Steeplejack has informed me that I misnumbered last night’s update. I have fixed it, it is now 444, and tonight’s is correctly 445.
Before we start, I want to thank everyone for the kind words in the comments last night. You are all most welcome. I look very forward to never having to do one of these updates again.
President Zelenskyy was in Germany today. Here are his remarks at the International Charlemagne Prize of Achen award ceremony. Video below, English transcript after the jump. President Zelenskyy gave his remarks in English.
Europe and other parts of the world should not be a place where the ambitions of tyrants destroy the lives of nations – President of Ukraine at the International Charlemagne Prize of Aachen award ceremony
14 May 2023 – 22:49
Thank you so much.
A great honor to be here.
Madam Mayor, Mr. Linden,
Dear Olaf, dear Ursula, Mateusz, Roberta!
Dear colleagues!
Thank you very much for your kind words about Ukraine and our heroes, and our soldiers, and our children. Thank you very much! They are real heroes! Thank you for Europe, which is now finally able to fulfill the dream that was laid as the basis of European unity!
It is an honor for me to represent the Ukrainian people here today. And each day. Millions of people who are fighting and working for our values and freedom – and for our free Europe. All Ukrainians, each of our heroes deserve to stand here and receive this award.
But since the millions of people just will not fit in this hall, let our language which represents all our people be spoken here today.
The Ukrainian language has never been spoken in these walls – by the awardee. Now, when Ukraine is returning to its native European home, I believe that the Ukrainian language will be spoken here on many occasions from now – while recognizing special contribution to the European unity.
Ukrainians will always make Europe stronger!
All of us in this room, all who stand with us in defense of freedom and Europe, are more than leaders and politicians, civil society activists and diplomats. We are all founders of peace. Exactly the founders of peace. This is our primary duty to our countries, to our Europe, and to our history.
It is peace that we will leave to our children and grandchildren as a legacy of today. We do not have and do not want any other alternatives. But in order to leave peace as a legacy, we must reach the day when we can say that we are ending this war with our common victory.
Dear Europeans!
History is built on victories, although it also remembers defeats. There were illusions that other bricks for history than victories were possible, but such illusions resulted in the disappearance or, at best, many years of silence in history of those who professed them. Illusions turn into deaths.
The peace of our parents’ generation is the peace that was left as a legacy by those who defeated the penultimate great aggression in Europe. And the peace of our children’s generation is the peace that we are gaining right now in the battles against the last aggression in Europe.
The battles are taking place more than 2,000 kilometers away from Aachen – on the land of Ukraine, in our skies, in our Black Sea… and in European destiny. This battlefield is the fate of Europe.
Today’s Russia has waged aggression not only against us as a free and independent state, not only against a united Europe as a global symbol of peace and prosperity. This is Russia’s war for the past. By overcoming kilometers of Ukrainian territory, Russia was trying to overcome years of European history. Our history, the very 73 years when The Charlemagne Prize is awarded here.
We are faced with an aggressor who is willing to go to any lengths of cruelty and meanness to claim that history allegedly does not change… As if it was once, so it will be again. As if whoever has the power will have the territory, any territory the aggressor wants. As if the one who is capable of greater meanness has more rights to Europe. As if civilization is worth absolutely nothing – this is what Russia is manifesting with this genocidal aggression.
We are faced with an aggressor for whom our common European striving for peace and rules means nothing and who wants something for Europe that no free nation, no honest leader, no one in this room would agree with.
We are united in the belief that Europe and all other parts of the world should not be a place where the ambitions of tyrants destroy the lives of nations.
And we must become winners so that it is our view of life that will remain in Europe.
Dear Europe!
Ukraine is offering you a victory that will turn into peace and save you.
Ukraine is offering a victory not just in this war alone, but over aggressions and annexations, the burning of cities, deportations, and the catastrophe of genocide anywhere else on earth. We are offering and bringing closer a common victory over those who have taken all this old evil from the pages of the past to destroy our future, which all of us – all of Europe – dream of for our children.
Russia, of its own free will, has embarked on the path of evil. Our will is enough to cut off this path and the path of any similar aggressors who might someday try to follow Russia.
We will accomplish this task. But only together!
Dear Olaf!
I am now addressing you personally, and through you I am addressing your entire state, the powerful Germany.
Ukraine and the whole of Europe – we honor your choice to be for Europe, to be with Europe. When you saw the Zeitenwende, you acted as a defender of Europe should act.
Europe will always be grateful to you and this German government.
Grateful for your effectiveness in helping Ukraine, for your and your colleagues’ effectiveness in defending your country, and for the strength you and all of Germany give to Europe.
Brilliant German IRIS-T that have already saved thousands of lives of our people from Russian missile terror. Powerful German Marders help save the lives of our soldiers as they put pressure on the Russian occupiers. Sturdy German Leopards provide us with the protection we need.
And it is very important that Germany helps not only militarily, but also with its leadership in the economy, in the humanitarian sphere, and in diplomacy.
Last year, Ukraine presented ten points of our Peace Formula, and I believe that Germany will also become one of the leaders in its implementation.
This Russian aggression takes place on our land. And it is our people who are dying every day in the confrontation with this evil, which, by striking Ukraine, strikes at the very idea of a peaceful Europe, at the very idea of a rules-based international order.
We see this evil of aggression closer than anyone, so we also see better than anyone how to defeat this evil, how to prevent its replication in other parts of the world or at other times. And we invite the world to join our just and fair principles of peace.
Everyone who joins our formula actually makes it their own. And I am sure that the Ukrainian formula for peace can become a German formula for peace, a European formula for peace, a formula for peace for the world.
The only one who does not accept it is the aggressor. And it is because he is the aggressor that he does not accept it. But what is most important is that he is alone, and we are not afraid of him. And he does not accept this because he is not interested in peace. This is it.
There were hundreds of rounds of negotiations between 2014 and 2022 in various formats with Russia after its occupation of our Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and the incitement of a hybrid war against Ukraine in Donbas. There were all these negotiations.
And you, Olaf, Mr. Chancellor, you remember, and our ally President Emmanuel Macron, and other conscientious leaders of the world spent hours and hours talking to Putin, trying to avert this modern-day catastrophe.
But Putin has chosen catastrophe. Alone.
Now everyone understands what we understand. Putin is a catastrophe. This is the answer. Putin is an aggression, and he does not want anything else for himself and his people. His formula has become death.
How can one talk to it, explain to me, how to talk to it? In its long history, humanity has never known anyone who could reach an agreement with death.
The one who brought death, the one who embarked on the path of genocide, the one who wants to destroy us, the one who wants to destroy the Europe we value must ask for mercy. And then there will be our response – a tribunal.
Our determination will lead to the fact that we will also see Russia’s interest in our efforts for peace. And it will happen. When there is no source of death there.
We can win! And we are already bringing the victory closer, as it has been repeatedly proven by the tears of joy of children and adults, women, men, young and old, whom our soldiers liberated from Russian occupation. Wherever our blue and yellow flag returns to the liberated land, Europe returns. Our Europe! The values return that you – just like us – defended on your squares and enshrined in your constitutions.
It is a fact that freedom for our people whom Russia tried to enslave is ensured by the bravery of our warriors and the weapons, including yours, of all those who help us defend ourselves. And now only weapons will stop this death. And this is a fact.
That is why it is important to be firm and resolute in helping Ukrainian soldiers with weapons.
It has often been said, including here in Aachen, during the award ceremony of this prestigious prize, that Europe must become one of the world’s superpowers. Unlike other similar powers, Europe has this potential only when nothing but European Unity becomes a superpower. And we see it now: the superpower of European Unity. We see it thanks to Ukraine and thanks to each and every one of you. Thank you.
Your solidarity and leadership, dear colleagues, in particular your solidarity and leadership, Ursula, with which the European Union has responded to our courage, reflected the basic principles that Robert Schuman, Konrad Adenauer and Jean Monnet sought for Europe. They would be proud of each and every one of you who is defending Europe together with Ukraine!
Ukrainian courage and your solidarity have given Europe a unity that has never been seen before.
The time has come to enshrine this strength of our unity with the decision on Ukraine’s accession to the European Union. You know that Europe is not complete without Ukraine in the European Union. And I thank you, Olaf, I thank every leader in Europe who supports the completeness of the European project.
There is no rational reason why our soldiers, who are fighting so heroically and successfully for our common freedom, our common values, are not yet in the same organization as all other soldiers of the Alliance.
Judging by the results of our actions, Ukraine is already in the Alliance, but the de jure decision has not yet been made. This decision should be made! And it is worth defining an algorithm – it motivates our soldiers. And this is important!
In addition to strengthening the entire Euro-Atlantic region with the courage of Ukrainians, our accession to the Alliance will definitely yield another historic result – NATO flags next to the flags of Ukraine on our eastern border will become a powerful lock that will keep Russian imperialism in the past forever. In the past that cannot be returned, because without control over Ukraine, Russian imperialism is dying.
And there is another prerequisite for our common victory, which Ukraine is offering.
Europe’s longest-lasting peace and most reliable security have been ensured by building ties between the peoples of Europe instead of barriers.
And when we now see, instead of strengthening our ties, any fresh barriers that are so reminiscent of old mistakes, whether they are barriers in politics, or barriers in economics, or in trade, we see a threat not to one European nation, but to the whole of Europe.
Mateusz! I am very grateful for the great support from Poland to Ukraine. Thank you very much! And it is very important for us to maintain this unity.
Any seeds of misunderstanding between anyone in Europe should not give rise to conflict! And this is in the fundamental interests of our peoples. Europe gains strength and prosperity every time there is minus one barrier on the continent.
Dear participants!
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen!
Today I spoke only about what is necessary for our common victory, and therefore only about what is necessary for sustainable peace for all of us.
I dream of Europe becoming victorious! I know that Ukrainians can win! I urge all of you to become winners together with us, together with Ukrainians!
This time has come! It is now being decided what the outcome of this war will be and whether this is really the last aggression in Europe.
Everything depends on our unity, on our speed, on our determination to win.
So my main appeal to you today is to be worthy of Charlemagne’s character! Win!
Establish peace, which will be the fruit of our common victory and which we will leave to our children and grandchildren as our main legacy, the legacy of Europe!
And if anyone still has doubts about whether to support the Ukrainian people, please, here in Aachen or in any other city of our beautiful free Europe, please go outside, look around you, feel the main thing we strive for, the thing that is given to us all by peace and respect in Europe. Feel the freedom that is simply there!
And we are fighting for it. And we will win.
Glory to all our warriors who are in combat today for the sake of Ukraine, at combat posts and on combat missions!
Glory to all who train Ukrainian warriors!
Glory to all who help, who work, who fight!
Ukraine will win! Europe will win!
Peace will prevail!
Glory to Ukraine!
Next stop, Paris:
Paris. With each visit, Ukraine's defense and offensive capabilities are expanding. The ties with Europe are getting stronger, and the pressure on Russia is growing. I will have a meeting with my friend Emanuel and we will talk through the most important points of bilateral…
— Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) May 14, 2023
During the EuroVision competition last night, the Russians opened up on Ternopil, which is where the Ukrainian contestants are from.
Ternopil last night. This is the hometown of @TvorchiBand, Ukraine’s Eurovision contestant. The city was bombed by russia while the duo was performing at @Eurovision.
russia has once again shown the world that it is nothing but a terrorist state. pic.twitter.com/UpJe4Fikpd— Defense of Ukraine (@DefenceU) May 14, 2023
Bakhmut:
russia’s MoD has confirmed the death of two of its colonels near Bakhmut.
But what about confirming another ~200,000 occupiers who were also destroyed in Ukraine.— Defense of Ukraine (@DefenceU) May 14, 2023
Makarov was fatally wounded during a fight south of Ivanivske village, to the west of Bakhmut, where Ukrainian forces recaptured land this week. He died en route to a hospital. Brovko was killed in shelling and received multiple shrapnel wounds, the Russian Defense Ministry said.
— Christopher Miller (@ChristopherJM) May 14, 2023
/2. Today, confirmations have appeared from Russian sources, including from Russian Ministry of Defense, that during battles for Bakhmut:
• commander and chief of staff of 124th brigade – were killed;
• two deputy brigade commanders – seriously injured.— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) May 14, 2023
/4. As for the total losses of personnel as a result of the strike in Klishcheevka, various sources report losses from 20 to 40.
— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) May 14, 2023
On Mother's Day, spare a thought for Ukrainian mothers, who had to take up arms, live under bombs, or flee. Who raise kids alone while their husbands are at the frontlines, whose children are fighting or in russian captivity. Mothers who will never kiss their kids again pic.twitter.com/3lJq5hQCjF
— Olena Halushka (@OlenaHalushka) May 14, 2023
Professor Timothy Snyder has published a new op-ed in The New York Times regarding Russian statements on nuclear war. Here are some excerpts:
In the Brezhnev era of Vladimir Putin’s youth, May 9 was an occasion for Soviet militarism, a celebration of weapons and might. It could be forgotten, at least for a moment, that Leonid Brezhnev’s war of choice would be fought and lost in Afghanistan less than two decades after he began the May 9 celebrations, much as what is likely Mr. Putin’s last war is today being fought and lost in Ukraine.
During both conflicts, people in the West worried, understandably, about nuclear war.
Today’s Russia issues an unending stream of nuclear threats. In the West today, unlike during the Cold War, these are discussed in psychological rather than strategic terms. How does Mr. Putin feel? How do we feel?
Americans’ fear of escalation delayed the supply of weapons that could have allowed Ukraine to win last year. One after the other, the weapons systems deemed escalatory have now been delivered, with no negative consequences. But the cost of delay can be observed in the Ukrainian territories that Russia still controls: the death pits, the torture chambers and the empty homes of kidnapped children. Tens of thousands of soldiers on both sides have unnecessarily died.
In nearly 15 months of war, despite Russian nuclear propaganda and Western anxiety, there has been no use of nuclear weapons. This is an absence worthy of an explanation. Those who predicted escalation if Ukrainians resisted, if the West supplied weapons or if Russia suffered defeat have thus far been wrong. Strategic thinkers point to deterrence and note that nuclear use would not in fact bring a Russian victory. It would ensure a dramatic Western response and make Russian leaders pariahs. But there is a deeper explanation: Russia’s nuclear talk is itself the weapon.
It rests on false assumptions. Russian nuclear propaganda assumes that the bully always wins. But the bully does not always win. Russian propagandists want us to think that nuclear powers can never lose wars, on the logic that they could always deploy nuclear weapons to win. This is an ahistoric fantasy. Nuclear weapons did not bring the French victory in Algeria, nor did they preserve the British Empire. The Soviet Union lost its war in Afghanistan. America lost in Vietnam and in Iraq and in Afghanistan. Israel failed to win in Lebanon. Nuclear powers lose wars with some regularity.
Some Americans have proposed a nuclear scenario in which Russians will have to use nuclear weapons to head off defeat. But Russia has been defeated in Ukraine, on its own terms, again and again. What it has proved is its ability to change those terms after each defeat. Russia failed to achieve the explicit aim of the “special military operation” to overthrow Ukraine’s democratic government. There will be no greater humiliation than that. The defeat at Kyiv was followed by further defeats at Kharkiv and Kherson. Each loss led to cover stories from Russia’s state propagandists and their believers, to talk of good-will gestures, strategic withdrawals and so on. The escalation has been in the propagandists’ workload.
Russia can lose without being cornered. It has 11 time zones of space for retreating soldiers and plenty of practice in propaganda refashionings. Indeed, Russian leaders have already indicated what they will do if they believe that they are losing: change the terms of reference and change the subject in Russian media. Mr. Putin’s kleptocratic state as a whole and its dependencies such as the Wagner mercenary army are public relations projects with a military arm. The assumption in Russian politics is that rhetoric overcomes reality. And the rhetorical preparations for defeat have been made.
Beneath Mr. Putin’s vague bellicosity is the idea that Russia wins if it avoids (in his words) “strategic defeat” imposed by NATO. Almost no matter what happens, it will be easy for him to define the war in Ukraine as a strategic victory. Since the Kremlin claims that it is fighting NATO, all Mr. Putin has to say is that Russia stopped NATO from crossing into Russia. The commander of Wagner wrote recently, in this spirit, that Russia can end the “special military operation” at any time and just claim that its goals have been achieved, so long as Russia does not retreat from any more occupied Ukrainian territory.
By taking nuclear blackmail seriously, we have actually increased the overall chances of nuclear war. If nuclear blackmail enables a Russian victory, the consequences will be incalculably awful. If any country with nuclear weapons can do whatever it likes, then law means nothing, no international order is possible and catastrophe beckons at every turn. Countries without nuclear weapons will have to build them, on the logic that they will need nuclear deterrence in the future. Nuclear proliferation would make nuclear war much more likely in the future.
When we understand that nuclear talk is itself the weapon, we can act to make the situation less risky. The way forward to strategic thinking is to free ourselves from our own anxieties and consider the Russian ones. The Russians talk about nuclear weapons not because they mean to use them but because they believe a large nuclear arsenal makes them a superpower. Nuclear talk makes them feel powerful. They see nuclear bullying as their prerogative and believe that others should automatically yield at the first mention of their weapons. The Ukrainians have not allowed this to affect their tactics.
If Russia detonated a weapon, it would lose that jealously guarded treasure of superpower status. Such an act would constitute an admission that its army has been beaten — a tremendous loss of face. Worse still, neighbors would build (or build up) their own nuclear arsenals. That would deprive Russia of superpower status in the minds of the Russians themselves. That is, for the Russian leadership, the one intolerable outcome of this war. In my view, the greatest risk of a Russian nuclear action would therefore be one that Moscow would lay the blame for on Ukraine, such as the deliberate destruction of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.
More at the link!
Can’t imagine anyone ever writing anything like that before…
That’s enough for tonight.
Your daily Patron!
My mom always tell me to be brave and to nurture goodness in myself. I thank her and all mothers in the world for life and love. Happy Mother's Day ❤️ #HappyMotherDay2023 pic.twitter.com/wXma3W353O
— Patron (@PatronDsns) May 14, 2023
And a new video from Patron’s official TikTok!
@patron__dsns Надважливе нагадування❤️
Here is the machine translation of the caption:
An important reminder ❤️
Open thread!
Rand Careaga
I add my voice to the throng of thanks for your labors here.
zhena gogolia
There’s a lot of praise for Adam in the Reverse Festivus thread as well!
The Ternopil thing just broke me. I woke up sobbing. How evil.
Chetan Murthy
I was reading last night about the Druzhba pipeline (which delivers Russia oil to Hungary, among other places). The branch going to Hungary passes thru Ukraine, and I was shocked to learn that somehow, Ukraine isn’t within its rights to turn it off? I mean, sure, don’t blow it up. But turn it off? It goes thru Western Ukraine, how can Ukraine not be 100% within its rights to turn it off? Or exact an eye-watering transit toll?
Gin & Tonic
@zhena gogolia: Ternopil was shelled again tonight.
Gin & Tonic
To those who may not remember, the mother and child in lavender in the Halushka tweet are not together this Mothers’ Day. The little girl, Lisa Dmitrieva, was killed by a russian shell in the city of Vinnytsia last July.
Alison Rose
Zelenskyy’s speech was wonderful, as always. I never listen to putin’s speeches but when I’ve read transcripts or excerpts, there is such a massive and stark difference between the self-serving, hateful, fantastical garbage he spews and the incisive, poignant, and community-centered patriotic words of Zelenskyy. If ever one needed to illustrate the difference between a figure of authority and a figure of authoritarianism, these two would serve the purpose.
This line – Russia’s nuclear talk is itself the weapon – seems so obvious and clear that it’s maddening so many people still do not seem to get it. Wonder if we can have a few hundred copies of Snyder’s op-ed sent to certain offices around DC.
Thank you as always, Adam
(Also just an FYI if anyone is planning to watch the full video, he only speaks in English for the first few minutes, then switches to Ukrainian with English subtitles, with a little joke about people beginning to learn the language :D )
Parfigliano
@Gin & Tonic: Russia is a shit hole. No suprise Trump puppet of. Good Russian is dead Russian.
Torrey
Since I missed the Reverse Festivus thread, I will add my thanks here. I feel that I am much more informed about what is going on there than most other people, and I echo what everyone else has said about what it must take to do these updates every evening after long and stressful days. Much respect, Adam, and many thanks. Thanks also to Gin & Tonic, zhena gogolia and others who provide specialized knowledge and context in the comments
Adam L Silverman
Everyone is most welcome. I have no idea what a reverse Festivus thread is.
Ruckus
From the Defense of Ukraine tweet
russia’s MoD has confirmed the death of two of its colonels near Bakhmut. But what about confirming another ~200,000 occupiers who were also destroyed in Ukraine.
Well vlad and his gang give less than one shit about those 200,000 men killed. They didn’t care when or if they worked or starved in russia because they had, in the mind of vlad and his cronies so little value. And those 200,000 likely didn’t actually support vlad and wouldn’t likely have minded if he died years ago. vlad cares about vlad and couldn’t give two shits about anyone but vlad. He will give one shit about people that help him get rich and stay in power but never two shits.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Two stops on the down elevator.
Rusty
I missed adding my comment last night, but I am also another appreciative reader.
Jay
Jay
Jay
Jay
As always, thank you Adam. This is one of the few places that talks about the war.
Matt McIrvin
So do we all.
oldster
@Jay:
At your link, the comments say that video is a year old.
Seeing Russians surrender is good news, but this is very old good news.
sab
@Adam L Silverman: Airing of gratitude instead of airing of grievances.
Chetan Murthy
Goddamn! Prigo is cruisin’ for a sledgehammer!
“In late January, with his mercenary forces dying by the thousands in a fight for the ruined city of Bakhmut, Wagner Group owner Yevgeniy Prigozhin made Ukraine an extraordinary offer,” the Washington Post reports.
“Prigozhin said that if Ukraine’s commanders withdrew their soldiers from the area around Bakhmut, he would give Kyiv information on Russian troop positions, which Ukraine could use to attack them. Prigozhin conveyed the proposal to his contacts in Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate, with whom he has maintained secret communications during the course of the war.
P.S. I guess I don’t *really* believe this happened. But boy howdy, it’d pretty if it did
P.P.S. And regardless of whether it happened or not, spreading the *rumor* is fantastic work on Ukraine’s part.
mvr
@Adam L Silverman: It is a couple of threads down and a calming read. Thanks for your work.
Steeplejack
The Ternopil bombing was particularly vile, since the city is in the far west of Ukraine.
Andrya
@Chetan Murthy: So interesting. I personally think the balance of probability is that this is Ukrainian disinformation, but it’s impossible to know. prigozhin is entirely capabable of a betrayal of this sort- and he must have been under incredible pressure to deliver a victory in Bakhmut by May 9.
Assuming that this is Ukrainian disinformation, the beauty of it is that it exploits the utter amorality of the russian regime. Utterly depraved as the Nazis were, they did have one principle they would not betray- “Germany must survive and rule everyone else”. The members of the current russian regime have no moral principles whatsoever, and none of them can trust any other a single inch.
Hopefully putin is paranoid enough to react to this…
Gin & Tonic
@Steeplejack: They’ve bombed Lviv, which is even further west, like 40 miles from the Polish border.
YY_Sima Qian
@Steeplejack: Nihilism just pervades everything that Russia does these days, & since at least 2014.
Of course, the Russian military is still targeting sites of military use. A major ammo storage site at Khmelnitsky was destroyed on 5/13. It was mainly housing Cold War era munitions, though newer materiale might have been there, too. I think it is telling that Russia is hitting known sites date from the Soviet era, it may imply that it lacks up to date intelligence. Russia has also been hitting spent rocket fuel storage sites, which are not legitimate targets. Hoping to release toxic fumes?
Gin & Tonic
@Andrya:
Carlo Graziani
@Andrya: It has one other hallmark of effective disinformation: it tells the targets something they probably already half-believe, or are disposed to believe, or need enough members of the ruling hierarchy to believe. It plays on an existing fissure to pry it wider, rather than attempt to create a new one.
Ironically, much like the FSB/GRU political info ops in the US since the 2016 election. So I rather hope it is a disinformation campaign. And I hope the really long, sharp knives come out as a result.
Jinchi
This was in the news early in the war. My recollection is that Ukraine is juggling the competing pressures of wanting to cut off Russian oil exports, with desperately needing the support of Europe for weapons and ammunition for their defense. Particularly the support of NATO.
They’re completely within their rights to turn it off, and doing so would have had a short term hit on Russian exports, but those probably would have been rerouted over time. As long as it’s in use, it still serves as a point of leverage on Hungary. Ukraine has taken the harder path of diplomacy in the hopes that it pays off over the long term.
Carlo Graziani
@Jinchi: Agree 100%. The Ukrainians are parsimonious about picking their battles.
Andrya
@Carlo Graziani: I assume that putin uses the same calculation that Stalin did: “if there is a 0.0001 probability that you will get in my way, I will crush you like a bug”. Hopefully this WP report, whether a true leak or UK disinformation, will pass the 0.0001 threshold.
way2blue
@Gin & Tonic: Now I remember! Sigh.
LadySuzy
@Steeplejack: It’s a response to the strikes in Luhansk. “See, we can hit you far behind the front lines”.
Do the Ukrainians have enough defense missile systems ? Enough to protect all those towns in the center and the west of the country ? Or they have a sufficient numbers, but they simply can’t block everything.
Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]
Slightly OT, but anyone heard about Lukashenko not showing up at official events recently? Maybe he will recover, but that’s definitely a headache that Putin doesn’t need right now (poor baby……).
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65585951
Shalimar
@Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]: He had a visible IV line hanging from an arm in Moscow on the 9th and probably should not have travelled to that event. He is clearly too sick to appear in public now. Beyond that, all we have is speculation.
Chetan Murthy
@Shalimar: I had heard this in a podcast I listened to (forget which) but was unwilling to say it here, b/c …. well, I didn’t even remember where I heard it. If you have a source, that might be useful.
Chetan Murthy
Oof. A gut-punch.
https://nitter.net/Bettina41107702/status/1657974344616665090#m