10:29 – Johan No.1
I will try to stay on topic but just want to highlight that there are many protests in Iran right now against the regime. I harbor a small hope that MENA will implode into something better but that is probably hoping for too much.
https://twitter.com/finphilosopher/status/1718294697519497683?s=46&t=cMvv-FzU8yqmC8V_ejoPsA
It has escalated very quickly and for residents in e.g. G…a it went from zero to one hundred overnight, a bit like the video below. That is why the West cannot afford to sleep through this because this escalation has gone incredibly fast. I think most are beginning to understand the level of escalation that we have been writing about for a while now, fundamentally it is a psyops and pouring gasoline on the fire worldwide and the hate rhetoric from some religious leaders is incredible and has quickly also come to include Christians.
https://twitter.com/humansnocontext/status/1718560870496616894?s=46&t=cMvv-FzU8yqmC8V_ejoPsA
It is quite telling also that as long as it is for a noble cause, Russia is happy to demonstrate as in Dagestan, just not against the Ukraine war. Then apparently there were internal troops available so it is not completely empty, one must admit.
Apparently there will be new FSB readers again, the new group was rolling on the floor laughing at less flattering descriptions of their great leader in the thread while a senior officer came in for an inspection at the office, they survived three days.
As with all great leaders, it would be good if the facade cracks and the citizens of the country Russia see Putin for what he really is, he has spent an incredible amount of time appearing as a great leader, a father figure for the country.
The truth is that he has been notoriously unfaithful not only to his wife but also to all those he has been unfaithful with and never gets enough of stealing from the citizens’ money so he can live in absolute luxury. Not least because he wants to give all partners and children with different hen (one should probably write that even if in this case it reasonably has been women since they gave birth?) a dignified life.
He has a proven acute germophobia and cares a lot about his appearance, only the most expensive clothing calms him for the moment.
In the 90s, Russia had a fleeting period of individual freedom that was quickly stamped out and if you judge by Prigozin and others close to him, Putin often sentences to FSB death when he considers loyalty to be lacking even the slightest. Medvedev is currently screaming in falsetto so that no suspicions arise.
Putin has megalomania and wants to be remembered as one of the world’s great Russian and former great leaders behaved exactly as he does, imperial ambitions and very quick to resort to executions. Ivan the Terrible one can probably guess where he got the name from.
We usually talk about this opportunity not coming back to get Russia to turn inward and the same applies to the citizens of the country Russia, various republics, oblasts or provinces that would naturally be their own countries but are colonized by Russia.
On the subject of election interference, the organization below believes that Russia has influenced Austria, Hungary, and Slovakia. Through Orban, Putin can block all consensus decisions in the EU and NATO which can be considered the highest possible payout. There is much more to read on the subject for those interested. As PerraG55 often points out, it is the black war chest that Western banks manage for Putin that presumably makes this so easy. Nothing is ideology nowadays, everything is money and there is plenty of it in the EU banking system.
And as we have often pointed out in the thread, one of the main purposes of the Russian influence operation is to paralyze the West and they have definitely found a way to paralyze the EU when it comes to decisions to support Ukraine – Orban.
The Slovak leader’s first speech in the EU was used to criticize Ukraine – guess if he gets pocket money from Putin.
https://europeanvalues.cz/cs/does-russia-interfere-in-czech-austrian-and-hungarian-elections/
One could kill two birds with one stone – an EU investigation of Russian funds in our banking system that are confiscated and entirely allocated to Ukraine directly, indirectly and distributed across the EU in purchases of soft and hard (weapons) goods for Ukraine?
The easiest way is, as we have written many times, to make Russia a “state sponsor of terrorism” (open goal someone – H..as!!!) or to classify all the letter agencies as terrorists. The first shoots broader and leaves fewer openings to crawl through.
One starts by following up the classification with an EU-wide ban on transferring funds suspected to be Russian with consequences for banks that ignore it. I do not know the terrorism legislation well enough but assisting in transferring funds for terrorism is on the penalty scale.
Then you set the bloodhounds to sniff out the funds and where each country is tasked with sending the funds to where they should go so Hungary cannot block anything.
In 2020, Russia’s cunning was underestimated and it was assumed that their subversive activities would have difficulties with NATO countries. Today Hungary, Slovakia, and Turkey are devoted Putin fans and Hungary blocks all EU consensus decisions. “Russian military subversion will be quite difficult in NATO countries and is most likely to occur in the non-Baltic former Soviet republics.” (p.10)
https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD1096326.pdf
It goes fast in hockey but above all Russia has gone deep and manipulated a sleeping West. I had to pinch myself when Zarkozy came out as a full Putinist.
All this sounds incredible, almost unreasonable, and pre-Ukraine war the interest was lukewarm at best, remember Martin Kragh and his persistent efforts, but it is slowly becoming an existential question for the West to tackle this.
For those in the thread who still feel some aversion to these imaginative incredible descriptions, one can google all the information from credible sources, it is just that nothing gets through in the media we read so we do not believe it exists.
10:41 – Johan No.1
There is a rumor circulating posted by several trusted sources that H..s murdered a father, desecrated a mother and then she had to watch as her newborn child was burned alive in an oven. It was paramedics who found the family.
I have also read that a driver who transported civilians from the attacked kibbutzim took his own life after a week.
This is on par with the worst atrocities the Russians have committed in Ukraine and it makes you feel sick just thinking about it.
Sorry for the OT.
10:45 – Johan No.1
I write what I see but I must also admit that there were quite a few comments yesterday saying I was too negative, so I made an effort not to paint too dark a picture 😀
We have repeatedly written that if Ukraine’s offensive runs out of gas during the autumn, it will be a critical situation, I haven’t seen that yet but it could absolutely be the case and on that day the West will have the whole mess on their lap.
However, I completely missed the blogger’s new strategic reserves from Russia – that was bad news to say the least 😐
I guessed they wouldn’t be fully trained until at the earliest after New Year.
If RU can deploy strategic reserves to the frontline at the southern front it would be unfortunate but I don’t think we’ve seen that yet.
Question – do we know what equipment these new brigades from Russia have?
10:52 – MatsExtrude
The dissonance between your positive essay and the darkness LW spreads in today’s post makes it hard to know which side to stand on. It was damn lucky you weren’t negative too (except for the criticism of the West’s deliveries)! 🙂
10:56 – Johan No.1
I had my negative day yesterday.
11:43 – Johan No.1
Operational security is tight and we write based on the information we get from RU or UA milbloggers.
There is no reason at all to distrust direct information to the blogger.
Right now there are two versions circulating, one that RU is building up reserves for a major offensive at Avdiivka and one where UA is conducting counterattacks that are going around on Twitter.
I grabbed the latter and the former could just as well be true, we will probably see in the coming weeks.
12:03 – Johan No.1
Mistake on my part as SSC below clarifies – Teplinsky was the former VDV commander and not the commander of 58CAA 😐
Careless error and then the conclusion instead is that they send the best they have to sort out the Dnepr front.
13:02 – Johan No.1
Jumping on your reasoning.
Haven’t we written since March 2022 that the West needs to send materiel?
The 200 CV90 mantra that the thread eventually got tired of?
There were two groups where one was certain that materiel would never be sent.
Weren’t we worried before January 6 when everything changed with the “coalition of tanks” only to again turn into demands for more materiel. There’s someone who calls Scholz the “steel eel” for example.
There was a discussion with MXT where he nicely put into words that the West gives just enough for Ukraine to keep its nose above water.
The risk with negativity is that everyone says “ok, now Ukraine is losing so we don’t care about this,” eagerly encouraged by who – yes Russia.
Why should the West send more if Ukraine is going to give up anyway?
The above sentence is not pulled out of thin air but that was how the West thought until Kherson autumn 2022, right?
At first Germany and France were just waiting for Ukraine to throw in the towel and they were angry that they had the audacity not to do so.
Then my follow-up question to what you write – why can’t more materiel be sent if things are going well, what is it that the West doesn’t understand?
If you send materiel it goes well, if you stop sending materiel it starts going badly – isn’t that kind of elementary logic?
The list of what Ukraine needs is circulating and they have Rammstein meetings where Ukraine begs like the worst car salesmen.
Virtually the entire military intelligentsia is pushing hard that Ukraine must get more materiel.
One should also not underestimate how defeatism can spread – let me present today’s thread 😀
That spreads like wildfire and if it seriously affects the home front opinion or the soldiers at the front it goes fast.
That is why Ukraine holds its head high every day, good or bad.
The problem here is the West, not Ukraine.
15:11 – Johan No.1
Looking historically at the whole war, Ukraine has –
-liberated 50% of its territory.
-decimated RU elite units very hard.
-is now firing more artillery shells per month in absolute terms than Russia from 15:1 at the start of the war.
-gotten everything except advanced aircraft.
-made the West go from suggesting they give up land to promising support until the war is won.
-invaded Russia.
-made the Russian navy flee to the eastern part of the Black Sea without having their own fleet.
What makes you think they can’t liberate the remaining 50%, you can’t look in the rearview mirror and come to that conclusion at least?
15:52 – Johan No.1
1. The West has not sent any unit sets and countries in Western Europe don’t need armor and the US has thousands of Bradleys and Abrams in storage.
They have sent surplus materiel so far and could send 1500 CV90s and about a thousand Leo2s (I pulled the numbers out of a hat!).
2. If Ukraine has taken relatively low losses and Russia massive losses isn’t that positive?
During this spring offensive Ukraine has removed the fleet from Crimea, decimated RU artillery to better than 1:1 and worn out VDV which are pretty big milestones to achieve.
3. They have had it but if you break through the southern front at one point the line is then obsolete and now they are well on their way to doing that at the Dnepr, Verbove and Staromaiorske.
4. I think the stories come from territorial and NG when they have been negative and rarely from the army’s brigades. Today territorial has PTGB and their own SOF groups and NG has the Azov units with tanks. What I have seen of clearing defense systems far exceeds what we learned in basic training and that was the hardest after fighting in urban areas.
5. According to the sources I have seen NK has sent 300,000 artillery shells 152mm (short range) and outdated artillery – makes no difference.
Yep, already early 2022 we argued in the thread that they should have LV or a no-fly zone and Poles at the border to Belarus and after NS1-2 it was unlocked.
Today after they sent H..as on I..el it is absolutely unlocked.
If Ukraine can beat Russia on home ground and make them turn inward there is a chance to extinguish the global conflict that is emerging possibly.
16:00 – Johan No.1
Point 4 is my interpretation, we probably have two sides on that in the thread 😀
16:01 – Johan No.1
The last sentence is speculation, I am of the opinion that Russia is one of the driving parties and above all they have the “know how” regarding influence operations so if they turn inward everything could die out with a bit of luck.
16:02 – Johan No.1
And regarding the conclusion we probably agree 😀
16:41 – Johan No.1
1. The word -more- is still with reference to quantity 😀
But ok, yes Ukraine has now gotten all capabilities when the advanced aircraft arrive but there aren’t that many more capabilities to send and you must still agree that quantity makes a difference?
Then maybe not all countries in Western Europe are skimping on unit-set materiel which they should.
3. Yes, well on the way might have been a bit of an exaggeration must admit.
It has completely stalled at Staromaiorske but at Verbove and across the Dnepr Ukraine can be considered to have advance?
Then you have to admit that the NATO doctrine that was hoped for heavily failed completely, the minefields were too extensive. Someone in the thread probably used the word “unstoppable” in their vivid descriptions.
5. Yes, China is exploiting the line between NK – Russia to push in its own equipment now. At least ammunition, probably more, you are absolutely right about that.
Yes, I severely underestimated the minefields even though a couple of people in the thread pointed it out, I don’t remember who. I relied on the fact that the fortifications were partly built by private contractors and would be impractical with weak points, which they did not turn out to have. I was quite sure that UA would reach Azov during the summer.
What must not happen is that Ukraine runs out of gas and RU manages to deploy its strategic reserves and staff the rear defense lines, then it’s a critical situation – I usually write that from time to time.
We are not there yet because UA would not have crossed the Dnieper if they did not intend to continue the offensive, I reasonably think?
My two cents 😀
16:43 – Johan No.1
Now I get what you meant Emil in your reply to Enrico and how the word escalation should be interpreted 👍
I have a free pass as an overseas Swede, Erik14 issued it already in 2022 😀
16:53 – Johan No.1
🤣🤣 thanks, an interesting discussion.
10:26 – Johan No.1
If anyone thought it wasn’t lively over at Dnipro despite the thread having rung the bell quite a while ago, the head of the Dnipro front has just been fired 😀
Gerasimov rarely denies himself.
Then he gives the job to Teplinsky, who was fired from 58CAA for criticizing the combat leadership, and Teplinsky did not mince words.
I harbor a small hope that it will be like with Suvorikin and that Teplinsky has gotten the job to be able to carry out an organized retreat, but I have zero evidence for that. However, some panic is beginning to be seen around the Dnipro front right now among the Russians.
https://twitter.com/ukikaski/status/1718768574754349385?s=46&t=jkHPVgDnxWvllj9hXQxrLQ
Unfortunately, it is more likely that, as history has shown with new commanders, Teplinsky will try to hold the bridgeheads in the coming month with all available units to keep the job for longer than a month.
However, we have reached the point where the bridgehead is so large and expanding that RU now has to redistribute units from other fronts to be able to strike it.
The units at the Dnipro front have tried and failed, and that says something about the condition of the units in that area; there should be a large number there according to that article from Ukrinform and 500 tanks (which contradicts previous estimates made).
Where will RU get the units from?
All offensive reserves have now been exhausted at Avdiivka, and there is nothing to draw from the southern front.
The charm of the bridgeheads is that the counterattacks have to move up and travel on the highway, where they are exposed to all indirect fire capabilities until the last lucky survivors come within range of close-range air defense and are knocked out – this was the effect that the grand campaign plan highlighted, the Davydiv Brid effect.
Ukraine has become very good at striking Russian counterattacks before they come within firing range of combat objectives – legendary level as mentioned, and they have pooled drone weapons and indirect fire to the Dnipro front ahead of this transition.
To strike the bridgehead, something similar to what was at Avdiivka would have been needed, but that can no longer be mustered because the entire reserve was burned at Avdiivka.
Then it is a bit ambiguous regarding Avdiivka; RU has brought down additional reserves probably from northern Luhansk since all other fronts are anorexic in terms of units.
It was quite a while ago that the redundancy of 10 brigades disappeared from northern Luhansk, so they are now weakening the defense up in northern Luhansk.
https://twitter.com/thedeaddistrict/status/1718553889622884445?s=46&t=wNciQVIBqfiIcuZos6ObJA
David D is, however, of the opinion that Ukraine has pulled three brigades from the southern front and is conducting counterattacks at Avdiivka.
As is well known, I am of the opinion that it is over for RU at Avdiivka with the arrival of the 1st Tank, but that does not prevent them from continuing to try.
https://x.com/secretsqrl123/status/1718686562597109782?s=20
I am sitting and wondering if Russia has now weakened itself in that area and that the offensive UA reserves are there for an offensive. That area has previously been handed over to the DPR, and their brigades were already exhausted. Now they have charged across the fields with drawn sabers one last time, so it is not unreasonable that the surrounding area is now poorly defended and that one of the famous opportunities has arisen?
Ukraine is probably waiting for the right moment to strike.
At Bakhmut, Ukraine is soon at Odradivka, and then that line has also been punctured. Slightly incredible and probably signals that RU brigades in the area are becoming exhausted.
At Staromaiorske, UA seems to have pulled out more brigades than the marine corps, so it looks like offensive operations have ended there for now. We were of the opinion in the thread that things were going very well in that area, so it is unclear to me why the massacre was paused.
As usual, things look very bright at the fronts. That, as it seems, maximum companies (thought battalions at first but it seems to have been fewer in number?), with marine infantry are on defense and can withstand RU counterattacks at Dnipro speaks volumes.
At Krunky, according to the maps, there should be 4 RU brigades and a battalion group, which by all measures should have been enough to overrun the defense in a morning, but they do not succeed.
That can only mean that the brigades were heavily reduced to begin with and are third-rate.
There should also be an offensive reserve of 3-4 MRR and TR, and enough time has passed for them to have been deployed. At all other fronts, counterattacks come immediately and violently, right?
Everyone understands that the Ukraine war is “ground zero” both as the start of an attempt at a global conflict but it must also be emphasized that it could be the fire extinguisher for the global conflict.
Russia has a habit of waging war through proxies and never exposing itself except in Ukraine where they have gone all in and Ukraine can reach their soft parts.
Ukraine has international law to defend itself and can as the only country in the world strike targets anywhere on Russian territory without it escalating.
A smart West should quickly ensure that Ukraine gets all the equipment they point to because right now they are in the orange zone and we want the meter back to green.
36 days without Storm Shadow is a disgrace 🤬
https://twitter.com/ukraine_map/status/1718805876159504836?s=46&t=jkHPVgDnxWvllj9hXQxrLQ
I find it hard to see that the West has been so cunning that it has always been part of the plan to prolong the war so that Russia would fall harder for the simple reason that absolutely no one could have predicted how Ukraine would manage this. They have amazed everyone.
Early analyses were that Kiev would fall within three days if you remember, and anxious leaders in the West who drag their feet with everything are not part of a clever plan, that is exactly what it looks like.
I would like to see this before we have to deal with sunken ships in Suez and Hormuz.
We now see more videos of forced mobilization, and it seems the Russians are sweeping their country for minorities to send to the fronts. One really hopes they manage to scrape together a few hundred thousand who will become the foundation of the coming revolution; haven’t they learned anything from history 😀
Ukraine is also doing its part and recruiting heavily for the volunteer units, and the interest is apparently overwhelming. These are groups that will take the war to Russia going forward.
It is my opinion that that ball is now rolling and cannot be stopped by Russia; we got the global escalation but Russia got a slowly growing popular revolution.
We have also heard Lukashenko hint at negotiations, and if we hear similar from Orban and Erdogan soon, we know it is a critical situation with the Russian combat leadership.
The demonstration in Dagestan was, by the way, not driven by the Kremlin and it can very quickly turn against the dictatorship; that area has been suggested as a possible starting point.
It would actually suit Russia perfectly to get rid of the UA war now that the global conflict is starting, so the West should do the opposite and immediately shower Ukraine with new equipment.
We have been writing for a while now that the UA offensive is increasing and going very well and that there is no reason to worry. Crossing the Dnipro is high risk and clearly tells us that Ukraine is in control here, positive-positive thus and it will be a lively late summer.