REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Russia Invades Ukraine. Again

POSTED BY: CAPTAINCRUNCH
UPDATED: Thursday, September 11, 2025 17:28
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Sunday, August 31, 2025 7:22 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Fuck Ukraine. Nobody cares.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Sunday, August 31, 2025 9:46 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Everywhere he quotes 1.7 million, a recalculation shows 1.4 million. Unfortunately we'll have to wait until the war is well and truly over, men can come home, and Kiev propagandists and security forces are no longer in charge of the numbers in order to get a better understanding of Kiev losses.

Quote:
A Dark Theory: Russian Strategy In Ukraine
Sunday, Aug 31, 2025 - 04:35 AM

Authored by Armchair Warlord,

A dark theory for the evening...

Let's talk about Russian strategy in Ukraine...

Looking at developments lately, specifically:

(1) the Ukrainian casualty leak showing an astronomical 1.7M KIA/MIA; and

(2) the Ukrainian collapse north of Pokrovsk

I thought should revisit a dark thought I had a while ago, namely that, "maybe the killing itself is the point of all of this."

Ya think?

Quote:
I've said before that the Russians have fought an extraordinarily clean war in Ukraine, but it should be understood that there is a very legalistic shade on that assessment.

They've killed very few civilians, and Ukrainian propagandists are perpetually beclowning themselves trying to pretend that the usual single-digit handful of injured civilians that accompany the latest attack using hundreds of standoff weapons fired into city centers (producing secondary explosions visible from outer space as military targets hidden among civilian infrastructure are destroyed with surgical precision) somehow constitute gEnOCiDe rather than some of the most well-controlled warfighting in the history of the businesse.

There is another and far darker side to Russia's "clean" war, however.

Let us consider the fate of the Armed Forces of Ukraine - legal combatants all, whom the Russians can and do target and kill without limit. I mentioned the casualty leak earlier, but I feel this needs to have a line drawn under it - one point seven million personnel killed or missing in action in the AFU, over the course of the war. 1.7 MILLION. Seven or eight percent of Ukraine's prewar population, probably something like a quarter of the entire national cohort of military-aged males, dead or missing. Casualties on the scale of a genocide, sufficient to permanently cripple any postwar Ukrainian nation.

Casualties multiple times that which I assessed two years ago as sufficient to shatter the AFU based on the experience of Nazi Germany.

This brings me to the Ukrainian collapse north of Pokrovsk two weeks ago, in which a run-of-the-mill Russian attack walked through twenty kilometers of Ukrainian defensive belts and into open country.

The Ukrainian propagandists coped by whining about how the single most important front sector for the AFU had somehow "run out of infantry."

But did the Russians throw in a mobile reserve to collapse the front and chase the AFU back to the Dniper, despite doubtless knowing full well what was going on? No, they did not - they consolidated in the breach and awaited the inevitable, panicked Ukrainian counterattack, in which they would have the opportunity to destroy Ukraine's remaining elite troops.

Which brings me to my conclusion.

The Russians have had countless opportunities to make large advances in this war, especially recently - the Ukrainian front line is an absolute shambles and their "drone wall" tactic will falter against any serious attack. So ineffectual is the AFU that very few Russian moves at the front even face serious opposition these days, with most geolocations of Russian advances showing them already established in place and dealing with harassment by kill drones after having seized positions bloodlessly. The Russians have in fact consistently foregone breaking the front and taking swathes of ground in favor of killing the largest possible number of Ukrainian soldiers on the existing front line under the existing attritional combat dynamic.

This "tactical directive" held true even during the Battle of Sudzha-Korenevo, fought in prewar Russia. Rather than counterattacking aggressively to evict the AFU, the Russians saw the opportunity to kill gigantic numbers of Ukrainians in a trap the enemy wouldn't be able to extract themselves from for ideological reasons, and they took it. That battle ended up being nine months of hideously lopsided butchery that broke the back of the AFU.

All of this makes observing the war more than a little maddening, but it's a consistent pattern of behavior that begs for explanation.

So here's my theory.

The Russian government has consistently sought to end the war via peace treaty with the existing Ukrainian government, not via regime change, outright conquest, or even killing enough of that government to find a more flexible interlocutor among the Maidanites. Putin apparently wants a treaty with Zelensky. The Russians have also consistently made demands of the Ukrainian government - and its NATO sponsors - that are absolute political nonstarters for the Maidan-era regime and which that regime, by its very nature, simply cannot accept. Russian language rights, Orthodox religious rights, demilitarization, large territorial concessions which would see the AFU surrender vast urban areas without a shot fired. And yet the Russians insist, and they're going to continue killing Ukrainian soldiers at ever-more lopsided ratios until they get their way.

Which leads me to the brutal conclusion: Putin doesn't want to see Ukraine conquered. He's never publicly expressed any desire for that.

The consistent Russian policy is instead to see Ukraine - a "free" and "independent" Ukraine, having come to this impasse of its own sovereign will - utterly humiliated.

Putin wants to make Zelensky put on a suit, come groveling to the Kremlin, and sign a treaty that will see the Maidanite government surrender its arms, disgorge huge amounts of territory, and reverse every single anti-Russian policy position it ever had.

Ukrainian nationalism will be discredited overnight by the hands of those very nationalists, and the economically irrelevant, demographically shattered rump state will be sucked back into Russia's political orbit in a matter of days.

So of course the Russians are only advancing in the most leisurely way possible.

Their goal is to place the Ukrainian government into a militarily untenable situation so as to force a flamboyantly humiliating peace treaty upon them that includes large territorial concessions beyond the line of control - the ultimate Ukrainian taboo - so as to discredit Ukrainian nationalism by the hands of the very ultranationalists who took their nation to war in the first place.


Except Russia will never sign with Zelensky.
Talk? Yes.
Negotiate? Yes.
Sign? No.

Which brings me to demographics. With so many Ukrainianmen killed, will there be a huge imbalance of sexes? Or have younger women fled proportional to the men lost, leaving only older people to carry the Ukrainian economy, such as it is?

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

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Sunday, August 31, 2025 9:54 AM

SECOND

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


Weekend Update #149: Breakthrough? What Breakthrough? Collapse? What Collapse?

Russia Attacks Civilians, Ukraine Attacks Strategic Industries; Pokrovsk Versus Oil Refineries--One Of These Is Strategic, The Other Not.

Phillips P. OBrien | Aug 31, 2025

https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/weekend-update-149-breakthrough
-what

Hi All,

Well, the battle lines hardly moved this last week—though the Ukrainians did recapture some territory. How can you tell? There was almost no reporting on the state of the land war. The last three weeks have indeed been a brilliant test case in the deceptive way the war has been reported/analysed over the last few years. When there seems to be any panic about Ukraine—its blown all out of proportions with stories of impending Ukrainian collapses and Russian breakthroughs into strategic areas of Ukraine. When, inevitably, these stories are shown to be steaming piles of BS, there is nothing-nada, no attempts to try and understand why the original reporting was so wrong and discussions of how to keep from making the same mistakes over and over again…

In the air war, the Russians launched one of their largest and most deadly attacks on Ukrainian civilians—as part of a campaign to try and break the will of the Ukrainian people. In comparison, the Ukrainian ranged campaign has steadily built up to the point that it might now be called a campaign. The signs are clear now that they have at least one clear strategic target (and its a target alot more “strategic” than a town such as Pokrovsk). This update will therefore end with a comparison between of the strategic importance of these Ukrainian attacks and the Russian efforts to seize Pokrovsk.
Rubble and destroyed buildings.

Kyiv after the Russian aerial attack this week—A Russian “strategic” campaign in action.

Breakthrough? What Breakthrough? Collapse? What Collapse?

Last week the battlelines hardly changed (which is far more the norm than you think). The Russians made no notable advances towards Pokrovsk, were actually pushed back a little near Kupiansk, though they seized some farm fields in a few places. Here is the most recent Deep State map covering a wide swath of the front line from Kupiansk down to Zaporizhzhia.

And here it was last Saturday (August 23).

The differences are so small as to be almost impossible to locate. And yet this is in the height of the summer campaigning season, when the Russian Army we were told was adapting strongly, building up its reserves—and just after the Russians had executed a supposedly devastating breakthrough against Ukrainian forces which indicated the Ukrainians were close to collapse while Putin was on the March.

It was fewer than 3 weeks ago that such stories were widely spread in major outlets such as the Financial Times, Washington Post, and, Daily Telegraph, to name just a few. This avalanche of stories was based on the long-term bugbears being pushed by the analytical community which include such reasons as Ukrainian morale was failing, Ukraine is not drafting enough soldiers from its own population, the Russian military is adapting and getting better, Ukraine has no chance of retaking the lost territory….

And all of it was fed by quotes by western analysts. I found this one piece on the Russian “breakthrough” which combined all the doom by the analytical community as regurgitated by someone who has worked with Pete Hegseth in the Trump Pentagon—Dan Caldwell. On 14 August it was reported that Caldwell had just spoken at an event and went through all the reasons that Ukraine was in peril.

"The Russians currently have the upper hand on the battlefield and, while for good reasons there may be an unwillingness to acknowledge that out loud directly, it also reinforces the fact that there really aren't any good options to fundamentally change that," he added. "From what I saw previously, and from what I'm seeing now in open-source, is that what has been building up for the Ukrainians is fundamentally a manpower issue."

And now, once that infiltration was quickly sealed, now that Russian advances have been severely cut back—we hear crickets. For instance, the Washington Post wrote arguably the worst piece on the “calamity” Ukraine was supposedly facing two weeks ago (even when it was no calamity). Since then, their reporting on the war has simply left that “breakthrough”. Where are the analyses of how the Ukrainians reacted quickly? How the Ukrainians cut the breakthrough into pieces? Or really how the original reporting was completely off-kilter and a small Russian infiltration success was turned into another club to beat Ukraine?

The last three weeks have indicated not massive problems with Ukrainian manpower (which are actually being grossly distorted) but more massive problems with how the war is viewed by the press and analytical community. Sadly, there are no signs that it is going to get better—and it matters, because Ukraine will (and in some ways already is) coming under massive pressure to cede land to Russia. It would be far better to report the land war for what it is—a bloody quagmire for Russia, where the Russian state is expending vast resources and losing mass numbers of soldiers for little or at times no gain. Because that is the truth.

Russia Attacks Civilians, Ukraine Attacks Strategic Industries

This week the Russian launched massive attacks on Ukrainian civilian targets. On the evening of August 30 there was a mass attack with almost 600 Russian drones and missiles on Ukrainian targets (details of the damage are still coming in, but there have been some civilian deaths). That comes only two days after the Russians launched what the Ukrainians are saying is the second largest Russian ranged attack of the war (mostly on Kyiv this time) a bombardment that involved 629 air attack weapons, comp.rising 598 drones and 31 missiles.

This latter attack was particularly bloody, as it included attacking residential blocks in Kyiv, causing more than 20 civilian deaths and many many wounded. The fact that the Russians have sent two mass attacks on civilian targets over the last 4 days shows that this is now a major part of their strategic air campaign. They seem to believe that they can break or at least weaken Ukrainian morale to the point that Ukraine will take the terrible deal that Putin and Trump are trying to foist on the Ukrainian state.

It might also be a sign that they do not know how to respond to the growing Ukrainian strategic air campaign. As I wrote yesterday, there are now signs that Ukraine is about to embark on a sustained strategic air campaign against Russian oil refineries and supplies.

A Strategic Air Campaign For Ukraine: Crushing Russian Mobility Through Oil and Rail Attacks
Phillips P. OBrien
·
Aug 30

Hello All,
Read full story

Earlier Ukrainian strategic air campaigns have been fitful—limited by access to effective equipment and therefore lacking the ability for sustained, destructive action. There were some spectacular attacks, but then long periods of quiet when the Russians were able to respond.

Something seems to have changed this last month, as the Ukrainians have upped the number of attacks on Russian oil refineries—at an increased pace During August, Ukraine launched at least ten strikes on major Russian refineries, including:

August 2: Ryazan and Novokuybyshev refineries (both in Samara region);

August 7: Afipsky refinery;

August 10: Saratov refinery;

August 13 and 19: Volgograd refinery (Lukoil);

August 15 and 24: Syzran refinery;

August 24: Novoshakhtinsk refinery;

August 25: Ilsky refinery;

August 28: Kuybyshev and Afipsky refineries.

And reports are now coming in that on the evening of August 30, the Ukrainians hit two more Russian refineries, one Krasnodar in southern Russia and the other in Syzran in the Samara region. Note—its important to see the Ukrainians returning to his the same refinery (Syzran) multiple times in one month. One and done raids are often a chimera—strategic air needs consistency and often regular attacks on the same target to be successful.

This campaign (if that is indeed what it turns into) has a ways to run—but so far the first indications is that it has great promise. The Russians, starting in July, have reportedly stopped all oil sales until the end of September—no small matter for a country that desperately needs oil revenues to keep supplying its war machine. At the same time there are reports that gas shortages are becoming far more regular across Russia. The Moscow Times started a story yesterday in this way.

Once again, Russia is in the grips of a gasoline crisis. Prices at the pump are rising, and some gas stations have run dry. This is not the first time Russia has experienced such shortages, but this time around they could be more serious because of the ongoing war in Ukraine.

And the Ukrainians are also focussing on rising Russian oil prices. Here is a story they have recently released on the subject.

Since July 2025, it (Russia) has banned gasoline exports to ensure internal supply. Yet this has not been enough—prices keep rising. Year-on-year, they are up more than 10%, surpassing 60 rubles (about 75 cents) per liter.

If Ukraine can keep hitting and damaging/destroying Russian refining capacity and the Russian domestic oil situation gets worse (no small matter as summer is ending and the weather will turn cold) this embargo on Russian oil sales might have to be extended. And we still have the Flamingo FP-5s to appear.

We are seeing two very different visions of strategic airpower in action—my bet is on the Ukrainian version being more effective.

Pokrovsk Versus Oil Refineries--One Of These Is Strategic, The Other Not.

Regular readers over the last few years will know that one of the things that bugs me most is the misuse of the word “strategic” by the press and analytical community. Strategic has become a lazy adjective, used by both reporters and analysts to describe something that they want to imply to their readers or followers is really important—particularly if its some difficult to pronounce Ukrainian village that the Russians are about to take. I wrote this piece on the subject almost exactly a year ago (about Pokrovsk as it turns out and the ludicrous way the town was being described as “strategic”. I just took off the paywall which exists on older pieces so you can read it.
Weekend Update #96: The Abuse of the Word “Strategic”
Phillips P. OBrien
·
September 1, 2024
Weekend Update #96: The Abuse of the Word “Strategic”

Hello All,
Read full story

However strategic does not mean important or even interesting. It means something of such value that its future will make a material difference to the course of the war—the ability of Russia or Ukraine to continue fighting.

However, lazy strategic myth continues. When the Russians launched their infiltration operation three weeks ago it did not take long for reporters/commentators to trot out the old “strategic” Pokrovsk about to fall narrative—particularly pro-Trump sources (amazing that). My favorite was this ludicrous report in the American Conservative—which basically claimed that Ukraine about to abandon the “strategic” town.

Its so depressing to see how completely the Trump-supporting right has adopted the Russian view of the.

However as the piece written a year ago I hope demostrates, Pokrovsk is not and has never been “strategic”. Its not some vital logistics hub, its a piece of economically unimportant geography that will not effect Ukrainian force generation in any way. No useful war production is located there and the town has been in a battle area for more than a year.

However, do you want to know what is “strategic”? The Russian oil refining industry—that is what. This industry is one of the vital cogs to the whole Russian war machine—the severely damaging of which would have numerous first, second and third order “strategic” effects that would seriously weaken the Russian war fighting.

Oil refining provides huge amounts of money to the Russian state, it helps heat and power Russian cities and factories, it powers the vehicles of the Russian army, etc. The future of Russian oil refining is infinitely more “strategic” in its impact on the war that the fate of Pokrovsk—and right now the Ukrainians are hitting it.

I await all the stories in the press that go into this real strategic war in detail and I want to see that when they do appear, they use the word “strategic”. Because in this case it really applies.

Have a good rest of the weekend everyone.

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

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Sunday, August 31, 2025 2:12 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Fuck Ukraine. Nobody cares.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Monday, September 1, 2025 8:04 AM

SECOND

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


Russian milbloggers heavily criticized Russian Chief of the General Staff Army General Valery Gerasimov's August 30 claims that Russian forces seized 3,500 square kilometers of territory and 149 settlements since March 2025 and rejected Gerasimov's claim that Russian forces have seized half of Kupyansk.[5] The milbloggers characterized Gerasimov's figures as a "very big exaggeration" and asked which elements of the Russian military command structure are feeding false reports to the Russian high command. ISW has observed evidence to assess that Russian forces had gained only roughly 2,346 square kilometers of Ukrainian territory and seized 130 settlements between March 1 and August 30.[6]

The Kremlin is intensifying these information efforts because its territorial gains remain disproportionately limited and slow relative to the high losses incurred.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-august-31-2025

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

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Monday, September 1, 2025 8:14 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Fuck Ukraine. Nobody cares.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Monday, September 1, 2025 10:08 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Fuck Ukraine. Nobody cares.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
The US Disaster With India Has Reached The Grovelling Stage by US State Department

And It Has NOTHING To Do With Helping Ukraine

Phillips P. OBrien | Sep 01, 2025

https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/the-us-disaster-with-india-has-
reached

The Trump Administration imposed punitive tariffs on India, expecting the Indians to come grovelling to Trump and ask what they needed to do to make things better.

And guess what? It is the US which is grovelling as the Indians treat the move by the Trump Administration with the disdain that it deserves.

The US decision to decimate the US-Indian relationship never made sense in any rational universe where states act with their self-interest at heart.

Singling out India for punitive tariffs was not just self-destructive, it was also profoundly illogical. The publicly stated idea that the move was because India was buying lots of Russian oil was, ipso facto, ridiculous. China buys even more Russian oil than India and Turkey buys almost as much—and Trump is desperately trying to keep both of these states onboard. Instead, India got closer to Russia.

So, if the move had nothing to do with helping Ukraine, it might be asked why it happened? Well, what has emerged in the last few days is that the reason for the blow-up was even more venal than most people could have predicted.

Trump was destroying one of the most important strategic relationships the US has because the Indians refused to lie on his behalf and feed his monstrous ego. Trump wanted the Indians to state that he was responsible for bringing peace between India and Pakistan (a laughable claim). And the Indian government, representing a proud state with a history of not bowing to western pressure, not surprisingly refused.

Mr. Trump had been saying — repeatedly, publicly, exuberantly — that he had “solved” the military conflict between India and Pakistan, a dispute that dates back more than 75 years and is far deeper and more complicated than Mr. Trump was making it out to be.

During a phone call on June 17, Mr. Trump brought it up again, saying how proud he was of ending the military escalation. He mentioned that Pakistan was going to nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize, an honor for which he had been openly campaigning. The not-so-subtle implication, according to people familiar with the call, was that Mr. Modi should do the same.

The Indian leader bristled. He told Mr. Trump that U.S. involvement had nothing to do with the recent cease-fire. It had been settled directly between India and Pakistan.

Its remarkable how the entire position of the United States is being perverted by the personal interest and delusions of the president. Where is the bureaucracy that is supposed to check these things? Where are the “sensible” Republicans?

This move has been so catastrophic that its hard to underestimate the damage that has been done. India was in many ways the great linchpin to any attempt to balance China with powers from the global south itself. India and the US had no areas of insurmountable difference and many areas of shared interest—and things had been steadily improving between the two states for decades.

Maybe, through grovelling, the US can try and repair some of the foolishness and destructiveness it has brought to its international position. However, even then, it has set back the US-Indian relationship for years, if not decades.

Cleaning up the damage that Trump is doing to US relations with allies and friends is going to be one of the greatest challenge the US has ever faced internationally. If, of course, it even wants to try.



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

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Monday, September 1, 2025 12:06 PM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

German soldiers fought all the way back to Berlin, and didn't surrender until Berlin itself was invaded. Let's hope, for Ukraine's sake, Russia doesn't have to go that far.

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



This is why I call signym, comrade signym. She is promoting anti-Ukraine pro-Russian success and, in her signature, she is spewing anti-American propaganda. Signym likes and promotes dictators. She does it with every post.

And as SECOND pointed out, she is using what she claims is a quote to misrepresent not what Kissinger said, but what he meant. She is doing what any Russian troll would do. This is, signym.

T

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Monday, September 1, 2025 1:22 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Fuck Ukraine. Nobody cares.


Sigs is American.

You are the person here who barely has a grasp on the English language.

I don't know where Jaynez comes from. He makes it clear he's not American, but to my knowledge he's never said where he is from and since he won't even say how old he is when asked, it's not surprising he won't disclose that.

Of everyone else still posting here, it is you and JSF that I have my doubts about. You can barely write English, and JSF has his weird story about not having internet and needing to use the library to post, but then he posts at all sorts of weird hours like 3AM. I lived right around where he claims to live for 5 years, and unless things have changed, there were no 24/7 libraries around. Then again, I never went to a library in the city of Milwaukee, so maybe that's a thing that big cities do.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Tuesday, September 2, 2025 6:24 AM

SECOND

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


The Kremlin likely timed the publication of a video address by former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych to coincide with Putin's SCO speech in order to lend legitimacy to Putin's demand for regime change in Ukraine. Russian state media published a video message on September 1 of Yanukovych claiming that he worked to bring Ukraine closer to the EU during his presidency and that his ultimate goal was Ukraine's EU accession.[8] Yanukovych blamed Ukraine's EU partners for behaving "incorrectly" during Ukrainian-EU negotiations and criticized the EU for not understanding the difficulties of Ukraine's economic situation. Yanukovych also claimed that he has always opposed Ukraine's membership in NATO, which he alleged would have been a "catastrophe" and "a direct road to civil war." Yanukovych's last public media appearance was in July 2022, when he called on Ukrainians to surrender to Russia.[9] The timing of the filming of Yanukovych's video address is unknown, but he opened by stating that Putin "is absolutely correct" – seemingly in response to Putin's remarks about Ukraine at the SCO summit, indicating this was likely a choreographed information effort. The publication of Yanukovych's video on Russian state media was likely intentionally timed to coincide with Putin's remarks. The Kremlin may be setting conditions to claim that Yanukovych is the legitimate leader of Ukraine – not Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Such claims are false, however, as Yanukovych fled Ukraine on his own accord after the Revolution of Dignity, and Ukraine has held several democratic elections since.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-september-1-2025

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

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Tuesday, September 2, 2025 8:29 AM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:

What an evil selfish prick Putin is. Does anyone but him benefit from this? And now? After 2 years of covid crap? Kill thousands and crash the world economy so he can redraw a MAP?!?? What fcking dinosaur. I look forward to watching this blow up in his face.




Hey G. Can you stick around a bit? It would be so so good to have another sane person keeping tabs on this. Also, its' good to see you're good.

T



Hey T - good to see you as well. I've checked in from time to time, but sadly nothing ever seems to change. Same broken logic, same idiocy, same lack of any intelligent discussion. Just stupid blah blah and repeat. We'll see.



I hear you G. Truth be told I could chose to leave tomorrow, but for today I’m here.

I have long dispelled any notion of a firefly reboot G but with Disney now owning it there is hope. Disney is up to its neck in space shows. If it is rebooted this site will bang back to life unless all that are left are trolls. If there is to be a reboot it may not be too long off. Pushing back against the trolls may be what’s needed at the moment to allow a fireflyfans reboot as well.


T





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Tuesday, September 2, 2025 8:31 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
This is why I call signym, comrade signym. She is promoting anti-Ukraine pro-Russian success


Son, I am merely recognizing reality.

You should try it sometime.

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

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Wednesday, September 3, 2025 5:46 AM

SECOND

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


Bloomberg reported on September 2 that sources who received offers from Russian crude oil exporters stated that Russian exporters are offering Urals crude to Indian importers at a discount of $3 to $4 per barrel, compared to Brent, on a delivered basis for cargo shipments in late September to October 2025.[6] Bloomberg reported that sources stated that Russian exporters were offering Indian importers a discount of around $2.50 a barrel during the week of August 24 to 30 and a discount of $1 in July 2025. Russia is likely offering Indian importers discounted crude oil to ensure that India continues to purchase crude from Russia despite Western secondary sanctions against India, including a 50 percent US tariff against Indian exports to the United States.[7]

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campai
gn-assessment-september-2-2025

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

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Wednesday, September 3, 2025 10:36 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK February 24, 2022 2:33 PM http://fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=64887 :

Hey. There he is.

Ted's been crying since you've been gone.

How's the first terrible year of Biden*'s horrible presidency treating you?


P.S.

Barack Obama is President: Putin invades Crimea.

Donald Trump is President: Putin doesn't do shit.

Joe Biden* is President: Putin invades Ukraine.

One of these things is not like the other.

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

Vaccinated People: "You need to get muh vaccination shots that don't work because I got muh vaccination shots that don't work and I'm afraid of people that didn't get muh vaccination shots that don't work because muh vaccination shots that don't work don't work."
September 2 was supposed to be "Russia ends its atrocious and unlawful war in Ukraine" day.

What? Did you forget that President Donald Trump laid down a 50-day marker on July 14, a hard-and-fast deadline for Russia to end the hostilities and remake the peace it destroyed by invading Ukraine?

Maybe it slipped your mind because Trump stripped that deadline from his calendar just two weeks after announcing it, cutting that timeframe down to "10 to 12 days" on July 28 before letting that day pass 10 to 12 days later with no significant outcome.

Trump will never stand up to Putin on Ukraine. It's on Congress to punish Russia.

At a time when our country is seeing a peak in political partisanship, Congress is actually speaking with a bipartisan voice about punishing Russia with sanctions, as a way to force an end to the war.

By Chris Brennan | USA TODAY
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2025/09/02/trump-us-r
ussia-sanctions-ukraine-war/85869429007/

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

Donald Trump took no apparent action at the passing of his latest deadline for Vladimir Putin to come to the negotiating table with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He was “very disappointed” in the Russian ruler, and was planning on “doing something to help people live”, said the US president, without any specifics. He was speaking on the radio show of Scott Jennings, a US conservative pundit.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/sep/03/ukraine-war-briefing-no-
action-from-trump-as-another-putin-deadline-passes

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

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Wednesday, September 3, 2025 10:52 AM

SECOND

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


For Trump ‘It’s all theatre’: How are Europe and the US pulling apart on Ukraine?

2 Sep 2025

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/2/its-all-theatre-are-europe-and
-the-us-pulling-apart-on-ukraine

Since their summit with United States President Donald Trump in the White House on August 18, Kyiv’s European and regional allies have begun to nail down commitments to a peacekeeping force that would enter Ukraine after a ceasefire is reached in the war that Russia began three and a half years ago.

They aim to collect those commitments by the end of the week.

What have countries promised?

So far, Estonia has said it was prepared to contribute at least a military unit to the peacekeeping force, and Lithuania had earlier announced it was ready to send an unspecified number of troops.

Romania said it would not send troops, but would make its airfields available as bases for F-35 air patrols enforcing a no-fly zone over Ukraine.

Turkiye is considering sending troops, and would help de-mine the Black Sea, Ukraine’s ambassador to Ankara said.

Colonel Andre Wuestner, the head of the German Armed Forces Association, told the Reuters news agency that at least 10,000 troops would be needed for an extended period.

“It won’t be enough to have a handful of generals and smaller military units man a command post in Ukraine,” Wuestner said.

A top priority for the Europeans at the White House meeting was to commit Trump to being involved in such a force.

Trump had said on August 18 that the US would participate, but not with troops.

Last month, The Financial Times reported that US officials recently told their European interlocutors that the US would contribute “strategic enablers”, such as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, command and control, and air defence assets.

Is a ceasefire and plan for a peacekeeping force viable?

“It’s all theatre. Every single European leader, including [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelenskyy, has had to find a way of keeping Trump on side,” said Keir Giles, a Eurasia expert at Chatham House. “They’ve succeeded in doing so, but it is at the cost of suspension of reality.”

“The need to humour Trump, and to play along with the fantasy version of reality that drives the Trump world, means that they still pay lip service to these ludicrous ideas,” said Giles.

Much more at https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/2/its-all-theatre-are-europe-and
-the-us-pulling-apart-on-ukraine

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

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Wednesday, September 3, 2025 11:22 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Fuck Ukraine. Nobody cares.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Wednesday, September 3, 2025 8:05 PM

SECOND

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


This shall be the Forever War Ending Only With Putin's Death:

Hot mic catches Xi and Putin discussing organ transplants and immortality

By Emily Atkinson BBC News

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr70rvrd41ko

Watch: Xi and Putin overheard discussing organ transplants and living to 150-years-old

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin have been overheard discussing organ transplants as a means of prolonging life on the sidelines of a military parade in Beijing.

Putin suggested even eternal life could be achievable as a result of innovations in biotechnology, according to a translation of remarks caught on a hot mic.

The unguarded moment was captured on a livestream carried by Chinese state TV as the two leaders and North Korea's Kim Jong Un walked together through China's historic Tiananmen Square.

Xi and Putin have been in power for 13 and 25 years respectively. Neither has expressed any intention of stepping down.

The exchange was relayed by a Mandarin translator for Putin and a Russian translator for Xi, and has been translated into English by the BBC.

"In the past, it used to be rare for someone to be older than 70 and these days they say that at 70 one's still a child," Xi's translator could be heard saying in Russian.

An inaudible passage from Putin follows. His Mandarin translator then added: "With the development of biotechnology, human organs can be continuously transplanted, and people can live younger and younger, and even achieve immortality."

Xi's translator then said: "Predictions are, this century, there's a chance of also living to 150 [years old]."

Putin reportedly reprised his remarks later while speaking to Russian media.

Russian state news agency Tass quoted him as saying: "Modern recovery methods, medical methods, even surgical ones dealing with the replacement of organs, enable humanity to hope for active life to last longer than it does today.

"Average age is different in different countries but life expectancy will increase significantly". [But NOT if you sign a contract with Putin to fight Ukraine.]

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

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Wednesday, September 3, 2025 8:46 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by SECOND:
Putin suggested even eternal life could be achievable as a result of innovations in biotechnology, according to a translation of remarks caught on a hot mic.


I'm sure he did.

Prove it.


You people do nothing but just say shit.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 6:22 AM

SECOND

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


Can The Ukrainians Manage A Large Strategic Air Campaign Now: Say On The Scale of the US and British Against Germany from 1943-45?

Sept 3, 2025

https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/a-strategic-air-campaign-for-uk
raine-a5b

This kind of question/comment came up a few times in different ways and it is really challenging and I’ve tried to think through it. While I think we need to be careful about comparing such campaigns 80 years apart (accuracy and range are more easily achieved these days for instance), it does point out the scale of what Ukraine might attempt. It took the US and UK, the largest and third largest economic powers in the world, years of effort to ground down the Germans from the air. Ukraine will be attacking from a far less lofty economic position and the idea that they can quickly achieve strategic effect in comparison could be said to be a tall order.

There are a few things to say in Ukraine’s favor, however. The first is that the last three years have seen Ukraine already achieve one of the things that was nowhere near achieved when the US-UK started the Combined Bombing Offensive (CBO) against Germany in 1943. That is the whittling down of Russian air defense. It was not until 1944 before the US and UK gained actual air superiority over Germany—and that took a great effort to neutralize German anti-aircraft capabilities ranging from interceptor aircraft (think ME-109s and FW 190s), to the masses of Flak guns and ammunition that the Germans were making.

Note: by 1944 the Germans were devoting more of their production capacity to building flak and flak artillery than they were to tanks.

Ukraine will be starting any strategic air campaign today in a much better shape vis a vis Russian anti-air capabilities now than the US and UK in 1943 were versus Germany. They have already destroyed a large number of Russian systems and forced the Russians to weakly defend some strategic areas. The fact that they have already had some success attacking facilities such as oil refineries, shows that Russian air defense already has some major holes.

And Russia today is not as relatively strong economically as Germany was then—nowhere close. So while Russian anti-air capabilities are still there and capable of taking a toll on Ukrainian attacks, but relatively speaking its weaker.

Then there is the question of accuracy and range. In bombing Germany the US and UK had to rely on dropping ordnance from moving aircraft in an inaccurate manner (except perfect circumstances). Only a small percentage of air-dropped bombs had a chance of hitting a target—which is why the raids often took hundreds or in some cases over 1000 aircraft to have strategic effect.

Weapons today are more accurate. If the Flamingo has a 40-45 foot accuracy (14 metres) that would mean that one Flamingo hitting the target would be the equivalent of tens, maybe 100 large bombers in 1943-1944.

Weapons today also have much increased range. US and UK aircraft could only efficiently reach eastern Germany in 1944 (and even then not all of eastern Germany). Their range was measured in the hundreds of miles. Today’s weapons have ranges in the thousands of miles. This both makes air defense more difficult (so much land to cover) it allows attacks on targets far more distant than 1943-1945.

So any direct comparison to what the Ukrainians are trying to do, to what the US and UK were trying to do, needs to take into account these differences.

Are We Putting Too Much Hope On The Flamingo?

Possibly. In the first piece I wrote about the FP-5 Flamingo Cruise Missile, I mentioned that we still did not know anything meaningful about its accuracy, production rate, survivability and reliability. I do believe that until we see it in action, and know that the Ukrainians have built enough of them to launch a sustained campaign, that we need to be very careful in assuming that the Flamingo will be capable of bolstering a strategic air campaign.

For instance, we do not know if it will be easy to shoot down a Flamingo, which would seriously lessen its value. Moreover it could have major manufacturing issues such as an undiscovered design imperfection or a difficulty in sourcing components (some have guessed that finding the massive engines needed for such a heavy payload will be a challenge). It is always prudent to understand that weapons production rates can be far lower than expected at first and teething problems can be discovered in the production process that were not expected.

So, many of the assumptions of what a strategic air campaign would be like are based on an optimistic idea that the Flamingo will be made and operated in the best possible way. This may not be the case and it could take longer before the weapon is actually effective.

Am I Overrating Strategic Bombing As A Whole?

Ah, I can see how many people think that. The idea that strategic bombing was very effective in World War II and other wars has been challenged by a range of scholars. Richard Overy, for instance, one of the great historians of air power in WWII, has gone back and forth on the value of the strategic air campaign in defeating Germany. In his last work on the subject, The Bombing War, he came down more on the negative side.

Also scholars like Robert Pape have generally cast doubts on the value of strategic air power—and said air power is far more useful when used in a tactical fashion (to attack directly the military forces of the enemy). Pape, in Bombing to Win, attacked the whole idea of independent strategic air power shaping wars (he is often contrasted as an opposite to John Warden). He starts by saying strategic bombing in World War II was not a success.

All I can say in response is that my life of research, where I have tried to break down WWII strategic bombing, is that people have not actually understood how it worked and how effective it was. It was not just an issue of its direct strategic effects (destruction of German production) but also in its second and third order effects—changes dispositions of German forces, degrades the land war, degrades the domestic economy, etc. etc.

I might even turn this idea on its head (what I will say here is probably better for a book). I think the focus on tactical use of air power has been a contributing factor to the USA losing almost every war since WWII. Not understanding how effective strategic bombing in the war was, has led to too much emphasis on “boots on the ground” and using air power to directly attack enemy forces—which amazingly are forces that can be rebuilt and come back time and time again.

A better way to defeat another side is to try and paralyze its military system—not to focus on the forward edge all the time.

Now that is an idea for a larger piece in the future!

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

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 10:08 AM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
This is why I call signym, comrade signym. She is promoting anti-Ukraine pro-Russian success


Son, I am merely recognizing reality.

You should try it sometime.




No you're not. Russia is out of food and fuel. Good luck finding a potato in Russia comrade. Good luck filling up your car with gas. Russia is without gas and potatoes. How funny, sorry weird is that?

T

US ORDERS PREPARATIONS FOR WORLD WAR, FUEL SHORTAGES REACH MOSCOW!



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Thursday, September 4, 2025 10:19 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


You don't know shit, Ted. Shut the fuck up.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 11:27 AM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

You don't know shit, Ted. Shut the fuck up.





T

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 1:55 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Come at me bro. I'd love to have an excuse.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 3:22 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.



Quote:
THGR:
This is why I call signym, comrade signym. She is promoting anti-Ukraine pro-Russian success

SIGNY:
Son, I am merely recognizing reality.
You should try it sometime.

THGR:
No you're not. Russia is out of food and fuel. Good luck finding a potato in Russia comrade. Good luck filling up your car with gas. Russia is without gas and potatoes. How funny, sorry weird is that?


Son, IDK where you get your propaganda from, but you really need better sources. I listen to people ... Americans, Brits ... who visit Russia, some of them traveling from end to end, and there's no such thing. Yes, there was a severe drought in southern Russia, but that doesn't affect grain supplies in Russia, just exports. AFA gasoline shortages... people were returning home from summer vacation since school starts in Sept (says Slavikman) leading to huge traffic jams on the main highways and high demand for gasoline, but that's about it.



US ORDERS PREPARATIONS FOR WORLD WAR, FUEL SHORTAGES REACH MOSCOW!

The only one who's stupid enough to start WWIII is us. We make enemies out of everyone.

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

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 4:27 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Here's your realism:
1. Fuck Ukraine.
2. Nobody cares.

That's been the truth since the genesis of this thread.
Here's your realism:

1. Your Precious NAZI's lost WW1
NAZIs lost World War One. Really? You mean between 1914 and 1918, when the NAZIs overran Yurp?
Quote:


2. Your precious NAZI's lost WW11
NAZIs lost World War Eleven. Really? Who lost World War Ten? What year was that?
Quote:


3. Your precious NAZI's will always lose.
NAZIs always lose? Hate to break the news to you, but NAZIs were winning on ALL 5 fronts of the European Theater of Combat, AT THE SAME TIME - until America entered the fray of World War II. That was why Hitler was so pissed at Japan for awakening the Sleeping Dragon of America on 7 December 1941.
Quote:


That's been the truth since the genesis of this thread.

T
Dude, that is 0 for 3 - you struck out.

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 7:47 PM

SECOND

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


Quote:
Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN:
NAZIs always lose? Hate to break the news to you, but NAZIs were winning on ALL 5 fronts of the European Theater of Combat, AT THE SAME TIME - until America entered the fray of World War II. That was why Hitler was so pissed at Japan for awakening the Sleeping Dragon of America on 7 December 1941.
Adolf Hitler declared war on the United States on December 11, 1941, four days after the U.S. declared war on Japan in response to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Despite not being obligated to do so by the Tripartite Pact, Hitler chose to join Germany's ally Japan, formally bringing the United States into the war in both the Pacific and European theaters.

What would have happened if Hitler had NOT declared war on the United States? This is google's answer:

If Hitler had not declared war on the United States in December 1941, it could have prolonged the war in Europe by delaying or preventing significant American military involvement, especially on the Western Front, and potentially strengthened the Axis powers' position by avoiding a two-front war. However, the US likely would have continued to support the Allies through lend-lease, and German conflict with the Soviet Union would have continued, making an eventual US entry into the European conflict probable regardless.

Potential Impacts on the War in Europe

Delayed or different Allied invasion:
The D-Day landings in Normandy in 1944, a critical moment in the war, might have been delayed or taken a different form without the full might of the US military behind it.

Prolonged German resistance:
The absence of American troops and resources could have given Germany more time to develop defensive strategies and potentially inflict greater losses on the Soviet Union and other Allied forces.

More resources for the Eastern Front:
With no need to divert resources to the Western Front, Germany might have been able to concentrate more forces and supplies against the Soviet Union, which could have had a decisive impact on the outcome of the war in the East.

Likely Scenarios and Motivations

Continued US aid:
Even without a declaration of war, the United States was already supporting Britain and the Soviet Union through the Lend-Lease Act. This aid likely would have continued and possibly increased.

Escalating tensions:
The conflict in the Atlantic and German U-boat attacks on American shipping made a direct confrontation between the US and Germany increasingly likely.

Overall Outcome
While a lack of declaration of war might have altered the course of the European conflict, an eventual Allied victory would still have been likely, though it may have come at a greater cost and took longer.

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

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 8:06 PM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Kick his ass SECOND. Nicely done...

T

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 8:07 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Shut the fuck up, Second.

The only two people in the RWED who behave like Nazis in 2025 are you and Ted.

Read a book and/or buy a mirror.


Your opinions all belong in the trash, and that's exactly where America and Americans are putting them now.

Your reign of terror is over.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 8:08 PM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Quote:
THGR:
This is why I call signym, comrade signym. She is promoting anti-Ukraine pro-Russian success

SIGNY:
Son, I am merely recognizing reality.
You should try it sometime.

THGR:
No you're not. Russia is out of food and fuel. Good luck finding a potato in Russia comrade. Good luck filling up your car with gas. Russia is without gas and potatoes. How funny, sorry weird is that?


Son, IDK where you get your propaganda from, but you really need better sources. I listen to people ... Americans, Brits ... who visit Russia, some of them traveling from end to end, and there's no such thing. Yes, there was a severe drought in southern Russia, but that doesn't affect grain supplies in Russia, just exports. AFA gasoline shortages... people were returning home from summer vacation since school starts in Sept (says Slavikman) leading to huge traffic jams on the main highways and high demand for gasoline, but that's about it.



US ORDERS PREPARATIONS FOR WORLD WAR, FUEL SHORTAGES REACH MOSCOW!

The only one who's stupid enough to start WWIII is us. We make enemies out of everyone.




Bullshit comrade, that's all, just bullshit.

T

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 8:10 PM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

Shut the fuck up, Second.

The only two people in the RWED who behave like Nazis in 2025 are you and Ted.

Read a book and/or buy a mirror.

Your opinions all belong in the trash, and that's exactly where America and Americans are putting them now.

Your reign of terror is over.




OH no SECOND, Jack says your reign of terror is over. What on earth are you going to do now?

I'm dying here Jack. Just way too funny...

T

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 8:15 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

Shut the fuck up, Second.

The only two people in the RWED who behave like Nazis in 2025 are you and Ted.

Read a book and/or buy a mirror.

Your opinions all belong in the trash, and that's exactly where America and Americans are putting them now.

Your reign of terror is over.




OH no SECOND, Jack says your reign of terror is over. What on earth are you going to do now?

I'm dying here Jack. Just way too funny...

T



Not Second, specifically. Second is a pissant just like you are.

That was an all-encompassing "your".

I won't bother explaining any further because my time is wasted on sub-humans, such as yourself. And six months from now I doubt very much that either of you will even have anything left to say without having any marching orders to parrot.

Figure it out on your own.



The one thing you did get right though is that you're dying over there. You sure ARE dying.



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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 8:46 PM

SECOND

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


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Shut the fuck up, Second.

The only two people in the RWED who behave like Nazis in 2025 are you and Ted.

Read a book and/or buy a mirror.


Your opinions all belong in the trash, and that's exactly where America and Americans are putting them now.

Your reign of terror is over.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
6ix, your problem is that you, a Trumptard, are the moral equivalent of a Confederate slave-owner, or a Nazi, or a Epstein Pedophile. You have no sense that you and Trump are evil, do you? At least Trump is making $billions from his bitcoins, but you're evil for free.

New crypto token boosts Trump family's wealth by $5 billion
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-wlfi-world-liberty-financial-crypto
-wealth/

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

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Thursday, September 4, 2025 8:56 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Heard it already. *yawn*

Go cry to people on BlueSky about it. That's the last place people like you are being taken seriously. The last bastion of your crumbling echo chamber.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, September 5, 2025 7:06 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Heard it already. *yawn*

Go cry to people on BlueSky about it. That's the last place people like you are being taken seriously. The last bastion of your crumbling echo chamber.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
6ix, 26 countries know Russia is evil. Only North Korea thinks Russia isn't:

Macron stated that 26 states formally agreed to form a “reassurance force” as part of security guarantees for postwar Ukraine. Macron stated that 26 unspecified states agreed to send ground forces to Ukraine or to provide assets to support at sea or in the sky.[4] Macron stated that the forces will be ready to deploy to Ukraine the day after Ukraine and Russia reach a ceasefire or peace agreement in the future. Macron noted that the foreign troops would not deploy to the frontline but to still undecided areas behind the front to prevent future Russian aggression.[5]

https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive
-campaign-assessment-september-4-2025/

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

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Friday, September 5, 2025 7:07 AM

SECOND

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


The Russians Have Saved Up Thousands of Tanks. They're About to Attack in Eastern Ukraine.

Russian regiments may shift back to armored assaults in a bid to capture the east.

Sep 04, 2025

https://www.trenchart.us/p/the-russians-have-saved-up-thousands

Russian regiments have deployed very few armored vehicles in Ukraine this year. The Russians’ main offensives—in Sumy Oblast in the north, around Kupiansk in Kharkiv Oblast in the northeast and around Pokrovsk in Donetsk Oblast in the east—have all been carried out by small teams of infantry marching on foot or riding on motorcycles.

The next offensive could be different, however: it may be led by tanks. This offensive “will be bigger, bloodier and focused on Donetsk Oblast,” Finnish analyst Joni Askola warned.

In an ominous sign of the coming clash, tens of thousands of Russian reinforcements are surging toward Pokrovsk. They include marines and paratroopers diverted from Sumy as well as the soldiers of the 70th Motor Rifle Division, diverted from Kherson Oblast in southern Ukraine.

The 70th MRD is bringing its T-90 and T-72 tanks and other armored vehicles—as are other formations. Analyst Unit Observer clocked the tanks on heavylift trucks winding their way from Kherson to Donetsk.

The reinforcements may help stabilize what little is left of a nine-mile salient Russian infiltrators carved northeast of Pokrovsk a month ago. After that, they’re likely launch a major mechanized assault on Pokrovsk, the last urban stronghold between the 700,000-strong Russian force in Ukraine and the “fortress belt” of eastern cities stretching from Kramatorsk to Sloviansk.

Risky tank strategy

It’s a risky plan. In the first three years of Russia’s wider war on Ukraine starting in February 2022, the Russians mostly attacked in armored vehicles—and the Ukrainians became very adept at destroying the vehicles.

Deploying mines, artillery, missiles and hundreds of thousands of tiny explosive drones every month, the Ukrainians ground up Russia’s armor corps—destroying, damaging or capturing nearly 23,000 armored vehicles and other pieces of heavy equipment.

The losses included 4,000 tanks. That’s more tanks than Russian forces had in active service before the wider war.

Russian industry has struggled to replace the thousands of lost tanks. The main Uralvagonzavod tank factory, in Sverdlovsk Oblast 1,000 miles from Ukraine, is building new T-90Ms—but it’s unclear how many. The factory’s output may have collapsed this year.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin’s constellation of storage bases have been giving up their Cold War surplus: thousands of old T-55s, T-62s, T-72s and T-80s, rusting out in the open for decades. But these, too, are running low: the bases are down to their last few thousand crude T-72As and T-72Bs.

But that doesn’t mean Russia is totally out of tanks. There are still thousands in service. And now many of them are rolling toward Pokrovsk.

It’s possible that, in shifting to infantry assaults this year, the Russians were deliberately husbanding their remaining tanks for a future offensive. “Slowly but surely, it’s being proven that Russia was indeed holding back armor in the rear and reducing mechanized attacks to the bare minimum,” analyst Jompy noted.

Whether this coming armored offensive will succeed where past armored offensives failed is one of most important questions for commanders on both sides as Russia’s wider war on Ukraine grinds into its 43rd month.

Ukraine flies more drones than ever, deeper than ever—and has dug better earthworks and laid more mines in many sectors. On the other hand, Ukrainian forces are still struggling with two huge problems. “Ukraine’s biggest vulnerabilities remain a lack of infantry [and] poor coordination between units,” Askola explained.

“Fixing these is urgent,” he added. “Russia is betting Ukraine won’t fix them in time.”

What happens next could shape the next year of fighting. If Russia’s tanks can’t break through the drone kill zone in the east in the coming months, the Kremlin may finally expend its last meaningful reserves of armor—for nothing.

There are hints this is the likely outcome. Attacking in armored vehicles along drone-patrolled roads just east of Pokrovsk on the evening of Aug. 28, the Russian 155th Naval Infantry Brigade—one of the reinforcing units surging into the area—was immediately spotted from the air by the Ukrainian state security service’s Ivan Franko Group.

The Ivan Franko Group attacked with its own explosive first-person-view drones—and also called in rockets from nearby High-Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems. The combined firepower “inflicted devastating losses on the enemy’s assault armored group, which ultimately could not reach the forward positions of the 79th [Air Assault] Brigade and was completely defeated,” the Ivan Franko Group reported.

The group counted five destroyed vehicles and two abandoned ones. “The enemy’s manpower losses as a result of the complex strike of FPV and HIMARS amounted to 50 to 100 men,” the group claimed.

That skirmish is the umpteenth reminder that big, slow, easy-to-detect heavy vehicles are extremely vulnerable in this new era of drone warfare. But could a very large force of Russian tanks shrug off its losses, roll through the drone kill zone and break into the Ukrainian rear?

We may find out very soon.

If the Russian tanks do break through, they may finally push the Ukrainians out of Pokrovsk and Kupiansk and position Russian field armies for the long-anticipated siege of the Kramatork-Sloviansk fortress belt.

Thanks for reading Trench Art! This post is public so feel free to share it.

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

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Saturday, September 6, 2025 7:20 AM

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


A 'Last, Final Battle' Is Coming as Russian Tanks Mass Outside Pokrovsk

Nine regiments and brigades under a single command are about to attack the fortress city

Sep 05, 2025

https://www.trenchart.us/p/a-last-final-battle-is-coming-as

Russia is massing troops and armored fighting vehicles, or AFVs, in the direction of Dobropillya, just north of the fortress city of Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast. Observing the growing concentration of Russian, one Ukrainian drone operator got an ominous feeling.

“They have prepared a lot of forces and are ready for the last, final battle for the rest of Donetsk Oblast,” wrote Kriegsforscher, who flies drones in support of Ukrainian brigades defending Lyman, 50 miles north of Pokrovsk. “We will see again the usage of AFV columns. And it will be very bloody for both sides.”

No fewer than five Russian marine and airborne brigades, regiments and divisions have redeployed—or are in the process of redeploying—from Sumy Oblast in northern Ukraine to the bottom of the collapsing Russian salient northeast of Pokrovsk.

Meanwhile, the Russian 70th Motor Rifle Division is redeploying from Kherson Oblast in southern Ukraine—and it’s bringing its T-72 and T-90 tanks.

“Russia is finalizing its strategic regrouping,” Unit Observer noted. “Having redeployed forces from Sumy and Kherson, its offensive will likely enter a new phase soon.” Kriegsforscher stressed that the offensive could last a year.

One big tank attack

The Russians’ plan is coming into focus. “The fact that they deployed 5 [or] 6 marine brigades into Dobropillya direction (alongside with a tank regiment, infantry regiment and two motorized brigades) and [are] considering to use them only in one direction under the only one command—tells a lot,” Kriegsforscher wrote.

Dobropillya sits astride the T0515 road, Pokrovsk’s easternmost main supply route. If the Russians can break through Ukrainian lines northeast of Pokrovsk and march on Dobropillya—something they tried and failed to do on a smaller scale last month—they could finally compel the Ukrainian garrison in Pokrovsk to retreat north to avoid creeping encirclement.

Pokrovsk is the proverbial gateway to the “fortress belt” of dense urban settlements stretching from Kramatorsk to Sloviansk in western Donetsk. The fortress belt is the last and biggest prize in Donetsk. If it falls, the whole oblast falls—and Russian conquest of eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region will finally be complete.

Capturing the fortress belt would represent a profound improvement in Russia’s fortunes as its wider war on Ukraine grinds into its 43rd month. In late 2022, Russia occupied around 19% of Ukraine. Today, it occupies 20%. And that 1% gain cost Russia hundreds of thousands of killed, wounded and captured troops. Ukraine’s own casualties were lighter: potentially half or a third as many.

The front line “actually hasn't changed that much,” pointed out Joni Askola, an independent Finnish analyst. But that doesn’t mean it can’t or won’t change. Russian commanders are gambling on an armored breakthrough to alter the dynamics of the wider war.

The Russians’ main offensives this year—in Sumy Oblast in the north, around Kupiansk in Kharkiv Oblast in the northeast and around Pokrovsk in Donetsk Oblast in the east—have all been carried out by small teams of infantry marching on foot or riding on motorcycles.

The coming offensive in the direction of Pokrovsk will be different, Kriegsforscher warned. The Russians “redirected nine regiments/brigades near Dobropillya,” he wrote. “If you think they will use those brigades … without armored columns—it’s up to you.”

It’s a risky plan—and the Russians may not get a do-over. The Ukrainians have become very good at destroying Russian armored vehicles. Russian losses since February 2022 include no fewer than 4,000 tanks. That’s more tanks than Russian forces had in active service before the wider war—and Russian industry has struggled to replace them.

The Uralvagonzavod tank factory, in Sverdlovsk Oblast 1,000 miles from Ukraine, is building new T-90Ms—but it’s unclear how many. The factory’s output may have collapsed this year.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin’s vehicle storage bases, once brimming with Cold War leftovers, are now mostly empty of usable vehicles. The bases may be down to their last few thousand crude T-72As and T-72Bs.

Russian field armies have husbanded their remaining tanks, clearly saving them for the big armored offensive that’s now imminent outside Pokrovsk. If those tanks can’t break through, there may not be enough survivors for a second attempt.

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

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Saturday, September 6, 2025 8:25 AM

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Schrödinger’s GPS Jamming and Not So Hybrid Warfare

Sep 06, 2025

https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/schrodingers-gps-jamming-and-no
t

Last week, Russia upped the ante in its direct attacks on Europe. First, Russia damaged the EU delegation's headquarters and the British Council in Kyiv on August 28, in one of the heaviest nightly air strikes since July that killed more than 20 people. According to EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, the damage was caused by two missiles that hit just 50 metres from the EU delegation office building. Three days later, von der Leyen's plane was forced to land manually in Plovdiv in Bulgaria using analogue maps after alleged Russian GPS interference.

Targeting EU officials directly – especially on such a high level – as well as the killing of former speaker of the Ukrainian parliament Andriy Parubiy in Lviv marks a new level in Russia's aggression against Europe as a whole.

Or it would, if Europe were able to agree on it. But Bulgaria has been first suggesting, then denying, then suggesting again that the landing problems were indeed due to “routine interruptions” that have occurred since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale war in Ukraine. Russian GPS jamming and spoofing have indeed become a daily nuisance in the Baltic Sea and Arctic region since 2022, forcing some airports to install alternative navigation systems. The Swedish Transport Agency said 2025 has seen 733 incidents so, up from 55 during the whole year in 2023. According to the agency, while the incidents used to be limited to the eastern parts of Swedish airspace over international waters, jamming now reaches to Swedish territory and waters.

So far, even otherwise hawkish Balts have shrugged off the jamming as a regrettable side effect of Russian electronic warfare aiming to protect its airspace from Ukrainian drone attacks, rather than targeted interference of European countries. But Swedish territory isn’t exactly close to Russian military sites. And neither is the Plovdiv airport in central Bulgaria, more than 200km from the Black Sea coast where Bulgaria has seen some action that can be assumed unintentional, such as a crashed drone landing on its shores.

With its attacks on European infrastructure, Russia has steered clear of crossing any direct thresholds that would trigger a response that goes beyond sanctions - until recently. But that changed back in May, when Russia protected a shadow fleet vessel by buzzing Estonian airspace with an Su-35 fighter jet when Estonia was trying to intercept the vessel Jaguar. Now, Russia no longer tries to hide behind a veil of (im)plausible deniability and does not seem to care about the potential consequences of its actions – probably because the Kremlin is confident there will be none (except for more sanctions). While important in tightening the noose around Russia's struggling economy, sanctions are clearly not sufficient to deter Moscow from escalating further.

Russia is currently delivering one occasion after another to take stronger measures - last week’s incidents could have easily warranted a deployment of the European-led coalition of the willing to Ukraine, without waiting for a ceasefire. Alas.

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

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Sunday, September 7, 2025 7:46 AM

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


Ukrainian officials warned that the Russian military command is regrouping and reinforcing its troops in western Donetsk Oblast, likely ahead of a major offensive operation.

A senior non-commissioned officer (NCO) of a Ukrainian brigade operating in the Siversk direction reported that Russian forces are conducting troop rotations in the area and that Ukrainian forces anticipate that Russian forces will soon conduct intensified offensive operations.[3] The NCO noted that the Russian military command is pressuring Russian units to advance during Fall 2025, given that Russian forces did not achieve their given objectives during Summer 2025.

https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive
-campaign-assessment-september-6-2025/

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

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Sunday, September 7, 2025 12:12 PM

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


The Ranged Campaign Against Russian Oil Production Continues

Phillips P. OBrien | Sep 07, 2025

https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/weekend-update-149-the-ranged-c
ampaign

In just the last few hours the Ukrainians have struck with long-range UAVs two more elements in the interconnected Russian system for oil production, refining and distribution. The Ukrainians reportedly hit the Russian refinery in Ilsky, which lies in the Russian Oblast of Krasnodar Krai (the picture below is reportedly a Russian telegram shot of the refinery burning). At the same time there were reports that the Ukrainians had targeted the Russian Druzhba pipeline pumping system in Bryansk Oblast—which amongst other things is being used to transport oil onto Russia’s partners in Slovakia and Hungary.
Reportedly the Russian Refinery at Ilsky Which Was Hit Only Hours Ago

And that was just last night. Two days ago the Ukrainians claimed to have struck (again) the Russian Ryazan refinery in Russia itself (see picture at top) and oil infrastructure in occupied Luhansk. This Ryazan refinery according to Ukrainian command “has a capacity of 17.1 million tons of oil per year, is one of the four largest oil refineries in Russia. It produces:

Various grades of gasoline,

Diesel fuel,

Jet fuel,

Liquefied gases,

Other petroleum products.

The facility is involved in supplying the Russian army.”

Not a bad week.

More and more we are getting indications that this is a sustained and well thought-out Ukrainian strategic air/bombing campaign against valuable targets that power the Russian war effort. The Ukrainians have now kept this oil campaign up continually for more than a month, from early August to today.

The Ukrainians clearly had stockpiled the systems to keep the campaign going to this point, as they are repeatedly attacking the same targets. Ryazan, for instance, was heavily attacked on August 4—reportedly leading to it losing half of its refining capacity. In the past this one attack might have been cause of celebration by Ukrainian supporters—but then they would probably have lost focus, and the Russians would have started restoring some of the lost capacity so that the long-term strategic impact of the attack would have been small.

Likewise in mid-August the Ukrainians struck the Druzhba pipeline, which caused howls of protest by the Hungarians at the time. Once again, in the past such an attack might have been celebrated, but then not followed up and the oil flow to Ukraine’s enemies would have been restored.

These repeat attacks are arguably the most important development in what we are seeing—because they show that the Ukrainians are not just trying to pull off spectacular missions, they are trying to methodically undertake a planned campaign—not just to damage certain facilities but to try and put them out of action or at least cripple them for long periods.

And more and more people are understanding what the Ukrainians are trying to do. The Economist (which has a very mixed record in this war and which regularly platforms the analytical community who said the Russian military was amazing, that Ukraine would fall in days and later that Ukraine being given ranged weapons would be no game-changer) published a piece this week which outlined the pressures Putin's state is now under because of this campaign.

According to the story about 20% of Russia’s refining capacity is now out of order (which contrasts to reports in August that the figure was just over 17%).

And these attacks are already having strategic effect on the war. Putin, for instance, is starting to warn the Russian people about fuel shortages—and letting them know that things will get worse before they get better. This week the Russian dictator (without admitting that the problem came from Ukrainian attacks) acknowledged that fuel shortages were a growing problem—particularly in the Russian Far East. You can see the typical dictator playbook here. The shortages will first be felt on the periphery, as Moscow and St Petersburg will get priority call on oil. However, that is only a temporary move—if refining capacity continues to degrade—fuel shortages will spread closer and closer to the centre.

Strategic effect can be seen in other areas. The Hungarians and Slovakians first hurled threats and bombast at the Ukrainians in August for the Druzhba pipeline attacks. Now, guess what? They are starting to plead with the Ukrainians to give them a break. Slovakian President Robert Fico (one of the most obvious of Putin’s allies inside the EU) met with Zelensky a day ago and tried to make nice. He said Slovakia stood ready to support Ukrainian membership of the EU — in an obvious attempt to curry favor with Kyiv.

Its amazing what not getting your hands on oodles of cheap Russian oil will do!
Fico meeting with Zelensky — who has the upper hand now?

The worry that both Fico and Putin are showing is that this is a real campaign, that Ukraine is not about to start, and that they need to start adjusting now. This is all heartening.

So this week provides further evidence for what has been suspected. Ukraine is going to keep up a campaign against Russian oil infrastructure for the foreseeable future—they are trying to deconstruct not just the refineries, but the delivery systems as well. Furthermore they have (at least for now) access to enough systems to keep the campaign going.

(And this is all before the Flamingos even appear in numbers).

The campaign also shows how misguided Ukraine’s “supporters” were for years in not helping Ukraine have strategic effect in Russia through ranged attack. In fewer than six weeks, Ukrainian ranged attacks in Russia are providing Ukraine with a potent means of damaging Russia’s war economy and even its alliance system (and yes, Fico and Orban are allies of Russia).

If I were the Ukrainians I would continue to attack Druzhba until both Hungary and Slovakia support Ukrainian membership of NATO. How about them apples. 20% refining capacity destruction will not be enough — but if they can keep it up . . .

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

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Sunday, September 7, 2025 2:04 PM

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


To make a Flamingo missile, pack in old bombs & add a tiny engine

The Flamingo missile’s best features are under its skin. Powerful and affordable, the missile could change the deep-strike math for Ukraine.

By David Axe | 06/09/2025

https://euromaidanpress.com/2025/09/06/flamingo-parts/

To make a Flamingo missile, pack in old bombs & add a tiny engine

Ukraine’s new Flamingo cruise missile appears to include older, cheaper and easy-to-acquire components. Leftover Soviet-made free-fall bombs as warheads. And, for propulsion, a simple jet engine borrowed from a military training plane.

The inclusion of off-the-shelf components that are readily available from manufacturers in Ukraine or allied countries is good news as the Flamingo’s builder, Fire Point, aims to ramp up production to as many as seven missiles a day by next month.

There’s still a lot we don’t know about the Flamingo, including its cost. Fire Point is under official investigation in Kyiv for possibly inflating the missile’s capability and price.

Regardless of the outcome of that probe, photos and videos of the massive, seven-ton missile hint at a reliable and affordable design. A close look at the fiberglass missile’s nose seems to indicate the warhead is actually two warheads: a pair of repurposed gravity bombs packed end to end.

The Flamingo seems to be based on the FP-5 missile design from U.K. firm Milanion. The firm claims the FP-5 ranges 3,000 km with a 1,000-kg payload. There isn’t a 1,000-kg Soviet-style gravity bomb in widespread use, according to missile expert Fabian Hoffmann. So “the payload could consist of two stacked FAB-500 unguided bombs,” each weighing 500 kg, Hoffmann wrote.

The evidence points to the FAB-500 M62, one of the most ubiquitous Soviet-era unguided dumb bombs. The Soviet air force left behind potentially thousands of the bombs when it left Ukraine in 1991. Many munitions companies continue to build new FAB-500s, including Bulcomers KS in Bulgaria.

Abundant bombs

It’s not for no reason that, when the Ukrainian air force recently developed a simple precision glide-bomb similar to the Russian UMPK, it used old FAB-500 M62s as the basis — and added pop-out wings and satellite guidance.

With end-to-end FAB-500s, a Flamingo should be able to strike with the equivalent of 550 kg of TNT, Hoffmann estimated. That “is substantially more than the long-range drones and mini-cruise missiles Ukraine currently employs.”

Satellite imagery from the aftermath of the first confirmed Flamingo raid, targeting a Russian intelligence and hovercraft base in occupied Crimea on Aug. 30, depicts a large crater and other damage that may confirm Hoffmann’s assessment.

The ramp-launched Flamingo depends on a simple rocket booster to get it off the ground—and, it seems, an Ivchenko AI-25TL turbofan engine to propel the giant missile as fast as 950 km/hr. The AI-25TL, which powers Aero L-39 jet trainers and other aircraft, produces 1,850 kg of thrust.

An L-39 weighs five tons, which is two tons less than a Flamingo weighs. But the L-39 must be maneuverable, where the Flamingo is expected to fly a simple course at steady speed under inertial and satellite guidance. The AI-25TL is more than adequate—and, more importantly, it’s in production in Ukraine with firm Motor Sich. It’s priced to move at around $40,000 per engine.

With a low-cost warhead and equally affordable engine, a Flamingo might cost less than $1 million. That’s quite low for a long-range heavy cruise missile. A Russian Kh-101 or American Tomahawk both cost several times as much.

The Flamingo could change the deep-strike math for Ukraine. The new missile “has so much range and such a big warhead that that’s one of the important ones that could really make a difference,” Finnish analyst Joni Askola said.

And if the missile really is as cheap as it appears to be, Fire Point may actually be able to ramp up production to seven missiles a day.

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

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Monday, September 8, 2025 7:11 AM

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


Putin has always been more concerned about the loss of control over Russia’s perceived sphere of influence than about a NATO threat to Russia. Putin’s actual issue with NATO and the West has been that they offered an alternative path to countries that Putin thought fell in Russia’s sphere of influence or even control. The “color revolutions” that so alarmed Putin were, after all, the manifestations of those countries daring to choose the West, or, rather the way of life, governance and values the West represented, over Moscow. NATO and the West threatened Russia by simply existing, promoting their own values, as Russia promoted its values, and being the preferred partner to many former Soviet states – which, in Putin’s view, undermined Russia’s influence over these states. Putin saw the ability to control former Soviet states as an essential prerequisite to reestablishing Russia as a great power, however. In simple terms, the West – and those in the former Soviet states who preferred to partner with the West even without fully breaking with Russia – stood between Putin and what he believed to be Russia’s rightful role in the world.

https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/weakness-is-letha
l-why-putin-invaded-ukraine-and-how-the-war-must-end/

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

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 7:29 AM

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


Russian Security Council Chairperson Dmitry Medvedev directly threatened Finland and used language that mirrors the Kremlin’s false justifications for its invasions of Ukraine.

Medvedev’s September 8 claims about Finland’s alleged persecution of ethnic Russians, destruction of Russian culture, ties to Nazism, and threat to Russia’s security parallel claims that the Kremlin has used to justify its invasions of Ukraine in 2014 and 2022. Medvedev claimed that the “root causes” of the current state of Russian-Finnish relations go back to the Second World War.[2] Medvedev’s use of the phrase “root causes” mirrors that which Kremlin officials have repeatedly invoked to justify Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Kremlin officials have claimed that any future peace settlement in Ukraine must eliminate the “root causes” of the war, which Kremlin officials have defined as NATO’s eastward expansion and Ukraine’s alleged discrimination against Russian-speakers.[3]

Medvedev’s threat against Finland is not unique but rather part of an ongoing Kremlin effort to threaten NATO states and justify future Russian aggression. Russian Presidential Aide and former Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev similarly claimed on March 13 that Finland tried to “exterminate” the Slavic population and that the West is “again turning [Finland] into a springboard” for aggression against Russia.[4] Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened Finland in December 2023, claiming that NATO “dragged” Finland into the alliance and that “there will be problems” with Finland.[5] Russian officials have been increasingly invoking narratives about Finland’s historic ties to Russia, and Russian information operations targeting Finland have long covered topics such as Finland’s history as a Nazi ally during the Second World War, Finnish intent to gain lost territories, and the West’s preparations to use Finland to threaten northwestern Russia.[6] The Kremlin has been employing the same playbook that it used against Ukraine towards NATO states, such as Finland and the Baltics, to set informational conditions for possible future Russian aggression.[7]

https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive
-campaign-assessment-september-8-2025/

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

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 9:07 AM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


It's a good thing Russians don't know how to fight. Hey G, clean up your thread.

T

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 9:28 AM

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


The Policies of Protecting Putin And Harming Ukraine Are Trump's

Phillips P. OBrien | Sep 9

https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/stop-blaming-elbridge-colby

Of all the deceptive narratives floating around about the Trump Administration’s policies towards Ukraine, maybe the weirdest is the idea that Elbridge Colby, the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, is some evil genius, manipulating US policy and the entire Trump Administration in an effort to implement his own policy agenda.

In the last few months this fantastical vision of US policy making has appeared at least three times. In each example, the US adopts an outrageously anti-Ukraine (even anti-Europe) policy, but instead of Trump receiving blame for the policies, they are ascribed to Colby. The most recent occurred just a few days ago, when it was reported that the US was slashing military support to European states on the border with Russia—materially damaging their ability to prepare for a fight with the Russian military. https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/european-countries-russia-puzzled-
us-plans-cut-defense-125309191

Right away the policy was blamed (almost always by pro-Ukraine Republicans who do not want to admit that in supporting Trump they are supporting a friend of Putin and an enemy of Ukraine) to some nefarious doing of Elbridge Colby. The Defense Correspondent of Fox News pushed this idea immediately. 

It was identical to the narrative that appeared more than two months earlier when it was reported that the US had unilaterally stopped all weapons shipments to Ukraine. Once again, supposedly pro-Ukraine Republicans stepped in to say that Colby was to blame. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/02/us-halts-ukraine-weapons
-shipments
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/02/ukraine-weapons-freeze-elbrid
ge-colby-00438156

For the record, the third policy blamed on Colby, was the decision by the US to forbid the Ukrainians from firing US-made weapons (including UK/French Storm Shadow/Scalp cruise missiles with some US technology) into Russia. https://www.newsweek.com/pentagon-block-ukraine-long-range-missile-str
ikes-russia-2118425

It's certainly a convenient narrative—and allows people to continue justifying their own support of Trump. The problem is, that it is not true. Elbridge Colby is no evil genius, manipulating the Trump administration for his own purposes—he is a Pentagon bureaucrat desperately trying to appeal to the President by pushing policies he knows that Trump supports.

That became even more apparent in the last few hours when it was reported in the FT that far from allowing lots of anti-air weapons into Ukraine, the US seems to be deliberately holding up shipments.  https://www.ft.com/content/26df4030-9613-498d-9ce8-44691aee4346

If you remember, when the arms freeze to Ukraine was announced, there was a huge amount of blowback against the White House. In particular, just as Ukrainian cities were getting hammered by Russian ranged attacks, it seemed incredibly cruel (and too blatantly pro-Putin) to deprive Ukraine of anti-air weapons such as Patriot anti-aircraft systems and ammunition. Worried about the political fall-out the White House also seemed to backtrack on the freeze quickly, and brought in a policy that Ukraine could still be given weapons from the US, as long as European states paid for them.

In other words—the US did not actually restart “aid” to Ukraine—it formally ended US aid and now made sure that Europeans had to pay (at marked up costs) to send weapons to Ukraine.

However it now turns out that this pivot was much less decisive than pro-Ukraine Trump supporters liked to imagine. It was just reported that the US has continued to slow walk anti-aircraft weapons to Ukraine since then, leaving the Ukrainians scrambling this summer as Russia launches ever larger attacks on Ukrainian cities. https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2025/09/9/7529971/

The situation is incredibly serious, with one source saying that "It’s a question of time for when munitions run out,"

And this, btw, meshes exactly with what I am hearing from Ukrainians.

So, actually much of the “Colby freeze” remained de facto in place—despite claims to the contrary. That seems to be even more the case with the US block on Ukraine using US weapons to attack into Russia and the recent freeze on military support to the Baltics. Even though the policies are always blamed on Colby—amazingly they stay in place even after they are reported.

That is because Donald Trump supports these policies—and Colby brought them in precisely because he knows what Trump wants. Look I’m no fan of Colby, he and I tussled about Ukraine policy a number of times when Biden was president.

However he is no policy savant trying to implement a personal agenda. He is a creature trying to get ahead by pushing the Trump vision and appealing to Trump. He has, for instance, wrongly been ascribed as being pro-Taiwan. That is not true—when Trump criticized Taiwan, so did Colby.

And when the Taiwanese Government spoke of its support for Ukraine, Colby lashed out at the Taiwanese.

In other words, Trump determines Colby’s policies—Colby does not determine Trump’s policies.

Finally, not only is the Colby-as-policy-maker narrative wrong, it is pernicious. It makes it look like Donald Trump is not complicit in the many anti-Ukraine decisions that his administration is taking, when he is the person driving the policy. It gives false hopes to those who somehow believe that Trump will eventually be good for Ukraine and tough on Putin; Two weeks anyone! Moreover, it allows Pro-Trump supporters to pretend that they can also support Ukraine, when they are actually pro-Putin in their choices.

So, please, stop saying that Elbridge Colby is the person responsible for the US continually implementing policies that are hostile to Ukraine. These policies are the clear preferences of Donald Trump, which is why once they are made, they are all either fully or mostly maintained.

Being honest about this is the first step to understanding what the US is now when it comes to the Russo-Ukraine War; a nation that is protecting Vladimir Putin and trying to damage Ukraine.

Thanks for reading Phillips’s Newsletter! This post is public so feel free to share it.

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

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 3:17 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Russia launched its largest drone and missile attack ever against Ukraine, with over 800 drones striking targets in Ukraine. Warehouses, drone assembly sites, airfields etc were targeted. For the first time ever, a bridge across the Dnieper was struck and damaged by about a dozen drones. The Cabinet of Ministers Building was also struck, at night when no one wax there, sending a message to the Zelensky "regime".

Kiev says Russia used an Iskander missile
Quote:
filled with dozens of foreign parts, including chips and other electronic components made in the United States...

The Iskander 9M727 missile that struck the building did not explode, most likely because it was damaged by Ukrainian air defenses, Vladyslav Vlasiuk, Ukraine’s presidential commissioner for sanctions policy, said on Tuesday.

Vlasiuk released photographs of the damaged missile...
The list includes 35 parts manufactured by American companies, including Texas Instruments, Analog Devices, Altera and others, as well as components made by Japanese, British and Swiss companies.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/09/09/europe/ukraine-russian-missile-us-compo
nents

The chips are dual-use, found in smart devices, gaming gadgets, and household devices.

Kiev will probably demand tighter sanctions, but companies like
Quote:
Infineon Technologies, the German company that now owns American-based Cypress Semiconductor – one of the manufacturers listed – told CNN that it has taken “extensive measures” to ensure its items don’t end up in Russia.

A spokesperson for the company said Infineon Technologies has stopped all direct and indirect shipments to Russia and that it has tools in place to ensure compliance among its customers.

“(If) we get tangible evidence that companies with which we have a business relationship are doing trade with Russia, we terminate the delivery and demand clarification from the company in question,” the spokesperson said.

However the company produces around 30 billion chips every year, which the spokesperson said makes it “difficult to control sales throughout the entire lifetime of a product.”


In addition,
Quote:
Vlasiuk said that even though this particular missile still included dozens of Western-made parts, it contained fewer such components compared to missiles analyzed earlier in the war.
which means the Russia is now less reliant on western chips.

The massive drone and missile attack may mean that Russia is preparing for the long-speculated massive attack along the front line.

*****
*****

In response, Kiev struck Donetsk city with Storm Shadow missiles, hitting (according to Russian MoD) civilian centers and killing "many" civilians.



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

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 5:28 PM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Russia launched its largest drone and missile attack ever against Ukraine, with over 800 drones striking targets in Ukraine. Warehouses, drone assembly sites, airfields etc were targeted. For the first time ever, a bridge across the Dnieper was struck and damaged by about a dozen drones. The Cabinet of Ministers Building was also struck, at night when no one wax there, sending a message to the Zelensky "regime".



Russia attacked with 810 drones and decoys, Ukraine's air force said, adding it shot down 747 drones and four missiles.


Comrade, do you think that your posting for years about Russia's prowess and not how they target civilians while Ukraine doesn't, while Ukraine 99.9 percent of the times hits Ligget military targets, shows your Russian bias? Exposes you as a liar for Putin?

T

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 5:56 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.



Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Russia launched its largest drone and missile attack ever against Ukraine, with over 800 drones striking targets in Ukraine. Warehouses, drone assembly sites, airfields etc were targeted. For the first time ever, a bridge across the Dnieper was struck and damaged by about a dozen drones. The Cabinet of Ministers Building was also struck, at night when no one wax there, sending a message to the Zelensky "regime".


THGR

Quote:
Russia attacked with 810 drones and decoys, Ukraine's air force said, adding it shot down 747 drones and four missiles.


Comrade, do you think that your posting for years about Russia's prowess and not how they target civilians while Ukraine doesn't, while Ukraine 99.9 percent of the times hits Ligget military targets, shows your Russian bias? Exposes you as a liar for Putin?


Russians don't target civilians. Despite a million or more dead Ukrainian soldiers, hundreds of thousands of drone strikes and hundreds of missile strikes, the total number of civilian deaths is about 14,000. That includes at the front.

That's about 10 a day since Feb 2022.

Most ANALYSTS who look at FACTS think Russia is waging a remarkably "clean", "surgical" war. Because, son, if Russia WANTED to kill civilians, civilian deaths would be in the hundreds of thousands, maybe as many as dead Ukrainian soldiers (i.e. a million or more).

Arithmetic.
Logic.
Use them.

Meanwhile, when Donetsk city was still in range of Ukrainian artillery, Ukraine routinely shelled civilian centers and ONLY civilian centers. I will say that Ukraine has gotten more ...er... focused in the past couple of months. They used to target Donetsk city markets and apartments, and apartment buildings and business centers and airports in Moscow and Crimea. I think they were hoping to provoke disaffection and a color revolution. Now they're targeting militarily relevent and dual-use sites like refineries and pipelines. The most recent attack on Donetsk city includes industrial sites that are reported (by Kiev) to be used as command centers and collection points for the (presumed) upcoming full scale Russian assault.



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

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 8:50 PM

THG

Thursday, September 28, 2017 5:39 PM _ I posted, "I am an independent."



Russian lies and propaganda comrade. Your above post is lies and Russian propaganda.

T

NATO Fighter Jets DEPLOYED Amid Possible Russian Drone ATTACK On Poland





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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 8:51 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Fuck Ukraine. Nobody cares.

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

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 9:20 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by THG:

Russian lies and propaganda comrade. Your above post is lies and Russian propaganda.


Oh, do you want links? Would that help?

FROM THE UNITED NATIONS
Quote:
Since the Russian Federation launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, HRMMU has documented the deaths of at least 13,883 civilians,

https://ukraine.ohchr.org/en/Number-of-civilians-killed-and-injured-in
-Ukraine-reaches-three-year-monthly-high-in-July-2025-UN-human-rights-monitors-say

HOW MANY DRONES ACCORDING TO CSIS? (And that's just since jan 2025)
Quote:
Since the start of the year, Russia has launched at least 37,000 air attacks on Ukraine, according to a tally by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/9/charting-the-past-year-of-russ
ian-drone-and-missile-attacks-on-ukraine

CSIS ONLY TABULATES LONG RANGE SHAHED DRONES, NOT FRONTLINE FPV DRONES.[INTERACTIVE TABLE]
https://www.csis.org/analysis/drone-saturation-russias-shahed-campaign

HOW MANY MISSILES?
Quote:
Russia launched 11,466 missiles at Ukraine from September 2022–2024

https://www.csis.org/programs/futures-lab/projects/russian-firepower-s
trike-tracker-analyzing-missile-attacks-ukraine

HOW MANY DEAD UKRAINIAN SOLDIERS?
Zelensky says 47,000.

Hackers say 1.7 million.


THGR, I look this shit up before I post. You might try that sometime.





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

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