Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

The choice is between normal and crazy.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

Please don’t feed the bears.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

Let’s show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

Israel is using food as a weapon of war. Unforgivable.

So many bastards, so little time.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

Republicans don’t lie to be believed, they lie to be repeated.

Never give a known liar the benefit of the doubt.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / War for Ukraine Day 805: Russia Steps Up Its Attacks on Kharkiv, Sumy, & Other Parts of Ukraine While Threatening Invasions of Kharkiv & Sumy

War for Ukraine Day 805: Russia Steps Up Its Attacks on Kharkiv, Sumy, & Other Parts of Ukraine While Threatening Invasions of Kharkiv & Sumy

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(Image by NEIVANMADE)

A couple of quick housekeeping notes. First, everyone is, as always, most welcome. The past several days have been very busy and long, so tonight’s update will also be briefer and, once I hit publish, I’m basically going offline to rack out. Second, Rosie is so far tolerating her third chemo treatment well. I appreciate all the good thoughts, well wishes, and prayers.

As I begin drafting tonight’s update – 7:55 PM EDT – the only air raid alerts up are for Kharkiv and the ones that are always up for Luhansk and Crimea. The air raid alert for Mykolaiv Oblast has just been taken down.

On the night of May 8, 2024, russian invaders attacked Ukraine with 55 missiles and 21 Shahed UAVs.

russian attack targeted infrastructure in Lviv, Vinnytsia, Kyiv, Poltava, Kirovohrad, Zaporizhzhia, and Ivano-Frankivsk regions.

Ukrainian defenders shot down 59 aerial targets:
◾️33 Kh-101 cruise missiles
◾️4 Kalibr cruise missiles
◾️2 Kh-59/69 cruise missiles
◾️20 Shahed UAVs

On a day meant for remembrance, Ukraine was hit by a severe missile and drone attack. The world must unite to prevent the rise of new Nazism.

russia carried out massive #attacks on Ukraine’s #energy infrastructure early on Tuesday, using missiles to inflict severe damage on DTEK facilities. Three of DTEK’s six thermal power plants in #Ukraine were struck in a new wave of russian attacks, seriously damaging equipment on which millions of Ukrainians depend.

#StandWithUkraine #FightForLight

 

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

Our Positions at the Front, the Physical Protection of Our People and Communities, and the Disruption of Any Attempts at Russian Offensive Are Urgent Priorities – Address by the President

8 May 2024 – 21:47

Dear Ukrainians!

A few important points for today.

First of all, I am grateful to all those who have been eliminating the consequences of the Russian Nazis’ attack in various regions of Ukraine today – Vinnytsia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, Zaporizhzhia, Poltava, Kirovohrad. This is how the Kremlin marks the end of World War II in Europe – with a massive attack, with its attempts to break the lives of our people, with its Nazism. Almost sixty Russian missiles and more than twenty “Shaheds” were launched in just one day. It was a deliberate, combined strike against our energy system – against power generation, hydroelectric dam, gas infrastructure. We managed to shoot down some of the missiles and most of the “Shaheds.” I thank each of our partners whose air defense systems were effective today. However, not all Russian missiles were shot down. Unfortunately. There were hits, and the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, power engineers, involved services and enterprises are facing many challenges. I am grateful to everyone who is working one hundred percent to increase the percentage of energy generation.

I would also like to personally thank the rescuers who have proved themselves effective and committed to eliminating the consequences of the Russian strikes today and in general at this time. Zaporizhzhia region – Oleksandr Antipov, Serhiy Sydorenko, Mykola Sereda – employees of state fire and rescue units. Thank you! Lviv region – Ihor Veretelnyk, Oleksandr Voitovych, Viktor Kapustiak. Thank you! Poltava region – Oleksandr Kit, Oleksandr Baiva, Yevhen Kibalnyk. Thank you! Vinnytsia region – Oleh Kostiuk, Dmytro Palamarchuk and Volodymyr Khudchenko. Ivano-Frankivsk region – Artur Vasiutiak, Oleh Shastkiv and Ruslan Kryklyvyi. I am grateful to you guys and all your colleagues – the entire staff of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, all the people whose job is to always give life hope, always help, under any circumstances.

Today, I continued negotiations with the leaders who can help us – Ukraine – and our entire Europe to bring a just peace and real, lasting security closer. We continue preparations for the first Global Peace Summit, which will be held in Switzerland and should become a truly effective peace-building platform. Today I personally invited the leaders of Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Hungary, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia and the Secretary General of the Council of Europe to the Summit. It is very important that we maintain dialogue with all leaders, and we actually share a common goal with all of them – to restore genuine tranquility to international relations and guarantee justice to every nation – guarantee that they will not be destroyed. Only in cooperation can the world ensure this. And I thank every leader, every state that has already confirmed their participation in the Peace Summit. We are working to make sure that everyone else understands us and joins in as well. Everyone who helps will feel the gratitude of history.

Of course, we also discussed our bilateral cooperation today. Denmark – we discussed the strengthening of our air defense and the implementation of defense agreements. The Netherlands – we discussed with Mark, Mr. Prime Minister, the search for additional Patriot systems. Hungary – a good conversation, long, with many details. Bilateral cooperation, the situation in the region. We agreed to work together further, based on the efforts of our teams. Germany – we discussed the restoration and protection of our energy sector, the preparation of a recovery conference in Berlin. Saudi Arabia – we discussed with the Crown Prince our bilateral cooperation and global affairs – ways to actually bring peace closer.

And one more thing.

Today, there was a separate report by the Minister of Defense of Ukraine and a report by the Commander-in-Chief. Our positions at the front, the physical protection of our people and communities, and the disruption of any attempts at Russian offensive are urgent priorities. I am grateful to each of our warriors whose courage and resilience make all this possible. To everyone in the Ukrainian Defense Forces – in our combat brigades, in all units involved, in the Air Defense Forces, in the Air Force, in the security forces. Everyone who is now on the frontline, who defends Ukraine on the ground, in the sky and at sea, gives our state the opportunity to gain a prospect for Ukrainians – for our independence, for our diplomacy, for our lives. Glory to all our warriors! Glory to our people!

Glory to Ukraine!

Today is Victory in (WW II in) Europe day.

 

On May 8, we mark the Day of Remembrance and Victory over Nazism in the Second World War.

Today, we honor the millions of Ukrainians who bravely fought and sacrificed their lives to defeat this evil.
Today, a new evil has emerged, threatening Europe’s peace and stability.

The new coalition of nations must now demonstrate its solidarity and resolve to make sure the new Nazism suffers defeat.

Tomorrow, 9 May, Russia will celebrate Victory Day as part of their fetishization of Russia’s and the Soviet Union’s accomplishments in WW II. I expect that the assault on Ukrainian civilians and civilian targets over the next 12 to 24 hours.

Yep, it’s always “Never Again” and all every year on May 8, poppies and speeches — up until the thing that should have never happened again actually happens — then it’s suddenly “Escalation Management”, “Don’t Provoke Putin”, “I Don’t Support Russia But…”, “They Have Nukes, You Know”, “Surrender For Peace Now”, “Pay For Your Own War”, “It’s All Your Fault”, “You Can’t Target Russian Territory” etc etc etc.

Go figure.

The cost:

Remember this picture of a woodland battlefield in east Ukraine that went viral last month?

The author, Denys Zeleny, a non-commissioned officer with Ukraine’s National Guards, has been killed in action….

In civilian life, he used to work as a manager at a confectionary chain called Honey.

 

This is a future we should make every effort to prevent:

Britain:

Taps the sign: It’s a world war!

Brussels:

From Euronews:

EU diplomats agreed Wednesday to use income from frozen Russian state assets to aid Ukraine – paving the way for the war-torn country to get around €3 bn for arms purchases and reconstruction before the summer.

Since the full-scale invasion of 2022, €210 billion in assets of the Moscow central bank have sat frozen within the bloc – chiefly at the Euroclear depositary in Belgium.

The deal was agreed “in principle” at a regular meeting of national representatives, according to a tweet by Belgium, currently chairing talks in the European Council.

Brussels has long touted using the interest from those funds, estimated at around €3bn per year, for Ukraine’s reconstruction costs – and later extended its plans to cover Kyiv’s military expenditure.

The plan – which also has backing from the group of seven leading industrialised democracies – comes as Ukraine hopes to turn the tide in an increasingly desperate military campaign, bolstered by €89bn recently agreed by the US Congress.

But Ukrainian ministers have said Brussels needs to go further than merely scooping up interest payments – and fully confiscate Moscow’s assets to ensure the aggressor pays for the cost of war.

Officials from EU countries and the European Central Bank have expressed concerns that seizing assets outright might set an unhelpful precedent or harm the euro’s reputation as a safe currency.

Talks were also held up by concerns over how many of the assets would be retained by Euroclear as an administration fee, a figure that was originally as high as 13%, as well as Belgium’s right to tax the profits gained by the Brussels-based securities depository.

Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo has already promised to send some €1.5bn directly to Ukraine, though that appears to be a result of applying existing corporate tax law to the unexpected windfall Euroclear gains by having frozen central bank assets on its books.

The final deal allows Euroclear to keep a provisional buffer worth 10% of the profits, in case of litigation over the funds. It can also keep 0.3% as an incentive, while 90% of the funds will be sent via the European Peace Facility to help Ukraine buy weapons.

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen previously suggested Ukraine could receive the first funds under the mechanism by July – but the calculation will be backdated to February, when Euroclear formally segregated the assets.

Ambassadors today also formally agreed on the reforms Ukraine will have to make to receive funds from a separate €50bn facility of EU grants and loans.

 

 

From Foreign Affairs:

On January 19, a Ukrainian drone struck an oil depot in the town of Klintsy, in Russia’s western Bryansk region, setting four gasoline tanks on fire and igniting some 1.6 million gallons of oil. Later that week, another strike lit a fire at Rosneft’s oil refinery in Tuapse, a Russian city some 600 miles from Ukrainian-held territory. In March, Ukrainian drones hit four Russian refineries in two days. April began with a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s third-largest refinery, located deep in the region of Tatarstan, around 800 miles away. The month ended with strikes on facilities in two more Russian cities, Smolensk and Ryazan.

In all, Ukraine has launched at least 20 strikes on Russian refineries since October. Ukrainian security officials have indicated that the attacks’ objectives are to cut off fuel supplies to the Russian military and slash the export revenues that the Kremlin uses to fund its war effort. By the end of March, Ukraine had destroyed around 14 percent of Russia’s oil-refining capacity and forced the Russian government to introduce a six-month ban on gasoline exports. One of the world’s largest oil producers is now importing petrol.

But the Biden administration has criticized the attacks. In February, Vice President Kamala Harris urged Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to refrain from targeting Russian oil refineries out of concern that the strikes would drive up global oil prices. Echoing that sentiment, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin warned the Senate Armed Services Committee in mid-April that the “attacks could have a knock-on effect in terms of the global energy situation.” Instead of striking oil infrastructure, Austin told the committee, “Ukraine is better served in going after tactical and operational targets that can directly influence the current fight.”

Washington’s criticism is misplaced: attacks on oil refineries will not have the effect on global energy markets that U.S. officials fear. These s​trikes reduce Russia’s ability to turn its oil into usable products; they do not affect the volume of oil it can extract or export. In fact, with less domestic refining capacity, Russia will be forced to export more of its crude oil, not less, pushing global prices down rather than up. Indeed, Russian firms have already started selling more unrefined oil overseas. As long as they remain restricted to Russian refineries, the attacks are unlikely to raise the price of oil for Western consumers.

Yet they can still inflict pain inside Russia, where the price of refined oil products, such as gasoline and diesel, has begun to surge. The strikes are achieving the very objectives that Ukraine’s Western partners set but largely failed to meet through sanctions and a price cap on Russian oil: to degrade Russia’s financial and logistical ability to wage war while limiting broader damage to the global economy. Kyiv must take wins where it can, and a campaign to destroy Russia’s oil-refining capacity brings benefits to Ukraine with limited risk.

Ukraine has so far concentrated its attacks on Russian oil refineries, not oil fields or crude oil export infrastructure. The distinction is important. After oil is extracted from a well, it is transported through pipelines and other infrastructure to refineries, where it is converted into products to be distributed to end users. In 2023, Russia extracted an estimated 10.1 million barrels of oil per day. Of this, around 50 percent was exported to refineries abroad, and the remaining 50 percent was refined domestically, creating products such as gasoline, diesel, aviation fuel, and chemical feedstocks. Half these refined products were consumed domestically, with a substantial proportion diverted to fuel the Russian war machine. Russia also sells refined oil products abroad—the country was responsible for around ten percent of the world’s seaborne exports in 2023—but most Western countries have already stopped importing refined Russian fuel. The top destinations for Russia’s refined oil products are Turkey, China, and Brazil, though Russia has also been selling fuel to North Korea, in violation of UN sanctions, in exchange for munitions.

The Ukrainian strikes have dealt a significant blow to Russia’s refining capacity, knocking out up to 900,000 barrels per day. Repairs will be slow and expensive, in part because refinery stacks—where oil is distilled into its constituent parts—are huge and complex pieces of equipment that take years to design and build, and in part because Western sanctions are hampering Russian firms’ access to specialized components.

Russia’s oil storage capacity is limited. When a refinery is destroyed or damaged, therefore, extracted crude oil cannot simply be stocked for later use. This leaves Russian producers with just two options: increasing exports of crude oil or shutting wells and reducing production.

Data from recent months confirm that, as expected, Russia is exporting more crude oil at the same time that its refined fuel exports have hit near-historic lows. Moscow exported just over 712,000 tons of diesel and other petroleum products in the last week of April, a drop from more than 844,000 tons in the same week in 2023. Monthly exports of crude oil, however, increased by nine percent from February to March, reaching their highest level in nine months and their third highest since Western sanctions on Russian crude oil took effect in December 2022. The strikes have had no discernible effect on international crude oil prices, which remained stable until the end of March, when Russia cut its output under a preexisting agreement with OPEC.

Western markets may not be hurting, but Russia is feeling the pinch. Since the Ukrainian strikes began, diesel production has fallen by 16 percent and gasoline production by nine percent. The average weekly wholesale price of gasoline and diesel in western Russia rose by 23 percent and 47 percent, respectively, between the end of 2023 and mid-March. In April, the cost of gasoline hit a six-month high, up more than 20 percent from the start of the year. Russia imported 3,000 tons of fuel from Belarus in the first half of March—up from zero in January—and the Kremlin has been forced to ask Kazakhstan to ready 100,000 tons of gasoline for supply in case of shortages.

Ukraine’s campaign is working. It is inflicting pain on Russian energy markets, and it is putting exactly the kind of pressure on Moscow that the U.S.-led sanctions regime was designed for but has had limited success in delivering.

In the early months of the war, the Biden administration assembled a coalition of countries to impose economic penalties on Russia, including a price cap on Russian crude oil exports. The idea behind the price cap was to set it high enough that Russia would keep oil flowing, helping avoid a global recession, but low enough to depress Russia’s export earnings. In practice, inconsistent enforcement and monitoring have undermined the price cap’s effectiveness: Russia’s federal revenues hit a record $320 billion in 2023. The price cap may also have been set too high. A recent assessment by the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air, a Finnish think tank, determined that a lower rate could have slashed Russia’s oil export revenues by 25 percent between December 2022 and March 2024 without pushing Russian companies to shut off the taps. The EU and G-7 shipping industry, meanwhile, is still deeply entwined with Russia’s exports. In March this year, 46 percent of Russian oil shipments were carried on ships owned or insured in G-7 and EU countries, and some Western tankers have continued to transport oil priced above the cap.

Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil refineries are now doing what the sanctions regime has not. Without compromising global energy supply or driving up prices, the attacks are eating into Russian revenues and curtailing Russia’s ability to turn crude oil into the kinds of fuel that tanks and planes need to run. As long as Ukrainian forces avoid hitting crude oil pipelines or major crude oil export terminals, they can maintain this balance.

The current strategy comes with limited risks. Ukrainian drones have generally been hitting their targets at night, causing few, if any, civilian casualties. As long as Ukraine continues to weigh potential harms to noncombatants every time it approves a strike, it should stay on the right side of international law. Targeting an industry that directly contributes to Russian military power is a reasonable wartime measure—one that past belligerents, such as the United States, have employed before, including in its recent operations against the Islamic State.

Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil refineries also seem unlikely to widen the conflict. At the very least, Russia will struggle to escalate in kind, given its long-running and far broader campaign to destroy Ukraine’s energy infrastructure: its forces destroyed Ukraine’s Kremenchuk oil refinery within weeks of the 2022 invasion, and the Ukrainian energy minister has said that Russian strikes earlier this year hit up to 80 percent of Ukraine’s conventional thermal power plants. Rather than threatening escalation in response to Ukraine’s strikes, the Kremlin has tended to play down their effects to avoid embarrassment.

To keep the risks low, the United States should neither help Ukraine proceed with these attacks nor even publicly encourage them. But nor should it try to dissuade Kyiv from this course of action. Despite the U.S. Congress’s recent approval of $61 billion in military aid, Ukraine is at its most fragile point in more than two years. Strikes on Russian refineries alone will not force Moscow to capitulate, but they do make the war more difficult and expensive for Russia—and so, if nothing else, when the time comes for negotiations, they may push the Kremlin to make concessions.

Zaporizhzhia Oblast:

Destroyed Russian BUK air defence system equipment, presumably 9A39 of BUK-M1. As said:

“Due to a mistake made by the crew, the vehicle started to catch fire. Which led to the explosion of the loaded missiles. The crew was not injured. The exact date is unknown. Near Pology, Zaporizhzhia region.”

https://t.me/dosye_shpiona/52

The Avdiivka front:

Krasnodar Krai, Russia:

Just a brief update on what is going on in Georgia. From the Thread Reader App:

Things have been developing quickly over the past 2-3 weeks in Georgia, but in the last couple of days, they have progressed at an unimaginable speed. The ruling Georgian Dream party has employed various tactics targeting civil society, escalating to an extreme level. 1/6 
Exclusive know-how: 100s, if not 1000s, of people—activists, NGO reprs, media, and their families—are receiving calls from foreign cell numbers, with insults and threats. This is very likely a coordinated and centralized effort to sow fear and intimidate civil society. 2/6 
An increasing number of physical attacks on representatives of NGOs, media, and teachers, either in the streets or at their homes, have been reported. They are being attacked by so-called Titushky. 3/6

The ruling Georgian Dream party is not even waiting for the passage of the Russian-style foreign agents law, it’s already operational. Today, they announced the creation of a database (a kind of enemy/blacklist) where they will place all individuals undesirable to them. 4/6 
Following this statement, at least two Telegram channels were launched today that began leaking personal information, including the addresses and phone numbers of representatives of NGOs, media, activists, etc. 5/6 
There’s already massive terrorising happening in Georgia and the Russian copy-pasta Agents Law is not even passed yet. 6/6

That’s enough for tonight.

Your daily Patron!

There are no new tweets from Patron today, so here is some adjacent material.

And a new video from Patron’s official TikTok:

@patron__dsns

Бажаю кожному знайти людину, поряд з якою вам буде всеодно на будь-який прогноз погоди❤️

♬ оригинальный звук – музикальний бункер

Here’s the machine translation of the caption:

I wish everyone to find a person with whom you don’t care about any weather forecast ❤️

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

18Comments

  1. 1.

    Westyny

    Thanks, as always, Adam, and warm thoughts for Rosie.   I have a dear friend in Georgia.  I hope she is ok.

  3. 3.

    Ksmiami

    I think it’s time to destroy Russia. The country shouldn’t exist. not sorry, not mincing words

  4. 4.

    Bill Arnold

    For those who despise Russian ransomware developers/crime organizations/affiliates, who sometimes are given targets by the Russian government, another operator identified and charged. More details at the link.
    U.S. Charges Russian National with Developing and Operating LockBit Ransomware (justice.gov, May 7, 2024)

    Alleged LockBit Developer Created and Operated Most Prolific Ransomware Variant Under Aliases “LockBit” and “LockBitSupp”; U.S State Department Offers Reward Up to $10M; U.S. Department of Treasury Designates LockBit Administrator for Sanctions
    …
    Dimitry Yuryevich Khoroshev (Дмитрий Юрьевич Хорошев), also known as LockBitSupp, LockBit, and putinkrab, 31, of Voronezh, Russia, is charged by a 26-count indictment returned by a grand jury in the District of New Jersey.
    “Today’s indictment of LockBit developer and operator Dimitry Yuryevich Khoroshev continues the FBI’s ongoing disruption of the LockBit criminal ecosystem,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray. “The LockBit ransomware group represented one of the most prolific ransomware variants across the globe, causing billions of dollars in losses and wreaking havoc on critical infrastructure, including schools and hospitals. The charges announced today reflect the FBI’s unyielding commitment to disrupting ransomware organizations and holding the perpetrators accountable.”

  6. 6.

    Devore

    Thanks Adam.  Glad to hear your pup keeps doing better

     

    and we even got a few happy doggy videos.   Interesting about the refineries.  I assume with the new longer range weapons.  Plenty of other new targets now

  8. 8.

    Dan B

    I’m dreading tomorrow’s news, which are fast approaching on the other side of the world.  I’m sure many in Donetsk are feeling the same.  Will it wake up the DOD and the Biden Administration?  The GQP Kremlin west branch may dance a jig.

  9. 9.

    Jay

    @Devore:

    Interesting about the refineries. I assume with the new longer range weapons.

    Ukraine has developed their own long range drones, which they are using to strike the refineries.

    The US supplied HIMARS and ATACMS are still “geofenced” by the US and are not “allowed” to be used to strike ruZZian targets in ruZZia.

    SCALPS and StormShadows have recently had their geofencing removed “on paper”, but French technical teams in Ukraine still do the targeting, so there have been no strikes yet.
    They are also cluster weapons designed to kill troops, light armor, parked aircraft and unhardened buildings.

    Scholz is still withholding TARUS missiles out of “escalation” fears. The TARUS missiles use the same programming, have longer range and are ‘bunker busters”.

  11. 11.

    Bill Arnold

    @Gin & Tonic:
    “a reward of up to $10 million for information that leads to the apprehension of Khoroshev” means that travel outside Russia will involve the risk of capture and potential extradition. He will laugh, yes, but they often do.
    Sometimes they are slack in their personal security, and get caught, or experience a transition in their existence status (not a binary).
    There are also

    In June 2023, a criminal complaint was filed in the District of New Jersey charging Ruslan Magomedovich Astamirov, a Russian national, in connection with his participation in the LockBit group. Astamirov is currently in custody awaiting trial.

    and

    Finally, in November 2022, a criminal complaint was filed in the District of New Jersey charging Mikhail Vasiliev in connection with his participation in the LockBit ransomware group. Vasiliev, a dual Russian-Canadian national, is currently in custody in Canada awaiting extradition to the United States.

    (That one was also recently (march 2024) sentenced to 4 years in Canadian prison.)
    and a $10M bounty/reward for another one:

    Matveev is currently the subject of a reward of up to $10 million through the U.S. Department of State’s Transnational Organized Crime (TOC) Rewards Program, with information accepted through the FBI tip website at tips.fbi.gov/.

  12. 12.

    wjca

    @Ksmiami: I think it’s time to destroy Russia. The country shouldn’t exist. not sorry, not mincing words.

    Just out of idle curiosity, what is your vision for the day after?

    There’s a whole lot of land (to put it mildly).  People live there.  I assume you aren’t envisioning some libertarian fantasy, so what government(s) would be there?  And how would that be different? (Just changing the label, from “Russia” to something else obviously isn’t your point.) So, what comes next?

  13. 13.

    Carlo Graziani

    Adam, that Foreign Affairs article is a real eye-opener. Thank you for bringing its content here. It makes very clear the reason for the deliberate and mindful Ukrainian selection of refineries as targets for long-and mid-rage strikes.

  15. 15.

    Carlo Graziani

    @Jay: To be perfectly honest, I feel that this judgnent confers too much dignity, and too little compassion, upon his contributions. He is our unreasoning primal scream.

  16. 16.

    Ksmiami

    @wjca: a broken up Russia into multiple nation-states each headed by an elected leader, administered by a new independent institution w funds from the old Russian state. And each with their own military to ward off any attempt to reunify. This is what should happen.

  17. 17.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Carlo Graziani: Not familiar w/ the other two authors, but Lauri Myllyvirta at the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) is fantastic. I have plugged him before as one to follow (along w/ David Fishman) to understand the latest developments in the PRC’s power & energy sectors (clean & otherwise), w/ all of the nuances & complexities, & far deeper than the typical drivel from the MSM & most think tanks that play to dominant & lazy narratives.

    So, not surprised at the quality of the article, & indeed it is rather elementary compared to the level of Myllyvirta’s expertise. Based on his Twitter posts, he has been a committed supporter of the Ukrainian cause.

    I had been rather confused by the Biden Administration’s talkings points on the strikes against refineries, for exactly the reasons stated in the article. It is mostly unrefined crude oil that is shipped across the globe & where prices are global. Refined gasoline/diesel is far less shipped (safety concerns over long distances, for one, mostly by rail or truck). If Ukraine starts to strike refineries that produce chemical feedstock, however, that could raise the global prices of many petrochemical products, & that would be nearly as damaging as if Ukraine started striking pipelines.

    Incidentally, the PRC only has a few refineries designed to take the high sulfur crude produced by Russia. That is why there is a cap as to how much crude oil (as opposed to natural gas) the PRC can purchase. That is also why India has consistently been among the top importers of Russian crude, because its refineries have been designed to take Russian oil since the Cold War days.

  18. 18.

    wjca

    @Ksmiami: a broken up Russia into multiple nation-states each headed by an elected leader, administered by a new independent institution w funds from the old Russian state. And each with their own military to ward off any attempt to reunify. This is what should happen.

    In other words, essentially what happened to the Soviet Union.  Not obvious, at least to me, why this time would work any better.

Comments are closed.