Russia Invades Ukraine. Again by captaincrunch

You're a real tough guy posting about the war you crave from your mom's basement, aren'cha Teddy boy?

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Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Sunday, August 21, 2022 6:57 PM

THG

How Belarusians are fighting Putin in their country and in Ukraine

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Sunday, August 21, 2022 7:11 PM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:

Too bad for Kiev they've lost 100,000 (conservative estimate) to 300,000 soldiers.

Where did you get that number from, Signym? So many numbers, yet so few reasons to believe you actually have a factual reference rather than you made the fantasy numbers all by yourself.

Total Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Russo-Ukrainian_War#To
tal_casualties

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Sunday, August 21, 2022 7:23 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
T

How Belarusians are fighting Putin in their country and in Ukraine

Why on earth do you care so much, Ted?

You got stock in Ukraine oil or something?

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Sunday, August 21, 2022 7:27 PM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Why on earth do you care so much, Ted?

You got stock in Ukraine oil or something?

6ix, you are the only person who has written many, many times "Nobody died of covid" and "Nobody cares about Russia and Ukraine". There is nobody like you, 6ix. Correction: Nobody sane.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Monday, August 22, 2022 5:12 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Russia appeals for new recruits for war effort

"Two volunteer artillery battalions are being formed. We invite men from 18 to 60 years old to join," the speakers blare out.

It's a message that's being repeated up and down this vast country. On social media, on TV and on billboards, men are being urged to sign short-term contracts with the military to fight in Ukraine.

In the face of significant losses in the conflict, the authorities have launched a recruitment drive for the Russian army.

I stop one man on the street in Volosovo and ask him if he supports the call-up for volunteers. "Yes! If I were young I'd go, but I'm too old now," he tells me, clenching his fists. "We should bomb them!"

But most people in the town seem less enthusiastic. "[The war] is too painful to even talk about," one woman complains. "Killing your brothers is wrong." I ask her what she would say if one of her relatives wanted to join. "Why go? Only their bodies will be brought back."

And many bodies are.

Investigative journalist Roman Dobrokhotov says the recruitment drive is a sign of desperation on the part of the authorities: "This is not the type of soldiers needed for a victorious war. The Kremlin still hopes that quantity can win over quality. That they can get these hundreds of thousands of desperate people with their debts and just throw them into the conflict zone."

Despite the eyewatering amounts of cash on offer to potential recruits - up to £4,700 ($5,700) a month in some cases - Roman says the reality is different.

"People don't actually see this money," he says. "They are returning [from Ukraine] now and telling us journalists about how they were deceived. This is also influencing the situation, this lack of trust in our government, so I don't think this strategy will be successful."

But some are happy to join up.

Nina Chubarina's son Yevgeny left their village in the northern region of Karelia to join a volunteer battalion. Nina says her son, who had no military experience, was given a gun and sent straight into Ukraine.

He was killed just days later. He was 24 years old.

Nina agrees to meet me in a park near Moscow, where she has found part-time work in a bread factory. She says the monotonous task of packing loaves takes her mind off the loss of her son.

She remembers pleading with her son not to go to Ukraine.

"I tried to talk him out of it. I cried. I said, 'There's a war, you'll be killed!' He said, 'Mum, everything will be fine.'"

Nina is critical of how the authorities recruit volunteers to fight in Ukraine.

"They just send them in like dumb little chickens! They'd hardly even held a gun before. They're cannon fodder. The generals think, 'We've got a volunteer: great, in you go!'"

Not everyone is as keen to sign up as Yevgeny.

Travelling around this country, you are not left with the impression that the Russian people are all fully behind the "special military operation," as the Kremlin likes to call it.

The number of cars on Russian roads displaying the pro-war "Z" symbol is still relatively few. Experts say that the numbers of volunteers joining up are low.

Military analyst Pavel Luzin says people here are not ready to sacrifice themselves for their president.

"The problem for the Kremlin is that most Russian people are not going to die for Putin or for the restoration of 'the great Empire'. Recruitment isn't possible in current circumstances because there is no civil consensus in Russia for the war.

"Compare this with Ukraine. The Ukrainians are ready to fight."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-62553629

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Monday, August 22, 2022 5:39 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Russian paratroopers facing crippling morale, severe losses in Ukraine

AUGUST 21, 2022 16:21

The biggest issue for the Russian forces seems to be the mass refusal of the command staff of VDV units to participate in the fighting in Ukraine.

Due to the alleged mass refusal of Russian Airborne Forces (VDV) officers to participate in combat in Ukraine, Russian paratrooper command has begun trying to hire contractors to fill the vacant positions, but even they do not seem keen to fight, Ukrainian Intelligence said in a statement Saturday.

Russia has been increasingly using contracted professionals - contraktniki in Russian - to replace conscripts in elite military units.

After severe losses suffered by the Russian paratroopers as a result of clashes with Ukraine's army, the command of the airborne troops is attempting to restore the morale and combat capability of the units, the statement explained.

Special focus is being put on units in which more than 60 percent of personnel were killed in action and units in which demoralized soldiers have refused to continue their service.

The biggest issue for the Russian forces seems to be the mass refusal of the command staff of VDV units to participate in the fighting in Ukraine. Even contract workers, who were urgently assigned officer ranks, have reportedly refused to fill in positions from platoon commander to battalion commander.

Members of Russia's general staff in Ukraine were instructed to investigate each case of refusal and persuade the commanders to return to their units by promising social benefits and government awards.

Russia's Paratrooper divisions - considered one of the country's elite units and poster boys for the Russian military - have encountered a series of problems since the invasion of Ukraine, tarnishing the once prestigious designation the unit held.

Paratroopers abandoning posts

Back in July, Ukrainian intelligence reported that paratroopers from the 106th and 76th Airborne Divisions had been refusing to continue fighting in combat operations in Ukraine and were returning from the Luhansk Oblast to Russian Federation territory, according to Ukraine's Pravda.

Further showing the morale issues Russia is having with the VDV, at least 60 Russian paratroopers from one unit in Pskov province refused to fight in Ukraine, according to independent Russian newspaper Pskovskaya Gubernia.

The troops were fired, and some were threatened with criminal prosecution for desertion or failure to comply with an order, the paper wrote on its Telegram channel.

331st Regiment loses former glory

Another unit, the renowned 331st Guards Parachute Regiment which served in the Balkans, Chechnya, and the 2014 Russian intervention in the Donbas region of Ukraine, and regularly took part in Red Square parades in Moscow has also suffered heavy losses in March, according to the BBC.

The regiment's commanding officer, Col Sergei Sukharev, along with 39 other soldiers were killed while advancing on Kyiv. The men were part of a column that advanced into Ukraine from Belarus, led by Russia's airborne forces.

The 331st was also a showcase for Russia's policy of replacing national service soldiers with professionals under contract. It is understandable why the generals should have given it an important role in the invasion.

https://www.jpost.com/international/article-715187

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Monday, August 22, 2022 8:25 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Russia Forcibly Conscripts Over 400 Mine Workers for Ukraine War

As the invasion of Ukraine continues, Russian forces have reportedly begun conscripting local workers to fill infantry roles.

Approximately 430 miners from the Luhansk region in Eastern Ukraine have been forcibly conscripted into the Russian infantry, according to the region's governor, Serhiy Haidai, in a post to his Telegram account on Sunday.

"The mass media of the so-called ['Luhansk People's Republic'] start to teach the population to be proud of this fact," Haidai said. "The report says that '...as in the years of the Great Patriotic War, women and pensioners replace in fields, factories, and mines the men who went to the front... Women stayed and they successfully perform their duties even in extremely difficult jobs...' 430 miners of the once leading coal mining enterprise of Donbas were mobilized."

According to a report from Ukrinform, the workers were conscripted from the Dovzhanska-Kapitalna mining company in the town of Dovzhanska, which was once the leading mining operation in the region.

Reports emerged earlier in August that the Russian military had begun conscripting civilians from Luhansk, which came under full Russian control early last month, and was dubbed the "Luhansk People's Republic." Portions of the region had been recognized as a breakaway state by Russia since 2014. At the time, Haidai also said that the need for conscriptions had become so dire, that even miners, who were key to the region's economy, were being swept up.

"They don't bother counting the casualties, because mostly it's the residents of the occupied territories who die," Haidai said in an August 4 Telegram post. "The Russians don't need them in the future, because for eight years the population of the so-called 'LPR' has been a burden on the Russian state budget. Now the men are 'working off' these financial losses... Everyone who can be mobilized has already been mobilized on the territories that have been occupied since 2014...now even irreplaceable miners are being taken away."

More at https://www.newsweek.com/russia-forcibly-conscripts-over-400-mine-work
ers-ukraine-war-governor-1735493

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Monday, August 22, 2022 8:51 AM

Wow. If that doesn't sound like a propaganda piece.

How about we stop calling this the war against Ukraine and call it what it really is.

It's NATO's war against Russia.

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Monday, August 22, 2022 9:11 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Wow. If that doesn't sound like a propaganda piece.

How about we stop calling this the war against Ukraine and call it what it really is.

It's NATO's war against Russia.

If it was NATO fighting Russia, then for every $750 billion in real estate damage Russia does to Ukraine, NATO would do $750 billion in damage to St. Petersburg. There wouldn't be a power plant left operating anywhere in Russia west of the Ural mountains because NATO bombed the generators. Millions of Russian refugees would be fleeing toward Siberia. That is what an actual war between NATO and Russia would be.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Monday, August 22, 2022 9:21 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Wow. If that doesn't sound like a propaganda piece.

How about we stop calling this the war against Ukraine and call it what it really is.

It's NATO's war against Russia.
If it was NATO fighting Russia, then for every $750 billion in real estate damage Russia does to Ukraine, NATO would do $750 billion in damage to St. Petersburg. There wouldn't be a power plant left operating anywhere in Russia west of the Ural mountains because NATO bombed the generators. Millions of Russian refugees would be fleeing toward Siberia. That is what an actual war between NATO and Russia would be.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Oh. It's by proxy. NATO isn't that brazen...

Yet.

But if it weren't funneling money and weapons to Ukraine along with the US, Ukraine would have lost this bullshit the moment it started.

Dissolve NATO today and the war ends by midnight.

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Tuesday, August 23, 2022 3:11 PM

THG

Scuttlebutt is, Russia is going to lash out in a major way. We'll see...

T

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Thursday, August 25, 2022 9:59 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Macron warns France needs to prepare for difficult time ahead

“I believe that we are in the process of living through a tipping point or great upheaval. Firstly because we are living through … the end of what could seem like the end of abundance,” he said.

Referring to the war in Ukraine, Macron also said: “Our system based on freedom in which we have become used to living, sometimes when we need to defend it, it can entail making sacrifices.”

The speech appeared designed to prepare the country for what promises to be a difficult winter ahead, with energy prices rising sharply and many families struggling with inflation.

‘The end of abundance’

The severe drought over the summer, leading to water restrictions across most of the country, has also caused many French people to express fears about the increasingly obvious effects of climate change.

“This overview that I’m giving – the end of abundance, the end of insouciance, the end of assumptions – it’s ultimately a tipping point that we are going through that can lead our citizens to feel a lot of anxiety,” Macron continued.

“Faced with this, we have duties, the first of which is to speak frankly and very clearly without doom-mongering,” he said.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/24/macron-warns-france-needs-to-
prepare-for-difficult-time-ahead

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Thursday, August 25, 2022 11:27 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Germany warns the same. They claim that Russia uses energy as a weapon, conveniently bypassing the fact that THEY cut themselves off from Russian gas and oil by ending Nord Stream II, sanctioning Russian oil, holding up a gas turbine, Ukraine ending gas flows to Europe, and not paying for gas delivered.

Jeez.

But the EU population has been conditioned to bow their heads to "the authorities". Just look at how they were made to tolerate unrealistic immigration programs and Covid responses. So I think this will go on for a while until reality breaks thru their conditioning.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Thursday, August 25, 2022 11:44 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Germany warns the same. They claim that Russia uses energy as a weapon, conveniently bypassing the fact that THEY cut themselves off from Russian gas and oil by ending Nord Stream II, sanctioning Russian oil, holding up a gas turbine, Ukraine ending gas flows to Europe, and not paying for gas delivered.

Jeez.

But the EU population has been conditioned to bow their heads to "the authorities". Just look at how they were made to tolerate unrealistic immigration programs and Covid responses. So I think this will go on for a while until reality breaks thru their conditioning.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

It needs to get a lot worse for them (and us) for that to happen.

I hope it does.

Most of my adult life I've marveled at the way that TPTB had learned from history and were able to slowly ebb away the freedoms and the relatively prosperous lives that The People lived in such a way that they hardly noticed that it was happening.

I figured they'd just keep that up forever until we all found ourselves in cages and happy about it.

The fact that they cranked it all up to full blast in 2020 and completely threw out the slow burn approach makes me think that they know about something big that we don't know, and they have a plan that we're not privy to.

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Thursday, August 25, 2022 11:46 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
. . . holding up a gas turbine . . .

The true story goes very different than the one you and Russians are telling, Signym: Russian gas supplier Gazprom refused to accept the turbine, blaming technical issues and missing documents. Despite Gazprom's rejection, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau confirmed on Tuesday that the five remaining turbines would be returned.
https://www.politico.eu/article/canada-to-return-five-more-turbines-to
-germany/

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Friday, August 26, 2022 10:47 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

FSB 'Disinformation Campaign'

Sergej Sumlenny, a German political expert with a particular focus on Russia and Eastern Europe, told Newsweek that he believes the Kremlin's version of Dugina's assassination is "totally fake."

"It's absolutely out of the scale of plausibility," said Sumlenny, pointing to the evidence the FSB produced in attempting to pin the blame on a female Ukrainian citizen, who allegedly arrived in Russia in July with her daughter, rented an apartment in the same building as Dugina and spied on her before killing her.

The FSB released a purported passport photo of the Ukrainian citizen, as well as footage that allegedly showed her in Russia. Data analysts were quick to point out on Twitter that the document was photoshopped.

"We already see that what they call evidence is clearly forged, for example, the ID of the woman who they say has killed Dugina is photoshopped," said Sumlenny.

Sumlenny suggested the allegations are part of the FSB's "standard disinformation campaign after every event."

"Why did they do this? Because they want to spoil the discussion. They want us to dig into all these insane versions and spend all valuable time in debunking them," he explained.

Does the NRA Exist?

Sumlenny said that from a historical point of view, he doesn't believe that the NRA underground partisan group exists at all, and suggested that it may even be a creation of the FSB.

"I don't believe it [NRA] exists, why? Russia is a state with very strong surveillance and a lot of informants among all potential groups," he explained.

In recent history, there were no terrorist networks in Russia, except for some Islamic terror groups in northern Caucasus, and a gang of young men, known as the Primorsky Partisans, who, in the early 2000s, committed crimes, including the murder of two policemen, Sumlenny said.

"All other terrorist groups which existed after that were poor FSB creations," he said.

Sumlenny explained that a typical FSB strategy has been to attend political discussion clubs in universities, infiltrate them with an agent and attempt to radicalize these young people in order to present them as a terror group.

He pointed to the "non-existent" terror group Set, which Russian authorities said were plotting to overthrow the government.

Rights groups and lawyers argued that charges against the members were fabricated and that they were tortured into confessing. Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny also described the Set group a "fictitious terrorist organization."

"So this is how Russian terror groups are being created," said Sumlenny. "So to think that some anti-Putin liberal pro-European movement has appeared, which is not infiltrated by the FSB, which has skills to assemble a bomb, to put this bomb into a car and to let it explode remotely. It's impossible."

Given the Kremlin's official narrative is that Ukraine is behind Dugina's killing, it is only logical that Russia has yet to comment on the existence of the NRA, Sumlenny suggested.

"Their unofficial narrative, which they have allowed to be spread is the 'underground movement,'—they also need to crack down [on opposition]. So they let this narrative be transmitted."

'A Patriotic Flame'

Ruslan Trad, a security researcher at the U.S. think tank Atlantic Council, told Newsweek it is evident that the murder of Dugina "created a wave of needed anger" in Russia, now six months into its war against neighboring Ukraine.

"Dugin is now mostly a symbol, not an instrument for the state. His role in the creation of the current Kremlin mythology for Eurasia and the so-called 'Russian world' has already ended and he can be sacrificed," Trad said. "Currently, the Russian army needs victories, a patriotic flame."

The Russian state and its proxies already use murder for political purposes, he said.

"Undoubtedly, this will not be the last such episode in Russian history and an internal order should not be ruled out by one of the security agencies."

Much more at https://www.newsweek.com/putin-russia-fsb-dugin-daughter-darya-dugina-
killing-death-1736598

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, August 27, 2022 1:11 PM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Europe’s Russia problem

The prevailing mood of denial in Europe has allowed Russian society to wholeheartedly embrace an anti-Western ideology while at the same time enjoying the benefits of Western civilization. Moscow actively attacks Western values and routinely depicts the United States, NATO, and the European Union as implacable adversaries. At the same time, the Kremlin elite and Russia’s middle classes send their wives and children to live in the hated West and take advantage of Europe’s superior education and healthcare opportunities. They buy up Western real estate, invest in Western businesses, settle their disputes in Western courts, and keep their savings in the same Western currencies they preach against.

Russians have grown used to the idea that they can use violent rhetoric, violate international norms, and even invade their neighbors with impunity. They are supremely confident that Western leaders will nevertheless seek to maintain dialogue with Moscow.

This has fostered a culture of contempt. Not unreasonably, Russians believe the West has no stomach for confrontation and is utterly unable to defend the values it so readily betrays. After years of engaging with the perceived hypocrisy of the West, Russians see nothing wrong in professing their hatred for democracy while enjoying its fruits. Likewise, they are entirely comfortable calling Ukrainians “brothers” and in the same breath proclaiming that Ukraine itself cannot be allowed to exist.

Until this absurd situation is addressed, there is little hope of ending Russian aggression. Instead of viewing the country as a difficult partner or a competitor, the West must acknowledge that today’s Russia is an unambiguously hostile power that is waging war against the entire democratic world.

One key measure would be to declare Russia a state sponsor of terrorism. A small number of countries have already taken this step, but others including the United States remain reluctant. Skeptics argue that such a move would lead to unwelcome consequences that should be avoided. This is a slippery slope. Experience since 2014 demonstrates that failing to respond forcefully to Russian aggression only leads to bigger problems and higher costs further down the line. Rather than seeking compromises with a hostile power, Western leaders should designate Russia a state sponsor of terror without delay.

Europe must also deploy its considerable soft power tools to demonstrate that the days of double-dealing are over. You cannot expect to drive luxury German cars while scrawling “to Berlin” slogans on Russian tanks and parading them on state TV as symbols of national identity. You cannot expect to drink French wine or Viennese coffee while simultaneously threatening to nuke Europe.

Sanctions should be tightened and loopholes closed. Russian citizens should face a Schengen Zone tourist visa ban, with only humanitarian cases permitted to enter the EU. A wealth of evidence indicates that the vast majority of Russians support the war in Ukraine. They need to understand that they will face negative consequences for the war crimes being committed in their name.

Until the Russian middle classes begin to lose access to the trappings of Western civilization, they will continue to dismiss Western criticism of Russia as hypocritical and insincere. Once they are denied access to the privileges they previously took for granted, serious change in Russia may finally become possible. This will not happen overnight, of course. But until the current double standards are addressed, there is no chance whatsoever of Putin facing genuine domestic pressure.

More at https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/a-strong-ukraine-is
-the-best-solution-to-europes-russia-problem/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Sunday, August 28, 2022 3:25 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Europe’s Russia problem

The prevailing mood of denial in Europe has allowed Russian society to wholeheartedly embrace .. blah blah blah ... blah blah blah...

I haven't seen such a load of happy horseshit since the last time you posted "Trumptards think ..."

In fact, I gave up about one para in.

Astonish us, SECOND. Instead of putting words in the EU's and Russia's mouths, why don't you report what they ACTUALLY say?

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Sunday, August 28, 2022 3:30 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
In parallel, The Lords of (Proxy) War will continue with their own strategy, which is to pillage an enfeebled, fearful, Europe, then dressing it up as a perfumed colony to be ruthlessly exploited ad nauseam by the imperial oligarchy.

Europe is now a runaway TGV – minus the requisite Hollywood production values. Assuming it does not veer off track – a dicey proposition – it may eventually arrive at a railway station called Agenda 2030, The Great Narrative, or some other NATO/Davos denomination du jour.

As it stands, what’s remarkable is how the “marginal” Russian economy hardly broke a sweat to “end the abundance” of the wealthiest region on the planet.

Moscow does not even entertain the notion of negotiating with Brussels because there’s nothing to negotiate – considering puny Eurocrats will only be hurled away from their zombified state when the dire socio-economic consequences of “the end of abundance” will finally translate into peasants with pitchforks roaming the continent.

t may be eons away, but inevitably the average Italian, German or Frenchman will connect the dots and realize it is their own “leaders” – national nullities and mostly unelected Eurocrats – who are paving their road to poverty.

http://thesaker.is/all-the-way-to-odessa/

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Sunday, August 28, 2022 7:15 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

In fact, I gave up about one para in.

Astonish us, SECOND. Instead of putting words in the EU's and Russia's mouths, why don't you report what they ACTUALLY say?

Typically the word from Russia's mouth is that Russia didn't kill those people, but there is a law authorizing assassination.

In 2002, Putin, a former KGB operative, started ratcheting up the practice of “wet affairs” and “special tasks” by approving a federal law, “On Countering Extreme Activity.” The law authorizes targeted assassinations for “extremist activity,” which includes “crimes” such as “diminishing national dignity” and “publicly expressing slander or false accusation of persons who hold Russian government positions.”

Many Russian journalists and political opponents have fallen afoul of this law. After journalist Anna Politkovskaya reported on the atrocities committed by her country’s forces during the Second Chechen War (1999–2009), she was shot and killed in her apartment elevator on Putin’s birthday in October 2006. Boris Nemtsov, a former Russian deputy prime minister and ardent Putin critic, was shot on a bridge near the Kremlin in February 2015.

Then there’s Aleksandr Litvinenko, a former FSB intelligence officer who defected to England and did contract work for British intelligence. In 2006, Litvinenko was murdered by two Russian GRU operatives who met with him in a luxury London hotel and served him a cup of tea laced with the radioactive agent polonium.

Cases have even happened to people on US soil.

In November 2015, Mikhail Lesin, a former Russian media executive and Putin advisor, was found dead in an upscale Washington, DC, hotel. Lesin’s death happened a day before he was due to be interviewed by the Justice Department about the Kremlin-funded media company, RT, which he had founded. An official at the Chief Medical Examiner’s office revealed that Lesin’s neck bone was fractured in a way that is “commonly associated with hanging or manual strangulation.”

In US intelligence circles, it is believed that Lesin was a victim of a Russian hit job.

In March 2007, another Kremlin critic, former CIA officer Paul Joyal, survived a brutal attack near his home in Maryland. Joyal was shot in the groin four days after he implied during a Dateline NBC broadcast that Putin and the Kremlin were behind the killing of Litvinenko. Although the FBI initially investigated the attack, they dropped the case and the criminals have never been found. Joyal believes he was the victim of another Russian hit job.

It is doubtful that DC law enforcement will devote the necessary time and resources to investigate this month’s “suicide” of Rapoport either. It took British investigators more than 10 years to conclude that Russian intelligence operatives were responsible for the murder of Litvinenko on UK soil.

And it could be true that some of Putin’s critics have intentionally jumped off high rises to their deaths. But usually they have helpers.

More at https://nypost.com/2022/08/27/two-shocking-deaths-are-right-out-of-put
ins-assassination-playbook/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Sunday, August 28, 2022 7:48 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Russian troops in Kazakhstan are refusing to return to Russia because they do not want to be deployed to the war in Ukraine, Ukrainian intelligence officials said Saturday.

There are roughly 1,000 Russian troops in Kazakhstan according to Ukraine's Main Directorate of Intelligence of Ukraine's Ministry of Defense. The directorate says that the the military contingent stationed in the country "does not want to replenish the composition of the occupation contingent" in Ukraine, according to a translation of a post on Telegram.

However, it also said that the "formal reason for the refusal is the lack of special air transport, which is fully engaged in the war with Ukraine."

Ukrainska Pravda first reported on the claims from the intelligence officials on Saturday.

In its Telegram post, the directorate said that Moscow does not want to completely withdraw troops from Kazakhstan. The troops were sent to the country in January following rallies against its government. The directorate added that Russia has almost completely withdrawn its troops from nearby Tajikistan and Armenia to support its war in Ukraine.

Newsweek has reached out to Russia's Ministry of Defense for comment.

The claims about Russia's troops in Kazakhstan come as Russian President Vladimir Putin has called for his military to add additional troops amid the ongoing war. Putin has ordered the military bring on 137,000 new troops, which would bring the total number to 1.15 million, by January 1.

Retired U.S. Army Lieutenant General Mark Hertling said Saturday that he believes the development shows the Russian military is "in trouble."

"Are they going to just put these new soldiers that they recruit through the basic training that they have, which truthfully, is not very good and then send them right out to a unit to try to learn combined arms operations, which are very difficult, without any additional training? If that's the case, they're going to be in trouble," Hertling said in an interview on CNN.

In May, The Daily Beast reported that a Russian soldier said that his commander shot himself in the leg to escape the war in Ukraine. The Ukrainian intelligence directorate released a phone call at the time, identifying the speaker as a Russian soldier speaking with his mother.

"This won't end anytime soon. What the hell do I need this for? At 20 years old...I'm not at all interested in Ukraine. I need to come back and resign," the soldier said during the call. "I had a commander...who shot himself in the leg just to get out of here. And that was in the very beginning!"

https://www.newsweek.com/russian-force-wont-return-mission-fearing-ukr
aine-deployment-report-1737586

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, August 31, 2022 8:06 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

The Director of Russia’s National Guard has begun a campaign to reassure Russian President Vladimir Putin that Ukrainians are supportive of Russia seizing territory in Ukraine when the reality couldn’t be further off.

“I would like to emphasize that we can feel that the population of the liberated areas is supporting us. They realize that we are defending their right to a peaceful life and their children’s happiness,” the director, Viktor Zolotov, told Putin, according to the Kremlin.

In a video of the exchange, Putin looks visibly troubled and concerned, gripping the table, while Zolotov shares his thoughts.

Zolotov’s efforts to feed Putin a narrative that Ukrainians want Russia to be capturing territory in Ukraine come just as two U.S. officials told The Daily Beast that the Biden administration has concerns that Russia may be preparing to run sham referenda in seized territories in Ukraine, in order to make it appear like Ukraine supports Russia’s invasion. Russia also ran a sham referendum, which the United States and other allies have repeatedly declared is invalid, in Crimea following Russia’s takeover of the Ukrainian peninsula in 2014.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/top-russian-general-viktor-zolotov-lies-
to-vladimir-putin-about-ukraine-war-in-awkward-briefing

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, September 1, 2022 7:16 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Gorbachev was born in Stalin’s Russia, but he began his career during the post-Stalin “thaw,” a moment when it became possible to acknowledge some truths out loud, but not too many. While he was still a student at Moscow State University, one of his closest friends was a Czechoslovak student named Zdenek Mlynár. Both believed that communism could be reformed, if only the corruption and violence were removed. Mlynár’s convictions led him to become one of the leaders of the Prague Spring, a 1968 movement that started out by calling for “reformed communism” and “socialism with a human face.” That movement was crushed by Soviet soldiers, proving that corruption and violence were intrinsic to a system with no human face. Even cautious Czech reformers could not remove them so easily.

Still, the language of “reformed communism” continued to appeal to Gorbachev, who revived it when he became leader of the Soviet Communist Party in March 1985. But although he knew that Soviet society was stagnant and Soviet workers were unproductive, he had no idea why. In fact, his first instinct was not that the system needed democracy, or even free markets. Instead, he thought: Russians drink too much. Just two months after taking power, he restricted the sale of vodka, raised the drinking age, and started digging up vineyards. By some accounts, the resulting loss of tax income to the Soviet budget, plus the dramatic shortages — people were buying sugar and other products in bulk to make moonshine at home — were the tipping point that sent the Soviet economy into its final death spiral.

Real change had to wait until the Chernobyl nuclear catastrophe of April 1986. News of the accident was initially hushed up, just as bad news was always hushed up in the U.S.S.R. Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians were allowed to march in the Kyiv May Day parade even as radioactivity spread silently across the city. But the scale of the disaster finally convinced Gorbachev that the real problem with his country was not alcohol, but its obsession with secrecy. His solution was glasnost — openness — which, like the anti-alcohol campaign, was originally meant to promote economic efficiency. Open conversation about the Soviet Union’s problems would, Gorbachev believed, strengthen communism. Managers and workers would talk about what was going wrong in their factories and workplaces, find solutions, fix the problem. No deeper reforms were needed, as he told a group of party economists early on: “Many of you see the solution to your problems in resorting to market mechanisms in place of direct planning. Some of you look at the market as a lifesaver for your economies. But, comrades, you should not think about lifesavers, but about the ship, and the ship is socialism.”

But once glasnost became official policy, once Soviet citizens could talk about whatever they wanted to talk about, factory efficiency was not their first choice of topic. Nor did they want to rescue the sinking ship of socialism. Instead, there was an explosion of debate and discussion about the past, about the history of mass arrests and mass murders, about the Gulag and Soviet political prisons. Historical accounts, memoirs and diaries that had been hidden in desk drawers, raced off the printing presses and became best sellers. Newspapers printed stories of sleaze and mismanagement in the economy, politics, culture, and everything else. Calls for the creation of a different kind of society, a more democratic society, a more law-abiding society, began immediately. The economists whom Gorbachev had silenced started openly talking about the end of central planning. Poles, Czechs, East Germans, Ukrainians, Balts, Georgians, and others then in the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union itself all began talking about the end of the empire too. Contrary to the retrospective Putinist historiography now prevalent in Russia, the glasnost era was a creative, exciting, hopeful time for millions of people, even millions of Russians.

Gorbachev seemed bewildered, and no wonder. Having lived much of his life at the top of the Soviet nomenklatura, he never understood the depth of cynicism in his own country or the depth of anger in the occupied Soviet satellite states, most of whose inhabitants rejected even the reformed communism of his youth: They didn’t want the Prague Spring; they wanted to join Western Europe. He never understood the depth of the rot inside Soviet bureaucracies or the amorality of the bureaucrats. In the end, he wound up racing to catch up with history, rather than making it himself.

Because he did not understand what was happening, Gorbachev also did not prepare his compatriots for major political and economic change. He did not help design democratic institutions, and he did not lay the foundations for an orderly economic reform. He removed the old system, put nothing in its place, and then seemed shocked and surprised when a Mafia state arose to fill the vacuum. Above all, he did not tell the Russians that their empire was oppressive and hateful to many of its non-Russian subjects, or that its dismantling represented a huge expansion of human freedom. He did not call for a full reckoning with the Soviet past, and no such thing ever took place. Even afterward, he failed to understand the significance of what had happened. After 2014, he repeatedly declared his support for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s annexation of Crimea, an action that helped catalyze the wave of imperial nostalgia that has now brought us the war in Ukraine.

Gorbachev did change some of his thinking, eventually embracing the idea of democracy, a term he was especially happy to use during his career as a wandering elder statesman, the kind who gets invited to anniversary parties in Berlin. He sometimes criticized Putin in public. But in truth, all of Gorbachev’s most significant decisions, his most radical actions, were the ones he did not make. He did not order the East Germans to shoot at people crossing the Wall. He did not offer the Polish communists a bailout as their economy crashed. He did not launch a full-scale war to prevent the secession of the Baltic states, or to stop the Ukrainians from declaring independence, or to prevent Russia from electing its own leadership too. He made some reactionary attempts to slow things down, and people died in the process, most famously in Vilnius (in Lithuania) and Tbilisi (in the republic of Georgia). But he was not as vicious as some of his predecessors and successors, and he did not, in the end, use mass violence to keep the empire together. Nor did he use violence to stay in power himself.

Gorbachev’s inaction brought the world 30 years of relief from the Cold War nuclear standoff, 30 years of time for some genuine reforms to take hold in some parts of his former empire. Although none of the forces he accidentally set in motion prevented Russia from turning back into a tyranny, the end of Soviet Communism could have been far more bloody, far more violent, and far more like the current war in Ukraine. If someone else had been in charge, it might well have been.

More at https://web.archive.org/web/20220831183307/https://www.theatlantic.com
/ideas/archive/2022/08/gorbachev-legacy-russia/671288/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, September 1, 2022 9:37 AM

Nobody cares.

Not even in California anymore, now that they've been ordered not to charge their coal burning cars during the day and to keep their thermostats down to 78 degrees.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Thursday, September 1, 2022 9:10 PM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Nobody cares.

Putin cares and kills opponents to his War

Ravil Maganov is the eighth Russian oil executive to die under mysterious circumstances since war began

Forbes reports:

Ravil Maganov, the chairman of Russia’s biggest private oil company, Lukoil, died after falling through the window of a hospital in Moscow, Russian media reported on Thursday, a death which comes under mysterious circumstances just months after his company emerged as a rare high profile voice of dissent against the invasion of Ukraine.

According to the Russian news agency Interfax, Maganov died from his injuries after falling out of the window of the Central Clinical Hospital in Moscow.

State-run news agency TASS reported Maganov’s death was the result of suicide as he was taking antidepressant drugs while being treated for a heart attack.

Adding to the confusion around the incident, Lukoil issued a statement saying the 67-year-old died after a “serious illness” but made no mention of the purported plunge from the hospital window.

https://attentiontotheunseen.com/2022/09/01/ravil-maganov-is-the-eight
h-russian-oil-executive-to-die-under-mysterious-circumstances-since-war-began/

and

https://web.archive.org/web/20220902011757/https://www.forbes.com/site
s/siladityaray/2022/09/01/russian-executive-maganov-whose-company-urged-end-to-ukraine-invasion-dies-after-reportedly-falling-through-hospital-window/?sh=38c6ccdc58ee

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, September 1, 2022 9:49 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
The Director of Russia’s National Guard has begun a campaign to reassure Russian President Vladimir Putin that Ukrainians are supportive of Russia seizing territory in Ukraine when the reality couldn’t be further off.

“I would like to emphasize that we can feel that the population of the liberated areas is supporting us. They realize that we are defending their right to a peaceful life and their children’s happiness,” the director, Viktor Zolotov, told Putin, according to the Kremlin.

In a video of the exchange, Putin looks visibly troubled and concerned, gripping the table, while Zolotov shares his thoughts.

Zolotov’s efforts to feed Putin a narrative that Ukrainians want Russia to be capturing territory in Ukraine come just as two U.S. officials told The Daily Beast that the Biden administration has concerns that Russia may be preparing to run sham referenda in seized territories in Ukraine, in order to make it appear like Ukraine supports Russia’s invasion. Russia also ran a sham referendum, which the United States and other allies have repeatedly declared is invalid, in Crimea following Russia’s takeover of the Ukrainian peninsula in 2014.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/top-russian-general-viktor-zolotov-lies-
to-vladimir-putin-about-ukraine-war-in-awkward-briefing

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

I watched the video, which they apparently looped to make it seem longer. I've watched other videos of Putin for health problems, as I've watched videos of Hillary and Biden and Trump, and I think I'm a pretty good diagnostician.

Most Putin interpretations are IMHO bogus. For instance, in a video where they claimed he had "uncontrollable shaking" of his right hand, it seemed clear to me that he was GESTURING "come here". What nobody commented on in that video was his obviously unsteady first few steps.

In this particular video, Putin is doing what I've seen him do before: gripping the table with his right hand. It looks to me as if he's controlling the movement of his right hand. Perhaps he has early Parkinson's. Maybe he's had a stroke or it could be something as benign as familial essential tremors. In any case, I wouldn't say he looked "troubled", just attentive.

AFA Ukraine is concerned, the western press is trying to disappear the deep split in Ukrainian people, which was evidenced by the Yanukovich vote and the formation of eastern militias immediately following the 2014 coup. Militias which are still fighting today.

It's disingenuous to speak of Ukrianians as if they're monolithic and have a single opinion. They're not, and they don't. Western press is trying to discredit the referendum votes ahead of time, which means they believe the vote will swing to Russia.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Thursday, September 1, 2022 10:52 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Nobody cares.
Putin cares and kills opponents to his War

Of course HE cares.

It's not his war. NATO and Biden* started it.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Thursday, September 1, 2022 11:20 PM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:

AFA Ukraine is concerned, the western press is trying to disappear the deep split in Ukrainian people, which was evidenced by the Yanukovich vote and the formation of eastern militias immediately following the 2014 coup. Militias which are still fighting today.

It's disingenuous to speak of Ukrianians as if they're monolithic and have a single opinion. They're not, and they don't. Western press is trying to discredit the referendum votes ahead of time, which means they believe the vote will swing to Russia.

The Russians are making Ukrainians disappear:

“We felt like hostages”: Ukrainians describe forcible transfers and filtration by Russian forces

A report from Human Rights Watch documents Russia’s deportation and screening of Ukrainians, but cautions the full extent is not yet known

Russian officials, for their part, claimed that over 2.8 million Ukrainians had entered the Russian federation from Ukraine, including 448,000 children, at least half of which came from areas of Ukraine that had been under Russian control since 2014.

Some Ukrainians felt they had no choice but to go to Russia, which they saw as the only way to escape relentless shelling — and a decision made under such conditions, Human Rights Watch notes, amounts to forcible transfer. While in Russia, some of the people transferred there were pressured to sign declarations stating that they had witnessed war crimes by Ukrainian forces, the group added.

But many Ukrainians also made the journey to Russia or Russian-controlled territory voluntarily, either because they held pro-Russian views, had family ties in Russia, or as a way to travel on to other destinations after the Ukrainian government imposed martial law, forbidding most adult males from leaving the country.

Wille, the Human Rights Watch researcher, noted that the mass biometric data collection happening as part of the filtration process was especially concerning.

“It fits into a much bigger thing going on in Russia,” she told The Intercept, noting that Human Rights Watch has documented widespread efforts by Russian authorities to build biometric databases for surveillance and monitoring. “They’re trying to, à la Xinjiang, create something quite similar and comprehensive in Russia. And I think this gives them a big kind of ground for experimentation. … I think the consequences are significant because we don’t know yet what they’re going to be.”

Soviet officials established filtration camps during World War II, targeting soldiers who had found themselves in German-controlled areas, to identify suspected defectors and collaborators. “Because of this Stalinist, permanent suspicion of spies and enemy agents, they had to undertake this filtration, this screening process,” said Statiev. Soon, the practice was extended to several million civilians who had been living in German territory.

Population transfers, often along ethnic lines, were also commonplace in Soviet Russia, added Statiev, who pointed to the deportation of 170,000 ethnic Koreans, suspected of sympathizing with the Japanese, from the Soviet Union’s far east to Central Asia.

More recently, filtration camps were a defining feature of the Chechen wars, which started in the 1990s. Some 200,000 Chechens, a fifth of the population, passed through the camps, where they were subjected to widespread and well-documented human rights abuses. “Filtration is a standard counterinsurgency procedure … but if a rebellion is popular — and in Chechnya it was popular — a lot of people support the rebels,” said Statiev, noting that there is no evidence that the filtration currently underway in Ukraine is comparable in terms of scale and treatment. “Russia did it on a very large scale in Chechnya, on a very large scale during the Second World War, but the scale of the current formulation is not really clear.”

The Russian government’s goal when encouraging or forcing Ukrainians to move to Russia is also unclear. Over the last several years, Russian officials dealing with a population decline have been trying to lure citizens of former Soviet countries to regions of the federation facing labor shortages, even though promises of support to those who agree to go often fall short. While some Ukrainians have chosen to move to Russia in the aftermath of their country’s invasion, Russian officials failed to articulate a vision for how the war and the destruction it wrought would serve their ultimate goals.

“I don’t think Russians are clear themselves. The trouble is that they started the war without rationally formulating the end game,” said Statiev. “We don’t really know what they would do with all those people. A great deal of them hate Russia as a state, not so much the people, but Russia as a state. And to find within your state so many people who hate you — what is the point?”

More at https://theintercept.com/2022/09/01/ukraine-russia-war-forced-deportat
ions/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, September 2, 2022 5:47 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

HRW and SECOND: both disinformation trolls.

But thanks for the wall of gibberish!

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Friday, September 2, 2022 8:21 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
HRW and SECOND: both disinformation trolls.

But thanks for the wall of gibberish!

1) Ukrainians endure abuse, forced transfer to Russia at filtration camps, report finds

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ukraine-russia-filtration-camps-human-rig
hts-watch/

Signym, was that article "disinformation" or a "wall of gibberish"?

2) “Filtration” and the Crime of Forcibly Transferring Ukrainian Civilians to Russia

https://www.hrw.org/report/2022/09/01/we-had-no-choice/filtration-and-
crime-forcibly-transferring-ukrainian-civilians

Signym, was that article "disinformation" or a "wall of gibberish"?

3) Russia’s “Filtration” Operations, Forced Disappearances, and Mass Deportations of Ukrainian Citizens

https://www.state.gov/russias-filtration-operations-forced-disappearan
ces-and-mass-deportations-of-ukrainian-citizens/

Signym, was that article "disinformation" or a "wall of gibberish"?

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, September 2, 2022 8:29 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Researchers at Yale University say they have uncovered 21 "filtration" sites in the Russian-controlled territory of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.

The researchers say these sites are used by Russian forces and their allies to process, register, interrogate and detain Ukrainians trying to leave Russian-occupied territory. Those detained can include civilians and prisoners of war.

The Yale School of Public Health's Humanitarian Research Lab (Yale HRL) in collaboration with US State Department-supported Conflict Observatory used open-source information and high-resolution satellite imagery to map them.

According to the report, there is evidence suggesting they were set up even before Russia's invasion of Ukraine began and grew following the capture of Mariupol in April.

"The conditions reported by those released from the facilities examined here can constitute cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment under international humanitarian and human rights law," the study says, adding that the "conditions include overcrowded facilities, a lack of access to adequate sanitation, insufficient food and clean water, exposure to the elements, denial of medical care, and the use of isolation."

"In some specific instances, the treatment described as having been endured by those released, such as use of electric shocks, extreme conditions of isolation, and physical assault, may potentially constitute torture if proven," the study says.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/26/europe/ukraine-filtration-camps-russian
-controlled-yale-intl/index.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, September 2, 2022 10:26 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Researchers at Yale University say they have uncovered 21 "filtration" sites in the Russian-controlled territory of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.

The researchers say these sites are used by Russian forces and their allies to process, register, interrogate and detain Ukrainians trying to leave Russian-occupied territory. Those detained can include civilians and prisoners of war.

The Yale School of Public Health's Humanitarian Research Lab (Yale HRL) in collaboration with US State Department-supported Conflict Observatory used open-source information and high-resolution satellite imagery to map them.

According to the report, there is evidence suggesting they were set up even before Russia's invasion of Ukraine began and grew following the capture of Mariupol in April.

"The conditions reported by those released from the facilities examined here can constitute cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment under international humanitarian and human rights law," the study says, adding that the "conditions include overcrowded facilities, a lack of access to adequate sanitation, insufficient food and clean water, exposure to the elements, denial of medical care, and the use of isolation."

"In some specific instances, the treatment described as having been endured by those released, such as use of electric shocks, extreme conditions of isolation, and physical assault, may potentially constitute torture if proven," the study says.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/26/europe/ukraine-filtration-camps-russian
-controlled-yale-intl/index.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Wow. What a load of horseshit.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Friday, September 2, 2022 7:49 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Ukraine’s Western Backed Gamble To Capture Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant Backfires
1 September 2022 by Larry Johnson 68 Comments

The title sums it up in a nutshell. The intelligence services of the U.K. and the United States put together a plan and directed Ukraine to carry it out–i.e., capture the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant from the Russians on the very day that UN Inspectors were scheduled to arrive. This was a highly coordinated operation. (See Andrei Martyanov’s piece on U.S. role in planning the Kherson offensive.) For example, David Ignatius, a reliable shill for the CIA, wrote a piece in the Washington Post–Ukraine’s Counteroffensive Is More Than Just Bravado. His cheerleading for Ukraine is no mere coincidence on the same day that the Ukrainian Army gambled and lost at Zaporizhzhia (warning, this is behind a firewall):

As Ukraine mounts a new counteroffensive in the southern part of the country, Zelensky’s bravado risks setting expectations too high. In truth, Ukraine probably won’t liberate its territory this year, or even next. Still, as Ukrainian forces push toward the Black Sea coast, Zelensky is delivering a defiant response to President Vladimir Putin’s claim that Ukraine is not a real country. Not only can Ukraine survive, it also can regain some of its occupied land.

The best defense is a good offense, as military strategists have argued for centuries. And if Ukraine’s drive toward the coast succeeds, it will restore the country’s economic viability by relieving pressure on its port city of Odessa. Moreover, it could threaten Russia’s occupation of Crimea by cutting into the land bridge that connects to the Russian-controlled Donbas region in the east.

The Ukrainian attempt to capture the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant consisted of two river crossings–1: seven speed boats carrying up to 60s that landed 3 kilometers northeast of the ZNP and 2: two barges launched several miles south of the ZNP manned by Ukrainian airborne forces.

The Russian Ministry of Defense provides an accurate summary of the action:

On the morning of September 1, the Kiev regime attempted a major provocation to disrupt the arrival of IAEA expert working group at Zaporozhye nuclear power plant.

??At 6:20 a.m., seven fast-moving motorboats landed on the coast of Kakhovskoye reservoir, three kilometres northeast of Zaporozhye NPP, with two sabotage groups of up to 60 people in total.

??The sabotage groups were detected and blocked in the drop-off area by Russian National Guard units guarding the territory of Zaporozhye NPP.

??A unit of the Russian Armed Forces and helicopters of the army aviation arrived to reinforce Russian Guard troops in order to suppress an attempt to enter the nuclear power plant and destroy Ukrainian saboteurs.

??At about 7:00 a.m., units of the Russian Armed Forces prevented another attempted landing to seize a nuclear power plant.

??A few kilometres from Zaporozhye NPP near Vodyanoye, an attempt was made to land a tactical airborne assault by AFU two self-propelled barges from Nikopol. Two self-propelled barges carrying tactical airborne assault of AFU are sunk as a result of the Russian Armed Forces’ shelling.

??As of 8:00 a.m., the Kiev regime has blocked the passage of IAEA expert mission from controlled territory to Zaporozhye NPP.

??Ukrainian artillery is shelling the territory of Zaporozhye NPP, the meeting place of IAEA mission with Russian specialists near Vasil’evka, as well as the route of their movement to Energodar. Four shells exploded 400 metres from the 1st unit of Zaporozhye NPP.

If Ukraine had pulled this off it would have been a major black eye for the Russians and would have put the nuclear plant back in Ukrainian hands. It would have marked the first serious victory in this war for Ukraine. If, if, if. There is an old saying, “If ifs and buts were candy and nuts it would be Christmas every day.” Christmas did not come for Ukraine. They got their ass handed to them.

The Ukrainian troops selected to carry out this operation clearly had advanced training. Some sources report that the British did the training and MI-6 had the lead in planning the operation. The CIA’s role appears to have been providing support on the information warfare front (i.e., getting Ignatius to tee up an article). Ukrainian sources are privately bitching that someone leaked the op to the Russians. It was an elaborate ambush. These are troops Ukraine could not afford to lose. There was a substantial investment in time and money to train them for this mission. I estimate at least two months were devoted to the training and equipping of these two attack elements.

This was not the brain child of the Ukrainians. This has the fingerprints of western intelligence all over it. That is why there were so many western reporters on hand. If Ukraine had succeeded, the operation would have dominated western news coverage. “Ukraine’s stunning victory.” Success would have bought Zelensky and Ukraine more time.

But this was a failure and it is likely to have some rather nasty side effects. The Ukrainians have lost some, if not all, faith in the competence and promises of the British and the American intelligence offices. I am pretty sure the Ukrainians were promised that this would be a swift victory and would catch the Russians with their pants down.

Just consider how things would look if Ukraine had pulled this off. With Ukrainian forces in control of the ZNP plant complex, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspection team would arrive and would have certified that Russia was shelling the place. In fact, with the IAEA present, it would have been crazy for Russia to try to take the facility back. Note that the IAEA team came prepared to leave some of its members behind. I would not be surprised to learn that the head of the IAEA team was briefed on the upcoming operation and was prepared to play the role assigned to him. Whoops. Russian killed those plans along with almost 100 Ukrainian troops involved in the operation.

One Telegram channel offers a dire assessment of the Ukrainian Kherson offensive:

The second wave of Ukrainian offense on Kherson ends in a predictable disaster, 2000 or more KIA, and between 5 and 6 thousands wounded. The hospitals in all the nearby large cities nearby are full. Yet, Ukrainians cling to the bridgehead near Davydov Brod, that can indicate their intent to try for the third time.

Russian intelligence uncovered the plan of Ukrainian spec op on Zaporozhye nuclear plant to capture it shortly before the IAEA mission would arrive. Some 300 elite Ukrainian elite special forces operatives lured into a trap and destroyed.

Apart from creating tensions between Ukraine and its western allies, this failure also is likely to exacerbate strife within the Ukrainian leadership. There are reports that the Ukrainian military leader, General Zaluzhny, was at odds with President Zelensky over the timing and scale of Ukraine’s “offensive”. This is not only a loss of face for Zelensky, it is likely a loss of support from key members of the Ukrainian government.

The icing on the cake for Russia came from the UN. In response to a reporter asking about the military action around the nuclear facility, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric thanked Russia:

https://sp.rmbl.ws/s8/2/5/l/3/B/5l3Bf.caa.mp4

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Saturday, September 3, 2022 7:53 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Ukraine’s Western Backed Gamble To Capture Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant Backfires
1 September 2022 by Larry Johnson 68 Comments

The original is at https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/09/ukraines-western-backed-gambl
e-capture-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-power-plant-backfire/

Signym, too bad this "Larry Johnson" doesn't exist. A rotating staff of Russian propagandists wrote every word from "Larry Johnson".

The Gateway Pundit (TGP) is an American far-right fake news website. The website is known for publishing falsehoods, hoaxes, and conspiracy theories.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gateway_Pundit

thegatewaypundit. com
A far-right political website that publishes false and misleading content. The Gateway Pundit regularly distorts information and occasionally spreads conspiracy theories.
https://www.newsguardtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/The-Gateway-P
undit-NewsGuard-Nutrition-Label.pdf

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, September 3, 2022 8:01 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Probably the item Gorbachev complained about the most has been the troubled matter of the expansion of NATO eastward. Gorbachev apparently believed that George H.W. Bush promised no such eastward expansion at the time of the 1990 reunification of Germany, although defenders of Bush note that the promise then made was specifically about no NATO troops in the former East Germany, which has apparently been kept. The Warsaw Pact still existed at that time, as did the USSR, and the idea that Poland or Estonia might be joining NATO seemed an absurdity. While US neocons have pushed for NATO to expand eastward, the fundamental push for that came from the nations who wanted to join after the Warsaw Pact and USSR broke up. The US resisted for some time the requests for it coming from Poland and the Baltic states. Perhaps George W. Bush should not have suggested that Ukraine and Georgia could join, which clearly aggravated Putin big time. But when Putin invaded Ukraine this year, it was not at all on the verge of joining NATO, and his invasion has led Sweden and Finland to join NATO.

https://angrybearblog.com/2022/09/where-will-m-s-gorbachev-be-buried

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, September 3, 2022 8:58 AM

Fuck NATO.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Saturday, September 3, 2022 9:57 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Fuck NATO.

NATO's purpose was to prevent Russia from repeating its 1945 invasion of Central and Eastern Europe. Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland and Romania became Russian puppets. 6ix, if you and Signym weren't brain damaged, you would know this. 6ix: your brain damage is from alcoholism and tobacco. Signym's damage is from chemotherapy addling the brain. Trump's damage, according to the psychologist in the family, Mary Trump (PhD), is from being dropped on his head dozens of times.

Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man
https://www.amazon.com/Too-Much-Never-Enough-Dangerous/dp/1982141468

The Reckoning: Our Nation's Trauma and Finding a Way to Heal – August 17, 2021 by Mary L. Trump
https://www.amazon.com/Reckoning-Nations-Trauma-Finding-Heal/dp/125027
8457

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, September 3, 2022 12:54 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Ukraine’s Western Backed Gamble To Capture Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant Backfires
1 September 2022 by Larry Johnson 68 Comments
The original is at https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/09/ukraines-western-backed-gambl
e-capture-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-power-plant-backfire/

Signym, too bad this "Larry Johnson" doesn't exist. A rotating staff of Russian propagandists wrote every word from "Larry Johnson".

The Gateway Pundit (TGP) is an American far-right fake news website. The website is known for publishing falsehoods, hoaxes, and conspiracy theories.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gateway_Pundit

thegatewaypundit. com
A far-right political website that publishes false and misleading content. The Gateway Pundit regularly distorts information and occasionally spreads conspiracy theories.
https://www.newsguardtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/The-Gateway-P
undit-NewsGuard-Nutrition-Label.pdf

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Unlike you, SECOND, Larry Johnson actually exists.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Saturday, September 3, 2022 1:54 PM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Unlike you, SECOND, Larry Johnson actually exists.

Prove it, Signym. Gateway Pundit is a front for Russia. Its motto: "GATEWAY PUNDIT
We report the truth — and leave the Russia-Collusion fairy tale to the Conspiracy media"

Just that motto (but everything published also proves the same point) is the proof that nobody writing on Gateway Pundit are who they claim to be. The Mueller Report proved that Russia did interfere with the 2016 election and that Trump obstructed Mueller.

A) Russia engaged in extensive attacks on the U.S. election system in 2016
B) The Special Counsel investigation uncovered extensive criminal activity
C) Special Counsel Mueller declined to exonerate President Trump and instead detailed multiple episodes in which he engaged in obstructive conduct

https://www.acslaw.org/projects/the-presidential-investigation-educati
on-project/other-resources/key-findings-of-the-mueller-report/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, September 3, 2022 2:32 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
SECOND: Prove it

Larry Johnson has his own blog, his own entry in Wikipedia, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_C._Johnson and many videos. He's real person that even the stupidest "leftist" acknowledges exists and is who he says he is.

If you really exist, you're stupider than the stupidest leftist. If not, you're a very badly written construct that can't even track what it posts from one to the next, much less track reality.
Troll.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Sunday, September 4, 2022 8:19 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

As of Aug 30

Ukraine Does Damage Control As counter Attack Falters
https://sonar21.com/ukraine-does-damage-control-as-counter-attack-falt
ers/

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Sunday, September 4, 2022 10:03 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Fuck NATO.
NATO's purpose was to prevent Russia from repeating its 1945 invasion of Central and Eastern Europe.

NATO's original purpose was fulfilled decades upon decades ago and was only supposed to be a temporary measure.

But like any other power bubble, the people who had that power have found other reasons to hold that power over everyone else, for generations now.

FUCK NATO. Fuck Globalism. Fuck Globalist Democrats around the world and their Neo-Con counterparts twice. Fuck Obama. Fuck Joe Biden*.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Friday, September 9, 2022 10:16 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I see Ukraine's blazing hot sun of attention is setting. It seems TPTB have created such a distractible mob they can't even focus attention on "crisis" long enough to fulfill their goals (whatever they are).

Quote:
Well, lest The Event that is Ukraine sinks below the horizon

Ukraine's Top General Doesn't Rule Out "Limited" Nuclear War

Ukraine’s top military chief has warned that Russia could unleash nukes if its army is against the ropes in Ukraine. The comments were issued Wednesday amid an ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive in the south and east which both Kiev and Washington say has so far had "success".

Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Gen. Valery Zaluzhny stated "There is a direct threat of the use, under certain circumstances, of tactical nuclear weapons by the Russian armed forces." He wrote this in an op-ed published by state run outlet Ukrinform, with the alarming words being picked up by The Washington Post and others.

"So send us more $$$!"
/snicker

In the meantime, a roundup from south to north...

Kievs much talked about counteroffensive in Kherson oblast (province)failed with heavy losses of troops (10,000 KIA?) and armored vehicles. Kherson oblast is just north of Crimea. The next step westward from Kherson is Mikolyaiv, and west of that is Odessa, the last oblast on the Black Sea and containing the important and historic port city of Odessa.

To the east of Kherson is Zaparizhzhya oblast. It's about 2/3 occupied by Russia and allied forces, including the important Zaparizhzhya nuclear power plant (NPP) which is (was?) being shelled by Kiev, but the front is essentially static.

Counter clockwise along Ukraine's border and north of Zaparizhzhya is Dontesk oblast. Russian and allied forces occupy the largest cities of Mariupol and Donetsk city. Russian and allied forces are slowly grinding westward, the Wagner Groups just took Podema, which is one step away from Bakhmut, which sits on the intersection of two important crossroads.

To the north of that is Luhansk, fully occupied. To the west of that is Kharkiv oblast and Kharkiv city. The eastern portion was occupied by Russian and allied forces, but lightly defended by local militia and border guards. This weak area was attacked by Kiev where they made inroads towards a number of villages.

So, in areas of active fighting:
Failed Kiev offensive with heavy losses in Kherson.
Slow progress by Russian and allied forces towards Bakhmut in Donetsk oblast
Surprise attack with territorial gains in Kharkiv.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

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Friday, September 9, 2022 10:20 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I see Ukraine's blazing hot sun of attention is setting. It seems TPTB have created such a distractible mob they can't even focus attention on "crisis" like ng enough to fulfill their goals (whatever they are).

They NEVER really cared.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Friday, September 9, 2022 11:55 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I see Ukraine's blazing hot sun of attention is setting. It seems TPTB have created such a distractible mob they can't even focus attention on "crisis" like ng enough to fulfill their goals (whatever they are).

They NEVER really cared.

Ukraine's Eastern Advance Puts Forces Close to Key Town

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-s-eastern-advance-puts-fo
rces-close-to-key-town/ar-AA11CE38

Ukrainian forces advanced on the strategic city of Kupyansk on Friday, threatening to isolate thousands of Russian troops further south and prompting Moscow to send reinforcements.

Over the past three days, Ukrainian forces have advanced almost 50 kilometers, or about 31 miles, in the northeastern Kharkiv region, achieving their biggest breakthrough in months of grinding combat.

Images of the Ukrainian flag being raised over local government buildings and residents greeting soldiers with tears of joy have boosted morale across the country after months on the defensive. One video showed Ukrainian soldiers in the city of Balakliya clambering on top of an armored personnel carrier to tear down a banner reading, “We are with Russia! One people!”

“It is very difficult for us, but we are moving forward,” the commander of Ukraine’s armed forces, Lt. Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, said on the Defense Ministry’s Twitter account. An accompanying video showed civilians rejoicing at the return of Ukrainian forces after six months under Russian occupation.

The surprise offensive has put Ukrainian forces near Kupyansk, a city of some 30,000 before the war that is a critical road hub for the resupply and movement of Russian occupation forces. Control over that city would isolate Russian forces to the south in Izyum, which Moscow had sought to use as a staging ground for its own offensive.

The Russian occupation authorities said Friday that the situation in Kupyansk remained difficult but the military was able to hold the city, Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported. They said no Ukrainian units have managed to penetrate into the Kupyansk city.

A video published by Russia’s Ministry of Defense on Friday showed the Russian military moving armored vehicles and personnel in the direction of Kharkiv.

Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, Vasily Nebenzya, late Thursday dismissed reports of a breakthrough by Ukrainian troops during their counteroffensive, according to RIA Novosti. He said that the Ukrainian military managed to take only a few peripheral villages, and “there is no talk of any breakthrough.”

Russian military correspondents, however, said Russian forces were preparing to defend Kupyansk. Losing the city would severely degrade but not completely sever Russia’s ground lines of communication to Izyum, according to the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, predicting that Ukrainian forces would recapture it within days.

Despite the gains, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken stressed Russia’s “significant resources” a day after meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv.

“Unfortunately, tragically, horrifically, President Putin has demonstrated that he will throw a lot of people into this at huge cost to Russia,” Mr. Blinken said. “This [the war] is likely to go on for some significant period of time.”

Last week, Ukraine also launched an offensive in the southern Kherson region, but progress there has been slower.

Six months into the war, Kyiv has been under growing pressure to show Western partners it can convert billions of dollars of military support into meaningful gains on the battlefield.

The arrival of long-range precision artillery from the West helped slow Russia’s goal of capturing the whole of the eastern Donbas area in recent months. But Ukrainian forces hadn’t regained significant territory since their resistance around Kyiv compelled Russian forces to pull back from there in March.

In the east, Ukrainian forces had gradually ceded territory to Russian forces advancing behind a wall of artillery fire that laid waste to towns and villages.

In July, Ukraine said it was preparing an offensive to retake territory in Kherson, drawing Russian troops away from other stretches of the 1,100-mile front line. That left them stretched thinner in places including Kharkiv, where Ukrainian forces punched through their defenses on Tuesday.

Since then, Ukrainian forces have made rapid progress, retaking some 20 villages and towns, including Balakliya, according to officials. A video purportedly filmed in Balakliya showed tearful women embracing Ukrainian soldiers on their doorstep and offering them pancakes.

Photographs from another village retaken by Ukrainian forces in recent days showed the sign at the entrance to Shevchenkovo had already been repainted in the yellow and blue of the Ukrainian flag.

“The clean-up is still ongoing,” said Oleh Synehubov, the head of the Kharkiv regional military administration. “The police and other services are returning to the liberated settlements. The work of state authorities is being resumed.”

Russian occupation authorities in Kupyansk said Thursday they would evacuate women and children as Ukrainian forces closed in. In villages occupied by Russia, there were posts in local chat groups urging residents to identify collaborators.

The general staff of Ukraine’s army said Russian forces were seeking to evacuate wounded personnel and damaged equipment near Vilkhuvatka and Borodoyarske. Fifteen soldiers were captured trying to escape back to Russia in civilian clothing, it said.

In the south and east, Ukrainian forces have retaken around 1,000 square kilometers, Mr. Zelensky said Thursday—about 385 square miles, more than the land area of New York City—since the start of September.

Presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said the successes proved Ukraine could effectively use modern Western weaponry to de-occupy its territory.

The gains are “creating fissures within the Russian information space and eroding confidence in Russian command,” the Institute for the Study of War said.

Facing setbacks in the east, Russia has intensified strikes on Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, in recent days. Mayor Ihor Terekhov said Russian artillery fire on Friday had wounded 10 people, damaging a kindergarten and private homes.

Write to Isabel Coles at isabel.coles@wsj.com

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-s-eastern-advance-puts-fo
rces-close-to-key-town/ar-AA11CE38

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, September 9, 2022 12:42 PM

Shut up, meat popsicle.

Your time is over.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Friday, September 9, 2022 12:47 PM