Russia Invades Ukraine. Again by captaincrunch

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

Russia Scraps Population Census As War Casualties Mount

By Amir Daftari | Oct 02, 2024 at 4:37 PM EDT

https://www.newsweek.com/russia-suspends-population-census-till-2029-1
962581

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a federal law suspending part of the All-Russian Population Census.

According to some sources, this measure is intended to hide Russian society from the demographic impact that the casualties in Ukraine are having on the population.

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Thursday, October 3, 2024 5:21 AM

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Fearing public discontent, the Kremlin tells Russian state media not to report on its defense spending hike

9:25 am, October 2, 2024

https://meduza.io/en/feature/2024/10/02/it-could-become-a-trigger-fear
ing-public-discontent-the-kremlin-tells-russian-state-media-not-to-report-on-its-defense-spending-hike

In late September, the Russian government submitted a draft budget for 2025–2027 to the State Duma for approval. The plan calls for a record-setting 41 percent of federal spending to go to national security and defense, leaving little doubt that the war in Ukraine is the Kremlin’s top priority. With many citizens struggling economically amid ongoing inflation and labor shortages, however, the Putin administration fears that news of a military spending boost will hurt the authorities’ approval ratings — and has instructed the pro-Kremlin media to cover the budget accordingly, Meduza’s sources say.

The Putin administration is worried the government’s new budget will “create a negative perception among citizens” and could lead to a decline in the government’s approval ratings, two sources close to the president’s political team told Meduza.

Immediately after Bloomberg published an article on the planned defense spending increase on September 23, the Putin administration sent instructions to Russia’s state-backed and pro-Kremlin media telling them to ignore the report, the sources said. Two sources from these media outlets confirmed this to Meduza; one said that officials told reporters “not to touch this topic” because “the budget hasn’t been passed yet.”

One week later, on the eve of the budget’s submission, pro-Kremlin outlets received new instructions: this time, they were told to present the budget as a primarily “social” one and to avoid discussing war spending altogether. “The only exception is payments to military personnel and support for their families,” said one state media employee, explaining that these fall under “social spending.”

The Bell has also reported that the Russian government asked the pro-Kremlin media “not to promote” news related to tax increases or mandatory payments, or to cover these topics in a positive light.

Meduza’s sources also stressed that the budget is “not supposed to be a taboo topic” overall, but that media coverage of it should “emphasize the right things.” “It’s better if the overall narrative is positive and social,” one source said.

A source close to the Putin administration added:

Opinion polls indicate that rising prices are one of the biggest problems right now, and people generally suspect that it’s because of the special military operation. It’s also hard to overlook social problems like the shortage of doctors and teachers. These issues are already evident, but when everyone reads that “military spending has increased,” sees billions added to the budget, and notices “social” problems getting even worse, the conclusion will be obvious: “The authorities are not managing things well.” And this can lead to declining approval ratings.

According to another source close to the president’s team, the Kremlin wants media coverage of the budget to inspire “social optimism, not pessimism, in the context that everything is going towards the war.” The source continued: “The messaging around the special military operation’s goals is still unclear. So far, it’s been possible to portray military activity as happening somewhere far away and not affecting people directly. But the increase in military spending could become a trigger: What is the money being spent on and why?”

Meduza reviewed coverage of the budget from pro-Kremlin and Russian state media so far. Their reporting is consistent with the Kremlin’s “recommendations,” keeping largely silent about military spending and instead emphasizing that the plan will “allow for increased funding for obligations, programs, and projects” while maintaining that the “distribution of social spending is quite fair.” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has described the budget as “carefully balanced and well-considered.”

Two sources close to the Putin administration said they expect the topic of war spending to “fade from the information landscape” in the near future. “It has another negative effect: if money for the special military operation is allocated in the 2025 budget, citizens might think, ‘Well, this means the war will definitely last at least another year.’ And society is very tired of war,” one source said.

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Thursday, October 3, 2024 5:25 AM

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Ukraine continues efforts to expand domestic production of significant military equipment and maintain its drone advantage over Russia. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stated on October 1 that Ukrainian companies can currently produce four million drones annually and that Ukraine has already contracted the domestic production of 1.5 million drones (presumably in 2024).[1] Russian President Vladimir Putin recently claimed that Russia plans to increase drone production by tenfold to 1.4 million drones in 2024, which will be lower than the two million drones that Ukraine aims to produce in 2024.[2] Zelensky also stated that Ukraine can produce 15 "Bohdan" self-propelled artillery systems every month and recently conducted a successful flight test for an unspecified domestically produced ballistic missile.[3] Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov stated on October 2 that Ukraine will continue prioritizing domestic production of drones and long-range missiles, including ballistic missiles.[4] Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal stated on October 2 that Ukraine has allocated $7 billion for the purchase of weapons and military equipment in the Ukrainian draft 2025 state budget — a 65 percent increase from the 2024 state budget.[5] Shmyhal stated that Ukraine increased domestic weapons production by a factor of three in 2023 and by factor of two in the first eight months of 2024.[6] ISW continues to assess that Ukrainian efforts to expand domestic military production will allow Ukraine to reduce its dependence on Western military assistance in the long-term, but that Ukraine still requires considerable Western assistance for the next several years in order to defend against Russian aggression and liberate strategically vital areas that Russian forces currently occupy.[7]

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-october-2-2024

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Thursday, October 3, 2024 6:23 AM

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Ukraine ATACMS Strikes Destroy Long-Range Russian Radar Station Worth $100M

By Ellie Cook | Oct 03, 2024 at 5:28 AM EDT

https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-hit-russian-radar-station-ballistic-m
issile-1962374

Ukrainian forces have struck a valuable Russian radar station using U.S.-supplied long-range missiles, Kyiv said on Thursday, in a move that could disrupt Moscow's air defenses and open up Russian targets to further Ukrainian attacks using sophisticated Western weapons.

Ukraine destroyed a Russian Nebo-M long-range radar station in an unspecified location, Kyiv's military said in a statement posted to social media, without giving further details.

"Its destruction significantly reduces the ability of the Russian army to detect, track and intercept aerodynamic and ballistic targets," Ukraine's military said.

Newsweek couldn't independently verify the report, and has reached out to the Russian defense ministry for comment via email.

Reports from late May suggested Ukraine had used U.S.-donated Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) ground-launched missiles to target a Nebo-M radar in the Russian-controlled eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk.

The Nebo-M is "very complex" and able to operate in "stealth mode," Ukraine's military said on Thursday.

Russia has just ten Nebo-M radar stations remaining, Kyiv said, putting the cost of each system at more than $100 million.

Taking out the radar station will help Ukraine to effectively wield its British Storm Shadow and French SCALP air-launched cruise missiles, the Ukrainian military added.

This is a breaking story and will be updated shortly.

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Thursday, October 3, 2024 9:49 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Nobody cares.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.
Belligerence, apathy and ignorance packed into an entity named 6ixStringJack.

6ix makes comments on everything http://fireflyfans.net/mthreaduser.aspx?u=20928

For example there is a thread started in 2016: "islamic Shootings, bombs, swords, sudden jihad in Dhaka, Bangladesh...reports of islamics hanging Hindus from Bridges and Hanging people off Lamp post Street Lights just like the Taliban do"

6ix contributed to that thread by venting his spleen: http://fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=60653&mid=12027
90#1202790

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Another great post.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.

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Friday, October 4, 2024 8:11 AM

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

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-october-3-2024

Russian authorities continue to nationalize Russian enterprises for the benefit of the federal government. Russian state outlet RBK reported on October 3 that the Russian Government submitted amendments to the Russian State Duma that would legally oblige Russian state corporations to pay 50 percent of the market value of their nationalized assets to the Russian federal budget starting in 2025.[75] The Kremlin has intensified efforts to nationalize Russian enterprises, particularly defense enterprises, in recent months, and this amendment would augment the Russian federal government's direct financial benefit from these nationalization efforts.[76]

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Friday, October 4, 2024 8:35 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-october-3-2024

Russian authorities continue to nationalize Russian enterprises for the benefit of the federal government. Russian state outlet RBK reported on October 3 that the Russian Government submitted amendments to the Russian State Duma that would legally oblige Russian state corporations to pay 50 percent of the market value of their nationalized assets to the Russian federal budget starting in 2025.[75] The Kremlin has intensified efforts to nationalize Russian enterprises, particularly defense enterprises, in recent months, and this amendment would augment the Russian federal government's direct financial benefit from these nationalization efforts.[76]

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

What do you care? Democrats in America hate Capitalism. At least the college "educated" ones under 35 years old all do.

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

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He will also be your next President.

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Friday, October 4, 2024 9:15 AM

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Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

What do you care? Democrats in America hate Capitalism. At least the college "educated" ones under 35 years old all do.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.

Two things: nationalizing the Russian defense industry means Putin wants for himself and his favorite people a bigger cut of the money being spent on weapons. The second thing is that slavery was pure Capitalism. Slavery was hated because it cheated the workers (the slaves) for the benefit of a more lush lifestyle for plantation owners. Capitalism continues cheating workers for the benefit of a more luscious lifestyle for the business owners. On top of that, the business owners have modern schemes that plantation owners could have never dreamed of for cheating their customers, too.

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Friday, October 4, 2024 9:54 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

What do you care? Democrats in America hate Capitalism. At least the college "educated" ones under 35 years old all do.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.
Two things: nationalizing the Russian defense industry means Putin wants for himself and his favorite people a bigger cut of the money being spent on weapons. The second thing is that slavery was pure Capitalism. Slavery was hated because it cheated the workers (the slaves) for the benefit of a more lush lifestyle for plantation owners. Capitalism continues cheating workers for the benefit of a more luscious lifestyle for the business owners. On top of that, the business owners have modern schemes that plantation owners could have never dreamed of for cheating their customers, too.

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

Well don't worry about it.

Your guys and gals are going to make sure Capitalism dies and we all own nothing and love it.

Don't take my word for it. Just go watch some of those WEF videos online. They have so much power and influence that they're untouchable now. 20 years ago anybody talking about those WEF meetings was called a conspiracy theorist. Now they talk about it and upload it to YouTube themselves. All while John Kerry tells everyone at the WEF that the 1st Amendment of the US Constitution is their biggest problem and they need to take care of that.

I mean... You do watch these things, right? They're not even hidden from you anymore. If you haven't, maybe you should stop downloading and watching shitty Hollywood movies that you know are going to be shitty and take some time and watch what these people have to say about us and how they talk about us.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.

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Saturday, October 5, 2024 8:16 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:

Well don't worry about it.

Your guys and gals are going to make sure Capitalism dies and we all own nothing and love it.

Don't take my word for it. Just go watch some of those WEF videos online. They have so much power and influence that they're untouchable now. 20 years ago anybody talking about those WEF meetings was called a conspiracy theorist. Now they talk about it and upload it to YouTube themselves. All while John Kerry tells everyone at the WEF that the 1st Amendment of the US Constitution is their biggest problem and they need to take care of that.

I mean... You do watch these things, right? They're not even hidden from you anymore. If you haven't, maybe you should stop downloading and watching shitty Hollywood movies that you know are going to be shitty and take some time and watch what these people have to say about us and how they talk about us.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.

6ixStringJack, you are a very predictable Trumptard. I have these bird-brain Trumptards chirping around me all day long, making the same sounds you do. They think of themselves as sensible and they won't go silent.

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

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Saturday, October 5, 2024 8:18 AM

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‘Drunk’ colonel sending troops to their deaths sparks Russian TV row

Angry women denounce Col Alexei Ksenofontov for ordering loved ones to undertake suicide missions

By James Kilner | 04 October 2024 5:31pm BST

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/10/04/drunk-colonel-sendin
g-troops-deaths-russian-tv-row/

A Kremlin propaganda ploy to deflect criticism away from a “drunk” front-line commander renowned for ordering soldiers on suicide missions has backfired.

Vladimir Solovyov, the host of state TV Rossiya-One’s daily chat show, last month described soldiers’ widows as liars for accusing Col Alexei Ksenofontov of being drunk and then sending their husbands to their deaths.

He told his audience that he personally knew Col Ksenofontov, who was made a “Hero of Russia” in April.

“Alexei is a normal commander, a thinking commander capable of competently preparing and carrying out a task,” he said. “They have slandered a hero.”

But instead of silencing the mourning women, Mr Solovyov’s intervention has heaped more embarrassment onto the Kremlin by triggering new accusations and given ordinary Russians a rare glimpse of the medieval techniques used by their military commanders.

Astra, the Russian opposition Telegram news channel that published the original complaints, said it had received dozens of messages in the past few weeks from angry women.

“After his [show], dozens of relatives of the military contacted the editorial office responding to Solovyov,” it said this week, before posting several more accusations on its Telegram channel.

Some of these criticisms were also posted directly on social media channels.

One woman wrote on the Kremlin-controlled VK social media website that she wanted Col Ksenofontov, whose call sign is “Tiger”, to die as her husband had.

“Solovyov, interview all of us. Look how many women are cursing your Ksenofontov. Talk to the women who wish death to the Tiger,” she wrote.

Criticising the Russian army comes at great risk for people living in Russia. Police arrest people for the slightest indiscretion and charge them with “discrediting the Russian army”, which carries a prison sentence.

Mothers and wives of soldiers in Russia were considered to have some leeway for criticising the government, but earlier this year, police detained several women and have now classified a group that had pushed for men mobilised into the army in 2022 to be given a break as a “foreign agent”. This is a derogatory term and makes it far harder for the group to operate.

Even so, in new comments published this week by Astra, Alina Bolvinova described how a drunk Col Ksenofontov had ordered her husband on a suicide mission near the town of Avdiivka in February without ammunition for his rifle.

“They were sent out as cannon fodder,” she said. “Can a mentally healthy person give such orders? A person who does not enjoy killing. I think not.”

The Kremlin has deployed mass infantry tactics over the past few months to push forward its front line, suffering more than 1,000 casualties every day.

The Russian military leadership has been heavily criticised throughout the war for its barbaric methods.

Last month, two Russian drone operators posted a video accusing their commander of ordering them on a suicide mission in revenge for an argument. Another video showed an enraged Russian commander punching young soldiers in the face.

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

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Sunday, October 6, 2024 7:20 AM

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

The Russian Government plans to allocate 90 billion rubles ($948 million) to one-time payments for concluding a military contract with the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) between 2025 and 2027, indicating that the Kremlin plans to continue relying on ongoing crypto-mobilization efforts to meet the manpower requirements of its war in Ukraine for as long as the crypto-mobilization system works.[1] The Russian federal government currently offers 400,000 rubles ($4,200) one-time payments for signing a military contract (in addition to one-time payments offered by regional governments, some of which recently exceed one million rubles), suggesting that the Kremlin intends to recruit 225,000 new personnel through contract service between 2025 and 2027, assuming current rates hold, which is unlikely given these rates have steadily increased since 2022.[2] Russian authorities have significantly increased financial incentives, particularly one-time payments, in recent months for signing military contracts, and the Kremlin may have allocated 90 billion rubles to one-time payments with the intent of further raising federal payments between 2025 and 2027.[3] Russian authorities have reportedly expressed concerns that ongoing recruitment efforts are producing diminishing results, however, and the significant increase in financial incentives in recent months suggests that existing recruitment efforts were insufficient for maintaining the consistent generation of new forces that the Russian military relies on for sustaining its offensive tempo in Ukraine.[4] ISW assesses that there are medium- to long-term constraints on how many recruits the ongoing Russian crypto-mobilization campaign can generate, and increased financial incentives are unlikely to significantly address these constraints.[5] Russian President Vladimir Putin remains committed to the ongoing crypto-mobilization campaign in order to avoid declaring another widely unpopular partial mobilization call-up of reservists, although he maintains the option to call another round of partial mobilization — as he did in Fall 2022.[6] Putin and the Russian military command appear unwilling to accept reducing the intensity of Russian combat operations in Ukraine since they view maintaining the theater-wide initiative as a strategic imperative, and it remains unclear whether Putin will respond with another round of mobilization if faced with another crisis similar to or worse than the crisis the Kremlin faced in Fall 2022.[7]

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-october-5-2024

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Sunday, October 6, 2024 10:10 AM

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KYIV, Oct 5 (Reuters) - Ukraine will present its "victory plan" to its allies in Germany next weekend, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday, setting up a test of support for Kyiv's vision on ending the war with Russia.

"We will present the victory plan, clear, specific steps for a just end to the war," Zelenskiy wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

Zelenskiy will meet U.S. President Joe Biden and other leaders at a regular meeting of Kyiv's key NATO and other allies at the U.S. Ramstein Air Base on Oct. 12.

Russia's President Vladimir Putin said in June that Moscow would end the war he launched in February 2022 only if Kyiv agreed to hand over all of four regions claimed by Moscow and to drop its ambitions to join NATO. Kyiv rejected those demands as tantamount to surrender.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraines-zelenskiy-present-victor
y-plan-ramstein-meeting-2024-10-05/

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Monday, October 7, 2024 5:52 AM

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Israel vs Ukraine: Why US-Led NATO Finds Its Easy To 'Shoot Down' Missile & UAV Strikes On Israel Than Ukraine?

By Ashish Dangwal | October 5, 2024

https://www.eurasiantimes.com/israel-vs-ukraine-why-us-led-nato-finds/

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called for stronger NATO support to protect Ukraine’s airspace following discussions with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.

Zelenskyy expressed hope that NATO countries will reevaluate their position on supplying Ukraine with improved air defense systems akin to the protection they offer Israel against missile and drone threats.

During a joint press conference, Zelenskyy said that there was no fundamental difference between defending Israeli skies from Iranian missiles and drones and defending Ukraine from Russian missile strikes and Iran-made Shahed drones.

He noted the close connection between Russia and Iran in providing these lethal weapons, which have become a central concern for Ukraine’s defense efforts.

Zelenskyy said, “Today, we discussed Ukraine’s air defense needs and cooperation with neighboring countries. We see how lives in the Middle East are safeguarded through unity among our allies,”

“Joint efforts to shoot down Iranian missiles are no different from shooting down Russian ones or Iranian-delivered Shahed drones,” Zelenskyy added.

He expressed his belief that NATO’s approach to assist Ukraine in defending its skies could evolve in the future. “More determination from partners in our region is needed to put an end to Russian terror. We will continue to persuade our partners,” he added.

However, Secretary General Rutte avoided directly addressing the possibility of NATO shooting down Russian missiles over Ukraine. Zelenskyy acknowledged that, for now, “the allies are not ready” to provide full protection for Ukraine’s airspace.

This isn’t the first occasion Zelenskyy has made this appeal. He previously mentioned that the response to the attack on Israel demonstrated that NATO members were capable of defending non-member countries and could similarly safeguard Ukraine, which is not part of the military alliance.

“Israel is not a NATO member, so no action, such as triggering Article 5, was required,” he stated, referring to the alliance’s collective defense clause.

This call for stronger NATO involvement comes as discussions intensify in neighboring countries like Poland and Romania. Poland’s Foreign Minister previously suggested that nations bordering Ukraine should intercept Russian missiles before they cross into NATO airspace.

While this was clarified as a personal opinion, Romania is reportedly considering legislative changes that would permit the downing of drones entering its airspace. The country has seen multiple instances of Shahed drones crashing in its territory, raising concerns about the growing threat to NATO members bordering Ukraine.

Why West Cannot Help Ukraine Shoot Down Drones Like Israel?

The United States and the United Kingdom have clarified that they will not assist Ukraine in repelling Russian attacks. The White House has already announced that it will not engage in shooting down drones for Ukraine despite doing the same for Israel.

In early 2024, John Kirby, the National Security Council’s Strategic Communications Coordinator, explained that the situations in Ukraine and Israel were fundamentally different, describing them as distinct conflicts with varying airspace and threat patterns.

He said that since the beginning of the conflict, President Biden has consistently communicated that the United States does not plan to engage in hostilities in Ukraine.

Kirby warned that avoiding direct clashes between NATO and Russian troops was essential to prevent a broader war in Europe, as such confrontations could escalate the situation. While Ukraine required sophisticated air defense systems such as the Patriot missile system to counter threats successfully, he noted that the UK did not possess these systems.

Dara Massicot, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, pointed out several practical factors that made it easy to defend Israel from aerial attacks. Israel’s smaller geographical size allowed the creation of consolidated and layered air defense systems.

Additionally, Israel can utilize aircraft in its airspace to intercept incoming missiles and drones.

Moreover, Israeli allies can deploy ballistic missile defenses from ships in the Mediterranean and utilize fighters from regional airbases for cruise missile defense if necessary. In contrast, Ukraine’s Black Sea coast is largely inaccessible to the United States due to the restrictions brought in by Turkey.

Massicot added that the United States has had no ships capable of ballistic missile defense in the Black Sea due to Turkey’s closure of the Bosphorus Straits to most warships.

However, the US does have warplanes in Europe capable of intercepting Russian cruise missiles and Shahed drones over parts of Ukraine, but this would require Washington to establish a no-fly zone over the country.

Ben Hodges, a former general of the US Army Europe, pointed out that Ukraine was facing a more sophisticated enemy. He stated that Iranian attacks do not match the quality or capabilities of Russian assaults on Ukraine.

Furthermore, Ukraine does not receive the same level of military support that Israel does. Hodges noted, “Jordan and even Saudi Arabia are actively helping to defend Israel, with aircraft/pilots and with munitions. Ukraine has zero active help and gets only a smattering of what it needs to defend itself.”

Although Ukraine could benefit from utilizing Israel’s Iron Dome system to protect key cities, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ruled out providing this technology to Kyiv. Nonetheless, Hodges emphasized that Israel’s defense strategies offer valuable lessons for Ukraine.

He asserted that both Iran and Russia are willing to launch numerous drones, rockets, and missiles against civilian targets, highlighting the importance of extensive air and missile defense capabilities to protect civilian populations, power grids, and critical infrastructure. He called for increased support and enhanced military capabilities for Ukraine and NATO.

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

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Monday, October 7, 2024 8:34 AM

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

Hint, Hint: If Ukraine doesn't surrender, Russia will nuke the USA. Or Worse!

Details Withheld to Allow Your Panicky Imagination to Fill In What Ultimate Horrors Russia Has Planned.

Exclusive: Russia's Lavrov Warns of 'Dangerous Consequences' for US in Ukraine

Published Oct 07, 2024 at 5:00 AM EDT

https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-russias-lavrov-warns-dangerous-cons
equences-us-ukraine-1964468

The United States will face "dangerous consequences" if it presses on with growing military aid to Ukraine rather than backing a proposed Russian settlement that would see Moscow take over swathes of territory, the man serving as Russian President Vladimir Putin's top diplomat for 20 years said in exclusive responses to Newsweek questions.

Lavrov said, "On the whole, it would be natural for the White House resident, no matter who they are, to mind their domestic business, rather than looking for adventures tens of thousands miles away from American coasts. I am confident that U.S. electors think the same."

Unfortunately, Lavrov who was raised on kilometers rather than miles, did not realize that "tens of thousands of miles away" means going around the world's circumference and alighting right back where you started.

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

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Tuesday, October 8, 2024 6:41 AM

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

Ukrainian Drones Cause Panic Among Russian Troops

By Kathrine Frich | Oct.08 - 2024 11:54 AM CET

https://www.dagens.com/war/ukrainian-drone-causes-major-collision-and-
panic-on-the-frontlines

Ukrainian forces have intensified their use of drones, specifically the FPV (first-person view) models known as "Baba Yaga," to target Russian logistics on the front lines.

Panic Among Russian Troops

This shift has made Russian civilian vehicles, particularly the UAZ-452 Buchanka, a prime target, sparking panic among Russian troops.

These vehicles, once considered a reliable part of Russia's military logistics, are now vulnerable to Ukrainian drone attacks, according to WP.

Reports indicate that Ukrainian drones can now strike from distances of over 6 miles (10 kilometers), significantly affecting the last leg of Russian supply lines.

As Russia faces shortages of armored vehicles, the Buchanka has become increasingly popular for logistical support, offering decent off-road capabilities and reasonable payload capacity.

However, its civilian nature means it is particularly susceptible to drone strikes, causing heightened anxiety among Russian drivers. In one recent incident, a UAZ-452 fleeing from a drone collided with another of its kind, exemplifying the chaos these attacks can create and leading to panic on the front lines.

Using Commercial Drones

To address their deficiencies in modern weaponry, Ukrainian forces have turned to commercial drones equipped with outdated munitions, transforming them into effective weapons.

While Russian forces have attempted to counteract these drones using jamming devices, the effectiveness of these measures is limited, typically reaching only about 1,640 feet (500 meters).

Exceptions exist, such as the military-grade R-330Z Zhytel, capable of disrupting signals over larger areas, but these solutions are not foolproof.

The improvised nature of Ukrainian drones, often constructed from commercial parts, has proven effective. FPV drones cost less than $1,000 and can be easily assembled with components available in the market.

Armed with grenades capable of penetrating substantial armor, these drones present a serious threat to Russian ground operations.

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

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Tuesday, October 8, 2024 7:54 AM

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

The USA has thousands of M-1 tanks in storage but sent only 31 to Ukraine because, you know, Biden does not want to provoke Putin into nukin' the USA (It is really stupid for Biden to be so fearful but he is old and shaky. What else would you expect from a guy with his particularly non-pugnacious history? Physical bravery? Not gonna happen.)

Ukraine’s Up-Armored, Drone-Jamming M-1A1 Abrams Tanks Are The Ultimate M-1A1s

But there aren’t many of these tanks left.

By David Axe | Oct 7, 2024, 03:40pm EDT

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2024/10/07/ukraines-up-armored-d
rone-jamming-m-1a1-abrams-tanks-are-the-ultimate-m-1a1s/

After fighting in many of the bloodiest battles in Russia’s wider war on Ukraine for 15 months straight, the Ukrainian army’s elite 47th Mechanized Brigade finally rotated off the eastern front line early last month for a well-earned period of rest and reset.

The brigade took with it the survivors of 31 American-made M-1 Abrams tanks that equipped the unit’s sole tank battalion. Those tanks have gotten some badly needed upgrades.

A video the 47th Mechanized Brigade posted on or around Monday depicts some of the unit’s surviving tanks in training. The 69-ton, four-person M-1s sport U.S.-made reactive armor blocks on their sides and Ukrainian-made reactive armor blocks on their turrets as locally-crafted anti-drone cage armor and drone-grounding radio jammers.

Ukraine’s 2000s-vintage M-1A1 Situational Awareness models aren’t the best-protected Abrams—that honorific belongs to the latest U.S. Army M-1A2s—but the Ukrainian Abrams might be the most modified. The modifications are tailored for defeating two main threats: anti-tank missiles and explosive drones. The reactive armor explodes outward to deflect the missiles’ warheads. The cage armor and jammer disable and block explosive drones.

In piling mods onto its Abrams, the 47th Mechanized Brigade is doing its best to preserve the tanks it has left for as long as it can. The United States has obligingly shipped hundreds of surplus M-2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles in order to keep the 47th Mechanized Brigade’s assault battalions fully equipped with modern vehicles despite those battalions suffering heavy losses.

Weirdly, the United States has not shipped replacement M-1s. Those first 31 Abrams, which arrived in Ukraine a year ago, are the only Abrams the Americans have pledged, despite there being literally thousands of the tanks in storage in the United States.

How many M-1s the 47th Mechanized Brigade has left is unclear. The analysts at the intelligence collective Oryx have tallied six destroyed Abrams and eight damaged or abandoned ones. It’s typical for tank units to try to tow away and repair immobilized vehicles, but it’s hard to say how many of its abandoned Abrams the 47th Mechanized Brigade managed to recover as it fought mostly rearguard actions in eastern Ukraine from last winter through the early fall.

At most, the 47th Mechanized Brigade has 25 M-1s left. At a minimum, it might have just 17. But it’s a safe bet all the survivors now have the add-on armor and jammers. They’ll roll back into battle better-protected than ever—potentially delaying the day when the brigade has too few tanks to form a cohesive fighting force.

If the 47th Mechanized Brigade gets more Abrams, they might not come from the United States—but from Australia. While the Americans haven’t signaled a willingness to transfer more tanks, the Australians are reportedly considering donating 59 surplus M-1A1SAs that recently retired from the Australian army.

With 59 fresh Abrams, the 47th Mechanized could replenish its existing tank battalion—and possibly form a second battalion, too. Unless and until that happens, those 14 to 25 survivors of the original 31 Ukrainian M-1s will have to soldier on alone.

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

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Wednesday, October 9, 2024 7:13 AM

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

Zelenskyy ‘victory plan’ summit in doubt after Joe Biden pulls out

US president prepares for arrival of Hurricane Milton as German chancellor says meeting will be rescheduled

(Some historian should remind Biden that Presidential actions never change the path of a hurricane or the cleanup after but a President can change Putin’s path and the cleanup of the aftermath)

By Dan Sabbagh Defence and security editor | Tue 8 Oct 2024 14.28 EDT

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/08/zelenskyy-victory-plan-s
ummit-in-doubt-after-joe-biden-pulls-out

Joe Biden has called off a four-day trip to Germany this week that had been intended to culminate in a summit to discuss Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s “victory plan” for Ukraine.

The White House said on Tuesday evening that the president would stay at home “to oversee preparations for and the response” to Hurricane Milton, which is expected to make landfall in Florida on Wednesday.

It was not clear how Biden’s absence would affect the planned summit, the first time world leaders were due to gather at the Ramstein US airbase, normally the location of a regular meeting of defence ministers to discuss military aid for Kyiv.

Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, promised that the Biden trip would be rescheduled and said he understood the president’s reasons for calling it off. “It would have been a very important meeting and we prepared it on all sides,” he said.

Earlier on Tuesday, Germany had said the UK’s Keir Starmer and France’s Emmanuel Macron would attend the event alongside Biden and Scholz. A total of 20 leaders were expected to attend.

They were to hear Zelenskyy unveil the latest version of his “victory plan” to end the war, which is expected to focus heavily on a demand to allow Ukraine to fire Storm Shadow and other western long-range missiles deep into Russia.

Zelenskyy is pitching his ‘victory plan’ on adverse terrain

Biden has been resistant to allowing Ukraine to use the Anglo-French Storm Shadow, which relies on American technology, or US Atacms missiles. A special trip by Starmer to Washington last month failed to resolve the issue.

A German official said on Tuesday that the purpose of the Ramstein summit was to show long-term support for Ukraine, though concerns linger about how far that would endure if Donald Trump wins next month’s US presidential election.

“The message to Ukraine will be that our support is powerful and enduring, and to Moscow that there’s no use in speculating that we might waver in our support and that time will play for the Russian war of aggression,” the German official said prior to Biden’s withdrawal announcement.

Trump and many of his Republican allies have long been sceptical about the value of military aid for Ukraine. At the end of last month, Trump met Zelenskyy in New York and said after the meeting that he wanted to see a “fair deal made” to end the war, now heading towards its third winter.

The Republican nominee said he had learned a lot from their meeting. Prior to it commencing, Trump said: “I also have a very good relationship, as you know, with President Putin and I think if we win, we’re going to get it resolved very quickly,” he said. (I agree with Trump! I disagree with Trump forcing Ukraine to surrender. See GOP skepticism about the value of military aid.)

Zelenskyy said the purpose of his trip to Ramstein was to present his plan to allied countries. “Once we fully understand the positions of our partners and assess all real possibilities for Ukraine, enhancing our victory plan, we will make our strategy for future actions public,” he said overnight on Monday.

Then on Tuesday morning he indicated he would make a specific plea for allies to give his country more Patriot and other air defence systems, to better intercept Russian drone missile attacks.

“The obvious necessity for Ukraine is to strengthen our air defence everywhere it is needed, to make this Russian terror impossible,” Zelenskyy said in social media postings.

Biden had planned to be in Germany from Thursday to Sunday, the first time he would have visited the country during his presidency. It was to have been followed by a trip to Angola to fulfil a promise he made to go to Africa while he led the US.

Both trips have now been postponed, the White House said, and its spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre acknowledged that there was little time remaining in Biden’s presidency to reschedule. “Three months is not a long time. As you know, that’s going to fly by. That’s going to fly by,” she said.

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

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Thursday, October 10, 2024 8:22 AM

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

Ukrainian Kharkiv Group of Forces Spokesperson Vitaliy Sarantsev stated on October 8 that Russian forces may have exhausted their preexisting stocks of aerial bombs for glide bomb strikes.[90] Sarantsev stated that Russian forces have intensified their glide bomb strikes by such a degree that Russian forces are now fielding aerial bombs that Russia has produced only several days ago in September 2024. Sarantsev stated that this indicates that Russian forces are now relying on logistics to bring newly-produced bombs to Russian airfields.[91] ISW has previously observed Ukrainian forces striking Russian ammunition warehouses holding glide bombs.[92] ISW continues to assess that continued Ukrainian strikes against rear Russian logistics facilities within Russia will generate wider operational pressures on the Russian military, including forcing the Russian military command to reorganize and disperse support and logistics systems within Russia to mitigate the impact of such strikes.[93]

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-october-9-2024

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

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Thursday, October 10, 2024 11:22 AM

It's a live show so the first 13 minutes is just to give people a chance to join the site. Always go to the 13-minute mark for these videos.

T

MASSIVE ATTACKS CRIPPLE RUSSIA, ISRAEL UNDER HEAVY FIRE!

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Thursday, October 10, 2024 2:43 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Zelensky Cancels Fall Peace Summit After ~~'Victory Plan'~~ WISHLIST Fails To Impress Washington

Germany's national dpa press agency (Deutsche Presse-Agentur) is reporting that Ukraine is scrapping plans for a second international peace summit which was to be held ahead of the US presidential election in November.

"The presidential office led by Andriy Yermak is responsible for preparing the gathering that seeks to bring together government representatives and organizations from around the globe to discuss Zelensky's plan aimed at ending more than two and a half years of war with Russia," the media outlet said.

"Initially, Ukraine had hoped for the second such conference to be held ahead of the November 5 election in the US, which could see the return of Republican Donald Trump to the White House, but an adviser to Yermak said on Tuesday that the plan was no longer feasible," dpa continues.
Source: NY Times via United States Institute of Peace

It had been tentatively scheduled for October 30 and October 31, or also possibly the start of November, but now the Ukraine presidency's office has announced that "The question of a date for the second peace summit will be decided after the thematic conferences have been concluded," in reference to prior smaller conferences.

"The Second Peace Summit will not take place in November," senior Ukrainian presidential aide Darya Zarivna separately confirmed.

The first big conference hosted in Switzerland this past June was attended by about 100 countries, and concluded without the conflict being any closer to moving toward peace talks between Moscow and Kiev. Quite the opposite... since then Russian forces have continued pushing back the Ukrainian army's positions in the east, and pro-Kiev forces have only stepped up drone attacks on Russian energy infrastructure, including recent attacks in Crimea.

Moscow was invited to neither the summer conference nor the one that was supposed to take place this fall. On this basis the Kremlin has rejected the legitimacy of the talks. China too has said such conferences are futile without representation of the other warring party.

MORE AT https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/zelensky-cancels-fall-peace-sum
mit-after-victory-plan-fails-impress-washington

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Thursday, October 10, 2024 2:51 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Ramstein meeting on Ukraine postponed after Biden cancels trip

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ramstein-meeting-on-ukraine-postp
oned-after-biden-cancels-trip/ar-AA1rY2CG

USA and top EU donors were set to meet at Ramstein Air Base in Germany to craft a statement of "unwavering support" for Ukraine, and to (potentially) decide whether to have NATO military technicians fire missiles deep into Russia from Ukrainian soil.

Apparently they haven't been able to reach a consensus.

Blinken isn't going either.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Friday, October 11, 2024 6:43 AM

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

The Russian military appears to be increasingly recruiting older Russian volunteers in order to sustain ongoing crypto-mobilization efforts. Russian opposition outlet Verstka reported on October 9 that a source in an unspecified Russian Airborne (VDV) unit operating in the Kherson direction stated that 40 percent of the unit's contract recruits and mobilized personnel are over 50 years old and that over 75 percent of new personnel are over 50 years old.[66] Verstka, citing an unspecified Moscow City official, stated that half of the Russian military volunteers from Moscow City are over 45 years old. Verstka also reported, citing data from Russian opposition outlet Mediazona, that 2,475 Russian military volunteers over the age of 45 have died in the war in Ukraine between January and September 2024 - 18 percent more than Russian volunteers who died in the war over the age of 45 in all of 2023.[67]

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-october-10-2024

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

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Saturday, October 12, 2024 7:34 AM

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

Russia's "Cannon Fodder" Tactic: Loses One Soldier for Every 2.5 Square Meters Gained in Ukraine

Written by Camilla Jessen | Oct. 11, 2024 11:24 AM CET

https://www.dagens.com/war/russias-cannon-fodder-tactic-loses-one-sold
ier-for-every-2-5-square-meters-gained-in-ukraine

Russia is reportedly losing one soldier for every 2.5 square meters of occupied territory in Ukraine, according to Nataliia Kostenko, Deputy Head of the Ukrainian Mission to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).

"The Russian military relies heavily on 'cannon fodder' tactics, showing that their advances come at an unbearable cost—one no other nation would accept. Estimates indicate that for every 2.5 square meters of territory Russia gains in Ukraine, one Russian soldier loses their life," Kostenko said during a meeting of the OSCE Security Cooperation Forum.

Kostenko cited the recent battle for Vuhledar, a city in the Donetsk region, as a prime example of this tactic.

"Russian forces only managed to take control of the city after hundreds of daily attempts to break through Ukrainian defenses. Despite their claims of a strategic victory, the reality is that even with a clear advantage in personnel, artillery, and air power, it took Russia two years to capture a city they’ve completely destroyed," she stressed, as reported by United24 Media.

In the past week, according to Kostenko, there were over 1,000 clashes between Ukrainian forces and the Russian army, with the overall situation on the front lines remaining highly tense and fluid.

"Over the last week, Ukrainian forces have continued to target and neutralize Russian military headquarters, logistical routes, and ammunition depots. Ukrainian troops successfully destroyed the command centers of Russia’s 35th and 27th motorized rifle brigades, as well as the command post of the 2nd Combined Arms Army of the Russian Federation," she added.

British intelligence had previously reported significant Russian casualties, estimating that Russia could lose up to 1,000 soldiers per day during the winter months.

(I suspect the unit conversion was botched. More likely it is One Russian expended per 2.5 hectares, not 2.5 Square Meters. A hectare is 10,000 Square Meters. Since Ukraine's total area is over 60 million hectares, 60/2.5 = 24 million expended Russians. Winning is doable, just like Russia “won” WWII by expending about 24 million Russians similarly.)

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

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Sunday, October 13, 2024 7:11 AM

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

Russia seizes the same amount of territory in one year as Ukraine did in one week in Kursk Oblast – expert

October 12, 2024, 03:52 AM

https://english.nv.ua/nation/in-one-year-russia-has-occupied-as-much-t
erritory-with-huge-losses-as-ukraine-in-kursk-oblast-50457939.html

Russia has seized the same amount of Ukrainian territory in a year as the Ukrainian Armed Forces did in a week during their Kursk operation, Yevhen Dykyi, the former commander of the Aidar battalion, said in an interview with Radio NV on Oct. 11.

"This is 1,300 square kilometers (the territory of Ukraine that Russia occupied in a year)," Dykyi said on Radio NV.

“For comparison, 1,300 square kilometers is the same amount that we occupied during our Kursk operation in the first week. And here, the same 1,300 square kilometers in a year of fierce, terrible battles. And the main thing: at such a cost that no other army in the world would even consider winning a fairly serious war.”

The Ukrainian veteran recalled that the battle for Avdiivka alone cost the Russians 40,000 casualties, with 20,000 of them killed.

He also noted that Russian war correspondent Andrey Morozov, known as Murz, "after seeing what was happening there (in the Avdiivka area), simply shot himself, leaving a note saying that it is no way to treat your own army.”

Dykyi described the Russian tactics in Avdiivka as "tactics of cockroaches."

"Small groups crawl simultaneously from different sides, where it is assumed that nine out of ten groups will not make it," the Ukrainian veteran said.

“But the tenth one does get through. It's like cockroaches running from different sides, and you simply can't keep up with all of them, no matter how hard you try. But nine out of ten don't make it, and they know it, and they continue to advance like this throughout the year.”
Recent indicators of Russian losses in Ukraine

Earlier, Deputy Head of the Ukrainian Mission to the OSCE Nataliya Kostenko stated that the Russian army loses one soldier for every 2.5 square meters of occupied Ukrainian territory.

September 2024 was the bloodiest month for Russia since the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Politico reported on Oct. 10.

According to Pentagon representatives, the losses from offensive operations in Donbas increased the total number of Russian casualties to more than 600,000. This figure, Politico writes, is more than 40 times the losses Russia suffered during its ten-year invasion of Afghanistan.

The British Ministry of Defense reported on Oct. 7 a new record for average daily losses of Russian invasion forces in Ukraine since the start of the full-scale invasion. For September 2024, the average daily losses of the Russian army amounted to 1,271 personnel (killed and wounded).

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

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Sunday, October 13, 2024 12:41 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Oh, some turd from the Aidar battalion decides to add to the pile of poop with more propaganda?

I guess if you didn't know what the Aidar battalion was, you might be tempted to take him seriously.

They are one of the Nazi groups that decided to ethnically cleanse Russian speakers from Ukraine.

Quote:
Ukraine: Abuses and war crimes by the Aidar Volunteer Battalion in the north Luhansk region

https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/EUR50/040/2014/en/

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Sunday, October 13, 2024 1:19 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

So, overall, I think the Kremlin feels pretty confident about the way things are going for them, militarily, economically, across the globe, and internally, because they are sharpening and hardening their terms for ending the war in Ukraine, rather than softening them.

I know that our neocons' threats of secondary sanctions [this past June] created concern among the BRICS and other nations, which generated pressure on Russia from "the global south" to end the conflict thru negotiation. But Zelensky's and Blinken's intransigence and continuing threats of escalation proved to be Russia's best ally.

It seems that the USA Pentagon has finally convinced the WH, NATO, and the EU eurocrats that the war is lost, and that escalating will only destroy more military assets and risk a nuclear confrontation without changing the outcome of the war.

Even Kier Starmer, British PM and ultimate "deep strikes in Russia" warhawk had his nuts put in a vise. He had to tell Zelensky "no Storm Shadow missiles" just a couple of days ago.

AFA secondary sanctions on third party banks potentially doing business with Russian "war machine" banks (which is most of them) the propsect doesn't seem to trouble Russian leadership.

Russian industry has actually been strengthened bc of sanctions. Many items that Russia imported are now being made internally. Russia's chief issue is a labor shortage: At a time when many hands are needed to boost production at home, a few million working age males are in the military, and factories are geared towards weapons and other war materiel. So domestic -use production is constrained. At the same time, sanctions on Russian banks and individuals has in essence placed capital controls on the ruble, requiring that all rubles stay at home. With -literally- too much money chasing too few goods, inflation is running about 10%.

So Russia needs to access foreign labor, without access to currency exchange. I have seen creative deals being made which amount to barter. (India to build icebreakers in exchange for oil.) Quite possibly there will be a more universal solution to "secondary sanctions" at the upcoming BRICS summit in a week.

Quote:
Exclusive: Russia's Lavrov Warns of 'Dangerous Consequences' for US in Ukraine

. . .

The Istanbul Agreements initialed on 29 March 2022 by the Russian and Ukrainian delegations could serve as a basis for the settlement. They provide for Kiev's refusal to join NATO and contain security guarantees for Ukraine while recognizing the realities on the ground at that moment. Needless to say, in over two years, these realities have considerably changed, including in legal terms.

On 14 June, President Vladimir Putin listed prerequisites for the settlement as follows: complete AFU withdrawal from the DPR [Donetsk People's Republic], LPR [Luhansk People's Republic], Zaporozhye and Kherson Oblasts; recognition of territorial realities as enshrined in the Russian Constitution; neutral, non-bloc, non-nuclear status for Ukraine; its demilitarization and denazification; securing the rights, freedoms and interests of Russian-speaking citizens; and removal of all sanctions against Russia.

Kiev responded to this statement by an armed incursion into the Kursk Oblast on 6 August. Its patrons – the U.S. and other NATO countries – seek to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia. Under the circumstances, we have no choice but to continue our special military operation until the threats posed by Ukraine are removed.

The costs of the conflict are greatest for Ukrainians, who are ruthlessly pushed by their own authorities to the war to be slaughtered there. For Russia, it is about defending its people and vital security interests. Unlike Russia, the U.S. keeps ranting about some sort of "rules," "way of life" and the like, apparently poorly understanding where Ukraine is and what the stakes in this war are.

Q: How likely do you think it is that a military or diplomatic solution can be achieved, or do you see a greater risk of the conflict spiraling into something even larger with Ukrainian forces receiving more advanced NATO weaponry and entering Russian territory?

Making guesses is not my job. What I want to say is that we have been trying to extinguish this crisis for more than a decade, yet each time we put to paper agreements that suit everyone, Kiev and its masters would backpedal.
. . .

MORE AT https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-russias-lavrov-warns-dangerous-cons
equences-us-ukraine-1964468

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Sunday, October 13, 2024 6:26 PM

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

Russia Gaslit Me for Decades. It's Doing the Same to You

By Andrew Chakhoyan | Oct 11, 2024 at 4:30 AM EDT

https://www.newsweek.com/russia-gaslit-decades-ukraine-ussr-1965487

The Victory That Wasn't

When the Berlin Wall came down and the Cold War order crumbled before our eyes, many in the West mistook it for a victory. But who exactly did we defeat?

During the 70 years of the USSR's existence, the evil of communist ideology was merely layered atop the evil of a Frankenstein state, one that desperately wanted the world to see it as a nation.

By 1991, Communism was gone, the USSR fell apart, but the revanchism and a deep-seated fear in Moscow—that the Russian Federation would collapse under the weight of its own contradictions—remained.

Empires thrive on perpetual expansion, as vividly demonstrated by Russia's invasion of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, Georgia, and now Ukraine.

Caught in a relentless cycle of conquest and domination, Moscow's legitimacy and stability hinge on the constant acquisition of new territories, the appropriation of other nations' histories, and the subjugation of their peoples.

Suppressed History Is a Harbinger of More Violence

In seventh grade, we studied the "Great Famine" of 1932-1933 and learned about the "kulaks" hiding grain and how the righteous Red Army was fighting the imperialists who wanted the Soviet project to fail.

But did I know what role Stalin's monstrous and deliberate policy to starve millions of Ukrainians by engineering Holodomor had to do with my own life story?

Why did everyone around me speak Russian in Ukraine at the tail-end of the twentieth century? How did my Armenian father, born and raised in Georgia, end up coming to Donbas—the Soviet Union's promised land of his youth?

Colonialism is the answer. Moscow knew that to bury the Ukrainian dream—escaping the empire's yoke—required repopulating the land with outsiders to prevent even a possibility of a grassroots national movement rekindling.

Finding myself both complicit in Russia's imperial project and its victim was as confusing as it was unsettling.

Raphael Lemkin, the man who introduced the concept of genocide to the world, recognized Moscow's Holodomor as a systematic effort to destroy the Ukrainian nation, culture, and people through starvation and repression.

Yet, as I grew up, his name and his views existed in a separate realm of knowledge and awareness from the one I inhabited. The two were meant never to cross.

Had I not escaped the morass of endless lies sustaining the evil empire, I would've never understood that we are witnessing another genocide attempt and that history is indeed repeating itself.

More at https://www.newsweek.com/russia-gaslit-decades-ukraine-ussr-1965487

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

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Sunday, October 13, 2024 6:47 PM

Until you figure out how you've been gaslit into oblivion we don't care about articles coming from the same people who gaslight you every day telling you that you've been gaslit.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.

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Monday, October 14, 2024 2:40 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Yep.

"Ukraine is just the start for Russia!

After that, they're coming for YOU!"

*****
Chakoyan gets paid, a lot, to gaslight people.

Quote:
Andrew Chakhoyan is an alumnus of the global leadership program of the World Economic Forum ... a degree from Harvard and is a regular contributor to several publications: WEF Agenda, Futurism, and NewCo Shift.

... Fortune 500 corporations on corporate diplomacy.... served in the U.S. Government working on international economic development, pushed for stronger global cooperation in the nonprofit sector ... blah blah blah

Since there's a considerable paycheck for Andrew at the end of every piece of crap that he writes, and every bullshit narrative that he spews, I really don't expect anything honest or objective out of him.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Monday, October 14, 2024 7:29 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:
Until you figure out how you've been gaslit into oblivion we don't care about articles coming from the same people who gaslight you every day telling you that you've been gaslit.

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

Trump will be fine.
He will also be your next President.

Both Russia and North Korea have been threatening to nuke America since they got their first A-bomb. It is an extreme example of gaslighting by both. Nobody except cowards believes those two nations. Furthermore, Russia and North Korea have been continuously claiming moral, cultural, religious, and material superiority to the neighbors, the EU in Russia's case and South Korea in N. Korea's case. That is more examples of gaslighting. Nobody except fools and Signym believe those braggarts leading Russia and North Korea.

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

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Monday, October 14, 2024 7:31 AM

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

Russian forces recently executed nine Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) in Kursk Oblast amid a theater-wide increase in Russian executions of Ukrainian POWs. A Ukrainian open-source intelligence (OSINT) project reported on October 13 that Russian forces executed nine Ukrainian POWs near the village of Zeleny Shlyakh, Kursk Oblast on October 10.[11] Ukrainian drone operators reportedly unexpectedly encountered Russian forces in what they likely perceived to be a near rear area and came under Russian fire. The Ukrainian drone operators, facing limited ammunition, were compelled to surrender and Russian forces took them as POWs. An image of the aftermath of the execution suggests that Russian forces disarmed, lined, stripped, and shot the Ukrainian POWs — a clear indication of the premediated nature of the executions.[12] Ukrainian Human Rights Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets condemned the executions on October 13 as a serious violation of the Geneva Convention on the Treatment of POWs and stated that he sent letters to the United Nations (UN) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) regarding the case.[13] The Geneva Convention on POWs prohibits the execution of POWs or persons who are clearly rendered hors de combat.[14] The Ukrainian Prosecutor's Office also announced on October 13 that it launched an investigation into the reports of the execution of the nine Ukrainian POWs in Kursk Oblast.[15]

ISW has recently observed an increase in Russian forces executing Ukrainian POWs throughout the theater, and Russian commanders are likely writ large condoning, encouraging, or directly ordering the execution of Ukrainian POWs. Head of the Ukrainian Department for Combating Crimes in Conditions of Armed Conflict Yuri Bilousov stated on October 4 that Ukrainian sources documented evidence indicating that Russian forces have executed 93 Ukrainian POWs on the battlefield since the start of the full-scale invasion and that 80 percent of the recorded cases occurred in 2024.[16] The largest single-instance of execution of Ukrainian POWs occurred on October 1 when Russian forces executed 16 Ukrainian POWs in the Pokrovsk direction.[17] ISW continues to track footage and reports of Russian servicemembers executing Ukrainian POWs and has observed a wider trend of Russian abuses against Ukrainian POWs across various sectors of the front that appear to be enabled, if not explicitly endorsed, by individual Russian commanders.[18] The Kharkiv Oblast Prosecutor’s Office recently noted that Russian commanders directly ordered the execution of four Ukrainian POWs at the Vovchansk aggregate plant in Summer 2024.[19]

Russian milbloggers largely glorified the Russian execution of the Ukrainian POWs, reinforcing a cultural norm to justify and celebrate war crimes within the broader Russian ultranationalist community. Many Russian milbloggers not only justified but celebrated the Russian execution of the POWs in Kursk Oblast by claiming that the executions were deserved or that such executions are a common aspect of war.[20] Other Russian milbloggers specifically called on the Russian military to increase the execution of Ukrainian POWs throughout the theater.[21] Many of these Russian milbloggers have very large followings and are affiliated with the Kremlin, providing them with a sense of authority in establishing and reinforcing the accepted cultural norms within the Russian ultranationalist community. The Rybar Telegram channel, which celebrated the execution of POWs, has received awards from the Kremlin and has a following of roughly 1.3 million subscribers as of this publication, and Rybar founder Mikhail Zvinchuk regularly appears on Russian state television to comment on the war in Ukraine.[22] Other prominent ultranationalist milbloggers who praised and justified the October 10 execution include: RVvoenkor with about 1.62 million Telegram subscribers, Dva Mayora with roughly 1.17 million subscribers, Starshe Edy with about 627,000 subscribers, and Zapisky Veterana with about 357,000 subscribers as of this publication.[23] Many of these subscribers are Russian military personnel and volunteers currently fighting in the war, and Russian soldiers routinely interact with these channels through correspondences and crowdfunding efforts. Russian milbloggers have often glorified Russian atrocities and brutality in Ukraine since the start of the full-scale invasion, and this glorification underscores a broader culture that is likely encouraging the systemic execution of Ukrainian POWs.[24]

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-october-13-2024

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

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Monday, October 14, 2024 7:56 AM

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

Russian Troops Captured Nine Ukrainian Drone Operators, Stripped Them And Then Murdered Them

The atrocity is sure to escalate an already brutal conflict.

By David Axe | Oct 13, 2024, 04:35pm EDT

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2024/10/13/russian-troops-captur
ed-nine-ukrainian-drone-operators-stripped-them-and-then-murdered-them/

Ukraine invaded Russia’s Kursk Oblast on Aug. 6.

Russian Pres. Vladimir Putin reportedly gave his troops until Oct. 1 to eject the Ukrainian invaders.

The Russians missed the deadline, but not for a lack of trying. And not for a lack of brutality.

The executions are sure to backfire on the Russians. Throughout history, the execution of surrendering soldiers by one side in a conflict has motivated the other side to execute prisoners in retaliation.

In just one of countless examples from the final years of World War II, German soldiers advancing near Bastogne, Belgium during the 1944 Battle of the Bulge overran a field hospital belonging to the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division. The Germans killed many of the wounded Americans they found there—by slashing the helpless men’s throats as they lay on their cots.

Learning of the atrocity, the U.S. Army’s 327th Glider Infantry Regiment located the German unit responsible and counterattacked. “They took no prisoners,” Justin Harris wrote in a 2009 thesis.

In executing Ukrainian prisoners, Russian troops only intensify the horror of an already horrific war—and all but guarantee the atrocities they inflict will ultimately be inflicted on them, too.

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

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Monday, October 14, 2024 8:02 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

One blurred out picture?

How do I know it wasn't staged?

I'm gonna wait for Military Summary channel. He's on top of all things visual.
He mentioned that there is a picture, but so far unverified.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Monday, October 14, 2024 9:56 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

One blurred out picture?

How do I know it wasn't staged?

I'm gonna wait for Military Summary channel. He's on top of all things visual.
He mentioned that there is a picture, but so far unverified.

Get on top of this comrade.

T

The US confirms Russia has lost over half a million soldiers

On October 9th, a senior U.S. defense official revealed that Russia has suffered over 600,000 in Ukraine since Vladimir Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of the country in February 2022.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/the-us-confirms-russia-has-lost-o
ver-half-a-million-soldiers/ss-AA1sewYF?ocid=msedgntp&pc=EDBBAN&cvid=15676341f849403bb236c2b9907300ac&ei=79

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 12:17 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Oh, those fiction writers at the DoD!

Quote:
Mediazona confirms identities of nearly 73,000 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine
Dmytro Basmat
Sat, October 12, 2024 at 5:54 PM PDT2 min read

Through open-source research, Mediazona, a Russian independent media outlet, together with BBC Russia, confirmed the names of 72,899 Russian soldiers who had been killed since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion.

Not even 100,000.

Quote:
Since Mediazona's last update in late-September, the names of 1,842 Russian soldiers have been added to the list of casualties.

The journalists note that the actual figures are likely significantly higher, as their verified information comes from public sources such as obituaries, posts by relatives, regional media reports, and statements from local authorities.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/mediazona-confirms-identities-nearly-73-005
439519.html?guccounter=1

You really need to get more reliable sources, THUGR.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 5:37 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:

One blurred out picture?

How do I know it wasn't staged?

I'm gonna wait for Military Summary channel. He's on top of all things visual.
He mentioned that there is a picture, but so far unverified.

All things remain "unverified" until Moscow verifies the Truth.

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

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 5:38 AM

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

The Only Way the Ukraine War Can End

By Anne Applebaum | October 2, 2024

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/10/ukraine-war-negotiat
ed-peace/680100/

In an underground parking lot beneath an ordinary building in an ordinary Ukrainian city, dozens of what appear to be small, windowless fishing boats are lined up in rows. The noise of machinery echoes from a separate room, where men are working with metal and wires. They didn’t look up when I walked in one recent morning, and no wonder: This is a sea-drone factory, these are among the best engineers in Ukraine, and they are busy producing the unmanned vessels that have altered the trajectory of the war. Packed with explosives and guided by the world’s most sophisticated remote-navigation technology, these new weapons might even change the way that all naval wars are fought in the future.

Certainly, the sea drones are evolving very quickly. A year ago, I visited the small workshop that was then producing the first Ukrainian models. One of the chief engineers described what was at the time the drones’ first major success: a strike that took out a Russian frigate, damaged a submarine, and hit some other boats as well.

Since then, the sea drones, sometimes alone and sometimes in combined attacks with flying drones or missiles, have sunk or damaged more than two dozen warships. This is possibly the most successful example of asymmetric warfare in history. The Ukrainian drones cost perhaps $220,000 apiece; many of the Russian ships are worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The military impact is enormous. To avoid Ukrainian strikes, Russian ships have mostly left their former headquarters, in the occupied Crimean port of Sevastopol, and moved farther east. They no longer patrol the Ukrainian coast. They can’t stop Ukrainian cargo ships from carrying grain and other goods to world markets, and Ukrainian trade is returning to prewar levels. This can’t be said often enough: Ukraine, a country without much of a navy, defeated Russia’s Black Sea fleet.

Nor is Ukraine’s talent for asymmetric warfare confined to water. During a recent trip, I visited another basement, where another team of Ukrainians was working to change the course of the war—and, again, maybe the course of all subsequent wars as well. (I was allowed to tour these operations on the condition that I not identify their locations or the people working at them.) This particular facility had no machines, no engines, and no warheads, just a room lined with screens. The men and women sitting at the screens were dressed like civilians, but in fact they were soldiers, members of a special army unit created to deploy experimental communications technology in combination with experimental drones. Both are being developed by Ukrainians, for Ukraine.

This particular team, with links to many parts of the front lines, has been part of both offensive and defensive operations, and even medical evacuations. According to one of the commanders, this unit alone has conducted 2,400 combat missions and destroyed more than 1,000 targets, including tanks, armored personnel vehicles, trucks, and electronic-warfare systems since its creation several months ago. Like the sea-drone factory, the team in the basement is operating on a completely different scale from the frontline drone units whose work I also encountered last year, on several trips around Ukraine. In 2023, I met small groups of men building drones in garages, using what looked like sticks and glue. By contrast, this new unit is able to see images of most of the front line all at once, revise tools and tactics as new situations develop, and even design new drones to fit the army’s changing needs.

More important, another commander told me, the team works “at the horizontal level,” meaning that members coordinate directly with other groups on the ground rather than operating via the army’s chain of command: “Three years of experience tells us that, 100 percent, we will be much more efficient when we are doing it on our own—coordinating with other guys that have assets, motivation, understanding of the processes.” Horizontal is a word that describes many successful Ukrainian projects, both military and civilian. Also, grassroots. In other words, Ukrainians do better when they organize themselves; they do worse when they try to move in lockstep under a single leader. Some argue that this makes them more resilient. Or, as another member of the team put it, Russia will never be able to destroy Ukraine’s decision-making center, “because the center doesn’t make all the decisions.”

I recognize that this account of the war effort differs dramatically from other, grimmer stories now coming out of Ukraine. In recent weeks, Russian glide bombs and artillery have slowly begun to destroy the city of Pokrovsk, a logistical hub that has been part of Ukraine’s defensive line in Donetsk for a decade. Regular waves of Russian air strikes continue to hit Ukraine’s electricity infrastructure. The repeated attacks on civilians are not an accident; they are a tactic. Russian President Vladimir Putin is seeking to deprive Ukrainians of heat and light, to demoralize the people as well as the government, and perhaps to provoke a new refugee exodus that will disrupt European politics.

Russia remains the larger and richer country. The Kremlin has more ammunition, more tanks, and a greater willingness to dispose of its citizens. The Russian president is willing to tolerate high human losses, as well as equipment losses, of a kind that almost no other nation could accept. And yet, the Ukrainians still believe they can win—if only their American and European allies will let them.

Two and a half years into the conflict, the idea that we haven’t let Ukraine win may sound strange. Since the beginning of the war, after all, we have been supporting Ukraine with weapons and other aid. Recently, President Joe Biden reiterated his support for Ukraine at the United Nations. “The good news is that Putin’s war has failed in his core aim,” he said. But, he added, “the world now has another choice to make: Will we sustain our support to help Ukraine win this war and preserve its freedom, or walk away and let a nation be destroyed? We cannot grow weary. We cannot look away.” Hoping to rally more Americans to his side, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spent much of last week in the United States. He visited an ammunition factory in Pennsylvania. He met with former President Donald Trump, and with Vice President Kamala Harris.

Zelensky also presented a victory plan that asked, among other things, for Ukraine to have the right to use American and European long-range missiles to strike military targets deep inside Russia. This kind of request is now familiar. In each stage of the war, the Ukrainians and their allies have waged public campaigns to get new weapons—tanks, F-16s, long-range missiles—that they need to maintain a technological edge. Each time, these requests were eventually granted, although sometimes too late to make a difference.

Each time, officials in the U.S., Germany, and other Western powers argued that this or that weapon risked crossing some kind of red line. The same argument is being made once again, and it sounds hollow. Because at this point, the red lines are entirely in our heads; every one of them has been breached. Using drones, Ukraine already hits targets deep inside Russia, including oil refineries, oil and gas export facilities, even air bases. In the past few weeks, Ukraine’s long-range drones have hit at least three large ammunition depots, one of which was said to have just received a large consignment from North Korea; when attacked, the depot exploded dramatically, producing an eerie mushroom cloud. In a development that would have been unthinkable at the beginning of the war, Ukraine has, since early August, even occupied a chunk of Russian territory. Ukrainian troops invaded Kursk province, took control of several towns and villages, set up defenses, repelled Russian troops, and have yet to leave.

But in truth, the imaginary red lines, the slow provision of weapons, and the rules about what can and can’t be hit are not the real problem. On its own, a White House decision to allow the Ukrainians to strike targets in Russia with American or even European missiles will not change the course of the war. The deeper limitation is our lack of imagination. Since this war began, we haven’t been able to imagine that the Ukrainians might defeat Russia, and so we haven’t tried to help those who are trying to do exactly that. We aren’t identifying, funding, and empowering the young Ukrainian engineers who are inventing new forms of asymmetric warfare. With a few exceptions, Ukrainians tell me, many allied armies aren’t in regular contact with the people carrying out cutting-edge military experiments in Ukraine. Oleksandr Kamyshin, Ukraine’s minister of strategic industries, says that the Ukrainians have spare capacity in their own drone factories, and could produce more themselves if they just had the money. Meanwhile, $300 billion worth of frozen Russian reserves are still sitting in European clearinghouses, untouched, waiting for a political decision to use that money to win the war. Biden is right to tout the success of the coalition of democracies created to aid Ukraine, but why not let that coalition start defending Ukraine against incoming missiles, as friends of Israel have just done in the Middle East? Why isn’t the coalition focused on enforcing targeted sanctions against the Russian defense industry?

Worse—much worse—is that, instead of focusing on victory, Americans and Europeans continue to dream of a magic “negotiated solution” that remains far away. Many, many people, some in good faith and some in bad faith, continue to call for an exchange of “land for peace.” Last week, Trump attacked Zelensky for supposedly refusing to negotiate, and the ex-president continues to make unfounded promises to end the war “in 24 hours.” But the obstacle to negotiations is not Zelensky. He probably could be induced to trade at least some land for peace, as long as Ukraine received authentic security guarantees—preferably, though not necessarily, in the form of NATO membership—to protect the rest of the country’s territory, and as long as Ukraine could be put on a path to complete integration with Europe. Even a smaller Ukraine would still need to be a viable country, to attract investment and ensure refugees’ return.

Right now, the actual obstacle is Putin. Indeed, none of these advocates for “peace,” whether they come from the Quincy Institute, the Trump campaign, the Council on Foreign Relations, or even within the U.S. government, can explain how they will persuade Russia to accept such a deal. It is the Russians who have to be persuaded to stop fighting. It is the Russians who do not want to end the war.

Look, again, at the situation on the ground. Even now, two and a half years into a war that was supposed to be over in a few days, the Kremlin still seeks to gain more territory. Despite the ongoing Ukrainian occupation of Kursk province, the Russian army is still sending thousands of men to die in the battle for Donetsk province. The Russian army also seems unbothered by losing equipment. In the long battle for Vulhedar, a now-empty town in eastern Ukraine with a prewar population of 14,000, the Russians have sacrificed about 1,000 tanks, armored vehicles, and pieces of artillery —nearly 6 percent of all the vehicles destroyed during the entire war.

Russia has not changed its rhetoric either. On state television, pundits still call for the dismemberment and destruction of Ukraine. Putin continues to call for the “denazification of Ukraine,” by which he means the removal of Ukraine’s language, culture, and identity—as well as “demilitarization, and neutral status,” by which he means a Ukraine that has no army and cannot resist conquest. Nor do Russian economic decisions indicate a desire for peace. The Russian president now plans to spend 40 percent of the national budget on arms production, sacrificing living standards, health care, pensions, broader prosperity, and maybe the stability of the economy itself. The state is still paying larger and larger bonuses to anyone willing to sign up to fight. Labor shortages are rampant, both because the army is eating up eligible men and because so many others have left the country to avoid conscription.

Negotiations can begin only when this rhetoric changes, when the defense machine grinds to a halt, when the attempts to conquer yet another village are abandoned. This war will end, in other words, only when the Russians run out of resources—and their resources are not infinite—or when they finally understand that Ukraine’s alliances are real, that Ukraine will not surrender, and that Russia cannot win. Just as the British decided in the early 20th century that Ireland is not British and the French decided in 1962 that Algeria is not France, so must the Russians come to accept that Ukraine is not Russia. At that point, there can be a cease-fire, a discussion of new borders, negotiations about other things—such as the fate of the more than 19,000 Ukrainian children who have been kidnapped and deported by the Russians, an orchestrated act of cruelty.

We have not yet reached that stage. The Russians are still waiting for the U.S. to get tired, to stop defending Ukraine, and maybe to elect Trump so that they can dictate terms and make Ukraine into a colony again. They are hoping that the “Ukraine fatigue” they promote and the false arguments about Ukrainian corruption (“Zelensky’s yachts”) that they pay American influencers to repeat will eventually overwhelm America’s strategic and political self-interest. Which, of course, might be the case.

But if it is, we are in for a nasty surprise. Should Ukraine finally lose this war, the costs—military, economic, political—for the U.S. and its allies will not go down. On the contrary, they are likely to increase, and not only in Europe. Since 2022, the military and defense-industry links among Russia, North Korea, Iran, and China have strengthened. Iran has delivered drones and missiles to Russia. Russia, in turn, may be providing anti-ship missiles to the Houthis, Iranian proxies who could use them against American and European commercial and military ships in the Red Sea. According to a recent Reuters report, the Russians are now constructing a major drone factory in China. The Chinese stand to benefit, that is, from the huge technological gains that the Russians have made, in many cases by imitating the Ukrainians in drone warfare and other systems, even if Americans aren’t paying close attention.

A failure to defeat Russia will be felt not just in Europe but also in the Middle East and Asia. It will be felt in Venezuela, where Putin’s aggressive defiance has surely helped inspire his ally Nicolás Maduro to stay in power despite losing an election in a landslide. It will be felt in Africa, where Russian mercenaries now support a series of ugly regimes. And, of course, this failure will be felt by Ukraine’s neighbors. I doubt very much that Germany and France, let alone Poland, are prepared for the consequences of a truly failed Ukraine, for a collapse of the Ukrainian state, for lawlessness or Russian-Mafia rule at the European Union’s eastern doorstep, as well as for the violence and crime that would result.

The means to prevent that kind of international catastrophe are right in front of us, in the form of Ukraine’s drone factories, the underground sea-drone laboratory, the tools now being designed to enable the Ukrainian army to beat a larger opponent—and also in the form of our own industrial capacity. The democratic world remains wealthier and more dynamic than the autocratic world. To stay that way, Ukraine and its Western allies have to persuade Russia to stop fighting. We have to win this war.

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

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 5:55 AM

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

Why North Korea is sending soldiers to the Russian front lines (The Washington Post)

By Michelle Lee | Oct 15, 2024

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/why-north-korea-is-sending-soldie
rs-to-the-russian-front-lines/ar-AA1shzvk?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=0ede9153647c45a594b31bd1ffcf912a&ei=60

The Kremlin has dismissed the assertion as a “hoax.”

In March 2022, a month after the invasion, North Korea was one of just four countries that joined Moscow to vote against a United Nations resolution condemning the aggression.

Four countries joined Russia in voting against the resolution — Belarus, North Korea, Eritrea and Syria — while 35 abstained.
https://www.axios.com/2022/03/02/united-nations-ukraine-russia-141

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

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 8:59 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

The propaganda is strong with this one. [SECOND]

****

Meanwhile, back in the real world

Ukraine Finally Admits To Russian Breakthrough In Kursk As They Evacuate Sumy
Monday, Oct 14, 2024 - 11:45 PM

For those tracking war maps from both sides of the conflict as well as geo-location data for troop positions, the failure of Ukraine's offensive in Kursk is not a surprise. The movement of their forces stalled out only a couple weeks after their initial push into the territory and the Russians have been grabbing back pieces of land ever since. However, for those people only listening to establishment news sources, the retaking of Kursk might come as a shock.

Russian troops have made significant advances from the western flank of Ukrainian positions, and reports indicate a threat of Ukrainian troops being encircled.

The Telegraph, usually a platform for pro-Ukraine propaganda, notes that sources from both sides confirmed the Russian breakthrough, which occurred during the heaviest fighting on Russian territory since Ukraine began its cross-border incursion in August.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 10:30 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:
The propaganda is strong with this one. [SECOND]

****

Meanwhile, back in the real world

Ukraine Finally Admits To Russian Breakthrough In Kursk As They Evacuate Sumy
Monday, Oct 14, 2024 - 11:45 PM

Who wrote that? Tyler Durden, an imaginary character from the movie Fight Club, which is a sure sign of propaganda from Zero Hedge, Signym's reliable source of Russian and Trumptardian falsehoods.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/ukraine-finally-admits-russian-
breakthrough-kursk-they-evacuate-sumy

"Not for nothing does one YouTube video switch Tyler Durden’s face for Trump’s." – from Fight Club in the Manosphere, 9 October 2024

Twenty-five years on, the film has become celebrated by lost young men who fail to grasp its subversive intent.
https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/film/2024/10/fight-club-in-the-ma
nosphere

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

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 10:51 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Oh, those fiction writers at the DoD!

Quote:
Mediazona confirms identities of nearly 73,000 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine
Dmytro Basmat
Sat, October 12, 2024 at 5:54 PM PDT2 min read

Through open-source research, Mediazona, a Russian independent media outlet, together with BBC Russia, confirmed the names of 72,899 Russian soldiers who had been killed since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion.
Not even 100,000.

Quote:
Since Mediazona's last update in late-September, the names of 1,842 Russian soldiers have been added to the list of casualties.

The journalists note that the actual figures are likely significantly higher, as their verified information comes from public sources such as obituaries, posts by relatives, regional media reports, and statements from local authorities.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/mediazona-confirms-identities-nearly-73-005
439519.html?guccounter=1

You really need to get more reliable sources, THUGR.

Mediazona (Russian: ?????????) is a Russian independent media outlet focused on Anti-Putinist opposition that was founded by Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda.

While Mediazona is an anti-Putin site, they don't have the resources to track Russian losses that the United States and our many allies have. Not even close. And what they say is that they confirmed 72,899 of their names. Not, that that is the total number of Russians who have died. Nope, 600,000 is the more accurate number.

T

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 3:54 PM

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

Russia Poses Long-Term Threats to Moldova’s European Integration Beyond the October Elections

By Christina Harward | October 15, 2024

Executive Summary: Moldova stands to advance its path towards European integration in the upcoming October 2024 presidential election and referendum, but Moldova will likely remain a battleground state into the 2030s as Moldova's European Union (EU) membership negotiations continue. The possible reelection of pro-Western Moldovan President Maia Sandu and passing of the pro-EU referendum in October 2024 will not set Moldova's EU path in stone. The Kremlin has recently been trying to sabotage Moldova’s EU accession and destabilize Moldovan democracy and will continue these efforts in the coming decade. Support for EU membership is growing in Moldova, but the Kremlin is unlikely to cease its influence operations and may instead increase its efforts to reverse pro-EU trends in the coming decade. The Kremlin is likely prepared to pursue several lines of effort in the future to derail Moldova’s EU path, such as attempting to influence and capture Moldovan state institutions; exploiting the Kremlin's military, economic, and political ties to the pro-Russian Moldovan regions of Transnistria and Gagauzia; and conducting reflexive control campaigns to shape EU member states' decision-making regarding Moldova's EU accession. The threat of a Russian invasion of Moldova through Ukraine is currently extremely low, but the current conditions may change in the future, allowing Russia to invade and occupy more of Moldova than what it currently does in Transnistria. Moldova's future as an independent and sovereign state is directly tied to the outcome of Russia's war in Ukraine and affects NATO's planning for the defense of its eastern flank. Western aid to both Ukraine and Moldova is vital to these states' abilities to resist Russian malign influence and aggression and keep Russian forces from threatening NATO.

Download the full report at https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russia-poses-long-term-t
hreats-moldova%E2%80%99s-european-integration-beyond-october-elections

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

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Tuesday, October 15, 2024 5:42 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Oh, those fiction writers at the DoD!

Quote:
Mediazona confirms identities of nearly 73,000 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine
Dmytro Basmat
Sat, October 12, 2024 at 5:54 PM PDT2 min read

Through open-source research, Mediazona, a Russian independent media outlet, together with BBC Russia, confirmed the names of 72,899 Russian soldiers who had been killed since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion.
Not even 100,000.

Since Mediazona's last update in late-September, the names of 1,842 Russian soldiers have been added to the list of casualties.

The journalists note that the actual figures are likely significantly higher, as their verified information comes from public sources such as obituaries, posts by relatives, regional media reports, and statements from local authorities.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/mediazona-confirms-identities-nearly-73-005
439519.html?guccounter=1

You really need to get more reliable sources, THUGR.

THUGR: Mediazona is a Russian independent media outlet focused on Anti-Putinist opposition that was founded by Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda.

While Mediazona is an anti-Putin site, they don't have the resources to track Russian losses that the United States and our many allies have.

Did you missed the fact that they partner with the BBC???

Quote:
THUGR: Not even close. And what they say is that they confirmed 72,899 of their names. Not, that that is the total number of Russians who have died. Nope, 600,000 is the more accurate number.

My god, you are gullible!

How does our military count the number of losses? What is their methodology?
Or are they just taking what "Kiev says" and passing it on? (HINT: YES)

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Wednesday, October 16, 2024 6:21 AM

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

Putin's 3-day 'special operation' is now in its 32nd month.

NotActuallyOnTwitter @LeonHuskKissesTrumpButt
So, it turns out that the strength and smarts of the mighty Soviet army was mostly Ukrainians. Who knew?
12:59 PM • Oct 13, 2024

Search Labs | AI Overview
Learn more…
This statement is largely accurate; a significant portion of the Soviet Army, particularly during World War II, was comprised of Ukrainian soldiers, contributing considerably to its strength and fighting prowess, with many holding important leadership positions within the ranks.

Key points to remember:

Large numbers:
Millions of Ukrainians served in the Red Army, making up a substantial portion of its overall personnel.

Leadership roles:
Ukrainians were present in significant numbers among the command staff, including generals and marshals.

Notable campaigns:
The "First Ukrainian Front" played a crucial role in battles like the capture of Berlin.

https://www.husj.harvard.edu/articles/fighting-soviet-myths-the-ukrain
ian-experience

Do y'all remember, before the internet, that people thought the cause of stupidity was the lack of access to information?
Yeah. It wasn't that.

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

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Wednesday, October 16, 2024 11:08 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Oh, those fiction writers at the DoD!

Quote:
Mediazona confirms identities of nearly 73,000 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine
Dmytro Basmat
Sat, October 12, 2024 at 5:54 PM PDT2 min read

Through open-source research, Mediazona, a Russian independent media outlet, together with BBC Russia, confirmed the names of 72,899 Russian soldiers who had been killed since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion.
Not even 100,000.

Since Mediazona's last update in late-September, the names of 1,842 Russian soldiers have been added to the list of casualties.

The journalists note that the actual figures are likely significantly higher, as their verified information comes from public sources such as obituaries, posts by relatives, regional media reports, and statements from local authorities.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/mediazona-confirms-identities-nearly-73-005
439519.html?guccounter=1

You really need to get more reliable sources, THUGR.

THUGR: Mediazona is a Russian independent media outlet focused on Anti-Putinist opposition that was founded by Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda.

While Mediazona is an anti-Putin site, they don't have the resources to track Russian losses that the United States and our many allies have.

Did you missed the fact that they partner with the BBC???

Quote:
THUGR: Not even close. And what they say is that they confirmed 72,899 of their names. Not, that that is the total number of Russians who have died. Nope, 600,000 is the more accurate number.

My god, you are gullible!

How does our military count the number of losses? What is their methodology?
Or are they just taking what "Kiev says" and passing it on? (HINT: YES)

A Statistical Approach for
Estimating Casualty Rates During
Combat Operations

https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA621488.pdf

It's a science comrade moron. Say, you do realize you keep coming across looking like a dick head, right?

T

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Wednesday, October 16, 2024 1:23 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

So, THUGR, I did some quick calcs of my own:

MediaZona counts appx 75,000 Russian dead.
Say 100,000 to account for missed deaths.
5 wounded per 1 death is 500,000
Plus dead is 600,000.
That comes pretty close to the figure reported.

So I looked at your original link, and

I see you've been a victim of deceptive reporting.

Quote:
The US confirms Russia has lost over half a million soldiers

On October 9th, a senior U.S. defense official revealed that Russia has suffered over 600,000 [dead? dead plus wounded?] in Ukraine since Vladimir Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of the country in February 2022.

Not 600,000 dead.

The story as reported on other sites makes that very clear.

And FWIW "wounded" does not mean severely wounded or permanently disabled. It just means "wounded". Many wounded are treated and returned to battle, the number depending on whether field medicine is available and evacuation is prompt.

FWIW Russian reports of successes (# of weapons destroyed, # of enemy soldiers killed, ground taken) is reliable. Conservative, even, since bombs and missiles bury a lot under rubble, making it impossible to count the # of dead/ wounded, or # weapons destroyed, and Russian MOD doesn't consider an area taken until it's been cleared, de-mined etc.

But the MoD is very, very quiet about losses. As is to be expected.

I expect Ukraine to be very quiet about losses too. But Kiev exaggerates its successes to the point of laughability.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger

AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA

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Wednesday, October 16, 2024 3:00 PM

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

Oct 16, 2024

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has unveiled the much-anticipated five-point “Victory Plan” which he says could bring an end to the war by the end of 2025.

An invitation to join NATO and specific weapons support from western allies sits front-and-centre of Kyiv’s plan, which Zelensky discussed with the US, UK, France, Italy and Germany leaders in a whirlwind tour.

The plan’s third point calls for a non-nuclear deterrence mechanism with the power to destroy Russia’s military, Zelensky told the members of Ukrainian parliament on Wednesday morning.

Zelensky said there is a secret addendum to the third point, which he could not disclose.

Western support in defending Ukraine’s natural resources from Russian attacks, alongside post-war reconstruction pledges from western allies, made up the rest of the plan.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/ukraine-russia-war-upd
ates-map-putin-north-korea-soldiers-b2629954.html

Ukraine is asking NATO to step across Russia's red lines. Will NATO take the steps? Or will the cheese-eating surrender monkeys take several naps, instead? There is a large chance of naps rather than energetically helping Ukraine. Naps, and empty speeches full of vague promises, are what Democracies tend toward.

Zelenskyy says ‘victory plan’ to end Russia war includes NATO membership

Ukrainian president tells parliament it’s ‘possible to end the war no later than next year’ if his proposal is followed.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/16/zelenskyy-says-victory-plan-
to-end-russia-war-includes-nato-membership

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

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Wednesday, October 16, 2024 6:40 PM