Ukraine Invasion: Part 23

[MagicFox]

Welcome all, thanks for the company

The original Kevin Rothrock thread on the above

twitter.com/KevinRothrock/status/1521696136867811328?t=KlxmYTj1OnkGszuZzjIiBA&s=19

Excerpts from an incredible exchange between South Ossetian “President" Anatoly Bibilov and a group of soldiers who refused to fight in Ukraine for lack of weapons, comms, and command. They told him that Russia is losing the war.
The exchange is more honest and direct than anything you’d expect in this breakaway statelet. Bibilov criticizes individual soldiers for returning from the front and complaining about problems in combat. The soldiers push back, describing absolute chaos.

Up to Lavrov's speech Israel wanted to stay neutral because of the geopolitical situation in Syria, a sworn enemy of Israel.
Russia backed Assad in his civil war, and the worst case scenario for Israel would have been the collapse of Assad's regime, and Syria collapsing into failed state status like Lybia, or religious fundamentalism like Iran, right on their northern border.
Israel is no lover of Assad, but better the enemy you know than total chaos right next to you.
Of course Lavrov managed to severely pass off Israel with his remarks about Hitler being Jewish.
Silly boy ...

#Ukrainian intelligence reports that #Russian occupiers are preparing a parade in #Mariupol. To this end, they are urgently removing rubble and clearing the streets of corpses and unexploded shells.

twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1521782224558952448?t=xjWru_OF_qs53XSdbRjRTA&s=19

That's rather brave of them...I wonder if the Ukrainians would be tempted to use any Tochka-U they have left in the locker...

BBC News:

"The Kremlin has dismissed speculation that President Vladimir Putin plans to declare war against Ukraine and mobilise nationally when Russia commemorates the Soviet Union's victory in World War Two.
Russia's biggest public holiday, Victory Day, is held annually on 9 May. World War Two cost more than 20 million Soviet lives.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has called the speculation "nonsense" and says "there is no chance of that".
Russia's President Vladimir Putin is set to deliver a speech on 9 May and oversee a military parade on Moscow's Red Square, as is usual for Victory Day.
The invasion of Ukraine has been described as a "special military operation" and not war by Russia."

Kremlin covering their back there

Not seen this confirmed

russia is stealing grain out of ukrainian occupied lands en masse. orcs already took away over 400k tons – more than a two-year reserve stock for some regions. starving ukrainians to death and replacing them with russian settlers is #RussianColonialism fav ukraine genocide tactic
twitter.com/MaximEristavi/status/1521810827321487360?t=cgV5E2uNbbeenZmQRyC-GQ&s=19

I've seen quite a few reports of that from Ukranian official sources Duncin.

To be fair when the West let on they knew the date of invasion the Kremlin denied it and just pushed it back a couple of days. Maybe they’ll just declare war on the 11th…

A large-scale fire in Russia again — an industrial zone is burning in Dzerzhynsk, Nyzhniy Novgorod region. The area of the fire is about 2 thousand square meters. Preliminary reason: solvent tanks caught fire

Thanks Ijs, I thought that would be the case, I just couldn't find it.

AP evidence points to 600 dead in Mariupol theater airstrike
apnews.com/article/Russia-ukraine-war-mariupol-theater-c321a196fbd568899841b506afcac7a1

All contact has been lost with the fighters inside the steel plant according to the mayor of Mariupol.

Looking forward to seeing Putin deliver a speech. Maybe they have an animatronic version, or a lookalike.

Reported by other sources as we

Euromaidan
The russians broke through to #Azovstal.
The assault began on Tuesday, after the partial evacuation of civilians from the plant.
On Wednesday, the russians broke into the plant, which was bombarded and fired upon.
There are heavy battles.
No connection with the Ukrainian fighters

Ukrainian paper @ukrpravda_news reports Russian troops have managed to break into the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol where the city’s last Ukrainian defenders are holding out. Heavy fighting reportedly ongoing.
Kremlin once again claimed today its forces weren’t storming it.

So Russia allowing a few civilians out of azovstal steel plant was just a tactic to say they allowed civilians to be cleared before storming it and slaughtering everyone inside. How vile and predictable. Mariupol and the Russians failure to take it has been an embarrassment for Russia so their intention would always have been to take this completely. I pray they take soldiers and civilians hostage and do not kill and mistreat them.

the grain thefts could be to sell and also to feed the Russians themselves as the cost of living increases in Russia people especially at the poorer end may be getting desperate and if they are hungry they may really start to complain about the war and the effects of sanctions so there could be multiple things going on with the grain thefts. For older Ukrainians this must be bringing back awful memories of holodmor famine in the 30’s. This war has opened my eyes to the poverty in Russia which I have found truly shocking and makes me feel angry considering the natural resources and wealth of the elites.

On another note I cannot get my head around the Russian death toll. How is losing approximately 1 in 5 of your soldiers going down in the army and in Russia? How is this hitting morale and resolve to keep going with this suicide mission? Do Russians have such a slave mentality that they will simply jump off the cliff on masse because putin and his other unimaginably rich cronies tell them to. Surely losing c.25,000 is having a seismic effect? Is it really worth all that for a looted laptop and a jar of Nutella or a toilet seat as zelensky put it.

The nuclear threat via Russian media seems to have really amped up recently. I can’t work out if Russia is now so backed into a corner it’s actually more likely to happen, or whether it’s bluster.
not thrilled with the talk of targeting the UK specifically but I imagine Putin is pretty pissed of that our government have been vocal about being against him after all the Russian money and manipulation that’s been invested in it!

The Russians must want to capture and parade, or failing that kill, Azov fighters so badly.

On Russia (and former Soviet Union) and Israel: there are over a million Israelis who are late through to post Soviet migrants, their relatives and children. This is a large political constituency in a country with national list PR elections and is something like one on nine citizens. They obviously don't all vote the same way. Forceful secular nationalist Avigdor Lieberman for instance is from Moldova and is currently Finance Minister.

I very loosely knew a Ukrainian who migrated to Israel some ten or so years ago. This was after a Birthright Israel or something similar exploratory trip. I felt she migrated partly for a better life but also because uncovering her roots had given her a sense of purpose and belonging.

Please correct me if I'm wrong but I just can't see the benefit of Russia nuking the UK or any other country in NATO really. MAD would obviously mean the end of Russia too and I can't see that we've actually done enough to warrant the end of Putins precious country.

Just a quick one from me.

There have been a number of reports of smaller quantities of grain thefts as well as larger ones. There will be significant stockpiles across Ukraine. Russia is a net exporter, but I suspect will want to be the 'saviour' when grain and cattle feed supplies fall short in some world regions later this year.

As far as the people of Ukraine are concerned, much of that country is made up of either the big international producers of grain, seeds and other vegetable products or smaller farms and small holdings growing a lot of local produce. From Google Earth you will see rural communities are structured very differently to the UK or USA. The curtilages of villages and towns are surrounded by smaller fields, orchards etc with black rich soil, similar to Fens or Vale of Evesham, which indicates to me there should be no issues with Ukraine feeding its own population over the year ahead.

I also saw this, but not sure what to make of it. 30-40 Russian vehicles moving to the Lithuanian border is not something we should get excited about, particularly in the context of Nato exercises and troop movements. But just wanted to placemark it in case it leads to something else (preferably continuing into Lithuania and claiming asylum.....)

censor.net/ua/video_news/3338894/u_bilorusi_viyiskova_tehnika_peremischuyetsya_u_bik_kordoniv_lytvy_yi_ukrayiny_videofotoreportaj

If the UK is attacked by nuclear weapons and if (if) Nato draws its breath to take stock, chickens-out and tries to de-escalate, I do not believe any Royal Navy nuclear-equipped submarine commander will hesitate to take out several major Russian cities, including Moscow and St Petersburg, when commanded to do so. I think the Kremlin know that also. And we know they know that..ad infinitum.

It’s propaganda, aimed at making the UK population shit their pants and as such push out Govt to back down. Judging by the response it’s working. Personally I think it’s irresponsible journalism (looking at you Daily Mail) to publish each and every detail, alongside pictures) it’s feeding people’s anxiety for no good reason.

I'm not sure it is working. The first threat did but with each subsequent one I think people start getting angry rather than scared. You can only threaten someone so many times before they tell you once and for all to fuck off.

I agree that people are definitely getting more angry and fed up! I do think anxiety around the matter is warranted though, someone is literally threatening your existence repeatedly. Obviously not a touch on what the Ukrainian people are facing day in day out at the moment.