Ukraine Invasion: Part 27

[MagicFox]

27th thread, thanks for the continued company and analysis all

I think he is absolutely fantastic

He is so clever and so shady

@minsmum · Today 22:15
m.facebook.com/sergiy.grau/posts/pfbid0BR7mrSpGDsRLqjAKoRWTNVujPJY5oyh2NRNipEZpn4pp9WXm5aWHtKQn3GHAG6L8l
I don't know if anyone has seen this, I have had to work for the last few days. Speech by the Ukrainian ambassador to the UN

I hadn’t seen that thank you. I read it quickly and have kept it to read again and look up his references.

The phrase ‘aggressive mimicry’ is good isn’t it,? I had never heard of that description of the aggressor making themselves seem the victim.

I thought this was a brilliant phrase too
the myth of a past golden Imperial age to be restored by healing violence

The idea of ‘healing violence’ doesn’t seem to be part of our common understanding here even when we are violent. It does exist in Russia see this in a Ria Novosti article 4th April:

Historical experience shows that the tragedies and dramas of wartime benefit peoples who have been tempted and carried away by the role of an enemy of Russia.
ccl.org.ua/en/news/ria-novosti-has-clarified-russias-plans-vis-a-vis-ukraine-and-the-rest-of-the-free-world-in-a-program-like-article-what-russia-should-do-with-ukraine-2/

ISW Key Takeaways

The Kremlin recently replaced the commander of the Russian Airborne (VDV) forces and may have fired the commander of the Southern Military District and appointed a new overall commander of Russian forces in Ukraine, indicating ongoing dysfunction in the Kremlin’s conduct of the war.

Russian forces conducted several successful advances in settlements southeast of Severodonetsk on June 21 and may be able to threaten Lysychansk in the coming days while avoiding a difficult opposed crossing of the Siverskyi Donets River.

Russian forces continued to launch assaults on settlements along the T1302 Lysychansk-Bakhmut highway to interdict Ukrainian ground lines of communications (GLOCs).

Russian operations along the Izyum-Slovyansk axis are increasingly stalled as Russian forces prioritize operations around Severodonetsk.

Russian forces likely recaptured the eastern bank of the Inhulets River from the Ukrainian bridgehead situated near the Kherson-Mykolaiv Oblast border.

Ukrainian forces reportedly struck Russian positions on Snake Island in the Black Sea, likely to destroy Russian fortifications and equipment on the island, but ISW cannot confirm competing Ukrainian and Russian claims of the results of the attack.

Russian occupation authorities are continuing to face challenges recruiting local collaborators and are likely relying on Russian government personnel to consolidate their societal control of occupied Ukrainian territories.

+++

The Kyiv Independent, [22/06/2022 04:02]
⚡️ Institute for the Study of War: ‘Radical reshuffling’ of Russian military command structure may indicate ‘ongoing dysfunction.’

The U.S. think tank reported on June 21 that potential “drastic rotations” in the Russian military may constitute a purge of senior officers blamed for failures in Ukraine.

Russian forces are also reportedly advancing successfully in the direction of Lysychansk from the south, rather than crossing the river from Sievierodonetsk, thereby threatening Ukrainian defenses.

⚡️General Staff: Russia positions up to 3 BTGs in border Kursk, Bryansk regions.

+++

UkraineNOW

⚡️The United States has set up a group to investigate war crimes in Ukraine. “Nazi hunter” Eli Rosenbaum heads it.

📌 Russia will give up two megaprojects because of the war with Ukraine

It is about the construction of a bridge to Sakhalin and a railroad between Yakutsk and Magadan.
The government said that due to the war with Ukraine, there is no finance for the implementation of these two projects. The total cost of construction is estimated at 2.3 trillion rubles, so the authorities decided to abandon the development of the main infrastructure.

⚡️The defeat of the Russian army on Zmiinyi Island is confirmed:

Pantsir-S1 SAMs (Russian land-based self-propelled anti-aircraft missile system);
a radar station, motor vehicles.
The rest of the enemy's losses are yet to be established. [some trained people thought there was a very important radar station on the island so if this is the one, then it may have been a very successful attack. A lot more needs to be confirmed though].

⚡️ Maxar published satellite images of Zmiinyi Island after the Armed Forces of Ukraine struck Russian positions
Despite Russian claims that all projectiles were shot down, the photos confirm otherwise. The images show at least three places of impact

🔍 “Reporters Without Borders” published an investigation (rsf.org/en/exclusive-rsf-investigation-death-maks-levin-information-and-evidence-collected-indicates) into how Ukrainian photojournalist Max Levin and the military officer who accompanied him, Oleksii Chernyshov, might have died
There is evidence that they were executed in cold blood by the Russian military on March 13 after being interrogated and tortured.
Max Levin was probably killed with one or two shots at close range, while Chernyshov could have been burned alive.
They could have been killed by soldiers of the 106th Guards Airborne Division (Commander Vladimir Selivyorstov) or by Russian special forces.

[note from the UK int update}
📌 The Russian army and pro-Russian forces in Donbas are extremely depleted, - British Intelligence
The losses of the self-proclaimed "DPR" army are equivalent to about 55% of its initial number.
Soldiers of the Russian army are provided with extremely outdated weapons and equipment.

Russia began this war with an estimated 3500 tanks. They've lost 3/7 of the original number. This seems astonishingly high. 216 planes. 34,000 troops killed.

This was without any resistance in the takeover of Kherson, a major city.

They are making slow gains in Donetsk but given the overwhelming numerical and equipment advantage they have, this is a terrible performance. Abysmal.

This has cheered me right up on a drizzly Wed morning!

@Ijsbear · Today 11:45

That is horrible news about the journalist and the military who accompanied him. I couldn’t read the full article. What does it mean by burned alive - incidentally in a burning vehicle that had been hit? Max Levin being shot was bad enough.

The military man who accompanied him.

@Ijsbear · Today 11:49

Thank you for the news today Ijsbear.

This was without any resistance in the takeover of Kherson, a major city.

I wonder in who decided that, and how many there would have preferred to resist?
How many are killed anyway?

The implication of the wording is that Chernyshov and the journalist were captured, interrogated then killed, one by shooting one by burning alive (grim subject, but petrol over him and then a match). A military officer might be seen as a traitor by some of the Separatists / Russians, and come in for a particularly bad time, or they might have been (very) unlucky in their captors.

However, often the wording of statements has to be considered carefully as sometimes they are translations and not quite correct, leading to nuances being wrong.

About Kherson, Zelenskyy has stated that there will be an investigation as to why there was no resistance. The implication of the statement at the time was that they thought the decision makers had betrayed Kherson.

Thanks Ijsbear for the explanations.

From the Washington Post.

Of the 10 countries surveyed, Italy emerged strongly in the former camp and Poland in the latter. “There are potential divisions over the cost of living, refugees and nuclear escalation, but the big divide is between those who want to end the war as quickly as possible and those who want Russia to be punished,” noted ECFR Director Mark Leonard in an email statement. “If badly handled the gap between the ‘peace camp’ and the 'justice camp’ over Ukraine could be as damaging as that between creditors and debtors during the euro crisis.”

I was annoyed by this phrase which I think is misrepresentative: the big divide is between those who want to end the war and those who want Russia to be punished

It is not about punishment as such. It is about stopping Russia completely and not conceding the invaded territories, because appeasing and turning a blind eye to them taking territories is what lead to the invasion in the first place. After ‘peace’ with concessions they would sooner or later get on with the next round of aggression.

www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/06/20/european-union-ukraine-support-fatigue/

About Kherson, Zelenskyy has stated that there will be an investigation as to why there was no resistance. The implication of the statement at the time was that they thought the decision makers had betrayed Kherson.

I've heard this too. Also that someone passed on all Ukraine defence positions, where the mines were, etc.

Absolutely @ScrollingLeaves and ending the war decisively so they are not tempted to invade sovereign territory in the future.

Given the bravery of the Kherson population it would either be the city's leadership or, another argument, was that resources were concentrated on Kyiv at the beginning of the war leaving other areas vulnerable

A lot depends on wether Ukraine accepts a ceasefire, or wants to keep fighting and liberate the occupied land, which in turn depends on support from NATO, the US in particular.
Russia proved itself incompetent in this conflict, but it has large reserves of weapons, although old and obsolete it is deadly, they could sustain the war for many years . The US has the conventional weaponry to match Russia easily, will they supply Ukraine with the aim of pushing the invaders out?.

@Crazykatie · Today 13:58

The US has the conventional weaponry to match Russia easily, will they supply Ukraine with the aim of pushing the invaders out?.

That’s why it matters when the Washington Post makes a misleading statement such as that the reason behind Ukraine not wanting to go cede those territories, and various parties wanting to see Russia defeated, is to punish Russia.

That punishment reason hints at the idea that these countries may childish/thoughtless/backward

The US has the conventional weaponry to match Russia easily, will they supply Ukraine with the aim of pushing the invaders out?.

Depends what you mean by "easily"....peer to peer, mostly NATO weaponry appears to be equal to or better than the Russian equivalent.

Problem is if the Russian leadership is prepared to accept, say, 5 or 10:1 losses in equipment and personnel verses the Ukrainians we are back to the quantity vs. quality issue again...

It's not about "punishing" Russia . It's about not rewarding Russia by allowing it to keep territory it stole

See this video of the Estonian Prime Minister from before the invasion detailing Soviet negotiating strategy and warning how Putin would try to take a mile so that he could end up with a foot that hadn't been his in the first place so as far as he's concerned, the "special military operation" will have been worth it

https://twitter.com/munsecconf/status/1512452117641977857?s=21&t=N-YOkzNfLDx7n160JOK7vw

Russia proved itself incompetent in this conflict, but it has large reserves of weapons, although old and obsolete it is deadly, they could sustain the war for many years .

There's one small problem. Weapons don't fight on their own, you need people to manage and direct them. And the longer this drags on, the less Russian men will be willing to risk their lives in a country that isn't theirs for the cause they don't care about.

Not to mention that it already has serious sgortages of reservists and difficulties with morale.

Assuming there is no ceasefire I would expect Russia to keep pushing forward, however slowly, Putin will not want to loose face, while he is in power it could last a long time.
Best bet for peace is a change in leadership in Moscow.

Seems to be a fair bit of speculation that Russia’s retaliation against Lithuania could take the form of cutting Lithuania off from the power grid.

I must admit to some extent I've stopped paying to much attention to a lot of the crystal ball gazing.

We don't really know Russian losses, we don't know Ukrainian losses...(quite right to).

I think there's a danger we base our model of what might be considered acceptable or not in terms of morale and casualties to those in Russia on a western POV.

Losses of say 35k killed , injured or MIA would be terminal to the British Army and would lead to public outrage.....in a society with rigid news management, wall to wall propaganda and steeped in myths of the Great Patriotic War the public response might be somewhat different (especially if the body bags, if there are any, are not being returned to Moscow).

In short I'd like to think the Russian Army is going to implode and runaway en-mass any day soon....but I really don't know how likely that is.

Another fire in oil refinery in Rostov oblast. Remains of 2 drones were found.