Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

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

People are complicated. Love is not.

This fight is for everything.

Let me file that under fuck it.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

Republicans can’t even be trusted with their own money.

Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

I was promised a recession.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Dear Washington Post, you are the darkness now.

Michigan is a great lesson for Dems everywhere: when you have power…use it!

I wonder if trump will be tried as an adult.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

We won’t go back.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / War for Ukraine Day 905: As the Clock Strikes Twelve the Bombardments Resume

War for Ukraine Day 905: As the Clock Strikes Twelve the Bombardments Resume

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Two quick housekeeping notes: First, Rosie is still doing amazing. Her next treatment is Monday. Sometime this week I’m going to be putting in a lower/shorter bed frame to make it easier for her to get on and off the bed. A year ago, as some of you may recall, I bought a new mattress, which I love. But it’s about three or four inches higher than the old one. So this will take the height back down to what it was a year ago.

Second, I’m still fried, though I did get a lovely four hour nap this afternoon. Minus the fifteen minutes where both legs cramped. That said, I’m going to keep this on the briefer side tonight as I want to go and crash.

As we’ve noted a couple of times, as soon as the clock strikes twelve in Ukraine each night, the bombardments commence.

Most nights these assaults use Iranian Shahed drones. But every few nights the Russians switch over to their cruise missiles and glide bombs. This is a strategy of terror. Specifically, to stress the Ukrainians out. To interrupt and disrupt sleep patterns. To create adrenaline overload. All in order to destroy their social resilience.

Absolutely THE WORST national security team that could be assembled by a Democratic president.

No, no they have not. It does not enter into their mental calculus at all. To quote former Shin Bet Director Avraham Shalom, “raq taktik, ayn strategik.” In English: “only tactics, no strategy.”

For want of a nail!!!!

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

We Must Inflict Maximum Damage on All Russian Positions, and We Are Doing That – Address by the President

16 August 2024 – 20:18

I wish you good health, fellow Ukrainians!

The main points. There have already been several reports by Commander-in-Chief Syrskyi about the frontline situation and our operation in the Kursk region. We see that the occupier is suffering losses, and this is helpful, very helpful for our defense. It is about destroying the logistics of the Russian army and draining their reserves. We must inflict maximum damage on all Russian positions, and we are doing that. I thank each of our warriors for their precision, I thank them for strength and for resilience. Commander-in-Chief Syrskyi reported on our defensive steps in the Donbas: Pokrovsk and Toretsk directions. As well as our advance in the Kursk region. We are eliminating the Russian military presence in the area of our operations there, and replenishing “the exchange fund” for our state.

Second. The new Ambassadors of the partner countries – Belgium, India, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Italy, and Mexico – have arrived to work in Ukraine. I have received their letters of credence and am grateful for the clear support of our territorial integrity and international law. Also today, I held several meetings regarding our further diplomatic efforts aimed at bringing peace for Ukraine closer, a just peace, and at protecting our people. We are preparing some news.

And one more thing for today, which is extremely important. I spoke with members of the Council of Churches and Religious Organizations. And I am grateful for their support of our course towards spiritual independence of Ukraine. A draft law has been submitted to the Verkhovna Rada; it can actually guarantee that there will be no manipulation of the Ukrainian Church by Moscow. This draft law should work and contribute to the unity of Ukraine, our true spiritual unity.

I thank everyone who is strengthening the independence of Ukraine!

Glory to Ukraine!

Say cheese!

Queen Hornet’s got a gun!

The Ukrainian military modified a Queen Hornet FPV into a machine-gun drone

A few days ago, one of our units won a ruzzian AK-74 assault rifle with the help of a Queen Hornet drone and a magnet

The military found a use for it – they installed it on the Queen and shot with it. The modification is being prepared for full operation and we will help them

Stay tuned for more🔥

Help the Ukrainian Armed Forces

Donate to the Wild Hornets on PayPal: [email protected]

Lithuania:

A 1 year ago, Ukraine took one of the most unprecedented steps – it announced the independent opening of a sea corridor through the Black Sea. On August 16, 2023, the first ship left the port of Odesa. Since then, more than 2,300 vessels with various cargoes have used the corridor. The total volume of transshipment is almost 65.5 million tons.

This was made possible by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, a team of port workers, businesses and international partners who supported our efforts

Look at that! Another red line crossed without any actual Russian response. It is almost like Putin expects his rhetoric and saber rattling will force the US to make the worst possible strategic decisions in response. I cannot imagine where he got the idea that that would work? It’s a puzzlement.

Kursk Oblast, Russia:

Ukrainian Special Forces are on the hunt!

We have confirmation of the Ukrainian kill of a Ka-52 rotary wing in Kursk Oblast:

The Ukrainians are making progress on one of their strategic objectives in the Kursk offensive:

From The Financial Times:

Ukraine says it has begun talks with Russia over the exchange of prisoners captured by Kyiv as it presses on with its startling counter-incursion in the Kursk region.

The negotiations follow more than a week of heavy fighting in the western Russian region and what Ukraine’s domestic security service said was the “biggest capture of the enemy that has been carried out at one time”.

Dmytro Lubinets, the Ukrainian parliament’s human rights commissioner, told local media on Wednesday evening that his Russian counterpart had contacted him to open discussions on the exchange of prisoners of war.

Ukraine’s military intelligence, which leads negotiations on prisoners of war, confirmed to the Financial Times that it was working on an exchange.

Kyiv has not disclosed the exact number of Russian prisoners its forces have captured in the Kursk operation but government officials and soldiers at the border told the FT that the figure is in the “hundreds”.

The talks come 10 days after Ukraine mounted its audacious counter-incursion into Russian territory. Kyiv’s top general, Oleksandr Syrsky, said on Thursday that Ukraine held 1,150 sq km in the Kursk region, up from 1,000 sq km.

Syrsky said his forces had complete control of the town of Sudzha, where a Ukrainian military office is being set up. The town, with a prewar population of 5,000, also houses a measuring station for natural gas on one of the last pipelines shipping Russian fuel to central Europe.

Ukrainian troops were advancing by between 500 metres and 1.5km each day in different directions, about half the distance reported on Tuesday, Syrsky added.

The FT could not independently verify his claims, but both figures indicate that Ukraine’s offensive in Kursk is slowing. Its troops were continuing their attempts to occupy more territory, said Syrsky.

Russia’s defence ministry said on Wednesday that its own forces had pushed back Ukrainians in seven Kursk settlements between 30km and 90km from the border.

The capture of Russian prisoners is likely to boost Kyiv’s calls for the return of thousands of its own soldiers and civilians who have been taken during Russia’s two-and-a-half-year invasion and occupation of large swaths of eastern and southern Ukraine.

Many young conscripts were captured by Ukrainian forces in the early phase of Kyiv’s stealthy incursion — the first such operation on Russian soil since the second world war.

While Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has not disclosed the objectives of the operation, he has repeatedly praised his soldiers for taking Russian captives on the battlefield and “replenishing” what he called an “exchange fund” for a swap of captives.

Before the incursion, each side already held hundreds of prisoners of war. President Vladimir Putin said in June that Russia held about 6,500 Ukrainian troops. He also said that Ukraine was holding more than 1,300 Russian soldiers, a figure confirmed by a person familiar with the situation.

Much more at the link!

Whether this is an intended strategic objective or just a positive second order/ripple effect remains to be seen, but it is an interesting development.

It seems that some of the beneficiaries of the operation in Russia’s Kursk region are the Baltic States, Sweden and Finland.

Russia is moving troops from Kaliningrad to the front. This city serves as a stronghold for the recently restored Leningrad Military District. The main task is to ensure Russia’s dominance in the Baltic States and Scandinavia. But now the situation has changed.

Part of the potential of the Leningrad Military District was reduced during the actions north of Kharkiv. Now, apparently, the second stage has begun.

By the way, this clearly demonstrates how much Russia is “afraid” of NATO. It also shows once again that Ukraine is the real shield of Europe in the east.

In fact, Ukraine has already become part of the European collective defense system.

Remember, that Polish President Duda has been spoiling for a fight with Russia since the re-invasion of Ukraine began. I don’t really think that Poland is going to try to scarf up Kaliningrad, but military deception (MILDEC) operations to raise Putin’s blood pressure are not out of the question.

One of the key questions about Ukraine’s Kursk offensive is determining what Ukrainian advances or occupation of Russian territory actually means. Its significance will largely be determined by how Russia responds. If Russia diverts significant reserves from Ukraine and starts a costly operation to retake the land, like with Krynky, or is willing to negotiate, then this could be significant. But what if Putin determines that he doesn’t need to do this and that the risk of serious domestic political ramifications is limited? It is possible that this will turn out to be another embarrassing episode for Putin that will have little tangible effect.

From Eugene Rumer at the Carnegie Endowment:

“Just when I thought I was out, they pulled me back in,” President Vladimir Putin, echoing Michael Corleone’s famous line from The Godfather Part III, probably thought in recent days. Until a week ago, the war in Ukraine was going well for the Russian leader: his troops were making small but steady territorial gains, the West was growing tired of the war, and Kyiv’s uncompromising refusal to negotiate an end to the conflict was softening. And then, on August 6, the Ukrainian army launched its offensive into the Kursk region of Russia.

It is hard to imagine a more humiliating setback for Putin and his generals than the Ukrainian army seizing some 800 square kilometers of Russian territory in that particular region. To most Russians, the very mention of Kursk invokes the memory of the battle of July–August of 1943. In Soviet and Russian historiography, the Soviet army’s victory in that epic clash paved the way for, in Putin’s own words, “the imminent and inevitable collapse” of Nazi Germany. With countless articles devoted to it in Russian military publications and generations of Soviet and Russian military officers schooled in its lessons, the Battle of Kursk has long been held up by Soviet and Russian military science as the pinnacle of the art of war. On August 23, 2023, Putin personally traveled to the old battlefield to commemorate the eightieth anniversary of that victory, to unveil the Battle of Kursk memorial, and to present awards to soldiers who distinguished themselves in the “special military operation” against Ukraine.

What a difference a year makes! Photographs released by the Kremlin from Putin’s August 12 meeting with his security chiefs to discuss the Ukrainian offensive show little jubilation on their part. The Second Battle of Kursk—if that is what the Ukrainian offensive into Russia will be called—is testimony to both Ukrainian bravery, daring, and resolve and the historic blunder Putin committed by launching a full-scale assault on Ukraine two and a half years ago.

No other part of Russia evokes more iconic images of the heartland than Kursk and nearby regions of Orel and Tula. Spasskoye-Lutovinovo, the estate of Ivan Turgenev, one of the classics of Russian literature, is just to the north in the Oryol region, and Yasnaya Polyana, Leo Tolstoy’s estate, is farther to the north, on the road to Moscow. Both are now museums and cultural shrines supported by the Russian state. Both fell under German occupation during World War II—the legacy Putin invoked in 2022 as the justification for the assault on Ukraine. Russia, he said on February 24, 2022, as his troops marched into Ukraine, “cannot feel safe, develop, and exist while facing a permanent threat from the territory of today’s Ukraine,” which he charged was ruled by a Nazi regime.

In the category of self-fulfilling prophecies, by invading Ukraine, Putin has created a “permanent threat” to the Russian heartland where none had existed before his criminal blunder. Ukraine had posed no military threat to Russia prior to February 2022. Even after Russia had illegally annexed Crimea in 2014, Ukrainian public opinion was divided on the question of joining NATO. As late as November 2021—with Russia massing troops on the border with Ukraine—membership in the alliance was favored by 54 percent of Ukrainians, while 28 percent opposed it, and the rest didn’t know what to say. A still significant minority of Ukrainians—21 percent—also favored joining the Russian-led customs union. Only 3 percent of Ukrainians considered the annexation of Crimea by Russia an important issue. Twenty percent—a significant minority but far below such issues as corruption and cost of living—considered the Russian-sponsored conflict in Donbas a priority. In February 2024, two years since the start of the all-out Russian invasion, 77 percent favored joining NATO, only 5 percent opposed it, and 46 percent saw Russia as the biggest threat to Ukraine (second only to government corruption at 51 percent).

No matter how it ends, the Second Battle of Kursk is a preview of what the Russian national security establishment will have to worry about for the indefinite future. On its southwestern flank, Russia will face a country moved by its sense of grief, trauma, historic injustice, and desire for revenge. Ukraine will have a battle-tested, motivated military, equipped with the latest armaments from its own surging defense industry and its NATO partners. Even if the war ends with Russia holding on to the territories it has occupied, the victory will be truly Pyrrhic. For a country like Russia that has long equated its security with land acquisition and strategic depth, the emergence of Ukraine—thanks to Putin’s blunder—as an implacable adversary within easy striking distance of the Russian heartland is a permanent security threat that will long outlast Putin.

However, Putin’s hold on power is unlikely to be weakened as a result of this humiliation. The entire Russian political and military establishment is complicit in his war and responsible for this disaster. They are all Putin’s creatures who depend on him for their political and probably physical survival: Sergei Shoigu, Putin’s fishing and hiking buddy who served as defense minister for over a decade and only recently was moved to the largely ceremonial chairmanship of the Security Council, while the Defense Ministry is being rocked by seemingly endless revelations of corruption and arrests of senior officers; Alexander Bortnikov, the long-serving head of the FSB—the Federal Security Service—that had fed Putin rosy predictions about a short, victorious war; and General Staff chief General Valery Gerasimov, whose name has become synonymous with military incompetence. After Yevgeny Prigozhin’s coup attempt a year ago, when “Putin’s chef” accused them of incompetence and threatened their survival, they are holding on to Putin’s coattails even tighter.

The Russian public, brainwashed by the propaganda it is fed constantly on TV, remains broadly supportive of the war. In a July poll conducted by Levada, one of the few remaining independent Russian public opinion research organizations, 75 percent of respondents approved of the war. And based on Russian media reporting, some of which has been surprisingly informative, the Ukrainian incursion into the Kursk region is reinforcing the Russian public’s supportive attitudes. Apparently indifferent or possibly ill-informed about the destruction of Ukrainian towns and villages by Russian troops, Russian residents of the Kursk region affected by the fighting have been shocked by the sight of damaged buildings and burning vehicles, the confusion that prevails among Russian first responders, and the evacuation order affecting some 120,000 people.

In their eyes, the Ukrainian attack is proof that the war is justified. To the extent they criticize it, much like Prigozhin, they aim their anger at Putin’s generals rather than Putin. “There is only crazy corruption [in the Ministry of Defense],” said one evacuee to a reporter from the Russian daily Kommersant. “They are all being sent to prison, while simple folk look and wonder, ‘You want to win the war with such people?’ . . . In 2022, we all felt sincerely patriotic. Everything for the front, everything for victory. . . . But then we saw that everything is going not as it was planned. And we began to think—who made those plans? . . . Maybe it made no sense to march on Kyiv? Maybe we should have liberated Donbas first? Why did [derogatory term for Ukrainians] prepare for ten years [for the war], while we negotiated with the West for ten years? They—[the West]—have shown their face at the [Paris] Olympics—all Satan-worshippers and pederasts.”

More at the link.

Here we have an ignoramus quoting someone who was allowed to fail upwards through academia into becoming important.

Beyond omitting the obvious fact that Ukraine has overrun and captured thousands of soldiers, commentators like Mearsheimer ignore that this counteroffensive, more than anything else, demonstrates that Russia’s reserves are as exhausted as Ukraine’s.

Neither side can quickly mobilize new forces or rapidly increase its warfighting capacity. This is why Russia appears unable to respond to the incursion and must withdraw forces from other fronts to defend its own territory.

I repeat: This war is far from decided for either side. However, if the West remains steadfast and provides Ukraine with what it needs to stem Russian strategic mobilization through 2025-27, I am more convinced than ever that Ukraine can win this war.

Hoffman is right, Mearsheimer and Apartheid Clyde Junior are wrong. Not that this is breaking news.

The Russian have committed another war crime at the Kolotilovka border crossing:

I’ve seen the video, it is not particularly gruesome, but you do not need to see it. Do not go looking for it.

Compare and contrast with how the Ukrainian military is treating the Russians in Kursk:

“[Ukrainian] soldiers told us, ‘We don’t touch you. Live a peaceful life, everything’s fine.’ ”

This is how the houses of the residents of Sudzha, Kursk region of Russia, look like after the Ukrainian troops entered the city. Nothing has changed – they are still standing perfectly intact. There is an abundance of products in one of the local stores, and humanitarian aid is being brought from Ukraine to those in need.

Dnipro airport, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast:

Toretsk and Pokrovsk:

Kherson Oblast:

These people need to be sanctioned into penury, have their citizenship stripped, and dropped off the coast of Siberia in a dinghy with a  half day’s worth of supplies.

The Financial Times has the details: (emphasis mine)

The world’s biggest oilfield services company is expanding in Russia following the exit of its main western rivals since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

SLB, the Houston-based company formerly known as Schlumberger, has signed new contracts and recruited hundreds of staff in the country even after its two largest US rivals Baker Hughes and Halliburton both sold their Russian businesses to local managers in 2022.

Peter Voser, chair of Swiss-based ABB, which also left in 2022, said: “We accept that some others will maybe not follow that and hence, they may have a competitive advantage. But I think that’s a short-term viewpoint and that will bite them at some stage.”

Documents obtained by non-profit group Global Witness and seen by the Financial Times show that in December SLB’s Russian business signed a contract with the Russian oil and gas institute Vnigni, which commits the company to help it build models of oil and gas deposits that can be used to develop projects.

The FT has identified more than 1,000 job advertisements posted by the company since December, seeking roles that range from drivers to chemists and geologists. Benefits on offer range from lunch at work and access to sports facilities to participation in discounted share schemes.

Searches of Russian trademark and corporate databases by the FT show SLB Russian subsidiaries registered two new trademarks in July.

SLB has been upfront that it has no plans to leave Russia. But in July 2023 the company said it was “halting shipments of products and technology into Russia from all SLB facilities worldwide in response to the continued expansion of international sanctions”.

Russian customs filings show that after this ban was imposed, such imports slowed to a stop by the start of September.

But filings show the company also continued to import materials from other sources, bringing in $17.5mn of equipment between August and December 2023, the most recent date of available records. Of this, $2.2mn was declared as having been originally manufactured by SLB or its subsidiaries.

SLB declined to comment. A person close to the company said the imports were not “from an SLB facility” and are therefore “consistent with SLB’s public statements and within international sanctions guidelines”.

Oilfield services providers carry out much of the grunt work for the global oil and gas industry — everything from building roads and laying pipes to drilling wells and pumping crude. But they also provide access to sophisticated technologies that are vital to support exploration and development of complex drilling operations.

Some of the goods SLB imported into Russia are of types that other governments have expressed concerns about: $3.3mn of the equipment shipped since July is in categories that could be subject to controls if exported from the EU to the country. The most expensive items in this category are described in filings as electrical cabling and chemicals.

The goods, however, come from countries applying no such controls. Most of the flow of SLB imports — $13mn worth — came from China, while a further $3mn came from India. The most expensive single part was a $1.3mn “heavy-duty non-magnetic drill pipe”, which was shipped from China.

But western policymakers have avoided imposing comprehensive sanctions on oilfield services in Russia over concerns it would choke off fossil fuel exports and cause a spike in global oil prices.

In May, a US Department of State official said SLB had “thus far” not breached sanctions and the company had a clear understanding of “where the guardrails” were.

A Treasury spokesperson told the FT: “The United States and an international coalition opposing Russia remain committed to reducing [Vladimir] Putin’s profits. At the same time, simply aiming to stop the flow of Russian oil would have serious consequences for the global economy.”

“Western energy firms are still free to help Russia produce oil, and to help fund the war,” said Lela Stanley, a senior investigator for Global Witness, which is set to issue a report on SLB on Friday. “That’s a profound failure.”

For want of a nail!!!!

Speaking of people who need to be sanctioned, and I’m not referring to financial penalties, the DOJ finally moves against known Russian asset Dimitri Simes.

The US has finally started taking action against Russian agents inside the country. The FBI is searching the American home of propagandist and KGB (FSB) agent Dimitri Simes, who purchased it for $1.63 million earned from airings on Kremlin media.

Although Solovyov and other Russian propagandists present him as an American political scientist, he is actually Russian. Dmitry was born in Moscow to a family of Soviet dissidents with the surname Simis, but after moving to the U.S. he changed it to the more American surname Simes.

In the Russian media, this “political scientist” talks about the weakness of Ukraine, which for the third year already “is about to be captured”, about the danger of escalation and scares NATO with a nuclear strike. To better understand how qualitatively he works for the Kremlin, I will conclude the post with an example of his address to NATO countries:

“But here we must also realize that Russia’s patience is not infinite, and that Russia’s ability not to respond to growing Western military pressure is not infinite. And where they refuse to engage in diplomacy, and it is Washington, London and Brussels that refuse, they must realize that Russia will have to persuade them by other means. In the Soviet Union’s Armed Forces, there was once a saying about recruits: ‘If you don’t know how to do it, we’ll teach you, if you don’t want to do it, we’ll make you do it.’ I think it is useful for Washington and other NATO capitals to familiarize themselves with this saying.”

#RussialsATerroristState #RussiaIsCollapsing #UkraineRussiaWar

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has the details. (emphasis mine)

Agents of the FBI have raided and searched the Virginia home of Dmitri Simes, a prominent political commentator and author who hosts a current-affairs program on Russia’s state-run Channel One television, the newspaper Rappahannock News reported on August 16.

The FBI told the paper the search began on August 13 but declined to comment further, RFE/RL’s Russian Service reported.

Simes told the paper he is currently out of the country, but was “puzzled and concerned” by the FBI’s action. He told the Russian state news agency TASS on August 16 that the reports that FBI agents were at his home were true, although he had not been officially notified.

Simes was born in Moscow in 1947 and emigrated to the United States in 1973. He served as an informal adviser to former U.S. President Richard Nixon and regularly traveled with Nixon to the Soviet Union and other Eastern bloc countries.

In 1994, Nixon named him to head the Center for the National Interest, which at the time was called the Nixon Center for Peace and Freedom. Simes retired from the position in 2022.

Simes also advised the 2016 presidential campaign of Donald Trump and arranged an important 2016 foreign-policy speech in which Trump outlined a vision for greater cooperation with Russia.

Simes’s name was mentioned more than 100 times in a 2019 report by U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller entitled Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election.

Simes moderated a question-and-answer session with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum in 2023.

Earlier this month, Fox News reported that FBI agents had raided the New York home of Scott Ritter, a former UN weapons inspector in Iraq who has been a frequent contributor to Russian government media including RT and Sputnik. An FBI spokesperson told Fox the search was part of an “ongoing” investigation.

Here’s my take on that one and only Trump foreign policy speech in 2016, which was also when I began to delineate the Trump doctrine.

Commenter JCJ sent me this:

And while it is funny, we also need to put it in a proper context of 2024.

Fellas, IMHO, enough with all that “German generals discuss the Kursk offensive in 2024” jokes.

Today’s Germany, a totally different country with totally different mindsets and values that is a galaxy away from what it used to be 80 years ago, does not deserve these insults.

Quite the opposite, in today’s war of aggression in Europe, Germany is totally on the good side as Ukraine’s 2nd largest defense aid provider. In a sense, Germany thus completed its own circle of redemption by making this choice.

We often criticize the German leadership’s resolve, but facts are facts.

Those are not “Germna tanks breaking into Kurks again”; those are Ukrainian vehicles provided by Germany and many other nations to be used in a surprise offensive operation in Russian territory – totally at Ukraine’s discretion and responsibility for the sake of survival of a 40-million European democracy being devoured by totalitarian Russia.

If someone deserves to be compared to Nazis here, it’s that ghoul Putin drunk with blood and his generals erasing entire cities into dust, as well as his armies of Nazi-led convicts and mercenaries with their human wave attacks, mass graves, acts of decapitation, dismemberment, and endless lust for more blood.

That’s enough for tonight.

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Open thread!

Reader Interactions

32Comments

  1. 1.

    Gin & Tonic

    Kyiv’s uncompromising refusal to negotiate an end to the conflict

    Yeah, fuck him and the horse he rode in on. What about russia’s uncompromising refusal to withdraw its troops from another nation’s sovereign territory?

  2. 2.

    Gin & Tonic

    Weird thing with Simes is he made his bones in the DC foreign-policy circuit as a hawk in the days of “captive nations” and The Committee on the Present Danger. His parents were bona-fide anti-Soviet dissidents. But I guess everyone has his price, and a $1.6 mil 130-acre spread in Rapahannock County is Dima’s price.

  4. 4.

    KatKapCC

    I have always supported Biden but I just can not understand the admin’s willingness to let Ukrainians keep dying and their land be destroyed. We are supposedly the most powerful country and yet we act like scared puppies with our tail between our legs when it comes to Putin. I don’t get it.

  6. 6.

    Adam L Silverman

    @japa21: You’re welcome. And I’ve been very pleased with it. Thank you again for your assistance in picking the right one.

  9. 9.

    Adam L Silverman

    @KatKapCC: An insular natsec team, many of whom like Sullivan and Kahl had been with the President for years/decades and are too close to their boss, combined with a boss – the President – who has himself become very risk averse as he’s aged except in the case of something like Israel, where he is too risk accepting. As are his key senior people.

  13. 13.

    wjca

    @Parfigliano: The best russian is a dead russian soldier.

    Obviously not.  The best Russian soldier is one being exchanged for a Ukranian.  Which kinda requires being alive.

  14. 14.

    Jay

    PS01 △
    @PStyle0ne1
    6h
    WAR CRIME🚨

    This is a radio intercept about the beheadings shown in the ISIS like video of the Russian 155th brigade

    In the radio intercept, the commander give the order to behead 4 people and put their heads on sticks like in the gruesome video.

    One of the victim is presumably a captain in the Ukrainian army.

    The filming occured likely near Kolotilovka

    RT = Highly appreciated, let the world know about Russia terrorism
    @SecBlinken

    https://nitter.poast.org/PStyle0ne1/status/1824551478997959121#m

  15. 15.

    sab

    @Parfigliano: These guys are all conscripts. Not reflective of or supportive of Russians. Just poor kids who enlisted because that was the only option in the ‘Stans they lived in.

  17. 17.

    Mallard Filmore

    @KatKapCC: 

    I have always supported Biden but I just can not understand the admin’s willingness to let Ukrainians keep dying and their land be destroyed.

    Any change from this policy is unlikely to happen before the election. A big escalation will have an unknown impact on voters irrespective of that Russia does in response.

  18. 18.

    Jay

    @sab:

    No, they are not.

    The guys torturing, smashing heads in with sledge hammers, cutting heads off raping and murdering are not “innocent” conscripts.

    Bucha and a 100,000 other atrocities.

  22. 22.

    Carlo Graziani

    I like Rumer’s analysis, on balance. This, however, strikes me as a non-sequitur:

    However, Putin’s hold on power is unlikely to be weakened as a result of this humiliation. The entire Russian political and military establishment is complicit in his war and responsible for this disaster.

    The fact that MoD, FSB and the Siloviki are equally complicit does not in any way entail that blame will be apportioned equally, or that it cannot be weaponized, along with grievance, by all parties in an internal struggle. And from the Ukrainian point-of-view, the fact that Putin’s successor would certainly be no less supportive of the war than Putin in no sense provides a reason not to attempt to destabilize the political order in Moscow, because no successor of Putin’s could be any more hostile to Ukraine and the West. And “why don’t you and he fight” is a great reason to destabilize that order.

  23. 23.

    Mallard Filmore

    Apparently the FSB has built a list of pro Ukrainian military bloggers, some of which are in the USA.  If the FSB starts going through with the idea of killing USA bloggers, when does that cross the line to become an attack on the USA?  Or more generally for European bloggers, NATO?

  24. 24.

    Anonymous At Work

    Attaching an assault rifle to a drone and firing it seems like it belongs on Skippy’s list.

    Aside from being the new Night Witch, any practical applications?

  25. 25.

    Jay

    @Mallard Filmore:

    when does that cross the line to become an attack on the USA? Or more generally for European bloggers, NATO?

    Never, responding to such an attack would be an escalation and result in the 129th empty threat by ruZZia to go nuclear since 1991.

  28. 28.

    Mallard Filmore

    @Adam L Silverman: Nothing direct.  Three YouTube bloggers have mentioned it.  They did not seem to think it was an active operation.

    • Jake Broe
    • Combat Veteran Reacts
    • The Enforcer (these guys were proud they got on the list ahead of CNN and their reporters in Sudzha)

    I will have to sift through a few hours of their videos and post links tomorrow.

  30. 30.

    Sally

    @Carlo Graziani: An historian/journalist has suggested that whenever Ru has been destabilised in the past, it withdraws. A destabilised Ru would have less interest and focus on conducting an external war. He argues that destabilising Putin could therefore be a positive thing. Not advocating assassination, but making him look weak might encourage a coup, or at least, make him fear one (even more).

  31. 31.

    Chris

    @Carlo Graziani:

    Not to put too fine a point on it: a sizable number of the political exiles we got from communist countries have always been reactionary scumbags, whose problem with communism isn’t that it’s oppressive, but that it’s not oppressive enough, or not towards the right people. It’s no surprise that people like that rushed to embrace Putin’s Russia or Orban’s Hungary once the whole Cold War misunderstanding was cleared up. Don’t know if Simes was one of them, but it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine.

    The quality of the political exiles we import went down markedly after our main foreign enemies went from being monarchist, oligarchic, and fascist regimes to being communist regimes.

  32. 32.

    Chris

    @Carlo Graziani:

    This.

    Putin was able to coast for twenty years on the West’s understanding that he was the least bad option we could expect from Russia, and that any scenario were we lost him risked seeing Russia falling into neo-communism or military dictatorship or anarchy, all of which would be worse.

    I would like to think it’s finally clear that Putin is so bad that he needs to go regardless of what comes next. The Ukrainians are certainly there. We, on the other hand…

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