Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

[It’s so Joever]

https://twitter.com/markito0171/status/1508188771031863298?s=20&t=PfwjjTJ3do...

Can we just call this what it is? A literal Holodomor 2.0.

[NOVA Green]

Meanwhile Russian Hip-Hop Artist Oxxxymiron (Anti-War)  live concert from Shepard's Bush London 3/25/22 has now just been uploaded in full to YouTube.

For anybody not following the thread, this is THE Russian Hip-Hop artist, with not only a massive following within Russia itself, but throughout the world.

Currently anybody looking to check out his 2022 concert in Kazakhstan, might be a good time to cancel your tickets, and pretty sure he doesn't want to drink any "special juice" on tour these dayz....

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/markito0171/status/1508188771031863298?s=20&t=PfwjjTJ3do...

Can we just call this what it is? A literal Holodomor 2.0.

Images like these make it hard not to come to that conclusion...

Unlike the Holocaust or Bosnia where the seeds of the genocide came from hate, these people were simply acceptable costs in furthering the interests of the Russian state, just as with the holodomor.

https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1508057510569197574?s=20&t=0me7VuKi31OsA...

[Frodo]

The overwhelming majority of these were probably Russian-speaking Ukrainians, the same demographic Putin spoke about wanting to protect from 'genocide' by their Ukrainian government as part of his justification for the invasion in the first place:

Civilian death toll in Ukraine surpasses 1,100: UN

The UN office noted that the actual injury and death tolls are likely far higher than its calculations.

"OHCHR believes that the actual figures are considerably higher, as the receipt of information from some locations where intense hostilities have been going on has been delayed and many reports are still pending corroboration," the office's statement said.

The current casualty count is from the time that Moscow's invasion began on Feb. 24 through midnight local time on Saturday.

[NOVA Green]

Oxxxymiron keeping it real for the Underground...

Oxxxymiron is the most viewed battle rapper in the world. Amount of views of his rap battles exceed 120 million on YouTube

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxxxymiron

[Oryxslayer]

https://twitter.com/DrGJackBrown/status/1508202800043286528?s=20&t=1WrlOiWvG...

Spotted this, though obviously take it with a grain of salt.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

https://twitter.com/markito0171/status/1508188771031863298?s=20&t=PfwjjTJ3do...

Can we just call this what it is? A literal Holodomor 2.0.

The humanitarian corridors in Mariupol seem to have been handled marginally better than they were in Aleppo. Much of this is just the Russian modus operandi.

[Frodo]

Desperate times, desperate measures:

https://twitter.com/CNBC/status/1507369164264161286

[NOVA Green]

More details from: "President Z's" interview with Russian Journalists...

Sorry that's all you are going to get.

Mr. Zelensky generally speaks Ukrainian in public — his country’s official language — but he is a native Russian speaker, and he has repeatedly switched into Russian in the video addresses that he posts to social media, seeking to encourage Mr. Putin’s critics inside Russia. But Sunday’s interview marked the first time since the war began that Mr. Zelensky had spoken at length with Russian journalists, in their language.

The journalists were Ivan Kolpakov, the editor of Meduza, a Russian-language news website based in Latvia; Vladimir Solovyov, a reporter for Kommersant, a Moscow-based daily newspaper; Mikhail Zygar, an independent Russian journalist who fled to Berlin after the war began; and Tikhon Dzyadko, the editor of the temporarily shuttered, independent television channel TV Rain, who had left Moscow for Tbilisi, Georgia.

Videos of the interview had been viewed more than a million times within a few hours of being published, offering a very different picture of the war to Russians than what they see daily on their televisions screens. Most independent news organizations have either been banned or forced into exile, while polls show that most Russians rely on state television for their news — in which the war in Ukraine is cast as a righteous crusade against extreme nationalism and necessary to pre-empt a threat emanating from an expanding NATO.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/03/27/world/ukraine-russia-war

[Pink Panther]

Desperate times, desperate measures:

https://twitter.com/CNBC/status/1507369164264161286

This is pathetic. That's all.

[Storr]

Desperate times, desperate measures:

https://twitter.com/CNBC/status/1507369164264161286

This is pathetic. That's all.

As is this factoid:

https://twitter.com/darksecretplace/status/1508253367696433159?s=20&t=MwNnX1...

[Buffalo Mayor Young Kim]

Desperate times, desperate measures:

https://twitter.com/CNBC/status/1507369164264161286

This is pathetic. That's all.

As is this factoid:

https://twitter.com/darksecretplace/status/1508253367696433159?s=20&t=MwNnX1...

Western militaries seem to have come to the conclusion that tanks aren’t particularly survivable in peer-peer conflicts (and I think this war is bearing that out) and have slimmed down their MBT corps in favor of IVFs taking over infantry support and lighter vehicles (which is to say humvees or IFVs rigged up with anti-tank missiles and sensory equipment) taking over anti-armor roles.

[Storr]

Another worthless token gesture. I'm starting to get Bosnian War vibes. The two opposing armies fight to a stalemate. The west continues having diplomatic talks, while ever more civilians continue to be killed by indiscriminate shelling from the aggressor army (and now with Russia, missiles). Nothing is done for years to actually to stop the killing until an "outrageous" event occurs.  

Except in this case, nothing will be done except more sanctions and empty rhetoric because everyone is scared of Russia's nukes. I read a report a few days ago quoting some American official (anonymously, of course) saying NATO intervention is unlikely even if Russia uses chemical or biological weapons.

I wish we could have a “Iraq will not be permitted to annex Kuwait. And that’s not a threat, not a boast. It’s just the way it’s going to be." moment.

https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1508267292454494213?s=20&t=eD2z0Mxw5...

[Frodo]

Another worthless token gesture. I'm starting to get Bosnian War vibes. The two opposing armies fight to a stalemate. The west continues having diplomatic talks, while ever more civilians continue to be killed by indiscriminate shelling (and now with Russia, missiles). Nothing is done for years to actually to stop the killing until an "outrageous" event occurs.  

Except in this case, nothing will be done except more sanctions and empty rhetoric because everyone is scared of Russia's nukes. I read a report a few days ago quoting some American official (anonymously, of course) saying NATO intervention is unlikely even if Russia uses chemical or biological weapons.

I wish we could have a “Iraq will not be permitted to annex Kuwait. And that’s not a threat, not a boast. It’s just the way it’s going to be." moment.

To be fair, President Biden is having to deal with a war-weary American public who have no desire to involve themselves in any more wars of choice (aka, the Vietnam War Syndrome of our era).  I certainly think Biden was too timid when it came to the Polish warplanes proposal (and that he should have stood his ground in demanding that Putin and his regime be overthrown), but I understand where he is coming from.  

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Another worthless token gesture. I'm starting to get Bosnian War vibes. The two opposing armies fight to a stalemate. The west continues having diplomatic talks, while ever more civilians continue to be killed by indiscriminate shelling (and now with Russia, missiles). Nothing is done for years to actually to stop the killing until an "outrageous" event occurs.  

Except in this case, nothing will be done except more sanctions and empty rhetoric because everyone is scared of Russia's nukes. I read a report a few days ago quoting some American official (anonymously, of course) saying NATO intervention is unlikely even if Russia uses chemical or biological weapons.

I wish we could have a “Iraq will not be permitted to annex Kuwait. And that’s not a threat, not a boast. It’s just the way it’s going to be." moment.

To be fair, President Biden is having to deal with a war-weary American public who have no desire to involve themselves in any more wars of choice (aka, the Vietnam War Syndrome of our era).  I certainly think Biden was too timid when it came to the Polish warplanes proposal (and that he should have stood his ground in demanding that Putin and his regime be overthrown), but I understand where he is coming from.  

Biden is still taking a firmer line than many European leaders. Macron and some of the Italian party leaders have been especially disappointing and tiresome with their recent walkbacks and the way they've framed them.

[pppolitics]

https://twitter.com/anders_aslund/status/1507802833617395712
https://twitter.com/StevenErlanger/status/1499042299040485382

KYIV, Ukraine — Standing in the cobblestone courtyard of a medieval monastery, with an icy wind whipping his black robes and artillery shells booming in the distance, Archbishop Yefrem is tormented by the war that is slowly engulfing his city.

But while Ukraine’s government is calling on every able-bodied male to defend the country against the Russian invasion, the archbishop sees things a little differently. Because Russians and Ukrainians are one people with one religion, he said, the Russian army is not an enemy. Believers in Ukraine should “pray for peace, not for victory.”

Launched by President Vladimir V. Putin to reassert Russian influence in the region, the war in Ukraine is also a contest for the future of the Russian and Ukrainian Orthodox churches.

The Russian church — of which Archbishop Yefrem is a part — has made no secret of its desire to unite the branches under a single patriarch in Moscow, which would allow it to control the holiest sites of Orthodoxy in the Slavic world and millions of believers in Ukraine. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church, for its part, has been slowly asserting itself under its own patriarch, reviving a separate and independent branch of Eastern Orthodoxy, after the independence of Ukraine in 1991.

If Ukraine prevails against the Russian invasion, the Moscow church will all but certainly be ejected. If Russia wins, the Ukrainian church is unlikely to survive inside Ukraine.

Prizes in the struggle include holy sites such as the Monastery of the Caves, a sprawling complex of churches in Kyiv overlooking the Dnieper River, whose golden onion domes were glistening in the sun on a recent afternoon as artillery shells exploded across the capital. In the caves, in grottos, lie the remains of the earliest saints of Slavic Orthodoxy, control over which would symbolize pre-eminence in this branch of Christianity.

After Ukraine’s independence, the Moscow patriarchate retained access to the site, while the Ukrainian government formally owned it as a museum.

The branch of the church in Ukraine subordinate to Moscow also enjoys the loyalty of a majority of city, town and village churches in Ukraine, though the newly independent Ukrainian church has had success encouraging parishes to switch allegiance. Those efforts so angered Mr. Putin that he warned in 2018 that it could “turn into a heavy dispute, if not bloodshed.”

Ukrainian political and religious analysts say the Russian Orthodox church in Ukraine was deeply infiltrated by Moscow, and is regarded by many as a tool of Russian foreign policy. Last week, when an angry crowd threw a Russian preacher out of his church in western Ukraine, the police did not intervene.

Christian teaching has also become part of the battlefield. Priests loyal to Russia, in sermons recommended by their leadership on Sunday, emphasized pacifist gospels at a time when the defensive strategy of the country rested on mobilizing civilians to fight. Many Ukrainians viewed that stance as subversive or treasonous.

Archbishop Yefrem, a member of the Moscow church who celebrates mass at the Monastery of the Caves, said he had been urging believers to pray. “Only God can bring peace,” he added.

“If an enemy came, yes, we could fight,” he said, explaining his stance. “But this is a very important point about Ukraine. We are one people with the Russians and only the devil spread enmity between us.”

The independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church has taken a starkly different view. In a televised sermon on Sunday, its patriarch, Metropolitan Epiphanius, soundly endorsed the resistance. “Dear brothers and sisters,” he said. “We pray and we act.”

Believers, he said, should defend the country. “Our heroic people are defending ourselves from the attack of Russia, which is throwing its soldiers and weapons at our villages and cities,” he said. “And every hour of our resistance inspires more and more people around the world to support Ukraine.”

[...]

[Hindsight was 2020]

Any new updates on the Ukraine counter offensive?

[Middle-aged Europe]

https://twitter.com/DrGJackBrown/status/1508202800043286528?s=20&t=1WrlOiWvG...

Spotted this, though obviously take it with a grain of salt.

According to Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin is really really smart though. Takes one to know one, I guess.

[Storr]

Let's keep trying what hasn't worked for 8 years: accommodating Putin and trying to "de escalate" and "peacefully resolve" a situation the Russians have only ever shown interest in further provoking.

https://twitter.com/PolishHeroes/status/1508317634714124292?s=20&t=qBVopLzqH...

relevant:

https://twitter.com/shashj/status/1508184017148993538?s=20&t=acA4xRXRvdlC1WU...

[ꙮ]

The Ukrainian victory at Trostyanets is probably their most encouraging success of the entire war to this point. They unquestionably recaptured a city in an important area, destroying a lot of Russian equipment in the process.

[CumbrianLefty]

The point is that a protracted stalemate is worse for the Ukrainian people than Russia's, but also very bad - indeed quite possibly worse - for the Russian state.

This maybe points to some sort of settlement being reached sooner rather than later.

[jaichind]

Average investment bank research 2022 CPI estimates done in Feb and then March.

             Russia       Ukraine      Eurozone       USA           PRC           Japan
Feb         7.1%          7.0%         3.8%          5.0%         2.1%          0.9%
March    20.0%        26.5%         5.2%          6.1%         2.2%          1.3%

War has a large impact on Russia and Ukraine inflation although both USA and Eurozone inflation will see a significant rise. Japan's inflation also rises but in a more restrained way which speaks to the underlying deflationary pressures.  PRC inflation barely budged.

Russia's interest rate is at 20% which means real interest rates in Russia are now higher than in the USA where the average saver in the USA is losing more of their savings through inflation than in Russia.  Hopefully Powell is watching and get more aggressive on raising interest rates.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

Another interview with a Ukrainian pilot.

The main problems he's prepared to talk about are outdated weapons systems (their MiG-29s can't carry the most advanced Russian missiles) and the lack of the most up-to-date radar/early warning systems, partly as a result of Russia targeting these (I assume the US AWACS aircraft flying just outside Ukraine are offering some intelligence, but there's unlikely to be the technical capacity for a full datalink/integration of systems).

The pilots try to circumvent a lot of their problems by flying low, but it'll come as no surprise that he advocates for the delivery of the MiGs and all of the Soviet air defences. What he doesn't advocate for, however, is upgrading these systems. He argues that would take too long, and to switch to Western systems as soon as the easier backfills are done.

Apparently, some Ukrainian pilots have had limited experience with F-16s and he estimates they could be taught in a few months. This doesn't sound too crazy but IMO there would be issues with ground crew training and logistics, and - most importantly - they would need (preferably modern) radar. Modern radar technology (the kind used for jets and AA, at least) is apparently among the more closely guarded bits of military tech and it could be a sticking point for Western suppliers.

He also argues for training Ukrainian SAM operators on NASAMS. The go-to argument for the "send 'murican weapons" crowd has been the more advanced/even longer-range Patriot missile system, but this isn't the first time I've seen it implied that NASAMS is more realistic/easier to learn. It is also cheaper - still quite expensive for buyers, of course, but its ammunition is a series of air-to-air missiles, and Western countries have a lot of ageing air-to-air missiles that simply aren't going to get fired by a jet. It could be a scalable solution in the long term. Again, issues with radar technology secrets apply here.

As for the backfills of Soviet AA, the US continues to remain optimistic about the negotiations but there's otherwise been no (public) progress. Slovakia earlier mentioned it'd need multiple Patriots to replace the S-300 battery and I presume haggling is going on. That makes sense up to a point - whatever deal the US cuts with Slovakia needs to be scalable if they think cutting a similar deal with Greece is realistic, and Greece has many more S-300s. Still, I can't help feeling they're making huge mistakes by delaying as long as they have - if nothing else, it sends the wrong message about NATO/EU unity.

[Omega21]

The video of UA soldiers kneecapping Russian POWs is looking more genuine after some work done by the OSINT community.

If Ukraine does not crack down on this, good luck getting more soldiers to surrender after they have seen videos of torture/mistreatment.

Thread below:

https://twitter.com/zcjbrooker/status/1508114632673828867

[Meclazine for Israel]

It's hard to listen to the teenage refugees coming out of Mariupol. It was just sad listening to what the 17 y.o. on the news just said.

A real tragedy.