of it is in the area of ​​fire and cannot be evacuated by the enemy to the rear.

At the same time, one should not flatter oneself ahead of time: the Ukrainian formations still have significant reserves and have not yet delivered the main blow with the forces of the 9th and 10th corps. And yet, in a few days, Russian troops unequivocally inflicted significant damage on them.

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Colonelcassad
0:41
The destruction of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station: what is known by the end of June 10

▪️It is the fourth day since the destruction of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station . The situation in the region remains difficult, but already relatively more controllable.

In Aleshki, the water level dropped by two meters, in Golaya Pristan - by one. In Novaya Kakhovka, the water is almost gone and the authorities have already started cleaning the streets. Electricity is supplied to most of the settlements.

PJSC RusHydro believes that the Dnieper will return to its usual course below the destroyed hydroelectric power station by June 16.

▪️More than 6,000 people have already been evacuated from the flood zone . The EMERCOM of the Russian Federation, Russian servicemen and volunteers from various public associations are involved in rescue work.

Nearly 2,000 people have been settled in temporary accommodation facilities.

▪️According to recent estimates, the damage from the destruction of the dam at the hydroelectric power station amounted to about 11.5 billion rubles . More than 60% of the volume of water has already flowed out of the Kakhovka reservoir.

▪️Meanwhile, the authorities have created a special commission to deal with the consequences of the flood, it will be headed by Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Marat Khusnullin.

The head of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation Mikhail Murashko , in turn, said that there were no problems with the delivery of medicines to the Kherson region.

▪️Residents of the Zaporozhye region published a video showing that part of the Dnieper became shallow and dried up. In the future, this may threaten the deterioration of the ecological situation in the region.

▪️At the same time, the disaster that befell the residents of the Kherson region did not become an obstacle to the ongoing shelling of the Armed Forces of Ukraine - today the enemy hit the south of the region, where the accommodation centers for the victims are located.

@rybar

https://t.me/s/boris_rozhin

Google Translator
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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