Ukraine Invasion: Part 24

[MagicFox]

Welcome one and all and thanks again to everyone contributing

Jack Detsch AT JackDetsch
U.S. gave electronic warfare equipment to Ukraine for the first time on Friday since Russia's invasion on Feb. 24

To think that jamming was a thing of the past ...

Dan Lamothe AT DanLamothe
Perhaps the most significant bit of news today: The Pentagon sees anecdotal evidence of numerous Russian military officers in Ukraine disobeying orders from their commanders.

Jack Detsch AT JackDetsch
U.S. believes Russia has "no ability" to threaten Ukraine's Black Sea port city of Odesa from the ground or sea: senior U.S. defense official

Dan Lamothe AT DanLamothe
Those Russian officers disobeying are mostly mid-level, even up to the level of battalion commander, the senior U.S. defense official said.

Jack Detsch AT JackDetsch
U.S. gave electronic warfare equipment to Ukraine for the first time on Friday since Russia's invasion on Feb. 24 To think that jamming was a thing of the past ...

Strange comment for Detsch to make, wonder who that last sentence was aimed at?

Not sure what his definition of commander is, as he applies it here to the Russian army, but it sounds as like those who know what the situation is like on the ground and importantly who make the fighting decisions and lead the actions are now saying it’s not feasible.

The ISW assessment of Putin's speech:

Key Takeaways:

Russian President Vladimir Putin used his May 9 speech to praise ongoing Russian efforts in Ukraine and reinforce existing Kremlin framing rather than announcing a change. He did not announce an escalation or declare victory in the Russian war in Ukraine.

Putin likely calculated that he could not ask the Russian population for a greater commitment to the war effort and implicitly reassured the Russian people that he would not ask for a greater societal commitment in his speech.

Putin may be recognizing the growing risks he faces at home and in Ukraine and may be adjusting his objectives, and his desired end state in Ukraine, accordingly.

The Kremlin has already scaled down its objectives in Ukraine (from its initial objective of capturing Kyiv and full regime change) and will likely do so again—or be forced to do so by Ukrainian battlefield successes.

Regardless of any change—or lack thereof—in the Kremlin's objectives, Putin’s speech indicates that the Kremlin has likely decided to maintain its current level of resourcing in the war.

The Kremlin attempted to demonstrate the alleged popularity of its occupation of eastern Ukraine through forced Victory Day celebrations in occupied Ukrainian territories.

[the whole thing seemed rather lacklustre to me]

This aged badly

twitter.com/Nikolai11449196/status/1523787680445726720

I feel concerned that Putin’s apparently non -escalators, non-victorious speech today may have been dissembling.

It's possible, Scroĺling, but feet on the ground. Gerasimov was not there, which I think is significant. Putin's going to have to be navigating a lot of swirling currends in the Kremlin atm, not least in his own department the FSB. The economy is rumoured to be beginning to feel the grip. His allies / friends might even be starting to avoid his gaze when he tries to look for them for support. The Donbas fight is making some gains but they are being pushed back around Kharkiv to some degree. Plus the man clearly isn't well and can't be feeling too great.

You might be right but he's got a lot on his plate and I wouldnt be surprised if he's feeling the strain. If there is something unpleasant coming in the future we will just have to deal with it. But maybe he's just struggling now. He's certainly far from invigorated.

The last sentence is a lyric from Bob Marley & The Wailers 'Jamming'. Does the electronic warfare gizmo block (jam) frequencies used by the enemy for communication maybe?

Oh, plus the families of the Russin dead are starting to ask questions. On top of that senior US defense ministers think that some soldiers are plain refusing to go into battle. Its a lot for a sick man who is afraid of his own people to handle ( no leader who is confident in his people treats them the way Putin does).

Video of a huge explosion at shopping centre in Odessa thought to store ammo and weapons. "The footage from Odessa tonight is like Lord of the Rings. It looks surreal."

What a set back for Ukraine. I am gutted.

@Ijsbear · 09/05/2022 23:47

It's possible, Scroĺling, but feet on the ground. Gerasimov was not there, which I think is significant. Putin's going to have to be navigating a lot of swirling currends in the Kremlin atm, not least in his own department the FSB. The economy is rumoured to be beginning to feel the grip. His allies / friends might even be starting to avoid his gaze when he tries to look for them for support. The Donbas fight is making some gains but they are being pushed back around Kharkiv to some degree. Plus the man clearly isn't well and can't be feeling too great.

You might be right but he's got a lot on his plate and I wouldnt be surprised if he's feeling the strain. If there is something unpleasant coming in the future we will just have to deal with it. But maybe he's just struggling now. He's certainly far from invigorated.

I hope you are right.
It is worrying to think of those ships in the Black Sea that can shoot missiles at Odesa.

On another note it seemed significant, and quite surprising to me that on the BBC News at Ten tonight, about 13 minutes in, a 100 year old veteran woman at the Victory Parade, whom one might have thought would be of the old Soviet Union sort, and very unlikely to have seen social media reports, said she just wanted peace, that in the last war she knew what they stood for, but there was something not quite right about this one, she just wanted it to end.

Summary of the most recent missile attacks on Odesa from the BBC News website

The city of Odesa, Ukraine, has come under further missile attacks Monday evening local time.

Around 10 p.m. local time (3 p.m. ET), witnesses in the center of the city said they heard several large explosions which shook buildings.

Social media showed at least one large fire burning. and a witness said a large shopping center was on fire. The resident of a city more than 40 kilometers (25 miles) from Odesa reported hearing the blasts.

A few hours earlier, Odesa city council reported three cruise missiles were fired from a Tu-22 bomber. Five buildings were destroyed and two people injured.

The targets were unknown but some images from Odesa suggested a mixed residential-industrial area had been hit.

Video released by the city council showed widespread devastation across a wide area.

On Monday morning authorities four sea-launched Onyx cruise missiles were fired towards Odesa.

The earlier attacks came as European Council President Charles Michel visited Odesa.

On Sunday, ten cruise missiles were fired at the Odesa area. Russia has used submarines, surface ships and aircraft to launch missiles at Odesa in recent days.

On Sunday, ten cruise missiles were fired at the Odesa area. Russia has used submarines, surface ships and aircraft to launch missiles at Odesa in recent days.

This is horrific how Russia can bombard Odesa and cause such wanton widespread destruction from afar. The cowards. Their men can't fight so they just throw big stones. Why isn't there a way to stop Russia doing this? How come they have not run out of artillery and missiles by now? I know I know, Nato cannot intervene in the air, in the Black Sea. This is so frustrating to stand by and watch Ukraine being pounded day after day.

Do you remember Alexandra Mishkonikova? She was the journalist who held an anti-war demo in the TV studio back in the early days of the war. Well she and a colleague have been at it again.

For some reason I cannot link the CNN rolling news article, but she posted a statement on a pro-Kremlin site Lentu.ru.

Interestingly, in it she accuses the administration of lying about the circumstances of the Moskva sinking. Do you remember the parade of the survivors about 5 days later? Well it is alleged the parents of one of the missing sailors has identified their son standing in the parade despite not hearing from him since the sinking. This raises the question that, like posters here suggested, the footage was a pre-war clip before the war and before Moskva set sail.

If you recall, the footage appeared right for the time of year, sun height, tree growth, shadows, so who knows. Maybe they focused on getting that right, by using a clip from a year earlier, but thought no family would come forward and challenge if they spotted a crew anomaly. And if they did, well maybe they thought at least the journalist would be too intimidated to file the report.

I know one thing. If CNN have got this right, I certainly believe Alexandra.

Sorry the site is Lenta.ru and it is Alexandra Miroshnikova. Wish it would link. Maybe this works but you may have to scroll down, CNN Henry Knapper around 03:36 AM

Here is another source, the independent Media Zone.

Hope this works.

<a class="break-all" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20220509071031/lenta.ru/articles/2022/05/09/den_pobedy/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Text from the journalists captured by Media Zone. This is a summary of the 40+ articles posted.

These journalists and others are so very brave, likely looking at 15 years in prison.

Well that didn’t work. Something in the chain of links from site to site (doubt it’s the MN upgrade this one).

Sitting on a deckchair in the middle of a meadow from 03 : 45 waiting to hear the dawn chorus while using an older i-phone model is not recommended if one wants to post text and links. So I have come back inside to use the good old desktop as I need to correct some of the above information. Apologies for some errors in my previous posts.

@MNHQ Please feel free to delete my posts at 04 : 21 and 04 : 55 which contain some errors.

Returning to the article on CNN. Firstly, a correction - the journalist who demonstrated in front of the news anchor was Russian TV editor Marina Ovsyannikova who held up an anti-war sign during a live broadcast on Russia’s Channel 1 in March. The two journalists who posted the article on Lenta.ru are Egor Polyakov and Alexandra Miroshnikova.

These are some key paragraphs from the CNN report are copied below. This is not a hack. These are two journalists employed by the pro-Kremlin news site.

Two Russian reporters appear to have posted at least 30 articles to a pro-Kremlin news site, lenta.ru, on Monday criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and his government’s suppression of critics.

CNN reviewed the articles which were almost immediately taken down some pegged to the 77th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s defeat of Nazi Germany, others criticizing the Russian leader for using Victory Day to justify his bloody onslaught into Ukraine.

Reporters Egor Polyakov and Alexandra Miroshnikova made several claims in their articles, including that Russian defense officials were “lying to relatives” about those killed in the sinking of the Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet flagship Moskva and accusing Putin of launching one of the "bloodiest wars of the 21st century."

"Putin and his circle are doomed to face a tribunal after the end of the war," Polyakov and Miroshnikova published on lenta.ru. "Putin and his associates won’t be able to justify themselves or flee after losing this war."

Polyakov and Miroshnikova are both business editors at lenta.ru, a major pro-Kremlin Russian news site. The outlet's parent company was recently bought by Russian Sberbank, which is subject to US sanctions for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

CNN reached out to the two reporters and lenta.ru for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

The article continues:

Independent Russian news site Mediazone published what it said was a statement from Polyakov and Miroshnikova after the articles appeared.
“Putin is a paranoid dictator,” they’re quoted as saying. “Putin must go. He started a senseless war and is leading Russia into a ditch.”

Polyakov and Miroshnikova not only publicly rejected the government line on the invasion but accused Putin of lying about his intentions in Ukraine from the outset. "Putin repeatedly lied about his plans for Russia in Ukraine, naming one goal at first then a completely different one."

They pointed to Putin’s call for a “liberation of Donbass,” “de-Nazification,” and the "demilitarization of Ukraine,” as examples of what they describe as hastily put together justifications for a needless war.

One of the articles in the duo’s Victory Day series focused on what they described as the Russian military lying to families of sailors who died on the Moskva flagship. CNN has previously reported on anxious Russian parents scrambling for information about the fate of sailors aboard the ship that was sunk by two Ukrainian missiles sunk last month.

The article claimed the Russian navy may have re-circulated old images of the Moskva’s crew to suggest more sailors made it off the ship unharmed than really did.

"The video of the Black Sea fleet leadership and crew members that the defense ministry circulated after the tragedy could’ve been archival since a relative of a missing crew member actually recognized him in the video itself."

CNN could not independently confirm these claims.

Then a poignant sign-off:

Each article on lenta.ru started with the same urgent plea under the headline.

Disclaimer: This material is not approved by the state, therefore the presidential administration will delete it... In other words: Take a screenshot urgently before it’s deleted.”

The duo also appeared to sign off from lenta.ru saying, “We’re looking for work, lawyers and probably, political asylum!”

“Don’t be afraid, don’t be quiet," they continued in an apparent call to action. “Resist! You are not one, you are many! The future is yours!... Peace to Ukraine!"

I am travelling shortly so signing out for 24 hours. But I will leave this for @Natsku and other Finnish posters to comment on. I have emboldened some comments.

"Highly likely" Finland will apply for NATO membership, Finnish minister says
From CNN's Jennifer Hansler

It is “highly likely” that Finland will apply for membership in NATO, said the Finnish minister for European affairs.

Speaking to CNN on Monday, Tytti Tuppurainen said the decision has not yet been made, but called the nation’s likely membership “a very natural response” to Russia’s war in Ukraine. She added that if her country does indeed apply, she hopes “the ratification process would be as brief as possible.”

“We would, of course, prefer to have a neighborhood that would have been founded on friendship and cooperation,” she said. “But it is Russia that has distanced itself from the security order and it is Russia that has started war in Europe. It is Russia that has invaded in Ukraine. Now, people see this new reality and the time has come to join NATO.”

On Thursday, Finnish President Sauli Niinistö is expected to give his personal opinion about whether to pursue NATO membership, which is expected to be followed by a statement by Prime Minister Sanna Marin.

Impending decision: Tuppurainen told CNN that most of the country’s political parties have already discussed the issue. The Social Democrats — Marin and Tuppurainen's party — will gather on Saturday to make their decision, which will be guided by Marin’s announcement.

“Now that the leader of the country is about to make the decision regarding the NATO application, we can say with good arguments that the whole country is ready for this,” Tuppurainen said, noting the strong public support in Finland for joining the defensive alliance.

Message to Moscow: Russia has warned it will respond if Finland – with which it shares a more than 800 mile border – joins NATO.

The Kremlin does not dictate our decisions,” Tuppurainen told CNN, adding it would be “in the best interest of Russia to behave like an adult in this situation.”
“We've seen now what kind of a country Russia is and what kind of a regime it has. It has a ruthless dictator as leader,” she said.

“We are no longer under any kind of illusions what he's up to ... and we know now that he can wage a war that is as despicable and ruthless and brutal as one can imagine.”
^^
Finland has been a longtime partner of NATO, something that US and NATO officials have pointed to in voicing support for the nation’s membership if it chooses to apply.

Biden fears Putin has no exit strategy.

US President Joe Biden says he fears Vladimir Putin does not have a way out of the Ukraine war.

Speaking in Washington DC on Monday, Biden described the Russian president as "a very calculating man" but without an exit strategy and admitted "I'm trying to figure out what we do about that".

Just going to reason this out and see what you all think.

I find it curious that Biden has said this immediately after Putin's non-speech.

It strikes me that the US are interpreting the non-speech as a non-admission by Putin that he is out of options, and the only course he feels he has left to him is to plough on and hope the western coalition fractures.

He can't escalate because it risks domestic unrest, plus he doesn't necessarily have the internal support he needs despite the best efforts of noisy propaganda makers. You have to consider here the fate of Gerasimov and how lower ranked commanders are disobeying orders. He may well be aware of increasing grumbles in his inner circle and that he can no lower intimidate people into compliance at this point.

If he is getting logistic feedback now, then he knows that a general mobilisation isn't possible to support or sustain for training and equipment reasons too.

The stuff about nukes may be measured by his knowledge that actually it won't improve matters. This is the rational actor argument in play - he is still rational.

There has been noises from the US that they don't believe he will use nukes. Though there is always the possibility. They have grown more confidence on this point. Why? What intelligence are they working on?

Equally its impossible for Putin to desecalate, and retain power. Defeat would be the end for him.

Thus his only option is to let it simmer, throw resources in perhaps a half hearted way, and to continue to throw men at the problem for as long as possible hoping that there is a collapse in the west or food prices generate a big enough crisis in the rest of the world before there is a complete military or political collapse for Russia.

Basically the US are interpreting yesterday's response as a sign of the sprung elephant trap for Putin. Having no way out, but to continue on the current path and to look for and to try and create alternative opportunities to win or exit with face.

I think Ukraine's response in recent days is consistent with this, as is the British increasingly bullish attitude and comments about Ukrainian ability to win this.

What is now lacking is either the crucial moment that provokes a Russian crisis point and forced error (a military collapse or political crisis point) or a diplomatic exit which saves Putin's face but also is inline with Ukrainian sovereignty and western security goals. I am fairly sure that Ukrainian sovereignty and western security goals are now completely aligned - hence joint comments about sanctions ending being in Ukrainian hands coming from the US and Germany's Scholz in a coordinated response followed by Zelensky doing a speech which clearly laid out Ukrainian terms (which also align with western security goals).

At this point my suspicion is that Ukraine have worked hard on building this consensus. If you recall Zelensky did an interview in which he said there were various groups within Europe / NATO who had different agendas (the ones that recognised the Nazi threat, the ones that saw a threat but were happy to throw Ukrainian lives at the problem to bleed Russia dry, those who were naively appeasing and then those who were effectively working against Ukrainian interests perhaps deliberately so.)

My guess is also that since the withdrawal from the North its become more apparent about the nazi threat to nato/eu but its also become more apparent to Ukraine that bleeding Russia dry is perhaps unavoidable.

Whats also curious about Putin's speech is the fact he referenced the warzone. As in he didn't couch language as the special operation despite his own laws. Thats just a day or so after Lukashenko called it a war. Thats language creep to sustain and support a drawnout conflict without legal reversal or overt admission and without legal escalation. It gives the public a message between the lines without saying it. Apparently yesterday there were long queues at some enlistment sites in Russia. At this point its also worth reflecting on economic desparation within Russia as sanctions bite. If you have no job and no money, what do you do? What are your options. This alone, without an organised attempt at General Mobilisation / forcable conscription might drive army numbers going forward... For now.

I don't know. But there's definitely something in what Biden's just said and why he's just said it.

It is all about what Putin didn't say far more than the hints of admission he did make.

@TargusEasting 10/05/2022 05:55

Interestingly, in it she accuses the administration of lying about the circumstances of the Moskva sinking. Do you remember the parade of the survivors about 5 days later? Well it is alleged the parents of one of the missing sailors has identified their son standing in the parade despite not hearing from him since the sinking. This raises the question that, like posters here suggested, the footage was a pre-war clip before the war and before Moskva set sail.

If you recall, the footage appeared right for the time of year, sun height, tree growth, shadows, so who knows. Maybe they focused on getting that right, by using a clip from a year earlier, but thought no family would come forward and challenge if they spotted a crew anomaly. And if they did, well maybe they thought at least the journalist would be too intimidated to file the report..

Someone on this thread posted the actual hacked Lents.ru article yesterday evening - for which thank you. I never did at the time. It is an archived version. You can use your telephone to translate it but by bit and I saw that about the mother of a missing sailor seeing him in that supposed Moskva crew parade. Meaning it was archive footage.

I find it curious that Biden has said this immediately after Putin's non-speech

When you are dealing with children, you sometimes need to allow them to outsmart themselves.

Putin now has a lot of incentive to prove Biden wrong. Especially to those close to him.