Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

You are so fucked. Still, I wish you the best of luck.

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

How stupid are these people?

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Anne Laurie is a fucking hero in so many ways. ~ Betty Cracker

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Let’s bury these fuckers at the polls 2 years from now.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

It is not hopeless, and we are not helpless.

Welcome to day five of every-bit-as-bad-as-you-thought-it-would-be.

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

Our messy unity will be our strength.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / War For Ukraine Day 175: A Shorter Update Tonight

War For Ukraine Day 175: A Shorter Update Tonight

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Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier this evening. Video below, English transcript after the jump:

Dear Ukrainians!

Diplomacy in the interests of our country is very active these days. First of all, today a ceremony of presenting credentials to the new ambassadors of foreign countries who arrived to work in our capital was held in the Sophia of Kyiv. The work of embassies in full capacity, the presence of ambassadors in Kyiv is one of the important indicators of the strength of our state, the Ukrainian ability to fight and win. Already 55 diplomatic missions have resumed their work. And today, the new ambassadors of Belgium, Spain, Kyrgyzstan and Romania presented their credentials.

Secondly, UN Secretary General António Guterres has already arrived in Ukraine. We will work to get the necessary results for Ukraine.

Thirdly, Ukrainian diplomats, our nuclear scientists and the IAEA are in constant touch, now they are working on sending the IAEA mission to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. Only absolute transparency and controlled situation at and around the ZNPP can guarantee a gradual return to normal nuclear safety for the Ukrainian state, for the international community, and for the IAEA.

The Russian army must withdraw from the territory of the nuclear power plant and all neighboring areas, and take away its military equipment from the plant. This must happen without any conditions and as soon as possible. Ukraine is ready to ensure proper control of the IAEA, and the relevant mission can be sent to the Zaporizhzhia plant in a legal way, very fast and as efficiently as possible.

Today, I made a very important address to the university communities, journalists and political circles of Chile and Latin America in general. This is not an easy direction of foreign policy – we are doing many things there now practically from scratch. We are working not only at the political level, but also establishing relations directly with the societies of the countries of this region. I called on Chileans and all freedom-loving people in Latin America to spread the truth about Russia’s war against our country and to support the sanctions policy aimed at making the terrorist state pay the highest possible price for terror.

In the evening, I signed new decrees on awarding our soldiers. 230 servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine were given state awards, 43 of them posthumously. Also, 24 employees of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine were awarded state awards.

All our soldiers – our army, our intelligence, border guards, the National Guard, the SBU and everyone involved in defending our state and people are doing everything possible to fight Russian terrorists and push them out of Ukrainian land.

The Avdiyivka area, Bakhmut area, Kharkiv region, and some other regions are the regions where the most difficult fighting is going on right now. I am grateful to everyone who withstands this pressure, who defends positions and helps our soldiers. In Zaporizhzhia region, in some areas of the south of the country, the occupiers are trying to improve their situation, but strategically it is hopeless for them. Ukrainian soldiers will destroy the potential of the occupiers step by step, and the day will come when the enemy will die in Zaporizhzhia, in the south, in the east of the country, and in Crimea. The invaders will die like dew on the sun, and our defense is and will be this sun.

Eternal glory to all who defend Ukraine!

Eternal gratitude to all those who focused on helping our people in a true Ukrainian unity!

Glory to Ukraine!

Here is today’s operational update from Ukraine’s MOD:

The operational update regarding the russian invasion on 18.00, on August 17, 2022

Glory to Ukraine! The one hundred seventy fifth (175) day of the heroic resistance of the Ukrainian people to a russian military invasion continues.

The situation remained unchanged in the Volyn, Polissya, and Siversky directions. On the Siversky, the enemy is improving the fortification equipment of the positions. Conducted artillery shelling near Chernihivske, Pavlivka, and Hudove, of the Sumy oblast.

In the Kharkiv direction, the enemy, from tanks, barrel and jet artillery, shelled the areas of the settlements of Kharkiv, Nova Mykolaivka, Dementiivka, Korobochkyne, Pechenihy, Ruski Tyshky, Odnorobivka, Lebyazhe, Nove, Svitlychne, Sosnivka, and Rubizhne.

The enemy tried to break through the defense of our troops in the direction of the settlements of Lebyazhe and Bazaliivka, but was unsuccessful and retreated.

In the Slovyansk direction, enemy units tried to damage our units and destroy civil infrastructure facilities in the areas of Brazhkivka, Dibrivny, Mazanivka, Dolyna and Dovgenky with the fire of barrel artillery and MLRS.

The enemy tried to advance in the direction of Novodmytrivka and Mazanivka, but had no success and retreated.

In the Kramatorsk direction, in order to dislodge our units from the occupied lines, the enemy fired from tanks and artillery near Mykolaivka, Kramatorsk, Verkhnyokamyanske, Tetyanivka, Serebryanka, Hryhorivka, and Raihorodok. Made an air strike near Ivano-Daryivka and Vesele.

It unsuccessfully tried to improve the tactical position in the direction of the settlement of Vesele with assault actions.

In the direction of Bakhmut, shelling was recorded near Bakhmut, Zaytseve, Yakovlivka, Bilohorivka and Mayorsk. The occupiers used aviation to strike near Soledar.

Ukrainian soldiers suppressed all attempts by the enemy to improve the tactical position of units in the areas of the settlements of Bilohorivka, Soledar, Bakhmutske, Kodema, Zaitseve and Mayorsk.

In the Avdiivka direction, the enemy continued to fire near Avdiivka, New York, Pisky, Vodyane, Opytne, and Nevelske. Conducted an airstrike near Maryinka. The enemy has partial success in the direction of Opytne.

In the Novopavlivske and Zaporizhzhia directions, the occupiers used tanks and artillery of various calibers to fire damage to the areas of the settlements of Velyka Novosilka, Kostyantynivka, Pavlivka, Sontsivka, Olhivske, Vuhledar, Charivne, Hulyaipole, Novodanylivka, Mala Tokmachka, Orihiv, Vremivka, Novopil and Novoandriivka. Airstrikes were recorded near Shcherbaky, Mali Shcherbaky and Zaliznychne.

In order to clarify the positions of the fire means and adjust the fire, the occupiers used the UAV.

The invaders made an unsuccessful attempt to advance in the direction of Shevchenko and have partial success in the direction of Novomykhailivka.

In the South Buh direction, the enemy continues to focus its efforts on holding occupied positions and preventing the Defense Forces from creating favorable conditions for a counteroffensive. With the use of available fire means, he is trying to cause maximum losses to our units along the contact line. It does not stop conducting aerial reconnaissance by unmanned aerial vehicles.

Carried out airstrikes near Bilohirka, Lozove, Bila Krynytsia, and Posad-Pokrovske.

The enemy tried to improve the tactical position in the direction of Bilohirka. Our soldiers completely broke the plans of the occupiers and pushed them back to their previous positions.

In the water areas of the Black and Azov seas, the enemy’s naval group continues to perform tasks to support the actions of the ground group of troops. Two sea-based cruise missile carriers are ready to use high-precision weapons.

russian occupiers suffer losses, are demoralized and look for any opportunity to avoid hostilities – they try to fake a light wound, resort to self-mutilation and various simulations. There is an increase in cases of sabotage of officers’ orders, especially when it concerns offensive actions.

We believe in the Armed Forces of Ukraine! Together we will win!

Glory to Ukraine!

Here is the British MOD’s assessment for today:

And here is their updated map:

Here is former NAVDEVGRU Squadron Leader Chuck Pfarrer’s updated map and analysis for the battle in Kherson:

Kharkiv:

Zatoka:

Melitopol:

I’ve now read The Washington Post‘s reporting on how the Biden administration approached Russia’s plans to re-invade Ukraine. It’s interesting, but I don’t think there’s anything in there we didn’t either know or have a really good reason to suspect. Apparently this is the first part in a multi-part series, so we’ll have to wait and see if there’s any surprises in the subsequent reporting.

Finally for tonight I want to bring everyone’s attention to this very interesting reporting at The Guardian about a wounded Russian paratrooper who began to write an expose of the re-invasion of Ukraine.

Pavel Filatyev knew the consequences of what he was saying. The ex-paratrooper understood he was risking prison, that he would be called a traitor and would be shunned by his former comrades-in-arms. His own mother had urged him to flee Russia while he still could. He said it anyway.

“I don’t see justice in this war. I don’t see truth here,” he said over a tucked-away cafe table in the Moscow financial district. It was his first time sitting down in person with a journalist since returning from the war in Ukraine.

“I am not afraid to fight in war. But I need to feel justice, to understand that what I’m doing is right. And I believe that this is all failing not only because the government has stolen everything, but because we, Russians, don’t feel that what we are doing is right.”

Two weeks ago, Filatyev went on to his VKontakte social media page and published a 141-page bombshell: a day-by-day description of how his paratrooper unit was sent to mainland Ukraine from Crimea, entered Kherson and captured the seaport, and dug in under heavy artillery fire for more than a month near Mykolaiv – and then how he eventually was wounded and evacuated from the conflict with an eye infection.

By then, he was convinced he had to expose the rot at the core of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. “We were sitting under artillery fire by Mykolaiv,” he said. “At that point I already thought that we’re just out here doing bullshit, what the fuck do we need this war for? And I really had this thought: ‘God, if I survive, then I’ll do everything that I can to stop this.’”

He spent 45 days writing his memoirs from the conflict, breaking an omerta under which even the word war has been banished in public. “I simply can’t stay quiet any longer, even though I know that I probably won’t change anything, and maybe I’ve acted foolishly to get myself in so much trouble,” says Filatyev, his fingers shaking from stress as he lit another cigarette.

His memoir, ZOV, is named for the tactical markings painted on Russian army vehicles that have been adopted as a pro-war symbol in Russia. Until now, there has been no more detailed, voluntary account from a Russian soldier participating in the invasion of Ukraine. Extracts were published in Russia’s independent press, while Filatyev appeared via video for a televised interview on TV Rain.

“It’s very important that someone became the first to speak out,” said Vladimir Osechkin, the head of the human rights network Gulagu.net, who helped Filatyev leave Russia earlier this week. That also made Filatyev the first soldier known to have fled Russia due to opposition to the war. “And it’s opening a Pandora’s box.”

This week the Russian investigative site iStories, which Russia has banned from the country, has published a confession from another Russian soldier admitting on camera to shooting and killing a civilian resident in the Ukrainian city of Andriivka.

Filatyev, who served in the 56th Guards air assault regiment based in Crimea, described how his exhausted and poorly equipped unit stormed into mainland Ukraine behind a hail of rocket fire in late February, with little in terms of concrete logistics or objectives, and no idea why the war was taking place at all. “It took me weeks to understand there was no war on Russian territory at all, and that we had just attacked Ukraine,” he said.

At one point, Filatyev describes how the ravenous paratroopers, the elite of the Russian army, captured the Kherson seaport and immediately began grabbing “computers and whatever valuable goods we could find”. Then they ransacked the kitchens for food.

“Like savages, we ate everything there: oats, porridge, jam, honey, coffee … We didn’t give a damn about anything, we’d already been pushed to the limit. Most had spent a month in the fields with no hint of comfort, a shower or normal food.

“What a wild state you can drive people to by not giving any thought to the fact that they need to sleep, eat and wash,” he wrote. “Everything around gave us a vile feeling; like wretches we were just trying to survive.”

Filatyev took a deep drag from a cigarette as he recounted the story, nervously looking around for anyone watching him at close to midnight in a Moscow park, then tries to explain.

“I know it will sound savage to a foreign reader,” he said, describing a fellow soldier stealing a computer. “But [the soldier] knows that this is worth more than one of his salaries. And who knows if he’ll be alive tomorrow anyway. So he takes it. I’m not trying to justify what he’s done. But I think it’s important to say why people act like this, to understand how to stop them … What a person will do in these kinds of extreme situations.”

He railed at length against what he called the “degradation” of the army, including the use of dated kit and vehicles that left Russian soldiers exposed to Ukrainian counterattacks. The rifle he was given before the war was rusted and had a broken strap, he said.

“We were just an ideal target,” he wrote, describing travelling to Kherson on obsolete and unarmoured UAZ trucks that sometimes stood in place for 20 minutes. “It was unclear what the plan was – as always no one knew anything.”

Much, much more at the link!

Filyatev is now in exile.

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Open thread!

Reader Interactions

44Comments

  1. 1.

    UncleEbeneezer

    I didn’t realize prominent the view that “Putin won’t invade” was amongst some of the other European countries, and even Zelenskyy.  I thought that long article also did a good job of illustrating how much trust in US intel was damaged by our dishonest justifications for invading Iraq.

  2. 2.

    Alison Rose 💙🌻💛

    WaPo also published an interview with Zelenskyy yesterday, and I thought his reasoning and responses made pretty damn good sense. (Blockquoting a bunch for those of you on the wrong side of the paywall)

    Q: When CIA Director William J. Burns met with you here in Kyiv in January, one of the things he told you was that the Russians would attempt a landing at the airport in Hostomel. What was your reaction when that actually happened on Feb. 24? Should there have been more Ukrainian forces already there?
    When it comes to all warnings or signals from certain partners, here is what I explained to them: If we don’t have enough weapons, it will be difficult for us to fight. We will fight them, that’s for sure. And they don’t want to talk. [Russian President Vladimir Putin] hasn’t been willing to communicate for three years. So I don’t want to listen to this nonsense that Russians are ready to talk, this is nonsense. I clearly explained that. Everything we need is weapons, and if you have the opportunity, force him to sit down at the negotiating table with me. I’d been talking about this specifically, because we believed there will be an invasion.

    You can’t simply say to me, “Listen, you should start to prepare people now and tell them they need to put away money, they need to store up food.” If we had communicated that — and that is what some people wanted, who I will not name — then I would have been losing $7 billion a month since last October, and at the moment when the Russians did attack, they would have taken us in three days. I’m not saying whose idea it was, but generally, our inner sense was right: If we sow chaos among people before the invasion, the Russians will devour us. Because during chaos, people flee the country.

    And that’s what happened when the invasion started — we were as strong as we could be. Some of our people left, but most of them stayed here, they fought for their homes. And as cynical as it may sound, those are the people who stopped everything. If that were to happen, in October — God forbid, during the heating season — there would be nothing left. Our government wouldn’t exist, that’s 100 percent sure. Well, forget about us. There would be a political war inside the country, because we would not have held on to $5 billion to $7 billion per month. We did not have serious financial programs. There was a shortage of energy resources in the market created by the Russians. We did not have enough energy resources. We would not have been able to get out of this situation and there would be chaos in the country.

    But it is one thing when chaos is controlled and it is during a military time — you run the state in a different way. You can open the border, close the border, attack, retreat, defend. You can take control of your infrastructure. And it’s another situation when you do not have a military situation or emergency regime in place, and you have a state that is ruled by a huge number of different officials and institutions. And minus $7 billion a month, even without weapons, is already a big war for our country.

    Q: So did you personally believe full-scale war was coming?

    A: Look, how can you believe this? That they will torture people and that this is their goal? No one believed it would be like this. And no one knew it. And now everyone says we warned you, but you warned through general phrases. When we said give us specifics — where will they come from, how many people and so on — they all had as much information as we did. And when I said, “Okay, if they’re coming from here and it’s going to be heavy fighting here, can we get weapons to stop them?” We didn’t get it. Why do I need all these warnings? Why do I need to make our society go crazy? Since February, even from January as there was a lot going on in the media, Ukrainians transferred out more money than Ukrainians abroad received in assistance. Tens of billions of dollars in deposits have been withdrawn, so Ukrainians spent much more money in Europe compared with the amount Ukrainians had been given there, with all due respect.
    …

    Q: Did you ever get an explanation for why you weren’t supplied with more weaponry before Feb. 24 if Washington knew what was coming?

    A: I have no complaints — up to the point when someone starts telling me, “But we were sending you signals.” Up to that point, I have no complaints. But when one is claiming they were sending us some signals, I tell them, “Send us weapons.” I was absolutely right, and I’m sure about it even now.

    So as soon as we received serious weapons — I had told them, “Our country is not going to run anywhere, we are ready to fight, give us weapons.” And as soon as we got them, we would fight.

    Everyone was afraid of the war. No one wants to wage war with Russia. Look, no one wants to wage war with Russia. Everyone wants Ukraine to win, but no one wants to wage war with Russia. And that’s it. That’s a full stop. And that’s why we had to decide how to stay strong. If no one wants to wage war with them, everyone is scared to fight them — excuse me, then we’ll be deciding how to do that, whether it’s right or wrong. But the war will go farther, deeper into Europe, so please send us weapons, because we are also defending you. And they started sending it.

    But is it possible to close the sky now? Just wondering. It’s a rhetorical question.

    I’ve seen a few other articles over the past few months similar to this new one from WaPo that include sentiments about how Zelenskyy and other Ukrainian officials were disbelieving or dismissive or whatever of warnings, and it’s always struck me as hard to buy. He’s not a fucking idiot. I’m not saying he was perfect or he acted in the best way in the whole lead-up, but it bothers me when it seems like sometimes people are trying to paint him as inept or naive. What is the point of doing that now? Even if it were true to a degree, what does it matter now?

    I don’t know. I get ornery about it.

    Anyway. Thank you as always, Adam.

  6. 6.

    Carlo Graziani

    Filatyev’s story shows that remorse can bring redemption capable of atoning for guilt, and worthy of forgiveness.

    I’m not even a religious person, but I’ve found some elements in that outlook that help me think about these things.

  7. 7.

    Another Scott

    Oryx had a retweet of a thread on Filatyev from “ChrisO”. It’s not clear if he’s just twittering the Guardian story.

    30/ Filatyev blames widespread corruption and a system of photo reports, which enables commanders to hide problems, for this situation. He suggests that as few as 100,000 Russian troops may have invaded Ukraine in February (despite paper numbers of at least 200,000).

    — ChrisO (@ChrisO_wiki) August 17, 2022

    VVP’s Russia lies about everything. I wouldn’t be surprised if Filatyev is correct.

    There’s a nearly 4 hour interview with him on YouTube (russian subtitles are available, but I don’t know about English).

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  8. 8.

    Carlo Graziani

    Here’s another war resister story from the Moscow Times: Veteran Russian Rock Star Fined Over Onstage War Criticism.  According to the article: “The motherland, my friends, is not the president’s ass that has to be slobbered and kissed all the time. The motherland is an impoverished babushka at the train station selling potatoes,” Shevchuk had told the crowd of 8,000 fans, who also recorded video of the speech.

    That…was bold.

  9. 9.

    Alison Rose 💙🌻💛

    @Adam L Silverman: Huh. Maybe it was just too long and WP said NOPE.

    Anyway, I was just quoting a bunch of the interview WaPo did with Zelenskyy, and saying that, to me at least, his reasoning and responses make a lot of sense. And I don’t really understand the point of articles that want to highlight what the West claims were his/his admin’s failures before the war. What does it matter now? What purpose does it serve to make him look inept or naive? It makes me ornery.

    But anyway, thank you as always, Adam.

  10. 10.

    Immanentize

    From above:

    In the Avdiivka direction, the enemy continued to fire near Avdiivka, New York, Pisky, Vodyane, Opytne, and Nevelske.

    Huh? I guess if you can make it there…

  11. 11.

    West of the Rockies

    Adam, your reports are always clear and sober.  I wish reports such as Putin’s declining health or Russia running on fumes by mid August were true, but so far, not so much. Thank you for your dedication and candor and always-valuable information.

  14. 14.

    Carlo Graziani

    @Alison Rose 💙🌻💛: For what it’s worth, I didn’t read it the same way, as in making Zelenskyy look inept. I thought that the article showed fairly the reasons why the Ukrainian government did not accept all the Biden administration’s warnings: those warnings were not accompanied by the actual intelligence (they couldn’t be), there was no actual specific action that the US wanted them to take, just “be very alarmed!”, and no substantial armament flows began until rather late. So the Ukrainian attitude of “what are we supposed to do with this information” seems pretty reasonable.

  17. 17.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Carlo Graziani: @Alison Rose 💙🌻💛: It’s important to remember that Biden’s nat sec team is small “c” conservative. So when they get alarmed that’s a strong signal. The other important thing is that policies and strategies that make sense in the White House may not be feasible, acceptable, ad suitable in Kyiv.

  23. 23.

    Alison Rose 💙🌻💛

    @Immanentize: We got a Dublin in California. It does have a large Irish population, but probably is best known for this:

    On December 6, 2011, during shooting for an episode of MythBusters at Camp Parks, a cannonball went skyward and zoomed through a nearby residence, coming to rest in a car. Many residents were shaken and the community was shocked, but nobody was injured. MythBusters cast members Adam Savage and Kari Byron hosted a student engineering event at Dublin High School, a move to express gratitude to the community of Dublin for the access to Camp Parks as a shooting location. The Dublin Film Commission declared December 6 “Victory in the battle for Dublin”, poking at the rogue cannonball incident, and announced plans to host a film festival every December 6 to honor Dublin’s fallen cannonball. On December 6, 2012, Tri-Valley Film Coalition President Morgan Finley King hosted a film festival at the Dublin Library, in which winners of each category were awarded a “Golden Cannonball Award”.

  27. 27.

    The Lodger

    You’ve heard of New Brunswick, NJ but in Canada there is also a town named New Jersey in New Brunswick.

  29. 29.

    errg

    I read these posts every day but rarely comment. Just want to say thank you to Adam for helping to keep me informed.

  31. 31.

    Another Scott

    @Alison Rose 💙🌻💛: Back in the olden days FYWP would get upset and trash a comment if it thought it had too many paragraphs/characters.  I haven’t gotten trapped by that recently, but maybe you were just over the line (or maybe something else happened).

    Dunno.

    HTH a little, and thanks for posting it.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  32. 32.

    Jinchi

    @Another Scott:

    26/ The unit raised the flags every morning accompanied by the Russian national anthem, but as Filatyev notes sardonically, “half the servicemen do not sing it”. He wrote that “the duty and anti-terrorist units are on duty only on paper” and did not attend morning roll calls.

    That helps explain all the explosions occuring around Crimea these days. You’d think the Russians would have reasonable security at military bases.

  34. 34.

    Chetan Murthy

    I had some kind thoughts about Filatyev last night.  I mean, at least he came out against the war, though (so far from what’s been published) for entirely selfish reasons, and so far from what I’ve read online (e.g. at The Guardian) he’s expressed no remorse that I can see, for his and his colleagues’ acts in this war.  But some Ukrainians are having none of it, and it would seem important to witness their position.

    HOW ARE UKRAINIAN REFUGEES SUPPOSED TO FEEL SAFE IF RUSSIAN SOLDIERS WALK FREELY NEAR US AND THE MEDIA & @Bundeskanzler @OlafScholz GLORIFIES THEM. I CAN’T EVEN #VISABANFORUSSIANS https://t.co/FRJNElFPd6
    — 🇺🇦🇬🇪 Valera (@porizna) August 18, 2022

  35. 35.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Chetan Murthy:

    More

    What was the most revolting for me is that the guy mostly complained about how corrupt and inefficient the Russian army was. If they managed to offer him better conditions to kill Ukrainians more efficiently, he probably wouldn’t have spoken out. https://t.co/djAVm1gRYe
    — Olga Tokariuk (@olgatokariuk) August 18, 2022

  36. 36.

    Geminid

    UN chief Guterres, Turkish President Erdogan and Ukraine President Zelenskyy meet today in Lviv. Topics to be discussed include grain shipments and the Zaporizhne nuclear plant. From France 24.

  37. 37.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Chetan Murthy: I’m glad you posted this, as I was coming here to do similar, but would likely be viewed as more biased. Shorter: Ukrainian Twitter is not at all impressed by Filatyev’s crocodile tears.

  38. 38.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Gin & Tonic: also relevant, I think.  I think we in the West tend to mash all those “former SU states” together, thinking of all the people there as “Russian and Russian-like”.  “I mean, how different could they be?  They were all part of the same country only 30 years ago”.  And this results in Westerners giving privilege to voices from Russia over voices from the Baltics, from Ukraine, etc.  It’s a mistake.

    …most Germans still equate Russia with the former Soviet Union. There are the Baltic States, Belarus, Ukraine and the Caucasus. Even today, these countries, some of which are quite large, are hardly perceived as individual nation states.
    — Lauri Nirgi (@LauriNirgi) August 18, 2022

  40. 40.

    Robert Sneddon

    @counterfactual: There’s a village called New York in the south of England. It’s only a few miles from Boston and Washington (supposedly the place where the First Colonial Traitor’s family came from). There’s another Washington in the north-east of England, usually surtitled “Tyne and Wear”. Moscow (in Scotland) is over four hundred miles away from New York though.

  42. 42.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Chetan Murthy: Even that writer gets it wrong. “The Caucasus” is not a country, it is several, sometimes mutually antagonistic (see, e.g., Armenia and Azerbaijan.)

  44. 44.

    Gin & Tonic

    More reaction to the Filatyev piece:

    humanizing, normalizing genocide criminals is not ok. what’s next? a memoir “how i mass murdered ukrainians. it wasn’t what i expected”? revolting how some western journalists are rabidly enthusiastic to amplify a russian terrorist while his buddies keep mass murdering my people pic.twitter.com/0sMHtAvTTv
    — maksym.eristavi 🇺🇦🏳️‍🌈 (@maksymeristavi) August 18, 2022

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