Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

[OSR stands with Israel]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-11/russia-s-war-economy-is-on-course-to-recover-from-sanctions-hit

"Russia’s War Economy Is on Course to Recover From Sanctions Hit"

Bloomberg article also points out that 2023 Russia GDP growth will most likely hit 2% which would put Russia 2023 GDP to match 2021 and wipe out 2022 drop.  Look for collective West MSM to shift discussions to Russia inflation since the economic collapse narrative is gone.  

Of course the economy is beginning to recover from the sanctions. Putin has been preparing for his "reconquest" of Eastern Europe and the Stans since he assumed office. He took on an openly anti-western course since his speech at the 2007 Munich Security Conference (when I was only one month old, fun fact). He probably saw our global economic and military supremacy weakening following Afghanistan and Iraq and because Russia had stabilized (or at least stopped being the complete sh**thole it was under Yeltsin) after the 1990s, he decided it was time to act.

This entire war was proceeded by the clownshow that was him testing us.

First he launched the Chechen war which he """won""" and as an added benefit got to jump on the radical Islamic terrorism bandwagon (remember this, the Russians change their tune on Islam at least three more times in this story), which he used to consolidate his power- in addition to getting around term restrictions by appointing the drunk Medvedev as a placeholder.

Then he decided to invade Georgia to probe the soil and see how the US/NATO would react. We were in the midst of the greatest financial crisis since 1929, so we mostly ignored him. He interpreted this as a carte blanche to do whatever he wanted. So, he went on to meddle in Eastern European politics, including but not limited to shaking down Ukraine for natural resources, funding right-wing parties all across Europe (with the added benefit of giving him ammunition for the "west is nazi" argument) while saturating the Russian people with anti-western sentiment and Soviet nostalgia at home (including the rehabilitation of Stalin).

He saw that the west was disunited because of the US/Europoor split following the Halliburton's war in Iraq. He capitalized on that in several ways using both the wars and the resulting refugee crisis. One, to increase/take advantage of existing racist sentiment and propaganda to stir up hatred against "the liberal gay western (((cabal))) " and the resulting Euroscepticism (AfD, FPO, etc)

Second, and just as importantly, he used this to prop up the traditionalist Russia as an alternative. Never mind that Russia has the highest rate of abortion, single mothers, and only 12% of the population actually go to church regularly, in news that I'm sure would be devastating to Jackson Hinkle if he was capable of reading.

Anyway, and three, to paint Eastern European governments that hate Russia for totally, 1989% unjustified reasons as a puppet of the US (((liberals))) who were totally Nazis in disguise, which was easy when the Euroids were divided between trying to coax them into joining the EU and Eurozone and keeping them as a buffer-zone backwater.

The best (and most recent) example of the latter was in late 2021 when Belarus' Potato Cockroach started dumping Middle Eastern migrants on the Polish border so the Poles could be painted as a racist, white supremacist state (I mean they (PiS) kinda are, objectively). Unlike, you know, the hyper-racist, militant failed state known as Russia.

Still, propaganda from this was effectively used (at least at the government level, polling still shows that Red Velvet's GLOBAL SOUTH doesn't really like Russia all that much) to convince backwaters in Africa and Asia that Russia was a better bet than Europe.

The Euroids- per usual- didn't do themselves any favors, to be fair. France intervened constantly in North West Africa, for instance. So a large, proud, middling power seemed like an intriguing idea.

Anyway, Putin first failed in Ukraine when his puppet (Yanukovbitch) 's sharp turn away from a planned EU accession path caused the Euromaidan protests. The jury is still out on why the Ukrainian people wanted to be more like the developed, relatively free EU than the failed backwater sh**thole country of Russia. But (totally unpaid) Pro-Russian protesters soon spawned, staging provocations in an attempt to make the protesters look like a CIA psyop or something. Russian media- in between calling for the genocide of ethnic minorities- started hurling accusations of Nazism against pro-freedom protesters.

But Euromaidan was like a switch flipped in Russian society. Putin through de-communization out the 13th floor window. For instance, just months after the Crimea debacle, Stalin was chosen as the most influential figure in world history by Russians. All the anti-Western, Russian nationalist, traditionalist, anti-Semitic, racist and homophobic sentiments (which was quite strong) was effectively directed in one direction.

1. It was Yeltsin who started a war against Chechnya not Putin and Russia should have won the first Chechen War. If they did, Putin never rises as much of his rise was thanks to him being considered the guy who won the Chechen War . Also letting Chechnya become its own independent nation would have been a disaster given it would have created an explicitly radical islamist nation and would have been a boon to terrorism as well.

Lastly putting this on the list makes it seem like sending troops to stop secession is the same thing as an invasion which is completely false.


2. The reason Russia was able to get away with their invasion of Georgia is because liberals internalized during the Bush years that all the world's problems was thanks to America acting very aggressively and believed that if the US acted in a more "cooperative" manner with the world then there would be less problems. They also claimed that our invasion of Iraq created the precedent of aggressive war of conquest which again is false.

This is exactly why Obama went in with the disastrous Russian Reset policy because liberals believed if America was more cooperative and nicer, then other nations would act less aggressive. This belief basically defined American foreign policy until the rise of ISIS/Russian invasion of Crimea

3. The Euromaiden showed exactly why Putin is no where near as competent as people think. He could have easily had Yanukovych sign the EU deal while signing a seperate deal with Russia which would have resulted in Russia still having more influence over Ukraine than Russia. Putin fundamentally views geopolitics from a 19th century worldview rather than a 21st which is why he took the direction he did.

4. The EU sucks and part of its creation is to try to challenge American hegemony which is why they were super weak on Russia and are now weak on China.

[jaichind]

This is just plain embarrassing.

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1689882886420213761

It's not.  It takes years to train a good F-16 pilot which can be deadly in combat.  This schedule already seems rushed.  The entire doctrine on how to use fighters and how they work with other branches is different between USA and USSR.  The way the runways work also are different and now Ukraine has to re-do their runways to support both types of planes.

I said it before, when it comes to military hardware, just like most things in life, diversity is not a strength and a clear weakness. 

"I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times."  - Bruce Lee

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

Few words about "sh**thole" (the word so frequently used when describing Russia of 1990th). Personally it was one of the best periods of my life, despite state of economy, organized crime and many other problems that really existed then (incuding default and so on). Why? Because, despite all this, there was freedom. Economic crisis almost always accompanies revolutions (look at England, France and Germany after their revolutions, on on US after war of Independence or Civil War, or on Russia itself after 1917), so it was at least likely, if not inevitable. But i still would prefer 1990th, with all problems of that period, to present time in Russia. And i say that as a person, who lived almost all that period in Russia, and who was an adult (in fact - between 30+ and 40+) even then.

I very much agree with you. Especially this unique feeling when the Iron Curtain was lifted up just now and the Outer World became available not only to the Party princes, but also to ordinary people.

[CumbrianLefty]

1. It was Yeltsin who started a war against Chechnya not Putin and Russia should have won the first Chechen War. If they did, Putin never rises as much of his rise was thanks to him being considered the guy who won the Chechen War . Also letting Chechnya become its own independent nation would have been a disaster given it would have created an explicitly radical islamist nation and would have been a boon to terrorism as well.

Lastly putting this on the list makes it seem like sending troops to stop secession is the same thing as an invasion which is completely false.


2. The reason Russia was able to get away with their invasion of Georgia is because liberals internalized during the Bush years that all the world's problems was thanks to America acting very aggressively and believed that if the US acted in a more "cooperative" manner with the world then there would be less problems. They also claimed that our invasion of Iraq created the precedent of aggressive war of conquest which again is false.

This is exactly why Obama went in with the disastrous Russian Reset policy because liberals believed if America was more cooperative and nicer, then other nations would act less aggressive. This belief basically defined American foreign policy until the rise of ISIS/Russian invasion of Crimea

3. The Euromaiden showed exactly why Putin is no where near as competent as people think. He could have easily had Yanukovych sign the EU deal while signing a seperate deal with Russia which would have resulted in Russia still having more influence over Ukraine than Russia. Putin fundamentally views geopolitics from a 19th century worldview rather than a 21st which is why he took the direction he did.

4. The EU sucks and part of its creation is to try to challenge American hegemony which is why they were super weak on Russia and are now weak on China.

Point 1 is pretty sensible, agreed.

Point 2 - whilst it is of course correct to say the 2003 Iraq war was far from unprecedented, in a way that is precisely the issue - it was seen by the vast majority of people outside the US as a totally unwelcome return to the days of unilateral military might making right; combined with the less than impressive results, the damage done to US prestige and moral authority was utterly catastrophic. You can rant on about how bad Obama's "reset" was all you want - but the fact remains that without the gross hubris and deranged overreach of the neoconservatives, it would never have happened.

And yes, it DID and DOES give the likes of Putin an excuse to do what they do.

Point 3 - again, little to disagree with. Save maybe to mention that - going back to the previous point - Putin's highly simplistic view of these things is rather like that of GWB and the neocons.

Point 4 - for all its undoubted faults the EU far from sucks, thanks. And another thing Iraq showed to many Europeans is that it may be no bad thing to create alternative power centres to the US

In short - blame the neocons for everything, Ukraine included

[smoltchanov]

Few words about "sh**thole" (the word so frequently used when describing Russia of 1990th). Personally it was one of the best periods of my life, despite state of economy, organized crime and many other problems that really existed then (incuding default and so on). Why? Because, despite all this, there was freedom. Economic crisis almost always accompanies revolutions (look at England, France and Germany after their revolutions, on on US after war of Independence or Civil War, or on Russia itself after 1917), so it was at least likely, if not inevitable. But i still would prefer 1990th, with all problems of that period, to present time in Russia. And i say that as a person, who lived almost all that period in Russia, and who was an adult (in fact - between 30+ and 40+) even then.

I very much agree with you. Especially this unique feeling when the Iron Curtain was lifted up just now and the Outer World became available not only to the Party princes, but also to ordinary people.

Yeah, the people from Outer World frequently fail to understand that. For them it's only natural to be free, because it was always that way. For us - it was something. Absolutely new, and extremely pleasant..

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

Often referred to as a 'Jaichind L'

https://twitter.com/Blake_Allen13/status/1690131843293585408

[jaichind]

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/russia-oil-breaches-price-cap-101932355.html

"Russia Oil Passes Price Cap as Export Revenue Hits 2023 High"

This is mostly about market driven higher energy prices.

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/GirkinGirkin/status/1690410376440016897?s=20
Urozhaine liberation is coming soon 🇺🇦

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

The best ownage of a Russia simp via "additional context" box I've ever seen.

https://twitter.com/jacksonhinklle/status/1689985812299939841

[quesaisje]

This threaf is such a detailled collection of the war from the start, it could very well be archieved and used for future writings.

Too bad 90% of the info is just posted as links to Twitter so it will only survive as long as Twitter does.

The contents of those embeds are also unreadable to anyone who uses tracking protection when they browse the web. I don't even see them on most of my devices.

It's frustrating that the readability of much of this forum now depends on an unreliable feature that breaks ever principle of the open internet. What a waste.

The only silver lining is that much of the information shared from Twitter is unreliable, speculative, or even undisguised propaganda, so I don't mind scrolling through until someone shares a link to a real news organization.

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/1690455931740418049?s=12
Waiting on the liberation vid but lots of tg reports on it 👀

[2952-0-0]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-11/russia-s-war-economy-is-on-course-to-recover-from-sanctions-hit

"Russia’s War Economy Is on Course to Recover From Sanctions Hit"

Bloomberg article also points out that 2023 Russia GDP growth will most likely hit 2% which would put Russia 2023 GDP to match 2021 and wipe out 2022 drop.  Look for collective West MSM to shift discussions to Russia inflation since the economic collapse narrative is gone. 

Meanwhile, in the real world...

https://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=USD&to=RUB&view=1Y

As I previously promised to post when the Ruble falls below 100 to the $:

[Cassius]

The Ruble’s reverting to a more normal rate after last year’s unusually large trade surplus stemming from high oil prices and the crash in consumer spending. Both of those factors are now unwinding (oil prices have fallen whilst government and consumer spending is on the up). It’s been a steady decline and it’ll be arrested somewhat by the Central Bank halting foreign currency purchases, so it’s not especially serious in the short term. Squiggly line go down, squiggly line go up, Solovyov’s ravings aren’t especially dissimilar to those of British commentators losing their minds over Sterling hitting $1.10 back in September of last year.

[2952-0-0]

But the squiggly line for the British Pound will eventually go back up as long as the Bank of England and Westminster policymaking is stable and transparent. With the Russian Ruble, its squiggly line only goes down, and has been the case for decades. Only doing less worse than the Turkish Lira and the Argentine Peso isn't something to be proud of.

In any case, the Russian Central Bank has been hiking its rates to restrain the slide of the Ruble, far more aggressively than any western central bank. And the Ruble is still falling, but less quickly than in the absence of these rate hikes. All this was supposed to be over in three days.

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/DefMon3/status/1690342213522194433?s=20

[Storr]

Welcome to the Russian World, or else:

https://twitter.com/KevinRothrock/status/1690076464144596993?s=20

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

The best ownage of a Russia simp via "additional context" box I've ever seen.

https://twitter.com/jacksonhinklle/status/1689985812299939841

Oops, Putin forgot to warn that some of the Christians, such as Jehovah's Witnesses, are declared extremists in Russia, so they face a long criminal sentence.

I hope the situation will not be the same as with the Chinese communists who studied in the USSR, when the Russians declared them Trotskists and sent them to penitentiary colonies just because they were more interested in communism in China than "in a single country" Russia. Well, at least the scale will be much smaller. Who will move — Charles Manson, Anton Szandor LaVey, who else?

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/noelreports/status/1690636105677176832?s=12
https://twitter.com/noelreports/status/1690638106301440001?s=12
Flee cowards lol

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

https://twitter.com/noelreports/status/1690636105677176832?s=12
https://twitter.com/noelreports/status/1690638106301440001?s=12
Flee cowards lol

On another note, "Urozhaine" seems to be the Ukrainian Springfield.
"Urozhaine, Simferopol Raion, Autonomous Republic of Crimea
Urozhaine, Sovietskyi Raion, Autonomous Republic of Crimea
Urozhaine, Chernihiv Oblast
Urozhaine, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast
Urozhaine, Donetsk Oblast
Urozhaine, Kherson Oblast
Urozhaine, Kirovohrad Oblast (abandoned sometime after 2001)
Urozhaine, Luhansk Oblast
Urozhaine, Ternopil Oblast
Urozhaine, Vinnytsia Oblast
Urozhaine, Zaporizhzhia Oblast"

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/noelreports/status/1690636105677176832?s=12
https://twitter.com/noelreports/status/1690638106301440001?s=12
Flee cowards lol

On another note, "Urozhaine" seems to be the Ukrainian Springfield.
"Urozhaine, Simferopol Raion, Autonomous Republic of Crimea
Urozhaine, Sovietskyi Raion, Autonomous Republic of Crimea
Urozhaine, Chernihiv Oblast
Urozhaine, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast
Urozhaine, Donetsk Oblast
Urozhaine, Kherson Oblast
Urozhaine, Kirovohrad Oblast (abandoned sometime after 2001)
Urozhaine, Luhansk Oblast
Urozhaine, Ternopil Oblast
Urozhaine, Vinnytsia Oblast
Urozhaine, Zaporizhzhia Oblast"

Makes sense as the word translates to “Harvest” and Ukraine is a very agricultural based country

[Florida Man for Crime]

Ground Control to Major Tomov:

Video Shows ‘Captured Russian Commander Sharing Troops’ Positions With Ukraine’

Russians are reportedly furious at Major Tomov’s apparent betrayal and one pro-Kremlin Telegram account has pleaded with readers not to judge him too harshly.

A video has emerged purporting to show a Russian commander captured during a daring raid by Ukrainian special forces showing his captors the positions of Moscow’s troops in an area of occupied Kherson.

According to the Russian Telegram account Grey Zone, the man in the video is Major Tomov, commander of the battalion of 1822 of the Russian Armed Forces, who went missing earlier this week.

He was captured during an operation conducted by Ukrainian special forces on a settlement on the occupied left-bank of the Dnipro River and until now there was no news of his whereabouts.

The new video shows Major Tomov crouching over a map, appearing to be informing his captors of troop positions on the Russian-occupied side of the river.

https://twitter.com/MrKovalenko/status/1690686344563953664

And relatedly, talking about the same general direction:

https://www.twitter.com/sarahashtonlv/status/1690569601426313216
If we are lucky, hopefully this means there are a significant number of defections giving Ukraine some easier than expected opportunities to advance.

Hopefully more Russian soldiers will come to their senses over time, realize that they are being used as cannon fodder by leadership that cares nothing for them, and surrender.

There is no faster way for the war to end than that. I am sure that all those posters like Woody who are so concerned about how much aid we are sending to Ukraine will join me in celebrating if that happens.

[Florida Man for Crime]

Russian perspective on the fighting near Urozhaine. TLDR, the Russian troops are all either wounded (and abandoned by their comrades who rarely rescue their wounded), dead, dying, or drunk on too much vodka.

https://t.me/milinfolive/104972

Today, the village of Urozhaynoye was abandoned in the Yuzhnodonetsk direction.

In recent weeks, fighters of the Kaskad OBTF and the 40th Marine Brigade have been stubbornly resisting the Armed Forces of Ukraine there. The assault groups of the 40th brigade repeatedly launched a counterattack and drove the enemy out of Urozhaynoye. Virtually every Marine who participated in the fighting was wounded.

The problem in holding the village is mostly due to the lack of desire to defend it on the part of the 36th army. The tank units of the 37th brigade refused to support the infantry in the battles for Urozhaynoye, arguing that the tanks were supposedly destroyed immediately after entering the firing position. The infantry of the brigade retreated from all the forest belts east of Harvest on the 10th. This was argued by the fact that they no longer have personnel for combat operations. In fact, half of the brigade is busy drinking alcohol in the rear, and the officers are not able to bring them to their senses. But for some reason, the 37th brigade continues to be thrown into the most important sectors of the front, which they successfully leave to the enemy.

Probably for Urozhaynoye they will again receive a decent amount of awards, as it was after the battles for Novodonetskoye. But the attack aircraft of the Marines from Storm Z, who voluntarily signed contracts and do not give up an inch of land without a fight, are not entitled to awards.

Military Informant

[Florida Man for Crime]

More details on what Major Tomov had to say to his Ukrainian captors:

https://t.me/vanek_nikolaev/16973

Major Tomov Yuri Anatolievich, 18.10.1977, Kombat 1822

We talked about losses, about the prospects of the Russian Federation in this war, about the attitude of local residents in the Kherson region to them, as well as about "Ukronazis" and, of course, about their previous place of service at a nuclear ammunition storage base.

The major for some reason evaluates the training of his unit extremely low, and does not blame himself for the fact that he was captured. he says that there are a lot of refuseniks (500th) in his battalion.

This battalion tried very hard to knock us out of the left bank of the Kherson region, but something went wrong.

Nothing will happen to the major, nobody will touch him with a finger, he tells everything as it is without any coercion.

also the major with very closed information helps us in the realization of some combat tasks, which you will certainly learn about in the future.

Believe me, considering all the events, it is very difficult to take such individuals prisoner, as well as hard to keep yourself in control when communicating with them.

thanks to all twins who professionally fulfill their duty!

P.S. Soon you will be waiting for other no less interesting materials. Wait for the next episodes

more to come!

Also there is a 14 minute video on telegram if you click the link

[CumbrianLefty]

https://twitter.com/DefMon3/status/1690342213522194433?s=20

They mean they will go on killing still more women and children, of course.

[Florida Man for Crime]

https://www.twitter.com/DefMon3/status/1690799334017650688

Brothers morale low.
Russian telegrams are not pleased with the interview of Major Tomov.
https://t.me/Separ13_13/17616