A barrage of more than 80 Russian missiles and a smaller number of exploding drones hit residential buildings and critical infrastructure across Ukraine.
Filed under: Russia, Ukraine | Tagged: Douglas Macgregor, Kharkiv, Kiev, Odessa, Ukraine War | Comments Off on Russia Strikes Kyiv, Odesa & Kharkiv – Col Doug Macgregor
Does US Secretary of State Antony Blinken think a Washington Post op-ed will move Russian Armed Forces Chief Valery Gerasimov to postpone his planned military offensive on Ukraine?
Realizing NATO’s war with Russia will likely end unfavorably, the US is test-driving an exit offer. But why should Moscow take indirect proposals seriously, especially on the eve of its new military advance and while it is in the winning seat?
By
Pepe Escobar
Those behind the Throne are never more dangerous than when they have their backs against the wall.
Their power is slipping away, fast: Militarily, via NATO’s progressive humiliation in Ukraine; Financially, sooner rather than later, most of the Global South will want nothing to do with the currency of a bankrupt rogue giant; Politically, the global majority is taking decisive steps to stop obeying a rapacious, discredited, de facto minority.
So now those behind the Throne are plotting to at least try to stall the incoming disaster on the military front.
As confirmed by a high-level US establishment source, a new directive on NATO vs. Russia in Ukraine was relayed to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Blinken, in terms of actual power, is nothing but a messenger boy for the Straussian neocons and neoliberals who actually run US foreign policy.
The secretary of state was instructed to relay the new directive – a sort of message to the Kremlin – via mainstream print media, which was promptly published by the Washington Post.
In the elite US mainstream media division of labor, the New York Times is very close to the State Department. and the Washington Post to the CIA. In this case though the directive was too important, and needed to be relayed by the paper of record in the imperial capital. It was published as an Op-Ed (behind paywall).
The novelty here is that for the first time since the start of Russia’s February 2022 Special Military Operation (SMO) in Ukraine, the Americans are actually proposing a variation of the “offer you can’t refuse” classic, including some concessions which may satisfy Russia’s security imperatives.
Crucially, the US offer totally bypasses Kiev, once again certifying that this is a war against Russia conducted by Empire and its NATO minions – with the Ukrainians as mere expandable proxies.
‘Please don’t go on the offensive’
The Washington Post’s old school Moscow-based correspondent John Helmer has provided an important service, offering the full text of Blinken’s offer, of course extensively edited to include fantasist notions such as “US weapons help pulverize Putin’s invasion force” and a cringe-worthy explanation: “In other words, Russia should not be ready to rest, regroup and attack.”
The message from Washington may, at first glance, give the impression that the US would admit Russian control over Crimea, Donbass, Zaporozhye, and Kherson – “the land bridge that connects Crimea and Russia” – as a fait accompli.
Ukraine would have a demilitarized status, and the deployment of HIMARS missiles and Leopard and Abrams tanks would be confined to western Ukraine, kept as a “deterrent against further Russian attacks.”
What may have been offered, in quite hazy terms, is in fact a partition of Ukraine, demilitarized zone included, in exchange for the Russian General Staff cancelling its yet-unknown 2023 offensive, which may be as devastating as cutting off Kiev’s access to the Black Sea and/or cutting off the supply of NATO weapons across the Polish border.
The US offer defines itself as the path towards a “just and durable peace that upholds Ukraine’s territorial integrity.” Well, not really. It just won’t be a rump Ukraine, and Kiev might even retain those western lands that Poland is dying to gobble up.
The possibility of a direct Washington-Moscow deal on “an eventual postwar military balance” is also evoked, including no Ukraine membership of NATO. As for Ukraine itself, the Americans seem to believe it will be a “strong, non-corrupt economy with membership in the European Union.”
Whatever remains of value in Ukraine has already been swallowed not only by its monumentally corrupt oligarchy, but most of all, investors and speculators of the BlackRock variety. Assorted corporate vultures simply cannot afford to lose Ukraine’s grain export ports, as well as the trade deal terms agreed with the EU before the war. And they’re terrified that the Russian offensive may capture Odessa, the major seaport and transportation hub on the Black Sea – which would leave Ukraine landlocked.
There’s no evidence whatsoever that Russian President Vladimir Putin, and the entire Russian Security Council – including its Secretary Nikolai Patrushev and Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev – have reason to believe anything coming from the US establishment, especially via mere minions such as Blinken and the Washington Post. After all the stavka – a moniker for the high command of the Russian armed forces – regard the Americans as “non-agreement capable,” even when an offer is in writing.
This walks and talks like a desperate US gambit to stall and present some carrots to Moscow in the hope of delaying or even cancelling the planned offensive of the next few months.
Even old school, dissident Washington operatives – not beholden to the Straussian neocon galaxy – bet that the gambit will be a nothing burger: in classic “strategic ambiguity” mode, the Russians will continue on their stated drive of demilitarization, denazification and de-electrification, and will “stop” anytime and anywhere they see fit east of the Dnieper. Or beyond.
What the Deep State really wants
Washington’s ambitions in this essentially NATO vs. Russia war go well beyond Ukraine. And we’re not even talking about preventing a Russia-China-Germany Eurasian union or a peer competitor nightmare; let’s stick with prosaic issues on the Ukrainian battleground.
The key “recommendations” – military, economic, political, diplomatic – were detailed in an Atlantic Council strategy paper late last year.
And in another one, under “War scenario 1: The war continues in its current tempo,” we find the Straussian neocon policy fully spelled out.
It’s all here: from “marshaling support and military-assistance transfers to Kyiv sufficient to enable it to win” to “increase the lethality of military assistance transferred to include fighter aircraft that would enable Ukraine to control its airspace and attack Russian forces therein; and missile technology with range sufficient to reach into Russian territory.”
From training the Ukrainian military “to use Western weapons, electronic warfare, and offensive and defensive cyber capabilities, and to seamlessly integrate new recruits in the service” to buttressing “defenses on the front lines, near the Donbass region,” including “combat training focusing on irregular warfare.”
Added to “imposing secondary sanctions on all entities doing business with the Kremlin,” we reach of course the Mother of All Plunders: “Confiscate the $300 billion that the Russian state holds in overseas accounts in the United States and EU and use seized monies to fund reconstruction.”
The reorganization of the SMO, with Putin, Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov, and General Armageddon in their new, enhanced roles is derailing all these elaborate plans.
The Straussians are now in deep panic. Even Blinken’s number two, Russophobic warmonger Victoria “F**k the EU” Nuland, has admitted to the US Senate there will be no Abrams tanks on the battlefield before Spring (realistically, only in 2024). She also promised to “ease sanctions” if Moscow “returns to negotiations.” Those negotiations were scotched by the Americans themselves in Istanbul in the Spring of 2022.
Nuland also called the Russians to “withdraw their troops.” Well, that at least offers some comic relief compared with the panic oozing from Blinken’s “offer you can’t refuse.” Stay tuned for Russia’s non-response response.
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.
Filed under: EU, Europe, NATO Alliance, Poland, Russia, Ukraine | Tagged: Antony Blinken, “EuroMaidan” coup, Crimea, Denazification of Ukraine, Donbass, Kherson, Medvedev, Odessa, Pepe Escobar, SMO, Victoria Nuland, Washington Post, Western proxy Wars against Russia, Zaporozhye region | Comments Off on A panicked Empire tries to make Russia an ‘offer it can’t refuse’
Check out this list of headlines, all from one source only, RT and all from the past week or so:
Some are only “more of the same” (like the Ukronazis making the Aussies ban Russian flags at the Open), some are rather disgusting (like the Ukronazi blogger who wants to exterminate the Russian people), some are revolting (like the French warning 5000 Russian graves that “their concession is expiring”!), some are hilarious (like the idea of bust of “Ze” at the Capitol building), some are outright crazy (like the idea of a “Ukraine peace summit” without Russian participation). Some are weird but encouraging (like the Kentucky gubernatorial candidate, a Democrat, calling for an impeachment of Biden for war crimes). But some are very, very serious indeed (like the increase of the size of the Russian military to 1.5M or the fact that both the General Milley and Defense Minister Shoigu visiting their troops at the same time.
One could certainly say that these headlines are “signs of the time” (“but can ye not discern the signs of the times?” Matt 16:2-3), but what does this all mean?
First, these headlines are like a snapshot of the West’s collective insanity. Please keep in mind that the past week was no more and no less rich in crazy ideas and statements than previous weeks. This snapshot is what one could call the “West’s homeostasis” or, in other words, that is the norm, the stable mental condition in which the West operates. Future historians, assuming the AngloZionists freaks in power allow us to have a future other than a nuclear apocalypse, will marvel at the collective insanity which overcame an entire continent.
Second, both the rabid #CancelRussia mass phenomenon and the discussions about sending NATO weapons, including MBTs, fighter aircraft, SAMs and the like are an expression of the same impotent rage felt by the leaders of the West. And headlines like this one “Russian economy doing much better than expected (…)” The financial results for 2022 have exceeded many forecasts, the president [Putin] says” certainly do not help.
The obvious danger here is that frustrated, hate-filled people are typically not capable of rational decision-making. Let’s, for example, take the “clever” idea of sending the Ukronazis (well, NATO, really) more tanks or aircraft. If you look at the numbers discussed, they are so small as to make no difference. But once you sent them to the Ukraine and they get destroyed by Russian missiles, what do you do next? Send more?
It took the Russians about one month to basically destroy the (original) Ukrainian armed forces.
Then it has taken Russia about 9 months to destroy most of the hardware former Warsaw Treaty Organization (no, it is *not* called a “Pact” – that is pure propaganda and why not call NATO the Atlantic Pact by the same logic?). The sad part here is that in the process of destroying all that WTO kit, Russia had not choice but to inflict horrendous casualties with Ukrainian KIA/MIA going well into the several hundred of thousands. “Ze” sent wave after wave after wave of mobilized men straight into the Russian meat-grinder with no chance of prevail and very little chance of survival.
It might take Russia a year or more to fully destroy all the hardware (and “volunteers”) sent by NATO. Russia is certainly making plans for a long and major war, hence the re-creation of the Moscow and Leningrad Military Districts (you can think of them as “fronts” once a war starts) or the massive increase in weapons procurement up to and including strategic deterrence forces (nuclear and conventional).
Right now, Russia seems to be focusing on destroying the (comparatively) better trained units of the mixed NATO-Ukronazi forces in the eastern Ukraine. The Russian strategy is very simple: Russia can kill NATO soldiers and hardware faster than NATO can provide reinforcements. Obviously, this is only a temporary situation, and there are three groupings of Russian forces (North, East, South) all along the frontlines which can intervene at any time and give Russia something she never had since the initiation of the SMO: a full combined arms offensive and a numerical superiority over the other side.
Most knowledgeable observers, such as Col Maggregor, believe that a Russian offensive is all but certain. Wars can be very unpredictable, and Putin does have a genius ability to act in unpredictable ways, so I would not say that this offensive is absolutely certain, but I agree that it is highly likely. However, such an offensive is not risk free.
In purely military terms, there is no force on the European continent which could take on the Russian forces currently aligned along the Ukrainian border. In political terms, there is a major issue for Russia: any terrain that she liberates will have to be protected.
During the first phase of the SMO, the Russians sent in a comparatively small force, which did great in combat against the Ukronazis, but which did not hold ground (which you never do in economy of force and maneuver warfare), resulting into absolutely awful optics including:
The fact that neither of these statements is quite true does not help as they are “close enough” to the truth to sound convincing. As a result, the Russian side completely lost control of the narrative, for a while even inside Russia! It took the appointment of Surovikin to reassure the Russian public that while mistakes were made (including in the early phase of the war or during the mobilization), those mistakes would be addressed and corrected. Now with the Russian Chief of General Staff in final and personal control of the war, nobody doubts that the Kremlin does mean business.
There is also a small, but noticeable change, in the western propaganda with more and more voices dissenting from the official AngloZionist party line. Of course, the economic disaster facing the EU is most helpful in sobering up the Europeans: now that more and more EU citizens have to say “bye bye” to the comforts and jobs they used to enjoy (including first and foremost, dirt cheap energy costs), we can count on an increasingly loud rumble of protests. Maybe not “pro-Russian” ones, no – most Europeans, especially northern Europeans, *do* hate Russia – but at least anti-Establishment ones. Having silenced your conscience does not keep you warm or, for that matter, employed. The EU will now discover the very real costs of rabid russophobia. And sending tanks to the Ukraine obviously won’t help. Hence the current strikes and protests in several EU countries.
So when the promised offensive materializes, there will be only two options left: ditch the Ukronazi regime “Kabul style” or full commit NATO (or a subset of NATO states) to invade the western Ukraine. My money is on the latter option.
Actually, this is not one option, but two very different ones.
Obviously, the second solution in infinitely safer and preferable, but just like Hitler and his goons did not want to negotiate with Russian subhumans, neither do the AngloZionists.
Still, here is a truism which must be always kept in mind:
This was true of the Ukraine before the SMO, and it is even more true today. Country 404 is basically deindustrialized and a prototypical failed state, while the population has been so brainwashed that it will take years to deprogram them. Russia only wants two things:
Notice that neither of these options necessarily requires making major territorial gains. I would even argue that, with one exception (see below), it would be ideal for Russia to achieve these objectives by liberating as little as possible of the currently Nazi occupied land. As I have said it many times, the Ukrainians need to clear their own house and not expect Russia to do it for them. Alas, it will take another generation of Ukrainians to do that, assuming they ever will. But as long as country 404 is sufficiently demilitarized, Russia can wait for the denazification to seep into the minds of millions of brainwashed Ukrainians.
The first consequence of this, is that the Russians are more than happy not to move forward and have the US push NATO forces into the Russian meat grinder. True, it is unlikely that Russia will be able to demilitarize and denazify the Ukraine without a major offensive to finish up the Nazi forces. However, the seizure of land is not the Russian goal, only the means to achieve it.
Then there is the issue of the Nikolaev-Odessa-PMR (Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic).
While the Kremlin might have other plans, I personally don’t see any other option than to open a land corridor to PMR. This would also have the immense benefit of cutting the rump-Banderastan from the Black Sea. For NATO, however, the loss of Odessa and the Black Sea Coast would be a major setback, both politically and militarily. There were some really dumb ideas circulated about this in the West,including sending in the 101st as a “tripwire” force. Why is that dumb? Simply because *IF* the Russians have concluded that the liberation of the entire Ukrainian coast is vital to the security of Russia, then no “tripwire” force will stop them. And what will the US do if that tripwire force is attacked? Launch a fullscale nuclear attack on Russia?
Are the US Neocons willing to lose Washington DC, New York, Miami or Los Angeles over Odessa? I don’t know, but if they are the typical self-worshiping Nazis (which they are), then a nuclear holocaust might seem preferable to these hate-filled freaks. Can somebody sane stop them? I don’t know that either.
The headlines above suggest to me that no real decision has been made and that right now there is a tug of war inside the western ruling elites about what to do when the (almost certainly) inevitable Russian offensive happens. By the way, this fact by itself might be a good reason for the Russians not to move in too soon. Yes, it is unlikely that saner voices will prevail, but being a nuclear superpower Russian must act with utmost caution and not listen to the Russian turbopatriots and the western “friends of Russia” would have been advocating for total war for months, if not years.
Maybe the “Georgian model” is what might save the day?
Remember how during the three day war in 08.08.08 Russian forces were closing on Tbilissi with nobody left to defend the Georgian capital? The Russians decided to call back their forces (no, Russia has no need for either the land or the people of Georgia. Sounds familiar?) but Saakashvili reinterpreted this withdrawal as “our heroic and invincible forces stopped the Russians”. And two years before that, Dubya who declared with a straight face that Israel defeated Hezbollah the “Divine Victory” war. So maybe the AngloZionist can save face by declaring that they “prevented Russian from seizing Lvov or Ivano-Frankovsk”? And if the Russians decide not to try to liberate Kiev, then NATO will be able to declared that “we stopped Russia from seizing Kiev”. Yes, that would be a rather transparent lie, at least for those few still capable of critical thought, but I personally much prefer a lie, however, silly, to a fullscale war.
So maybe Russia needs to have a third, unspoken, objective: give the crazies in the West a face-saving “out”, no matter how thin or ridiculous. In fact, I am pretty confident that there are folks in Russia working on this right now.
Filed under: EU, NATO Alliance, Russia, Ukraine | Tagged: AngloZionist Empire, Black Sea, Denazification of Ukraine, Kiev Nazi Regime, Nuclear War, Odessa, Russophobia, SMO, The Saker, Ukro-nazis | Comments Off on Revisiting Russian objectives in the Ukraine
Source: https://t.me/c/1274044880/3362
Text: Alyona Zadorozhnaya
translation by A.
By the end of 2022, Vladimir Zelensky has achieved unique and in many ways tragic results. He managed to reduce the population of Ukraine to the level of a century ago, put the country in bondage to the West and deprive fellow citizens of the elementary benefits of civilization. What other “successes” could be added to Zelensky’s track record?
In 2023, a catastrophic drop in the birth rate is expected in Ukraine. This was stated by the director of the Ptukha Institute of Demography and Social Research, academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine Ella Libanova. According to her, by 2030 the population will decrease to 35 million people, and the reduction process has been going on since 1994. At the same time, Libanova assures that 34-35 million people still live in Ukraine.
However, these figures are questionable. The number of refugees who arrived in Russia from the territory of Donbass and Ukraine has already exceeded five million people. In the summer, according to the UN, there were about 6.3 million Ukrainian citizens who left the country in all the European states. Experts are convinced that Libanova gives inflated figures – and already today there are significantly fewer people living in Ukraine than she claims..
“Even before the start of the SVO, it was difficult to understand how many people really live in Ukraine. Official figures were around 40 million people, while in reality there were approximately 33 million people, if not less,” economist Ivan Lizan told the newspaper VZGLYAD. “From 2016 to 2019, Ukrainians were leaders among those who obtained primary residence permits in Poland. Every year, up to 500 thousand people “flowed out” this way. Also, do not forget that a large number of their refugees have recently moved to Europe,” the expert emphasizes.
“Thus, there are at best 25-27 million people left in Ukraine, which is comparable to the population as of the 1920s of the last century. Mostly men remained in the country, because they were simply banned from traveling abroad,” the source notes.
“I am sure that these trends will continue in 2023. We will also observe internal migration. In those areas of the front where the situation is heating up, people will run away. As, for example, from the Kiev–controlled part of Donbass, local residents fled to Dnepropetrovsk,” the economist claims.
“A terrible situation is developing in the labor market. State employees mostly live on bare salaries. Teachers who are forced to move to other regions of Ukraine due to the proximity of hostilities have enough money only to pay for rented housing,” says Lizan.
“The most profitable job is to go to war. The APU pays 100 thousand hryvnias (189 thousand rubles or USD 2 700 /month) to those who participate in the battles, and 30 thousand hryvnias (57 thousand rubles or USD 817/month) to those who are not involved in active hostilities. Those who return home from the front begin to drink heavily and indulge in reckless spending. It gets to the point that they go into home appliance stores and, without looking at the price, ask to pack the most expensive TV,” the expert said.
“Some also actively supplement their income by looting. In Ukraine, there is a non–state post office, Nova Poshta, that has been integrated into the logistics system of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Nowadays its trucks deliver ammunition, provisions, etc. to the front line, and from there they take out and sell all the loot. This was also the case during the so–called ATO,” the interlocutor stressed. “Life is not easy for the villagers either. Back in the spring, former collective farmers were paid shares in grain, not in money, although in previous years people themselves could make a choice,” said Lizan.
“At least eight million people left Ukraine in 2022. If the population of the lost territories is taken into account, then no more than 18-20 million inhabitants remain in the country. And because of the tough restrictions on the departure of men, it is mostly women and children who leave the state,” adds human rights activist Larisa Shesler.
“Schools are closed in most cities, formally they work remotely. Settlements, even large ones, look like ghost towns. In Nikolaev, Odessa, Zaporozhye, less than half of the buildings’ apartments are occupied, mostly it is the old people or very poor people who have no money and no chance to settle in another country who stay there,” the interlocutor describes.
“And 2023 does not give hope for an improvement in the situation. The majority of the refugees in Europe understand that they will not be able to return to Ukraine. The birth rate is falling catastrophically, and next year will be even more difficult because of the accumulated effect,” the political scientist emphasizes.
“Of those who stayed, many lost their income. Western experts and the Ukrainian authorities estimate unemployment at 30% of the active population. But a couple of months ago, the governor of Nikolaev spoke about 80% of citizens who lost their jobs. And this is more like the truth,” the expert continues. “Those who have jobs also have a difficult time. The vast majority of the employed population receives about 14 thousand hryvnias, which is equivalent to 26 thousand rubles (~USD 381/month). However, the price of goods has risen by 40-80%, so people exist on the verge of survival,” Shesler emphasized.
Against the background of the population outflow and unemployment, the entire economy of Ukraine is suffering. Despite the colossal injections of money from the West, the factories are shutting down, mining is declining, and the harvest is falling. Political scientists predicted the transformation of Ukraine into a third world country back in August. Then it was noted that the state could lose its agricultural potential. And now the forecasts are being confirmed.
Even Ukrainian oligarchs, who [usually] only get richer in difficult times, are losing their fortunes today. Thus, the total wealth of the richest citizens of Ukraine has decreased by more than $ 20 billion compared to the beginning of February 2022, Ukrainian Forbes pointed out.
The government debt is also rising (it is more than $ 100 billion now). “There are simply no adequate estimates of the level of decline in the Ukrainian economy, there is only an assumed range of data. Before the autumn Russian strikes on the electric power industry, the Ukrainian authorities talked about a drop in GDP by 30-40%. The GDP figure for 2021 was 198 billion dollars,” economist Ivan Lizan told the newspaper VZGLYAD.
“When we began to launch large-scale strikes on the energy facilities in order to destroy the enemy’s logistical capabilities, the estimates were adjusted. Kiev then said that if the attacks continue, the GDP will sink by 50%. And the strikes continued,” the source adds. “But already in December, Prime Minister Shmygal said that although there is a drop in GDP, it fluctuates around 35%.
I would not believe this statement and I am of the opinion that GDP will sink by 50% by the end of the year. This is about $100 billion”,
– the expert argues. “Zelensky’s economic adviser Rostislav Shurma also said that in the fourth quarter the industrial production fell in the range of 50 to 90%, depending on the region. At the same time, there is a pattern according to which the territories located closer to the front line have sunk most seriously,” the economist continues.
“For Ukraine, the loss of half of its GDP is even more damaging than it was in 2014-2015. A country without a normal electric power industry cannot have a normal economy. Everything is somehow tied to electricity. For example, corn can be harvested from the fields before the frost and first snow. But then it needs to be dried, and without electricity it becomes almost impossible. Subsequently, the corn harvest fell by 30%, and in general, the yield decreased by 40%,” the expert explains.
“Accordingly, if it were not for the support of the West, Ukraine would have already begun to collapse. But NATO managed to keep it afloat. This is not about the development of the country, but about stabilization of its financial system – they give money so that there is enough for the war,” the interlocutor notes. “There is a separate story with borrowing – it happens [exclusively] inside the country, because no one needs [their] bonds on the foreign market. In fact, this year Ukraine has defaulted for the second time in the last eight years. And now foreign creditors are simply shying away from the Ukrainian debt,” the economist draws attention.
“The forecast of the drop in the Ukrainian GDP is getting worse every day. Over the past month, the critical situation in the electric power industry has led to a drop in production of up to 80% in many industries. Metallurgy has practically stopped, mining and processing enterprises have sharply reduced production,” clarifies Larisa Shesler.
“Now only small enterprises and shops which run on the generators can function in the country; the banking and municipal institutions operate in a limited mode. The situation is complicated by the fact that there are no solutions to the energy crisis yet,” the interlocutor notes.
“Previously, the decline in the annual GDP in November reached 40%. In December, the situation worsened. But no figures can reflect the reality of the rapid deindustrialization of Ukraine. Almost all large factories have been stopped, construction and mining have been stopped,” the expert lists.
“Now Ukraine is losing everything that has been created on its territory for decades. It’s scary to imagine how much it will cost to resuscitate power grids and thermal power plants. It is obvious that neither Europe nor the USA are going to keep Ukraine as an industrial country, even in the form of a supplier of metallurgical raw products or an exporter of electricity from nuclear power plants,” says Shesler.
“They want to convert Ukraine into a territory overrun by paramilitary groups fighting with Russia, and [having only] agricultural land for growing cheap sunflower”,
– she emphasizes. “This year, Ukraine has received large amounts of money in the form of loans and financial tranches, unprecedented previously. And absolutely no one expects a full refund of these payments. Thus, the state becomes completely economically dependent on the Western countries,” the political scientist notes.
Filed under: EU, Europe, NATO Alliance, Poland, Ukraine, USA | Tagged: Nicolaev, Odessa, Ukraine War, Ukrainian refugees, Zaporozhye region, Zelensky | Comments Off on Zelensky has achieved unique results in the destruction of Ukraine
Filed under: NATO Alliance, Poland, Putin, Russia, UK, Ukraine, USA, USSR | Tagged: Bandera national battalions, Crimea, Donetsk, Eastern Ukraine, General Armageddon, Gorbachev, Lithuania, Lugansk, Moldova, NATO Expansion, Odessa, Proxy War, SMO, Ukraine War, Ukro-Neutrality, Western proxy Wars against Russia, Yeltsin, Zelensky | Comments Off on Dr Michael Vlahos interviews Col. Douglas Macgregor (MUST SEE!)
translated by the Saker community
The world elite is not ready to compromise with Moscow
by
Alexander Khramchikhin
The training of Australian submariners on the British nuclear submarine Anson is being carried out as part of the effort to put together a new Anglo-Saxon coalition on a world-wide scale. Photo from http://www.gov.uk
The most important political outcome of the outgoing year should become a radical change in Russia’s relations with the West. Not at the level of propaganda for the “plebeian multitudes”, but at the political, economic and, most importantly, mental level.
BEFORE AND NOW
At present, Russia’s complete and final break with the “collective West” (which means the countries of NATO, the EU, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and, with some reservations, the Republic of Korea, Taiwan and Singapore) is becoming not only an objective reality, but also an objective necessity. Over the past half century, the Western model of development has undergone a very serious degradation, and this degradation continues to deepen.
Half a century ago, the West, with its classical democracy, was qualitatively superior to the then Soviet Union in all respects – both in terms of the living standards and quality of life, and in terms of democratic freedoms (competitive elections, real pluralism of opinions, equality of all before the law). If a Soviet person had the opportunity to emigrate, only two things could stop them – patriotism (in relation to the country and its culture, and not to the system) or sincere adherence to communist ideology (although there has been no smell of communism in the USSR for a long time).
Today the situation has changed radically. The West still has some purely quantitative advantage over today’s Russia in the living standards and quality of life, but even that can be claimed only with very large reservations. As far as the level of democratic freedoms is concerned, the West and we have now became practically equal, and in some ways, perhaps, we even surpassed the West.
Therefore, today there are only two rational reasons for emigration – the guaranteed availability of a well-paid job in the West, or a fanatical adherence to the left-liberal ideology with its tolerance, the cult of “identities” and such things as the “cancellation culture” that have nothing to do with the real democracy.
WHO ARE ALL THESE PEOPLE
So, the Western model (even if taken independently of the current state of relations with the West) can no longer serve as a model or guide for Russia, thus reconciliation with the West becomes meaningless. At the same time, the reconciliation also became impossible due to the intellectual degradation of the Western political elites (which we will discuss later), due to their feminization and a significant presence of the representatives of sexual minorities. Who are, in fact, hired according to the quotas – as it was practiced in the USSR for workers and peasants.
Feminists and the representatives of sexual minorities make negative contribution to the politics of those states where they are allowed into the power structures. Moreover, all such people view Russia not so much as a geopolitical, but as an ideological adversary, reconciliation with whom is fundamentally impossible.
In addition, the West has absolutely inadequately assessed its “victory” in the Cold War, assuming Russia was a country which lost and which has to to acknowledge its defeat and live with that knowledge forever, giving up protection of its national interests ( “Russia and the West remain antagonists” , “NVO”, 12/15/17).
For all these reasons, modern Western elites will not make any compromises with Russia and will make no concessions. Because Russia’s concessions and accommodations to the West are unequivocally regarded by the West not just as a Russia’s weakness, but as the reason to apply even more pressure to achieve its unconditional surrender followed by its dismemberment into several states.
Nor will Russia be able to incorporate itself into the collective West on its own terms by force, which, it seems, our elites continue to aspire to to this day. For the West, any Russian success becomes just an excuse to try to isolate Russia as much as possible, to weaken and undermine it from within.
WESTERN WORLD DECLINE
There is no reason to hope that the Western elites will be replaced by some more adequate ones. The process of changing elites by itself takes decades. We don’t have that much time at our disposal.
But the main thing is that right now there is an ongoing progressive degradation of the Western elites taking place. If any of the Western politicians nowadays demonstrates even a minimal degree of adequacy, those, almost exclusively, are retired politicians of the old generation. Accordingly, even if the governments of the individual European countries change due to the socio-economic problems, nothing is going to change for Russia this winter.
For example, the right-wing coalition who denies the current Western left-liberal “tolerant-politically correct” political mainstream, won the recent parliamentary elections in Italy. At the same time, however, the winners immediately stated that there would be no changes in the support of Ukraine.
In Germany, Chancellor Scholz (he is 64 years old) is losing popularity very quickly. But the most popular political figure in the country, who could theoretically replace Scholz at his post, is the current foreign minister, 41-year-old Annalena Burbock, whose Russophobia is almost clinical.
It is unlikely that the activities of 47-year-old Liz Truss as a Prime Minister of Great Britain need additional commentary.
Here again we can turn to the Soviet example. It must be acknowledged that the level of education in the USSR was very high, which made a massive contribution to the collapse of the system and the country – it was thanks to good education and the ability to think critically that people realized the absurdity of the communist ideology and the falsity of propaganda.
The current West is much more consistent in this regard. The most powerful brainwashing through propaganda is combined not only with the gagging of any opponents, but also with an obvious drop in the quality of education. Therefore, there will be simply no one to understand the absurdity of the left-liberal ideology and the falsity of the propaganda. Accordingly, the quality of the elites will only worsen.
TURN FROM THE WEST
In connection with all these circumstances, the Russian elite should be purged to the maximum extent of the supporters of normalizing relations with the West, and of playing by the rules of the West. This is not about those who work directly for the West (this is a criminal offense). We are talking about those who are trying in one way or another to influence the domestic and foreign policy of Russia in this direction, without being formally a direct agent of the West.
It is especially necessary to rid the power structures of the people who have personal interests in the West (bank accounts, real estate, families living there, children studying there). Today, these people represent the main threat to the national security of the Russian Federation.
The same applies to the representatives of big business, who maintain close ties with the West and with Ukraine. It is extremely significant that, even after falling under Western sanctions, none of the Russian oligarchs provided any assistance to the Russian and allied army forces in Ukraine. Moreover, some of them, on the contrary, are ready to help Ukraine in order to earn the lifting of the sanctions.
Accordingly, for Russia there is no alternative to a complete break with the West. This means that it is necessary to stop any attempts to communicate with the West in any format (except for maintaining diplomatic relations).
It is necessary for ourselves at the mental level to break the long-established paradigm of identifying the collective West with the “world community” and the “civilized world”. The world community is all countries of the world without exception. The civilized world is also all countries, except, perhaps, some states of Tropical Africa. The opinion of a notional “Egypt” cannot be less valuable than the opinion of a notional “Belgium”.
Moscow needs to stop its attempts to prove to the world that it is not in the “international isolation”, as this only leads to senseless concessions to the West, which in turn create serious problems for us and do not provide us with the slightest benefit. A classic example of such a “breaking the isolation” was Russia’s participation in the Normandy format and the subsequent signing of the Minsk agreements in 2014. The purpose of these actions was precisely the “breaking the isolation” and a forceful insertion of ourselves into the formats with participation of two large Western countries – which was a gross mistake and brought us nothing but harm.
Instead, it had been necessary to finish off the current Kyiv regime and change the structure of Ukraine (at least by tearing away from it the eastern and southern regions from Kharkov to Odessa), which at that time would have been an order of magnitude easier task than now. In fact, all of our current losses in Ukraine are the result of signing of the Minsk agreements.
TURN TO THE EAST
The West should be assessed adequately and all the political and economic processes going on there should be watched. Now the US and UK are almost openly destroying the economy of the European Union, eliminating it as an economic competitor and facilitating transfer of the European industry and the most skilled workforce to the US.
By forcing European countries to transfer their already limited military equipment to Ukraine, the United States are trying to make the military potential of the European countries totally insignificant. They lose the ability to defend themselves not only individually, but even collectively. The destruction of economic and military potentials tightly binds Europe to the United States in the military-political sphere, making any relations with Europe completely meaningless for Russia (except, again, purely diplomatic ones).
This US policy further confirms the fact that NATO is of a value to Washington only politically, but not militarily. Ever since the end of World War II, the most important allied format for the Americans has been a coalition of five Anglo-Saxon countries.
However, New Zealand is geographically too isolated, its economic, demographic and military potentials are extremely insignificant, besides, it has long pursued a non-nuclear policy. Because of this, her value in the Anglo-Saxon coalition is limited. But Canada, Great Britain and Australia are truly the closest allies of the United States (this is manifested in all American military campaigns, starting from the same World War II), and their geographical position gives the coalition a global scale. Naturally, the format of this coalition is much broader than the intelligence cooperation known as the Five Eyes.
The UK, especially after leaving the EU, plays the role of the main “subcontractor” of the US in Europe. In particular, last year it was London that became the main “watchdog” on Ukraine instead of Washington itself ( “Washington promotes its little brother” , “NVO”, 07/16/21). At the same time, Great Britain became part of the Pacific Anglo-Saxon AUKUS format.
The fact of creation of AUKUS once again confirms that the United States is paying more and more attention to the Asia-Pacific region (APR). Since it has been clear for several decades that it is this region, and by no means the Euro-Atlantic one, that is now the “locomotive” of the world development ( “Imaginary Threats and Cynical Alliances” , “NVO”, 10/15/21).
In this regard, it is absolutely puzzling that Russia, which has direct geographical access to Asia-Pacific region, had, so far, paid minimal attention to it. During the post-Soviet period, Moscow has managed to make many “turns to the East”, but only in words. If we do not actually start doing this today, then it would be simply impossible not to recall the classic question of Pavel Milyukov: “What is this – stupidity or treason?
Filed under: Canada, EU, NATO Alliance, Russia, UK, Ukraine, USA, USSR | Tagged: Anglo-Saxon nations, AUKUS, “cancel Russia”, Kharkiv, Kiev Nazi Regime, Minsk Agreements, Odessa, The Collective West | 1 Comment »
November 23, 2022
By Eric Arthur Blair
During this current relative reduction of hostilities in Ukraine, the calm before the storm so to speak, it may be useful to reflect upon the goals of the various geopolitical players, whether stated overtly or intended covertly. This may enable us to make educated guesses as to how events may ultimately unfold.
WHAT DOES RUSSIA WANT?
The party whose openly stated goals appear to align most closely with their defacto goals seems to be Russia, who at the start of the special military operation stated that they wanted the denazification and demilitarisation of Ukraine, the cessation of hostilities against and the autonomy of Donbass (respecting the rights of Russian speakers) and the long term neutrality of Ukraine with no possibility of it being part of NATO, whether defacto (as it currently is) or dejure. Implicit in the latter is the indivisibility of security, the guarantee that US/NATO intermediate range missiles or so-called anti-ballistic missiles (which in reality can be fitted with nuclear warheads and function as INF) will never be stationed in Ukrainian territory. The Russian status of Crimea was never negotiable.
Current situation: having attempted peace negotiations many times but being repeatedly rebuffed by the Oligarchic States of America / Ukraine / NATO (henceforth termed OUN) regarding all the concerns above, and facing ongoing genocidal aggression by the OUN against Donbass, Russia was forced to occupy and denazify much of Eastern/Southeastern Ukraine to protect Russian speaking civilians and Russia’s own security, discovering along the way more than 30 bio-pathogen labs near the border of Russia which had been funded by the USA (as admitted by droolin’ Nuland herself):
https://russiaun.ru/en/news/271022_nb
Subsequent referenda conducted in the the four liberated oblasts (Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhia and Kherson) all overwhelmingly voted to join Russia. Hence ensuring the security of these territories in perpetuity is now a priority. It seems likely that the majority population in Russia will also demand the liberation of Odessa (which has a huge number of Russian speakers, constantly under violent threat by the UkroNazis. Please recall that 48 Russian speakers were killed by the firebombing of the trade union building in Odessa in 2014 by Ukronazis). Odessa was historically a Russian city. The return of Odessa to Russia will shrink the remaining territory of Ukraine to an impoverished land-bound “rump” state, if it continues to exist at all.
There was a time Ukraine had one of the greatest prospects of any European state, with large, fertile steppes producing massive quantities of grain for export, with the lucrative status as an energy hub to distribute Russian gas to Western Europe and a base for heavy industry in Donbass. All of this is now lost (as will likely be Ukraine’s remaining access to the Black Sea) because of a violent corrupt fascist puppet regime that was installed by the USA. The former bread basket of Europe is now the basket case of Europe.
Presently Russia is hammering the crap out of Ukraine, lobbing 3 times more missiles into Ukraine daily than Ukraine can muster (20,000 vs 7,000 according to Colonel Doug MacGregor). “Most missiles launched by Ukraine are ground to air anti-missile missiles” (many are outdated S-300s, one which supposedly went “astray” into Poland, killing two civilians). The OUN also continue to shell the Russian occupied Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, even while insisting that the Russians are shelling themselves.
As far as the previous Russian “retreats” from Kharkov and Kherson were concerned, please see my footnote, to place these events in proper historical perspective.
Where to from here? The Russians only began to seriously target Ukrainian infrastructure (electricity, water etc) eight months into the SMO, after the OUN terrorist attacks against the Nordstream pipelines and Kerch bridge. When the OUN sent drones through the maritime corridor previously designated for peaceful grain export, in order to attack the Russian fleet in Sevastopol, the Russians then proceeded to demolish even more Ukrainian infrastructure. The big question is this: why has Russia not yet destroyed 100% of Ukrainian infrastructure, which it could easily have done months ago? To US analysts, this was a puzzle, because standard practice of the USA has always been to completely destroy vital civilian infrastructure from day one, as in the case of Yugoslavia or Iraq or Libya. Possible explanations for Russian reticence are:
WHAT DO EUROPEANS WANT?
By “Europeans” we must distinguish between the so-called “leaders” of Europe and the ordinary people of Europe. The former are totally corrupt, bought-and-paid-for and in the pockets of the US neocons. The latter are largely clueless and brainwashed by their Mainstream media to adopt mindless anti-Russian hatred and bigotry. As far as can be seen right now, even if the European people could cobble together a vaguely coherent idea of what they may or may not want, their wishes are utterly irrelevant. They have no agency in how events are going to unfold, unless they can overthrow their US controlled puppet governments and install leaders who truly work in their interests. The solutions to the European problems are simple: reverse all sanctions against Russia, request that gas is delivered to them through Nordstream 2B and that the other 3 pipelines are repaired, and agree to total demilitarisation of Ukraine with removal of all Nazis and all NATO “advisers”. These are the best ways to prevent Russia from opening a floodgate of Ukro refugees into the West. Sanity is unlikely to prevail because the Germs in particular seem to be terminally stupid and spineless. So my advice to the Germs is this: get ready for a shitstorm of events: industrial and economic collapse and a massive influx of refugees who you will have to support with your dwindling tax base and rising inflation.
WHAT DO UKRAINIANS WANT?
This is no more relevant than the wishes of flotsam tossed about by a stormy sea .
WHAT DOES THE USA WANT?
There is a huge disconnect between the officially stated goals and covertly pursued goals of the USA, as befits a two faced “non agreement capable” imperialist oligarchy. The official line from the US is that they are engaging in a noble struggle to “free” Europe from being held to ransom by an “unreliable” energy provider, Russia, and that this is a global confrontation between Western “Democratic” and Eastern “Authoritarian” regimes for the future of the world. That is of course total bullshit. In reality, the exact opposites apply. All actions by the US with regard to Russia and Ukraine, dating back not just to 2014 but to 1991, were deceitfully ignoble, the US is utterly focused on the enslavement, not the liberation of Europe (to be permanently kept under the jackboot of US hegemony), Russia has always been a completely reliable provider of cheap energy to Europe and the Oligarchic States of America are completely undemocratic: they neglect the well being of their own citizens while donating hundreds of billions of tax payer dollars to the US MIC. “Authoritarian” Putin has always been careful to address the wishes of the Russian public (via the Duma) and the wishes of the majority populations of Crimea and Donbass (via referenda, which were much better conducted and more legitimate than the recent suspect and dodgy US mid-term elections https://podbay.fm/p/the-duran-podcast/e/1668956802 ).
Some short term goals of the US neocons, as far as sabotaging the sale of Russian energy to Europe and railroading the Europeans into buying very expensive fracked US LNG, seem to have been successful. However this will not work in the medium to long term because expensive fracked LNG can never generate industrial products economically competitive with products manufactured using much cheaper energy eg by China using piped Russian gas. Hence the medium and long term collapse of the German industrial economy is certain (hence they will eventually be unable to buy expensive US LNG) if the Germs continue down this foolish path. I previously devoted an article to the real motivations of the US neocons and oligarchs who have hijacked US policy.
The medium term US tactics and goals were these: to confiscate more than $300 billion of Russian foreign reserves and to impose economic sanctions (more than 10 thousand so far) which would turn the “Ruble to rubble” (as stated by sleepy Joe) and trigger Russian economic collapse. This would create public unrest in Russia which would enable a US sponsored colour revolution to depose Putin in favour of a US designated puppet (echoes of “Yats is our guy, fuck the EU” droolin’ Nuland). Astroturf revolutions are an old tactic taken directly from the CIA playbook, dating back to the antics of Kermit Roosevelt in Tehran. Embroiling Russia in a lengthy resource-sapping war in Ukraine, perpetrated by US terrorist proxies, was designed to weaken Russia as Lloyd “Raytheon” Austin so transparently admitted. Stinkin’ Blinken also admitted the Ukraine situation was a US/NATO proxy war with Russia, just as he had crowed about how the bombing of Nordstream represented a “tremendous opportunity” for the US to sell LNG to Europe.
The US long term goal would eventually be to fragment Russia into smaller states (just as the USSR had previously been broken up, following its embroilment in a lengthy resource-sapping war in Afghanistan, perpetrated by US terrorist proxies). Those smaller post Russian banana republics would each have puppet leaders appointed by the USA, who would then foil the “belt and road” initiative of China, the next target of the US neocons. All of this devious skulduggery has been outlined in many a Beltway think-tank document, especially that from the Rand corporation.
Not only have every single one of those US goals failed, they have backfired spectacularly. Especially laughable is smellin’ Yellin’s “oil price cap” policy, which is being ignored by everybody. The only sane strategy is to negotiate peace with Russia. Nevertheless the position of the US at present remains unchanged: any peaceful economic links between Germany and Russia must be sabotaged at all costs, because it would create an economic-industrial behemoth that, along with China, would sideline the USA into irrelevance on the world stage. The only excuse Germany has for “sanctioning” Russian gas today is the so-called “aggression” of Russia in Ukraine. If a peaceful outcome in Ukraine is achieved, there will no longer be any excuse for Germany to deny itself Russian gas. Hence, from the POV of the USA, peace in Ukraine must be avoided at all costs. The consequence of refusing to achieve a peaceful settlement, of obstinately continuing to lob missiles against the Russians, will be this: the complete and utter destruction of Ukraine by Russia, with massive out-flux of refugees into Western Europe. Does the US care if there are economic and humanitarian catastrophes in the making (and of their making) in Western Europe? Absolutely not. Not only is the USA happy to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian, the USA is happy to fight Russia to the last European.
THE SPECIAL CASE OF TURKEY:
Turkey has been a long standing NATO member. Readers will remember from history that the stationing of US nuclear capable missiles in Turkey was the catalyst for the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. Today, Turkey and the OUN are best described as “frenemies”, now leaning towards being enemies. The USA sees Turkey as an unreliable ally and was particularly miffed by the Turkish insistence on buying Russian energy in Rubles, of continuing to honour Mir transactions and its intention to become a Russian natural gas hub, supplying south eastern Europe via the Turkstream pipeline. Erdogan firmly believes that the attempted coup against him in 2016 was perpetrated by Gulenists sponsored by the USA. The recent terrorist bombing in Istanbul which killed 6 and injured 81 was traced to an individual that the Turks claimed was a Kurd from northern Syria who was a proxy of the AngloZionists. We do not know if this is true, but what matters is that the Turks believe this to be true and it is certainly consistent with the history of the US using terrorist proxies. Accordingly, when the US ambassador to Turkey offered his condolences for the bombing, the Turkish interior minister flatly rejected it, saying that Turkey knew who did it, expressing disgust for such US hypocrisy. All US interactions with Turkey in recent years have counter productively served to push it closer towards Russia and the BRICS+ countries.
CONCLUSION: The USA is the worst terrorist state in the world, they represent the greatest threat of global nuclear war to every one of us (USAnians included) – which could cause human extinction. Being an enemy of the USA is dangerous, but being an ally (especially if you are a Germ or a Ukie) is fatal. The Turks are discovering this to their chagrin and are wising up.
Footnote: The AngloEuroZionist mainstream media and their stooge pundits always crow loudly over every transient Pyrrhic victory “won” by the Ukie proxies, while demonstrating a profound ignorance of history and strategy and reality. General Surovikin is nothing if not rational. Given a choice between precariously holding on to Kherson city located on the “wrong” side of the river (which can and will later be recaptured) and preserving the lives of Russian soldiers, he chose his soldiers. All civilians who appreciated the protection of Russia were evacuated. Die hard Ukie ideologues who prefer to freeze and starve this winter in an eviscerated city were allowed to stay.
This echoes the much higher stakes situation of 1812 when General Kutuzov had to choose between Moscow and his army and he chose his army. He allowed Napoleon to march into Moscow which had been stripped of any and all resources that could support the French, who eventually had to withdraw, enabling Russian forces to recapture Moscow. The Russians slaughtered the French as they withdrew. Today’s Ukie/NATO forces are tactically and strategically far more stupid than Napoleon.
Remember the “massive victory” of Ukies advancing into Kharkov oblast empty cow paddocks not long ago? The Russians had staged a tactical withdrawal* and suffered almost no casualties, but enticed the Ukies into open territory where the Ukies were sitting ducks to Russian artillery and rockets. The Ukies lost around 8000 dead. With such a great “success”, it is just a matter of time before the Ukies suicide their way to moribund victory.
(*this was a classic Mongol tactical “withdrawal” which the Kievan Rus had learned from history to their great cost, and now inflicted upon the stupid Ukies to their great cost.)
BTW, Kiev was founded by the primordial Rus, it was the first capital city of the Russian people who were then known as the Kievan Rus. That is historical fact.
EAB is not Russian, knows no Russians and has never been to Russia. Inspired by Tolstoy, he is learning more about Russian history day by day.
Filed under: Europe, NATO Alliance, Poland, Russia, Turkey, Ukraine, USA | Tagged: American oligarch, Antirussia sanctions backfires, brl, Crimea, Crimean Bridge, Cuban missile crisis, Donbass, Erdogan, LNG, Nord Stream, Odessa, SMO, Ukraine disarming, ukro-terrorism | Comments Off on The OUN-Russia war (no longer an SMO): What do the parties want and what does the future hold?
The announcement of the Kherson Retreat may have signaled one of the gloomiest days of the Russian Federation since 1991.
Leaving the right bank of the Dnieper to set up a defense line on the left bank may spell out total military sense. General Armageddon himself, since his first day on the job, had hinted this might have been inevitable.
As it stands in the chessboard, Kherson is in the “wrong” side of the Dnieper. All residents of Kherson Oblast – 115,000 people in total – who wanted to be relocated to safer latitudes have been evacuated from the right bank.
General Armageddon knew that was inevitable for several reasons:
no mobilization after the initial SMO plans hit the dust; destruction of strategic bridges across the Dnieper – complete with a three-month methodical Ukrainian pounding of bridges, ferries, pontoons and piers; no second bridgehead to the north of Kherson or to the west (towards Odessa or Nikolaev) to conduct an offensive.
And then, the most important reason: massive weaponization coupled with NATO de facto running the war translated into enormous Western superiority in reconnaissance, communications and command and control.
In the end, the Kherson Retreat may be a relatively minor tactical loss. Yet politically, it’s an unmitigated disaster, a devastating embarrassment.
Kherson is a Russian city. Russians have lost – even if temporarily – the capital of a brand new territory attached to the Federation. Russian public opinion will have tremendous problems absorbing the news.
The list of negatives is considerable. Kiev forces secure their flank and may free up forces to go against Donbass. Weaponizing by the collective West gets a major boost. HIMARS can now potentially strike targets in Crimea.
The optics are horrendous. Russia’s image across the Global South is severely tarnished; after all, this move amounts to abandoning Russian territory – while serial Ukrainian war crimes instantly disappear from the major “narrative”.
At a minimum, the Russians a long time ago should have reinforced their major strategic advantage bridgehead on the west side of the Dnieper so that it could hold – short of a widely forecasted Kakhovka Dam flood. And yet the Russians also ignored the dam bombing threat for months. That spells out terrible planning.
Now Russian forces will have to conquer Kherson all over again. And in parallel stabilize the frontlines; draw definitive borders; and then strive to “demilitarize” Ukrainian offensives for good, either via negotiation or carpet bombing.
It’s quite revealing that an array of NATO intel types, from analysts to retired Generals, are suspicious of General Armageddon’s move: they see it as an elaborate trap, or as a French military analyst put it, “a massive deception operation”. Classic Sun Tzu. That has been duly incorporated as the official Ukrainian narrative.
So, to quote Twin Peaks, that American pop culture subversive classic, “the owls are not what they seem”. If that’s the case, General Armageddon would be looking to severely overstretch Ukrainian supply lines; seduce them into exposure; and then engage in a massive turkey shoot.
So it’s either Sun Tzu; or a deal is in the wings, coinciding with the G20 next week in Bali.
The art of the deal
Well, some sort of deal seems to have been struck between Jake Sullivan and Patrushev.
No one really knows the details, even those with access to flamboyant 5th Column informants in Kiev. But yes – the deal seems to include Kherson. Russia would keep Donbass but not advance towards Kharkov and Odessa. And NATO expansion would be definitely frozen. A minimalist deal.
That would explain why Patrushev was able to board a plane to Tehran simultaneous to the announcement of the Kherson Retreat, and take care, quite relaxed, of very important strategic partnership business with Ali Shamkhani, Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council.
The deal may have also been the inbuilt “secret” in Maria Zakharova’s announcement that “we’re ready for negotiations”.
The Russians will leave the Dnieper riverbank in a managed military retreat. That would not be possible without managed military-to-military negotiations.
These back channel negotiations have been going on for weeks. The messenger is Saudi Arabia. The US aim, in the short term, would be towards a sort of Minsk 3 accord – with Istanbul/Riyadh attached.
No one is paying the slightest attention to coke clown Zelensky. Sullivan went to Kiev to present a fait accompli – of sorts.
The Dnieper will be – in thesis – the settled and negotiated frontline.
Kiev would have to swallow a frozen line of contact in Zaporizhye, Donetsk and Lugansk – with Kiev receiving electricity from Zaporozhye, hence cease shelling its infrastructure.
The US would come up with a loan of $50 billion plus part of the confiscated – i.e. stolen – Russian assets to “rebuild” Ukraine. Kiev would receive modern air defense systems.
There’s no doubt Moscow will not go along with any of these provisions.
Note that all this coincides with the outcome of the US elections – where the Dems did not exactly lose.
Meanwhile Russia is accumulating more and more gains in the battle for Bakhmut.
There are no illusions whatsoever in Moscow that this crypto-Minsk 3 would be respected by the “non-agreement capable” Empire.
Jake Sullivan is a 45-year-old lawyer with zero strategic background and “experience” amounting to campaigning for Hillary Clinton. Patrushev can eat him for breakfast, lunch, dinner and late night snack – and vaguely “agree” to anything.
So why are the Americans desperate to offer a deal? Because they may be sensing the next Russian move with the arrival of General Winter should be capable of conclusively winning the war on Moscow’s terms. That would include slamming the Polish border shut via a long arrow move from Belarus downwards. With weaponizing supply lines cut, Kiev’s fate is sealed.
Deal or no deal, General Winter is coming to town – ready to entertain his guest of honor Sun Tzu with so many new dishes at their dinner table.
(Republished from Strategic Culture Foundation by permission of author or representative)
← Bamboo Diplomacy: The China-SE Asia Rom…Rewiring Eurasia: Mr. Patrushev Goes to… →
Filed under: NATO Alliance, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, USA | Tagged: Donetsk, G20, General Armageddon, General Winter, Global South, Kherson, Lugansk, Minsk Agreements, Odessa, Pepe Escobar, SMO, Zaporozhye region | Comments Off on Sun Tzu Walks Into a Kherson Bar…
After the western military attack on Sevastopol briefly halted Russian grain transports, Moscow is back in business with a stronger hand and more favorable terms.
By Pepe Escobar
So, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan picks up the phone and calls his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin: let’s talk about the “grain deal.” Putin, cool, calm and collected, explains the facts to the Sultan:
First, the reason why Russia withdrew from the export grain deal.
Second, how Moscow seeks a serious investigation into the – terrorist – attack on the Black Sea fleet, which for all practical purposes seems to have violated the deal.
And third, how Kiev must guarantee it will uphold the deal, brokered by Turkey and the UN.
Only then would Russia consider coming back to the table.
And then – today, 2 November – the coup de theatre: Russia’s Ministry of Defense (MoD) announces the country is back to the Black Sea grain deal, after receiving the necessary written guarantees from Kiev.
The MoD, quite diplomatically, praised the “efforts” of both Turkey and the UN: Kiev is committed not to use the “Maritime Humanitarian Corridor” for combat operations, and only in accordance with the provisions of the Black Sea Initiative.
Moscow said the guarantees are sufficient “for the time being.” Implying that can always change.
All rise to the Sultan’s persuasion
Erdogan must have been extremely persuasive with Kiev. Before the phone call to Putin, the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) had already explained that the attack on the Black Sea Fleet was conducted by 9 aerial drones and 7 naval drones, plus an American RQ-4B Global Hawk observation drone lurking in the sky over neutral waters.
The attack happened under the cover of civilian ships and targeted Russian vessels that escorted the grain corridor in the perimeter of their responsibility, as well as the infrastructure of the Russian base in Sevastopol.
The MoD explicitly designated British experts deployed in the Ochakov base in the Nikolaev region as the designers of this military operation.
At the UN Security Council, Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzya declared himself “surprised” that the UN leadership “failed not only to condemn, but even to express concern over the terrorist attacks.”
After stating that the Brit-organized Kiev operation on the Black Sea Fleet “put an end to the humanitarian dimension of the Istanbul agreements,” Nebenzya also clarified:
“It is our understanding that the Black Sea Grain Initiative, which Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine agreed on under UN supervision on 22 July, must not be implemented without Russia, and so we do not view the decisions that were made without our involvement as binding.”
This means, in practice, that Moscow “cannot allow for unimpeded passage of vessels without our inspection.” The crucial question is how and where these inspections will be carried out – as Russia has warned the UN that it will definitely inspect dry cargo ships in the Black Sea.
The UN, for its part, tried at best to put on a brave face, believing Russia’s suspension is “temporary” and looking forward to welcoming “its highly professional team” back to the Joint Coordination Center.
According to humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths, the UN also proclaims to be “ready to address concerns.” And that has to be soon, because the deal reaches its 120-day extension point on November 19.
Well, “addressing concerns” is not exactly the case. Deputy Permanent Representative of Russia Dmitry Polyansky said that at the UN Security Council meeting western nations simply could not deny their involvement in the Sevastopol attack; instead, they simply blamed Russia.
All the way to Odessa
Prior to the phone call with Erdogan, Putin had already pointed out that “34 percent of the grain exported under the deal goes to Turkey, 35 percent to EU countries and only 3-4 percent to the poorest countries. Is this what we did everything for?”
That’s correct. For instance, 1.8 million tons of grain went to Spain; 1.3 million tons to Turkey; and 0.86 million tons to Italy. By contrast, only 0,067 tons went to “starving” Yemen and 0,04 tons to “starving” Afghanistan.
Putin made it very clear that Moscow was not withdrawing from the grain deal but had only suspended its participation.
And as a further gesture of good will, Moscow announced it would willingly ship 500,000 tons of grain to poorer nations for free, in an effort to replace the integral amount that Ukraine should have been able to export.
All this time, Erdogan skillfully maneuvered to convey the impression he was occupying the higher ground: even if Russia behaves in an “indecisive” manner, as he defined it, we will continue to pursue the grain deal.
So, it seems like Moscow was being tested – by the UN and by Ankara, which happens to be the main beneficiary of the grain deal and is clearly profiting from this economic corridor. Ships continue to depart from Odessa to Turkish ports – mainly Istanbul – without Moscow’s agreement. It was expected they would be “filtered” by Russia when coming back to Odessa.
The immediate Russian means of pressure was unleashed in no time: preventing Odessa from becoming a terrorist infrastructure node. This means constant visits by cruise missiles.
Well, the Russians have already “visited” the Ochakov base occupied by Kiev and the British experts. Ochakov – between Nikolaev and Odessa – was built way back in 2017, with key American input.
The British units that were involved in the sabotage of the Nord Streams – according to Moscow – are the same ones that planned the Sevastopol operation. Ochakov is constantly spied upon and sometimes hit out of positions that the Russians have cleared last month only 8 km to the south, on the extremity of the Kinburn peninsula. And yet the base has not been totally destroyed.
To reinforce the “message,” the real response to the attack on Sevastopol has been this week’s relentless “visits” of Ukraine’s electrical infrastructure; if maintained, virtually the whole of Ukraine will soon be plunged into darkness.
Closing down the Black Sea
The attack on Sevastopol may have been the catalyst leading to a Russian move to close down the Black Sea – with Odessa converted into an absolutely priority for the Russian Army. There are serious rumblings across Russia on why Russophone Odessa had not been the object of pinpointed targeting before.
Top infrastructure for Ukrainian Special Forces and British advisers is based in Odessa and Nikolaev. Now there’s no question these will be destroyed.
Even with the grain deal in theory back on track, it is hopeless to expect Kiev to abide by any agreements. After all, every major decision is taken either by Washington or by the Brits at NATO. Just like bombing the Crimea Bridge, and then the Nord Streams, attacking the Black Sea Fleet was designed as a serious provocation.
The brilliant designers though seem to have IQs lower than refrigerator temperatures: every Russian response always plunges Ukraine deeper down an inescapable – and now literally black – hole.
The grain deal seemed to be a sort of win-win. Kiev would not contaminate Black Sea ports again after they were demined. Turkey turned into a grain transport hub for the poorest nations (actually that’s not what happened: the main beneficiary was the EU). And sanctions on Russia were eased on the export of agricultural products and fertilizers.
This was, in principle, a boost for Russian exports. In the end, it did not work out because many players were worried about possible secondary sanctions.
It is important to remember that the Black Sea grain deal is actually two deals: Kiev signed a deal with Turkey and the UN, and Russia signed a separate deal with Turkey.
The corridor for the grain carriers is only 2 km wide. Minesweepers move in parallel along the corridor. Ships are inspected by Ankara. So the Kiev-Ankara-UN deal remains in place. It has nothing to do with Russia – which in this case does not escort and/or inspect the cargoes.
What changes with Russia “suspending” its own deal with Ankara and the UN, is that from now on, Moscow can proceed anyway it deems fit to neutralize terrorist threats and even invade and take over Ukrainian ports: that will not represent a violation of the deal with Ankara and the UN.
So in this respect, it is a game-changer.
Seems like Erdogan fully understood the stakes, and told Kiev in no uncertain terms to behave. There’s no guarantee, though, that western powers won’t come up with another Black Sea provocation. Which means that sooner or later – perhaps by the Spring of 2023 – General Armageddon will have to come up with the goods. That translates as advancing all the way to Odessa.
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.
Related Stories
Filed under: Britain, EU, Europe, NATO Alliance, Putin, Russia, Turkey, UN, UNSC | Tagged: Energy and food crisis, Erdogan, General Armageddon, MOD, Nikolaev, Nord Stream, Odessa, Pepe Escobar, Russian Army, Sevastopol, ukro-terrorism | Comments Off on No pain, no grain: Putin’s Black Sea comeback
October 27, 2022
Gonzalo Lira recently posted two soliloquies which were both accusatory and predictive about NATO’s apparent motivations and likely near-term kinetic military objectives. He concluded that after detonating a “dirty bomb” on Ukrainian territory, the USA and NATO would use the opportunity as an excuse to move the 101st Airborne Division from Romania into Odessa.
and
both may be sped up 1.5x-1.73x
While I think his big picture thinking is generally correct, I disagree with Mr. Lira on the mission of the 101st Airborne Division in the scenario he described.
Many years ago I was an officer in the National Guard sister Brigade to the 101st. Both Brigades are “air assault light infantry,” which was developed in the Vietnam War with the 7th Air Cavalry Division. “We Were Soldiers Once and Young,” tells that story.
Though the 101st is called “airborne” in reference to its World War II days, today its soldiers are not trained to jump out of airplanes; the 82nd Airborne Division does that.
The 101st deploys using UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters. Each division in the brigade has an aviation battalion with three companies of Blackhawk helicopters. Their primary combat mission is to secure a bridgehead.
When deploying, an air assault infantry battalion goes to a designated pickup zone, and a company of Blackhawks comes in to ferry them to the landing zone. Although they are trained to rappel out of the helicopters in a hot Landing Zone, in practice the helicopters usually land, and the troops jump out. It is much faster and safer. Two minutes later the chopper is back in the air and goes back for another squad at the pickup zone. Thus it might take the better part of an hour with two or three round trips to move an entire infantry battalion from the PZ to the LZ, longer if the distance is longer.
While an air assault infantry brigade can move 105 mm light artillery pieces via helicopter, the main supply and logistics assets of the brigade must follow the main force on the ground in trucks. Therefore, unlike the 82nd Airborne Division, or the Rangers, both of which are designed to jump into areas far behind enemy lines, an air assault brigade like the 101st is limited in how far it can leapfrog ahead of its support assets.
If NATO desires to fortify Odessa against the Russian advance, or use Odessa as a base to engage Russian forces near Nikolaev, they have a serious logistical problem. Supply lines from Poland on main Ukrainian highways or railroads must travel 700 kilometers to reach Odessa.
Figure 1: These routes are vulnerable to Russian air power and cruise missiles which have hit targets as far West as Lviv.
The shortest supply lines to Odessa for NATO would be from Romania, which has two segments of border with Ukraine. However, the best paved route would be through Moldova, which is not a member of NATO. Romania has state of the art NATO air defense batteries which can cover most of the route to Odesssa. Therefore, assuming they are effective against Russian cruise missiles, which may be a bad assumption, it would be safer to supply forces in Odessa from Romania than from Poland.
Figure 2 shows two possible approaches to Odessa from Romanian territory.
The NATO base in Cincu ( 45°54’49.15″N 24°48’21.25″E ), Romania is about 450 km from Odessa, which is too far for Blackhawks to make a round trip without mid-air refueling or using a FARP. It is more likely that an Assembly Area would be used near the Romanian city of Huşi.
The 101st cannot advance quickly to Odessa from the south, because there are practically no roads, and then Dniester Bay has to be crossed to get to Odessa. There is only one bridge over that bay, which is right on the coast, within range of Russian missiles, and far from the air defense umbrella in Romania. While possibly an avenue of attack, it would be almost impossible to defend that bridge from Russian cruise missiles.
Transnistria, with its Russian base at Tiraspol, is located directly in-between Romania and Odessa. This presents a problem for any NATO intentions for Odessa.
Transnistria, as an unrecognized breakaway province of Moldova, has been defended by Russia since 1994 or so, and would be seen as fair game by NATO, which doesn’t seem to worry about the rules, anyway.
Just like Azerbaijan and Turkey taking Nagorno Karabakh, if NATO can grab Tiraspol nobody other than Russia is going to squawk about it.
A key military objective for NATO / 101st Airborne is likely to be Tiraspol, the capital of Transnistria, which because of its geography, is the most difficult region for Russia to defend. Sandwiched between Ukraine and NATO, Russia has no supply lines to it. And more importantly, the two best bridges over the Dneister on the best-paved route to Odessa from Romania are located at Tiraspol.
In the Kharkiv region, Russian forces fell back rather than get encircled. But as Tiraspol lies within the merest sliver of land between the Ukraine and Moldova, there is no room for strategic withdrawal or even much maneuver. It is highly relevant to find out how strong the Russian ground and air defenses are around Tiraspol. However, I do not have access to good information about that.
The much-vaunted Kherson offensive may yet prove to be a feint, and the Ukrainian Army’s real attack might well come against Tiraspol from Ukrainian territory, with the 101st Airborne soldiers attacking from across Moldova. Although Moldova is not a member of NATO, I have a feeling that the USA could twist arms hard enough to get permission to overfly Moldovan airspace, especially with the promise of returning Tiraspol to Moldovan control.
Plucking Tiraspol out of Russia’s hands would make Biden look strong just before the midterm election, even though so far he never has been strong. This could be hoped to be a repeat of Joe Biden’s apocryphal poolside triumph over the bully named “CornPop.”
Therefore, if NATO takes action toward Odessa, the 101st’s primary objectives will certainly be the three bridges over the Dniester. Taking these bridgeheads would allow a larger NATO force to cross over and prepare to defend Odessa.
Main Bridge Pair: 46°49’57″N 29°29’26″E
Secondary Bridge: 46°55’11″N 29°28’20″E
Third Bridge: 46° 4’34.55″N 30°28’11.28″E
Without at least one of those three bridges, NATO cannot hold or resupply Odessa. The mission of the 101st would actually be to take Tiraspol and neutralize the air defenses first. Then a follow-on force can roll into Odessa with Ukrainian support.
Figure 3: shows a hypothetical joint assault by the 101st and Ukrainian forces on Tiraspol. However, it does not show the Russian defending forces, as we don’t know where or how strong they are.
In order to take Tiraspol, the bridges over the Dniester River must be secured. U.S. Army air assault infantry is ideal for such a mission. However, the 101st will nevertheless have to survive while coming under fire from Russian S-300 and S-400 air defenses. Crimea is the main Russian Anti-Air platform in the region with the S-400, and its batteries can reach about 200 to 300 km West of Odessa. (Albeit Tiraspol would be at the gray edge of their range.)
Figure 4: shows roughly the air defense ranges of batteries in Crimea and Tiraspol.
A single Russian S-400 battery in Crimea has about 380 missiles ready to launch. These missiles consist of five or six different kinds, having varying ranges, and various types of targets they are designed to hit.
The 40N6E missile in particular is designed to hit low-flying targets over the radar horizon at ranges up to 450 kilometers. These are ideal helicopter killers: The missile flies up to a high altitude, and then—about halfway to its target—turns on its own radar and looks down to find low-flying aircraft. Recently one scored a record 250 km kill in the Ukraine.
The Russian surface fleet also has S-300 and S-400 air defenses. However, the Moskva was the primary S-400 Anti-Aircraft platform in the Black Sea. The Americans helped the Ukrainians to sink it, so, it is gone. While, it is true that Russia cannot get any additional capital ships into the Black Sea, it has already moved several smaller missile ships from the Caspian through the Volga-Don canal system to Rostov-On-Don. I do not know if any of those smaller vessels have AA capability similar to the Moskva.
Despite such a long-range Russian AA threat to the 101st transport helicopters, it might still be possible for Tiraspol to be taken, especially if the US Fleet in the Adriatic were to launch a barrage of cruise missiles against Crimea. That would temporarily take up the full attention of the S-400 batteries, while allowing the 101st to fly to its landing zone in its UH60 Blackhawks.
But such a ploy would probably come at the cost of the NATO carrier group. If the US Navy fires on Crimea or the Russian Navy, it seems quite certain that the Russian Navy will sink the entire carrier group.
The Russians could have long ago escalated this war and sunk the NATO naval assets in the Mediterranean with a first strike. There is a reason that they have not escalated so far: The Kremlin realizes that time is on Russia’s side.
The Western Central Banking System is on the verge of a full melt-down. Russia, China, and Iran have made great progress toward ending the U.S. petrodollar hegemony for energy sales (and for much else). Even in the Ukraine, the slow grind is working in Russia’s favor, despite all the news headlines to the contrary.
The longer Russia waits to escalate, the sooner the U.S., UK, and EU hang themselves with their own rope. It looks like the West has about six months left, tops. We are running out of diesel fuel, oil, gasoline, natural gas, fertilizer—and soon enough—food.
However, if that calculation were to change, Russia could very quickly escalate and deal a quick defeat to the entire NATO naval and air forces via its hypersonic missiles and S-400, S-500, and S-550 air defenses. Russia could permanently blind NATO’s GPS and spy satellites in 30 minutes.
Why hasn’t Russia simply ended this like it could? Because, the U.S. would be likely to retaliate with nuclear weapons. Even though the Russian S-500 and S-550 provide a missile shield to their main cities, they do not want to risk being on the receiving end of a nuclear strike. So the Kremlin is willing to eat relatively small losses in Ukraine and the Black Sea, because it knows victory is already won. Russia is not willing to trade this for a Pyrrhic Victory. Therefore, patience continues to dominate Russia’s actions.
NATO, on the other hand, seems to have misinterpreted patience for weakness. If the geniuses of “NATO” send in the 101st Airborne Division and a Mechanized Infantry Brigade to Odessa, they will learn the hard way that the propaganda about Russian losses in Ukraine was wrong. But I hope they don’t do it. Both Odessa and Tiraspol are ancient and beautiful cities. It would be a terrible tragedy to see them leveled like Mariupol was.
In the final analysis, the only way that the U.S. could pull this whole thing off would be if it can degrade the Russian air defense capabilities for long enough to fly their entire air assault brigade into the landing zones, which is to say, about 12 hours. However, the Russians are “waiting for it,” so, I wouldn’t bet on the U.S.
Crimea is unsinkable. The US Carrier group in the Adriatic is hypersonic missile bait. Tiraspol is a historical Russian city like Odessa. Russia would hate to lose it, but it is the least defensible of all their properties at the moment.
While it would be a big gamble by NATO, Tiraspol is the low-hanging fruit that the U.S., the 101st Airborne Division, NATO, and the Ukraine will probably attempt to seize. I think that will be their first objective if they choose to escalate with a dirty bomb.
Filed under: China, EU, Iran, NATO Alliance, Poland, UK, Ukraine, USA | Tagged: Gonzalo Lira, Odessa, Romania | Comments Off on NATO Set To Attack Tiraspol?
Multiple missile strikes targeted Ukrainian cities all across the country on Monday morning, according to local officials and media, which attributed the attacks to Russia. This comes two days after a bomb damaged the strategic Crimean Bridge – which Moscow called a Ukrainian terrorist attack.
President Vladimir Zelensky highlighted the attacks on the capital, Kiev and the cities of Dnepr and Zaporozhye, before urging people to take shelter. Local officials in Lviv, Kharkov, and Odessa also reported that their cities came under fire.
The office of Valery Zaluzhny, the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian armed forces, reported they had detected at least 75 missiles and claimed they had intercepted 41.
In Kiev, damage from the strikes was reported near the headquarters of the Security Service of Ukraine [SBU], which is located in the government area of the capital. City officials halted operations of the metro system, and the stations are now being used as shelters for civilians.
Kiev mayor, Vitaliy Klitschko, issued a statement via his official Telegram account, saying, “Several explosions in the Shevchenskivskyi district – in the center of the capital.”
At least four explosions were heard, the Kiev Independent reported and according to public broadcaster Suspilne, an explosion was heard near a railway station in the city.
A cloud of black smoke was also reported to be seen rising from one area in the city center.
According to Ukrainian MP Oleksiy Goncharenko, one rocket fell “right in the center of the city”.
“Cars are burning, and windows have been shattered in houses. There are dead,” he tweeted.
The head of Lviv Region, Maksim Kozitsky, reported that elements of the western province’s energy infrastructure came under attack.
Boris Filatov, the mayor of Dnepr, a major city in central Ukraine, confirmed the strikes and said he could only feel “hatred and the wish to fight,” while urging residents to take shelter.
Vitaly Kim, who heads the southern Nikolaev Region which borders Russia’s Kherson Region, reported dozens of projectiles and a number of kamikaze drones coming from Russian troops. He claimed that Moscow was targeting “critical infrastructure” throughout the country.
With similar accounts coming in from many parts of the country, senior Ukrainian officials have expressed determination to fight Russia. “Our courage will never be destroyed by terrorists’ missiles, even when they hit the heart of our capital,” Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov tweeted, also claiming that Russia’s future is that of “a globally despised rogue terrorist state.”
Ukraine has not claimed responsibility for the explosion. Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak has, however, declared in a Twitter message that the bombing was “the beginning.”
The blast came amid a February-present Russian “special military operation” in Ukraine, which has been seeking to defend the eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk’s pro-Russian population against persecution by Kiev.
Filed under: Russia, Ukraine | Tagged: Crimea, Crimean Bridge, Donbass, Kharkiv, Kiev Nazi Regime, Lugansk, Odessa, SMO, Ukie SBU, Zaporozhye region | Comments Off on Massive Wave of Missile Attacks Reported Across Ukraine, Zelensky Confirms Strikes
Ukraine is finished as a nation – neither side will rest in this war. The only question is whether it will be an Afghan or Syrian style finale.
By Pepe Escobar
One year after the astounding US humiliation in Kabul – and on the verge of another serious comeuppance in Donbass – there is reason to believe Moscow is wary of Washington seeking vengeance: in the form of the ‘Afghanization’ of Ukraine.
With no end in sight to western weapons and finance flowing into Kiev, it must be recognized that the Ukrainian battle is likely to disintegrate into yet another endless war. Like the Afghan jihad in the 1980s which employed US-armed and funded guerrillas to drag Russia into its depths, Ukraine’s backers will employ those war-tested methods to run a protracted battle that can spill into bordering Russian lands.
Yet this US attempt at crypto-Afghanization will at best accelerate the completion of what Russia’s Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu describes as the “tasks” of its Special Military Operation (SMO) in Ukraine. For Moscow right now, that road leads all the way to Odessa.
It didn’t have to be this way. Until the recent assassination of Darya Dugina at Moscow’s gates, the battlefield in Ukraine was in fact under a ‘Syrianization’ process.
Like the foreign proxy war in Syria this past decade, frontlines around significant Ukrainian cities had roughly stabilized. Losing on the larger battlefields, Kiev had increasingly moved to employ terrorist tactics. Neither side could completely master the immense war theater at hand. So the Russian military opted to keep minimal forces in battle – contrary to the strategy it employed in 1980s Afghanistan.
Let’s remind ourselves of a few Syrian facts: Palmyra was liberated in March 2016, then lost and retaken in 2017. Aleppo was liberated only in December 2016. Deir Ezzor in September 2017. A slice of northern Hama in December and January 2018. The outskirts of Damascus in the Spring of 2018. Idlib – and significantly, over 25 percent of Syrian territory – are still not liberated. That tells a lot about rhythm in a war theater.
The Russian military never made a conscious decision to interrupt the multi-channel flow of western weapons to Kiev. Methodically destroying those weapons once they’re in Ukrainian territory – with plenty of success – is another matter. The same applies to smashing mercenary networks.
Moscow is well aware that any negotiation with those pulling the strings in Washington – and dictating all terms to puppets in Brussels and Kiev – is futile. The fight in Donbass and beyond is a do or die affair.
So the battle will go on, destroying what’s left of Ukraine, just as it destroyed much of Syria. The difference is that economically, much more than in Syria, what’s left of Ukraine will plunge into a black void. Only territory under Russian control will be rebuilt, and that includes, significantly, the bulk of Ukraine’s industrial infrastructure.
What’s left – rump Ukraine – has already been plundered anyway, as Monsanto, Cargill and Dupont have already bagged 17 million hectares of prime, fertile arable land – over half of what Ukraine still possesses. That translates de facto as BlackRock, Blackstone and Vanguard, top agro-business shareholders, owning whatever lands that really matter in non-sovereign Ukraine.
Going forward, by next year the Russians will be applying themselves to cutting off Kiev from NATO weapons supplies. As that unfolds, the Anglo-Americans will eventually move whatever puppet regime remains to Lviv. And Kiev terrorism – conducted by Bandera worshippers – will continue to be the new normal in the capital.
The Kazakh double game
By now it’s abundantly clear this is not a mere war of territorial conquest. It’s certainly part of a War of Economic Corridors – as the US spares no effort to sabotage and smash the multiple connectivity channels of Eurasia’s integration projects, be they Chinese-led (Belt and Road Initiative, BRI) or Russian-led (Eurasian Economic Union, EAEU).
Just like the proxy war in Syria remade large swathes of West Asia (witness, for instance, Erdogan about to meet Assad), the fight in Ukraine, in a microcosm, is a war for the reconfiguration of the current world order, where Europe is a mere self-inflicted victim in a minor subplot. The Big Picture is the emergence of multipolarity.
The proxy war in Syria lasted a decade, and it’s not over yet. The same may happen to the proxy war in Ukraine. As it stands, Russia has taken an area that is roughly equivalent to Hungary and Slovakia combined. That’s still far from “task” fulfillment – and it’s bound to go on until Russia has taken all the land right up to the Dnieper as well as Odessa, connecting it to the breakaway Republic of Transnistria.
It’s enlightening to see how important Eurasian actors are reacting to such geopolitical turbulence. And that brings us to the cases of Kazakhstan and Turkey.
The Telegram channel Rybar (with over 640k followers) and hacker group Beregini revealed in an investigation that Kazakhstan was selling weapons to Ukraine, which translates as de facto treason against their own Russian allies in the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). Consider too that Kazakhstan is also part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the EAEU, the two hubs of the Eurasian-led multipolar order.
As a consequence of the scandal, Kazakhstan was forced to officially announce the suspension of all weapons exports until the end of 2023.
It began with hackers unveiling how Technoexport – a Kazakh company – was selling armed personnel carriers, anti-tank systems and munitions to Kiev via Jordanian intermediaries, under the orders of the United Kingdom. The deal itself was supervised by the British military attaché in Nur-Sultan, the Kazakh capital.
Nur-Sultan predictably tried to dismiss the allegations, arguing that Technoexport had not asked for export licenses. That was essentially false: the Rybar team discovered that Technoexport instead used Blue Water Supplies, a Jordanian firm, for those. And the story gets even juicier. All the contract documents ended up being found in the computers of Ukrainian intel.
Moreover, the hackers found out about another deal involving Kazspetsexport, via a Bulgarian buyer, for the sale of Kazakh Su-27s, airplane turbines and Mi-24 helicopters. These would have been delivered to the US, but their final destination was Ukraine.
The icing on this Central Asian cake is that Kazakhstan also sells significant amounts of Russian – not Kazakh – oil to Kiev.
So it seems that Nur-Sultan, perhaps unofficially, somehow contributes to the ‘Afghanization’ in the war in Ukraine. No diplomatic leaks confirm it, of course, but bets can be made Putin had a few things to say about that to President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev in their recent – cordial – meeting.
The Sultan’s balancing act
Turkey is a way more complex case. Ankara is not a member of the SCO, the CSTO or the EAEU. It is still hedging its bets, calculating on which terms it will join the high-speed rail of Eurasian integration. And yet, via several schemes, Ankara allows Moscow to evade the avalanche of western sanctions and embargoes.
Turkish businesses – literally all of them with close connections to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) – are making a killing, and relishing their new role as crossroads warehouse between Russia and the west. It’s an open boast in Istanbul that what Russia cannot buy from Germany or France they buy “from us.” And in fact several EU companies are in on it.
Ankara’s balancing act is as sweet as a good baklava. It gathers economic support from a very important partner right in the middle of the endless, very serious Turkish economic debacle. They agree on nearly everything: Russian gas, S-400 missile systems, the building of the Russian nuclear power plant, tourism – Istanbul is crammed with Russians – Turkish fruits and vegetables.
Ankara-Moscow employ sound textbook geopolitics. They play it openly, in full transparence. That does not mean they are allies. It’s just pragmatic business between states. For instance, an economic response may alleviate a geopolitical problem, and vice-versa.
Obviously the collective west has completely forgotten how that normal state-to-state behavior works. It’s pathetic. Turkey gets “denounced” by the west as traitorous – as much as China.
Of course Erdogan also needs to play to the galleries, so every once in a while he says that Crimea should be retaken by Kiev. After all, his companies also do business with Ukraine – Bayraktar drones and otherwise.
And then there’s proselytizing: Crimea remains theoretically ripe for Turkish influence, where Ankara may exploit the notions of pan-Islamism and mostly pan-Turkism, capitalizing on the historical relations between the peninsula and the Ottoman Empire.
Is Moscow worried? Not really. As for those Bayraktar TB2s sold to Kiev, they will continue to be relentlessly reduced to ashes. Nothing personal. Just business.
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.
Filed under: Afghanistan, American crimes, NATO Alliance, Russia, Syria, Ukraine, USA | Tagged: Age of Multipolarity, Bandera national battalions, brl, Darya Dugina, Donbass, EAEU, Erdogan, Global war on Syria, Justice and Development Party (AKP), Kazakhstan, Kiev Nazi Regime, Odessa, Ottoman Empire, Pepe Escobar, S-400, SMO | Comments Off on Ukraine: Somewhere between Afghanization and Syrianization
by Pepe Escobar, posted with the author’s permission and widely cross-posted
Dmitry Medvedev, relishing his unplugged self, has laid down the law on the Special Military Operation (SMO). Bluntly, he affirmed there is a “one and a half” scenario: either to go all the way, or a military coup d’Etat in Ukraine followed by admitting the inevitable. No tertium applies.
That’s as stark as it gets: the leadership in Moscow is making it very clear, to internal and international audiences, the new deal consists in slow cooking the Kiev racket inside a massive cauldron while polishing its status of financial black hole for the collective West. Until we reach boiling point – which will be a revolution or a putsch.
In parallel, The Lords of (Proxy) War will continue with their own strategy, which is to pillage an enfeebled, fearful, Europe, then dressing it up as a perfumed colony to be ruthlessly exploited ad nauseam by the imperial oligarchy.
Europe is now a runaway TGV – minus the requisite Hollywood production values. Assuming it does not veer off track – a dicey proposition – it may eventually arrive at a railway station called Agenda 2030, The Great Narrative, or some other NATO/Davos denomination du jour.
As it stands, what’s remarkable is how the “marginal” Russian economy hardly broke a sweat to “end the abundance” of the wealthiest region on the planet.
Moscow does not even entertain the notion of negotiating with Brussels because there’s nothing to negotiate – considering puny Eurocrats will only be hurled away from their zombified state when the dire socio-economic consequences of “the end of abundance” will finally translate into peasants with pitchforks roaming the continent.
It may be eons away, but inevitably the average Italian, German or Frenchman will connect the dots and realize it is their own “leaders” – national nullities and mostly unelected Eurocrats – who are paving their road to poverty.
You will be poor. And you will like it. Because we are all supporting freedom for Ukrainian neo-nazis. That brings the concept of “multicultural Europe” to a whole new level.
The runaway train, of course, may veer off track and plunge into an Alpine abyss. In this case something might be saved from the wreckage – and “reconstruction” might be on the cards. But reconstruct what?
Europe could always reconstruct a new Reich (collapsed with a bang in 1945); a soft Reich (erected at the end of WWII); or break with its past failures, sing “I’m Free” – and connect with Eurasia. Don’t bet on it.
Get back those Taurian lands
The SMO may be about to radically change – something that will drive the already clueless denizens of US Think Tankland and their Euro vassals even more berserk.
President Putin and Defense Minister Shoigu have been giving serious hints the only way for the pain dial is up – considering the mounting evidence of terrorism inside Russian territory; the vile assassination of Darya Dugina; non-stop shelling of civilians in border regions; attacks on Crimea; the use of chemical weapons; and the shelling of Zaporizhzhya power plant raising the risk of a nuclear catastrophe.
This past Tuesday, one day before the SMO completing six months, Crimea’s permanent representative to the Kremlin, Georgy Muradov, all but spelled it out.
He stressed the necessity to “reintegrate all the Taurian lands” – Crimea, the Northern Black Sea and the Azov Sea – into a single entity as soon as “in the next few months”. He defined this process as “objective and demanded by the population of these regions.”
Muradov added, “given not only the strikes on Crimea, but also the continuous shelling of the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, the dam of the Kakhovka reservoir, peaceful facilities on the territory of Russia, the DNR and LNR, there are all preconditions to qualify the actions of the Banderite regime as terrorist.”
The conclusion is inevitable: “the political issue of changing the format of the special military operation” enters the agenda. After all, Washington and Brussels “have already prepared new anti-Crimean provocations of the NATO-Bandera alliance”.
So when we examine what the “restoration of the Taurian lands” implies, we see not only the contours of Novorossiya but most of all that there won’t be any security for Crimea – and thus Russia – in the Black Sea without Odessa becoming Russian again. And that, on top of it, will solve the Transnistria dilemma.
Add to it Kharkov – the capital and top industrial center of Greater Donbass. And of course Dnipropetrovsk. They are all SMO objectives, the whole combo to be later protected by buffer zones in Chernihiv and Sumy oblasts.
Only then the “tasks” – as Shoigu calls them – of the SMO would be declared fulfilled. The timeline could be eight to ten months – after a lull under General Winter.
As the turbo-charged SMO rolls on, it’s a given the Empire of Chaos, Lies and Plunder will continue to prop up and weaponize the Kiev racket till Kingdom Come – and that will apply especially after the Return of Odessa. What’s unclear is who and what gang will be left in Kiev posing as the ruling party and doing specials for Vogue while duly fulfilling the mass of imperial diktats.
It’s also a given the CIA/MI6 combo will be refining non-stop the contours of a massive guerrilla war against Russia in multiple fronts – crammed with terror attacks and all sorts of provocations.
Yet in the Bigger Picture it’s the inevitable Russian military victory in Donbass and then “all the Taurian lands” that will hit the collective West like a lethal asteroid. The geopolitical humiliation will be unbearable; not to mention the geoeconomic humiliation for vassalized Europe.
As Eurasian integration will become an even stronger vector, Russian diplomacy will be solidifying the new normal. Never forget that Moscow had no trouble normalizing relations, for instance, with China, Iran, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Israel. All these actors, in different ways, directly contributed to the fall of the USSR. Now – with one exception – they are all focused on The Dawn of the Eurasian Century.
Filed under: EU, Europe, France, Germany, NATO Alliance, Russia, Ukraine, USA | Tagged: Bandera national battalions, Collapse of USSR, Crimea, Darya Dugina, DNR, Donbass, Eurasian integration, LDNR, Medvedev, Odessa, Pepe Escobar, SMO, The Collective West, Western proxy Wars against Russia | 1 Comment »
After lying for months, the media are preparing the public for Ukraine’s military collapse.
Douglas MacGregor at The American Conservative
Diogenes, one of the ancient world’s illustrious philosophers, believed that lies were the currency of politics, and those lies were the ones he sought to expose and debase. To make his point, Diogenes occasionally carried a lit lantern through the streets of Athens in the daylight. If asked why, Diogenes would say he was searching for an honest man.
Finding an honest man today in Washington, D.C., is equally challenging. Diogenes would need a Xenon Searchlight in each hand.
Still, there are brief moments of clarity inside the Washington establishment. Having lied prolifically for months to the American public about the origins and conduct of the war in Ukraine, the media are now preparing the American, British, and other Western publics for Ukraine’s military collapse. It is long overdue.
The Western media did everything in its power to give the Ukrainian defense the appearance of far greater strength than it really possessed. Careful observers noted that the same video clips of Russian tanks under attack were shown repeatedly. Local counterattacks were reported as though they were operational maneuvers.
Russian errors were exaggerated out of all proportion to their significance. Russian losses and the true extent of Ukraine’s own losses were distorted, fabricated, or simply ignored. But conditions on the battlefield changed little over time. Once Ukrainian forces immobilized themselves in static defensive positions inside urban areas and the central Donbas, the Ukrainian position was hopeless. But this development was portrayed as failure by the Russians to gain “their objectives.”
Ground-combat forces that immobilize soldiers in prepared defenses will be identified, targeted, and destroyed from a distance. When persistent overhead intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance assets, whether manned or unmanned, are linked to precision guided-strike weapons or modern artillery systems informed by accurate targeting data, “holding ground” is fatal to any ground force. This is all the more true in Ukraine, because it was apparent from the first action that Moscow focused on the destruction of Ukrainian forces, not on the occupation of cities or the capture of Ukrainian territory west of the Dnieper River.
The result has been the piecemeal annihilation of Ukrainian forces. Only the episodic infusion of U.S. and allied weapons kept Kiev’s battered legions in the field; legions that are now dying in great numbers thanks to Washington’s proxy war.
Kiev’s war with Moscow is lost. Ukrainian forces are being bled white. Trained replacements do not exist in sufficient numbers to influence the battle, and the situation grows more desperate by the hour. No amount of U.S. and allied military aid or assistance short of direct military intervention by U.S. and NATO ground forces can change this harsh reality.
The problem today is not ceding territory and population to Moscow in Eastern Ukraine that Moscow already controls. The future of the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions along with the Donbas is decided. Moscow is also likely to secure Kharkov and Odessa, two cities that are historically Russian and Russian-speaking, as well as the territory that adjoins them. These operations will extend the conflict through the summer. The problem now is how to stop the fighting.
Whether the fighting stops in the early fall will depend on two key factors. The first involves the leadership in Kiev. Will the Zelensky government consent to the Biden program for perpetual conflict with Russia?
If the Biden administration has its way, Kiev will continue to operate as a base for the buildup of new forces poised to threaten Moscow. In practice, this means Kiev must commit national suicide by exposing the Ukrainian heartland west of the Dnieper River to massive, devastating strikes by Russia’s long-range missile and rocket forces.
Of course, these developments are not inevitable. Berlin, Paris, Rome, Budapest, Bucharest, Sofia, Vilnius, Riga, Tallin, and, yes, even Warsaw, do not have to blindly follow Washington’s lead. Europeans, like most Americans, are already peering into the abyss of an all-encompassing economic downturn that Biden’s policies are creating at home. Unlike Americans who must cope with the consequences of Biden’s ill-conceived policies, European governments can opt out of Biden’s perpetual-war plan for Ukraine.
The second factor involves Washington itself. Having poured more than $60 billion or a little more than $18 billion a month in direct or indirect transfers into a Ukrainian state that is now crumbling, the important question is, what happens to millions of Ukrainians in the rest of the country that did not flee? And where will the funds come from to rebuild Ukraine’s shattered society in a developing global economic emergency?
When inflation costs the average American household an extra $460 per month to buy the same goods and services this year as they did last year, it is quite possible that Ukraine could sink quietly beneath the waves like the Titanic without evoking much concern in the American electorate. Experienced politicians know that the American span of attention to matters beyond America’s borders is so short that an admission of defeat in Ukraine would probably have little or no immediate consequences.
However, the effects of repeated strategic failures in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria are cumulative. In the 1980s, General Motors wanted to dictate the kind of automobiles Americans would buy, but American consumers had different ideas. That’s why G.M., which dominated the U.S. market for 77 years, lost its top spot to Toyota. Washington cannot dictate all outcomes, nor can Washington escape accountability for its profligate spending and having ruined American prosperity.
In November, Americans will go to the polls. The election itself will do more than test the integrity of the American electoral process. The election is also likely to ensure that Biden is remembered for his intransigence; his refusal to change course, like Herbert Hoover in 1932. Democrats will recall that their predecessors in the Democratic Party effectively ran against Hoover for more than a half century. Republicans may end up running against Joe Biden for the next 50 years.
Douglas Macgregor, Col. (ret.) is a senior fellow with The American Conservative, the former advisor to the Secretary of Defense in the Trump administration, a decorated combat veteran, and the author of five books.
Filed under: American Lies, NATO Alliance, Russia, Ukraine, Western Lies, Western Propaganda | Tagged: American Empire's Decline, “Empire of Lies”, Biden's Foreign Policy, Donbass, Global inflation, Kharkiv, Odessa | 1 Comment »
June 06, 2022
by Saker Staff
Weapons incoming
Russia have struck a major artery for the shipment of NATO weapons from Europe via the Beskidy railway tunnel. The Beskidy Tunnel is a railway tunnel under the Volovets Pass in the Carpathian Mountains. Confirmed by Ukraine itself.
High-precision long-range air-based missiles of the Russian Aerospace Forces have destroyed industrial buildings of the smithy-mechanical plant on the outskirts of Lozovaya (Kharkov Region), where the AFU armoured vehicles were being rebuilt and repaired.
The consequences of the arrival at the Darnitsa car repair plant, which was converted for the repair of equipment and the preparation of Polish tanks for shipment to the front https://t.me/intelslava/30873
Russian Mod states that an An-26 military transport aircraft of the Ukrainian Air Force carrying weapons and military equipment was shot down in the Odessa region.
More here
Filed under: Europe, NATO Alliance, Poland, Russia, Ukraine | Tagged: MOD, Odessa, Operation Z., Russian Aerospace Forces, UAF | Comments Off on Sitrep Operation Z: Back into The Grind while the penny drops in Europe
And this is the real issue:
And a little real history and situation today, that would be fine to discuss at a barbecue and probably not at a formal summit.
Filed under: EU, Europe, France, Germany, NATO Alliance, Russia, Ukraine, USA | Tagged: “Empire of Lies”, “EuroMaidan” coup, Color Revolutions, Donbass, Gonzalo Lira, Indivisibility of security, Kharkiv, Kiev Nazi Regime, Minsk Agreements, NGOs, Odessa, Ukro-nazis, Ukro-Neutrality, Victoria Nuland, War on Donbass, Western proxy Wars against Russia | Comments Off on More Gonzalo Lira: No More Lies, No More BS
May 18, 2022
by Saker Staff with thanks to Pepe Escobar for that prescient title
Nazi Azovites – from rats in a hole to fish in a barrel – This is what denazification looks like!
The New York Times prevaricates as follows: Ukraine ended its “combat mission” in Mariupol and said fighters were being evacuated, signaling that the battle at a steel plant was over. https://nyti.ms/3sIon9B
Zelensky adds some Ukrainian/Cocainian dreams to that: “The evacuation mission from Azovstal continues. It is led by our military and intelligence officers.” (OK, Mr PianoDick, they’re being led straight into war criminal prison! – thank your military and intelligence officers for doing the job for the world!)
Dmitry Polyansky says it differently: “I didn’t know English has so many ways to express a single message: the #Azovnazis have unconditionally surrendered.”
Nightfall did not stop the surrender process. Ukrainians are still surrendering in crowds without stopping. Sufficient forces to deal with this are on the terrain and the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the DPR are kicking ass and taking prisoners.
Illumination rockets are constantly launched into the sky, which at least somehow facilitates the crawling out of underground inhabitants 🙂
These invincible heroes are emaciated, ragged, hungry and a pitiful sight.
Donetsk Defense HQ – 962 Azovites surrendered and the process continues. In the meantime, 11 servicemen of the 25th airborne brigade and seventeen of the 54th mechanized brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine voluntarily laid down their arms and went over to the side of the DPR. We hope this is the start of a mass surrender.
This is denazification and movies will be made and books will be written. After this major loss of prestige, expect a doozy of a false flag.
Starting point today is the MoD report and somewhat reformatted for ease of use.
💥Over a day, high-precision air-based missiles of the Russian Aerospace Forces have hit
✈️💥Operational-tactical and army aviation have hit
💥Missile troops and artillery have hit
💥Russian air defence means have shot down
Not too shabby for a day’s work. And they will repeat it, and repeat it, and rinse, and repeat it again.
Secrets from Azovstal and surroundings are beginning to be revealed. There will be many!
How the OSCE mission cooperated with the Azov terrorists
The filming crew of IA “Arbelet” was the first to visit the territory where the OSCE mission in Mariupol was located. Among other valuable finds, they found two mortar positions, equipped directly near the mission’s administrative building. The mortars themselves and their ammunition are of Italian origin, as evidenced by the markings. Another noteworthy fact: the last delivery of the Italian BC is dated March 11, 2022.
Do ordinary Italians know that their authorities are helping outright terrorists of the national battalions? How will the OSCE comment on the fact that they were in clear collusion with the terrorists, allowing “Azov” to fire from their territory? How, after these facts, will the OSCE be able to clean up their reputation at all?
(Sidebar: Do you now understand why Russia is leaving international organizations? Simple, these organizations are corrupt to the extent that they cannot be reformed but they have to be broken. Mr Lavrov today is meeting with SCO Secretary-General Ming where new structures are being built.)
Update from Brian Berletic: He views the canoodling from western sources and he hoists them on their own petard. Do take a listen, specifically Brian’s explanation of how the Russian command and soldiers keep certain areas ‘fixed’.
Here is another example of such a ‘fix’. The Russian army attacked Ukrainian defense facilities in the Odessa region with precision weapons from the Black Sea. This information is confirmed by the Ukrainian operational command “South”. https://t.me/intelslava/29149
(Sidebar: Today in Odessa – On this day “Russian Spring”
May 18, 2014 – “Odessa is a Russian city”, “Donbass – we are with you” – such slogans sounded at the House of Trade Unions in Odessa.
Hundreds of protesters with Russian flags and banners of the Victory came out not only to honor the memory of those killed in the May 2 tragedy, but also to show the Ukrainian Nazis that Odessans are Russian people who are not afraid of the Kyiv punishers.)
Is the Russian SMO beginning to touch hearts and minds? Remember the stories that Russia underestimated the willingness of the Ukrainian people to support the denazification.
Telescoping into the current pic on a map we see that cauldrons do not come in onesies any longer but in threes:
Readovka on the fronts
Kharkiv Front. The fighting in the area of Kazachya Lopan and the village of Liptsy is of a positional nature. The enemy in the area of Ternovka reached the border MASS MEDIA: Ukrainian Armed Forces have reached the Russian-Ukrainian border in Kharkiv region. Ukraine conducted a counterattack in the north-east of the Russian Federation, and is also probing the positions of the Russian Armed Forces in the area of Volchansk. The Russian Armed Forces do not conduct active offensive operations in the Kharkiv direction.
On the Izyum part of the front, fighting continues in the area of Kamyshevakha, Kurulka and Dolgenky. The enemy continues to try to strain the flank of the Russian group to the north-west of Izyum, forcing the Seversky Donets. In the Slavic direction, the troops took Drobyshevo and Krasny Liman in a semicircle. The front also approached Svyatogorsk.
In the Luhansk-Donetsk part of the front, fighting continues in the area of Kamyshevakha, north of Popasna. There are also battles for Toshkovka. There are attempts to enter the flank and rear of the fortified area in Gorsky and Zolotoy. Fighting continues on the outskirts of Severodonetsk, as well as to the west of Lisichansk in the area of Privolye and Belogorovka. According to unconfirmed reports, Russian troops occupied the town of New York.
On the Zaporozhye part of the front without any special changes. An attempt by the Ukrainian Armed Forces to attack in the area of Malinovka ended in failure and heavy losses. The battles here are of a positional nature all the way from Gulyai-Pole to Velikaya Novoselovka. The enemy is moving part of the reserves from the Zaporizhia direction to the Donbass, where the situation for the Severodonetsk group is rapidly deteriorating. Heavy fighting continues in the area of Novomikhailovka and Ugledar.
On the Southern Front, the development of the offensive is not yet taking place. The Ukrainian Armed Forces are waiting for the landing of Russian troops in the Odessa region and are working on mining the entire coast. In the Nikopol and Kryvyi Rih directions, the Ukrainian command is accumulating forces to uncover weaknesses in the Russian positions.
On arrival, it is already traditional – the APU shelled Petrovsky district Ukrainian Armed Forces shelled Petrovsky district of Donetsk. The shell hit the school grounds Donetsk, a shell hit the school territory. The Ukrainian side also shelled the outskirts of Kherson, which resulted in the death of one civilian.
SmoothieX12 is correct when he says that the only battle that the Ukrainians know, is the battle taught to them by their NATO advisors, which is to shell civilian territory and hide behind civilians.
The battlefront is still in a relatively chaotic state, but Russia is now forming and shaping it.
Let’s take a look at Martyanov’s levels of war as we can categorize from this handy depiction:
Finland and Sweden formally submit applications to join NATO – currently, it is harassment but may well move up the scale to major operations. We cannot say where Russia will stop.
FM Lavrov: “Ukraine… No one wants Ukraine. They are an expendable country in this hybrid war against Russian Federation. No one has doubts anymore”. The language from Russian sources has changed and they now say clearly that Ukraine is a tool and the fight is against Russia by the West.
Weapons
Russian self-propelled howitzers “Msta-S” and “Acacia-M” are being put to good use and they destroy armored vehicles and fortified positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Distance of fire is up to 30 km and they use high-explosive fragmentation projectiles that can destroy buried concrete fortifications of the enemy. https://t.me/intelslava/29140
Incoming weapons. On the Polish-Ukrainian border, seven South African-made Mamba Mk2 EE armored vehicles transferred to Ukraine by Estonia as military assistance were seen. These vehicles were specifically produced for the Estonian army.
We have to conclude if we can see these armored vehicles via telegram channel on the Polish border, then the Russian forces can see them too. And ditto for all other incoming weapons.
There are smaller reports of new Russian artillery weapons appearing in the field of battle, but it is limited as yet.
Major Fail, other than war.
Washington failed to get the summit with the ASEAN countries to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
ASEAN nations are Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines.
Another failure of freezing funds: Switzerland released $6.33 billion of Russia’s frozen funds.
We end with biolabs
Russia’s First Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN Dmitry Polyanskiy gives key takeaways from the last UN Security Council meeting on US biolabs in Ukraine:
Main conclusion: we have definitely hit their soft spot. It’s clear for any unbiased observer that they are obscuring the issue and trying to divert attention from this uncomfortable topic trying to discourage us to raise it by repeating mantras on “Russian aggression” etc.
So stay tuned, there’s more evidence on US military biological programs to follow!
Top level headline in China’s Global Times today: ‘Neo-Nazism’ poisons Ukraine, Europe under US, West’s connivance
That is it for today. Enjoy your discussion and be careful with the Ukie propaganda. It is everywhere.
Filed under: NATO Alliance, Russia, Ukraine | Tagged: Azovstal plant, Denazification of Ukraine, Donbass, Donetsk, Dpr, Mariupol, Neo-Nazi, Odessa, OSCE, Russian Aerospace Forces, SCO, SMO, UAF, Ukro-nazis | Comments Off on Sitrep Operation Z: NATO surrenders in Azovstal
by Pepe Escobar, posted with the author’s permission and widely cross-posted
After careful evaluation, the Kremlin is rearranging the geopolitical chessboard to end the unipolar hegemony of the “indispensable nation”.
But it’s our fate / To have no place to rest, / As suffering mortals / Blindly fall and vanish / From one hour / To the next, / Like water falling / From cliff to cliff, downward / For years to uncertainty.
Holderlin, Hyperion’s Fate Song
Operation Z is the first salvo of a titanic struggle: three decades after the fall of the USSR, and 77 years after the end of WWII, after careful evaluation, the Kremlin is rearranging the geopolitical chessboard to end the unipolar hegemony of the “indispensable nation”. No wonder the Empire of Lies has gone completely berserk, obsessed in completely expelling Russia from the West-centric system.
The U.S. and its NATO puppies cannot possibly come to grips with their perplexity when faced with a staggering loss: no more entitlement allowing exclusive geopolitical use of force to perpetuate “our values”. No more Full Spectrum Dominance.
The micro-picture is also clear. The U.S. Deep State is milking to Kingdom Come its planned Ukraine gambit to cloak a strategic attack on Russia. The “secret” was to force Moscow into an intra-Slav war in Ukraine to break Nord Stream 2 – and thus German reliance on Russian natural resources. That ends – at least for the foreseeable future – the prospect of a Bismarckian Russo-German connection that would ultimately cause the U.S. to lose control of the Eurasian landmass from the English Channel to the Pacific to an emerging China-Russia-Germany pact.
The American strategic gambit, so far, has worked wonders. But the battle is far from over. Psycho neo-con/neoliberalcon silos inside the Deep State consider Russia such a serious threat to the “rules-based international order” that they are ready to risk if not incur a “limited” nuclear war out of their gambit. What’s at stake is nothing less than the loss of Ruling the World by the Anglo-Saxons.
Mastering the Five Seas
Russia, based on purchasing power parity (PPP), is the 6th economy in the world, right behind Germany and ahead of both the UK and France. Its “hard” economy is similar to the U.S. Steel production may be about the same, but intellectual capacity is vastly superior. Russia has roughly the same number of engineers as the U.S., but they are much better educated.
The Mossad attributes Israel’s economic miracle in creating an equivalent of Silicon Valley to a base of a million Russian immigrants. This Israeli Silicon Valley happens to be a key asset of the American MICIMATT (military-industrial-congressional-intelligence-media-academia-think tank complex), as indelibly named by Ray McGovern.
NATOstan media hysterically barking that Russia’s GDP is the size of Texas is nonsense. PPP is what really counts; that and Russia’s superior engineers is why their hypersonic weapons are at least two or three generations ahead of the U.S. Just ask the indispensable Andrei Martyanov.
The Empire of Lies has no defensive missiles worthy of the name, and no equivalents to Mr. Zircon and Mr. Sarmat. The NATOstan sphere simply cannot win a war, any war against Russia for this reason alone.
The deafening NATOstan “narrative” that Ukraine is defeating Russia does not even qualify as an innocuous joke (compare it with Russia’s “Reach Out and Touch Someone” strategy). The corrupt system of SBU fanatics intermingled with UkroNazi factions is kaput. The Pentagon knows it. The CIA cannot possibly admit it. What the Empire of Lies has sort of won, so far, is a media “victory” for the UkroNazis, not a military victory.
Gen Aleksandr Dvornikov, of Syria fame, has a clear mandate: to conquer the whole of Donbass, totally free up Crimea and prepare the advance towards Odessa and Transnistria while reducing a rump Ukraine to the status of failed state without any access to the sea.
The Sea of Azov – linked to the Caspian by the Don-Volga canal – is already a Russian lake. And the Black Sea is next, the key connection between the Heartland and the Mediterranean. The Five Seas system – Black, Azov, Caspian, Baltic, White – enshrines Russia as a de facto continental naval power. Who needs warm waters?
Moving “at the speed of war”
The pain dial, from now on, will go up non-stop. Reality – as in facts on the ground – will soon become apparent even to the NATOstan-wide LugenPresse.
The woke Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen Mark Milley, expects Operation Z to last years. That’s nonsense. The Russian Armed Forces may afford to be quite methodical and take all the time needed to properly demilitarize Ukraine. The collective West for its part is pressed for time – because the blowback from the real economy is already on and bound to become vicious.
Defense Minister Shoigu has made it quite clear: any NATO vehicles bringing weapons to Kiev will be destroyed as “legitimate military targets”.
A report by the scientific service of the Bundestag established that training of Ukrainian soldiers on German soil may amount, under international law, to participation in war. And that gets even trickier when coupled with NATO weapons deliveries: “Only if, in addition to the supply of weapons, the instruction of the conflict party or training in such weapons were also an issue would one leave the secure area of non-warfare.”
Now at least it’s irretrievably clear how the Empire of Lies “moves at the speed of war” – as described in public by weapons peddler turned Pentagon head, Lloyd “Raytheon” Austin. In Pentagonese, that was explained by the proverbial “official” as “a combination of a call center, a watch floor, meeting rooms. They execute a battle rhythm to support decision-makers.”
The Pentagonese “battle rhythm” offered to a supposedly “credible, resilient and combat-capable Ukraine military” is fed by a EUCom system that essentially moves weapons orders from Pentagon warehouses in the U.S. to branches of the Empire of Bases in Europe and then to the NATO eastern front in Poland, where they are trucked across Ukraine just in time to be duly incinerated by Russian precision strikes: the wealth of options include supersonic P-800 Onyx missiles, two types of Iskander, and Mr. Khinzal launched from Mig-31Ks.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has stressed Moscow is perfectly aware the U.S., NATO and UK are transferring not only weapons but also loads of intel. In parallel, the collective West turns everything upside down 24/7 shaping a new environment totally geared against Russia, not caring for even a semblance of partnership in any area. The collective West does not even consider the possibility of dialogue with Russia.
Hence talking to Putin is “a waste of time” unless a “Russian defeat” in Ukraine (echoing strident Kiev P.R.) would make him “more realistic”. For all his faults, Le Petit Roi Macron/McKinsey has been an exception, on the phone with Putin earlier this week.
The neo-Orwellian Hitlerization of Putin reduces him, even among the so-called Euro-intelligentzia, to the status of dictator of a nation chloroformed into its 19th century nationalism. Forget about any semblance of historical/political/cultural analysis. Putin is a late Augustus, dressing up his Imperium as a Republic.
At best the Europeans preach and pray – chihuahuas yapping to His Master’s Voice – for a hybrid strategy of “containment and engagement” to be unleashed by the U.S., clumsily parroting the scribblings of denizens of that intellectual no-fly zone, Think Tankland.
Yet in fact the Europeans would rather “isolate” Russia – as in 12% of the world’s population “isolating” 88% (of course: their Westoxified “vision” completely ignores the Global South). “Help” to Russia will only come when sanctions are effective (as in never: blowback will be the norm) or – the ultimate wet dream – there’s regime change in Moscow.
The Fall
UkroNazi P.R. agent Ursula von der Lugen presented the sixth sanction package of the Europoodle (Dis)Union.
Top of the bill is to exclude three more Russian banks from SWIFT, including Sberbank. Seven banks are already excluded. This will enforce Russia’s “total isolation”. It’s idle to comment on something that only fools the LugenPresse.
Then there’s the “progressive” embargo on oil imports. No more crude imported to the EU in six months and no more refined products before the end of 2022. As it stands, the IEA shows that 45% of Russia’s oil exports go to the EU (with 22% to China and 10% to the U.S.). His Master’s Voice continues and will continue to import Russian oil.
And of course 58 “personal” sanctions also show up, targeting very dangerous characters such as Patriarch Kirill of the Orthodox Church, and the wife, son and daughter of Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov.
This stunning display of stupidity will have to be approved by all EU members. Internal revolt is guaranteed, especially from Hungary, even as so many remain willing to commit energy suicide and mess up with the lives of their citizens big time to defend a neo-Nazi regime.
Alastair Crooke called my attention to a startling, original interpretation of what’s goin’ on, offered in Russian by a Serbian analyst, Prof. Slobodan Vladusic. His main thesis, in a nutshell: “Megalopolis hates Russia because it is not Megalopolis – it has not entered the sphere of anti-humanism and that is why it remains a civilization alternative. Hence Russophobia.”
Vladusic contends that the intra-Slav war in Ukraine is “a great catastrophe for Orthodox civilization” – mirroring my recent first attempt to open a serious debate on a Clash of Christianities.
Yet the major schism is not on religion but culture: “The key difference between the former West and today’s Megalopolis is that Megalopolis programmatically renounces the humanistic heritage of the West.”
So now “it is possible to erase not only the musical canon, but also the entire European humanistic heritage: the entire literature, fine arts, philosophy” because of a “trivialization of knowledge”. What’s left is an empty space, actually a cultural black hole, “filled by promoting terms such as ‘posthumanism’ and ‘transhumanism’.”
And here Vladusic gets to the heart of the matter: Russia fiercely opposes the Great Reset concocted by the “hackable”, self-described “elites” of Megalopolis.
Sergey Glazyev, now coordinating the draft of a new financial/monetary system by the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) in partnership with the Chinese, adapts Vladusic to the facts on the ground (here in Russian, here in an imperfect English translation).
Glazyev is way more blunt than in his meticulous economic analyses. While noting the Deep State’s aims of destroying the Russian world, Iran and block China, he stresses the U.S. “will not be able to win the global hybrid war”. A key reason is that the collective West has “put all independent countries in front of the need to find new global currency instruments, risk insurance mechanisms, restore the norms of international law and create their own economic security systems.”
So yes, this is Totalen Krieg, Total War – as Glazyev spells it out with no attenuation, and how Russia denounced it this week at the UN: “Russia needs to stand up to the United States and NATO in its confrontation, bringing it to its logical conclusion, so as not to be torn between them and China, which is irrevocably becoming the leader of the world economy.”
History may eventually register, 77 years after the end of WWII, that neocon/neoliberalcon psychos in Washington silos instigating an inter-Slavic war by ordering Kiev to launch a blitzkrieg against Donbass was the spark that led to the Fall of the U.S. Empire.
Filed under: American Hegemony, China, Germany, NATO Alliance, Russia, UK, Ukraine, USSR | Tagged: Andrei Martyanov, AUKUS, “Empire of Lies”, Donbass, Nord Stream 2, Odessa, Operation Z., Orthodox civilization, Pepe Escobar, SWIFT a US Tool, The 5 Seas Region, Ukraine disarming, Ukro-nazis, Unipolar World Order, US Deep State | Comments Off on Megalopolis x Russia: Total War
April 30, 2022
Firstly, the biggest news at the forefront is that the Mariupol situation appears to be nearing a possible conclusion. We reported last time that one prominent source said Azovstal would be fully resolved by 4/30 (today), while Sladkov said days ago that Azov had about 9 days of food left, which by now would put them at maybe 6 days or less, by those estimations.
We also reported that negotiators had arrived and were settling in to the small villages around Mariupol. Now today there is a large, full blown UN / Red Cross operation under way to evacuate the civilians in the Azovstal factory.
Now as many have seen a family was the first to leave the Azovstal factory yesterday, and now today it’s being reported by Novosti that 25 people have been released, including 6 children. The interesting thing is that the first family released said there were “70+ others” left in the bunkers, though I’m unclear if they meant 70 people or 70 families (presuming it’s total people). This is in stark contrast to Azov’s claim that over ‘1000’ civilians were hiding beneath the factory. It’s clear that Azov likely lied to inflate the numbers for obvious reasons.
With the UN and Redcross involved, it’s unclear what the terms of the current negotiations are. Here’s one report:
“In Bezymenny (Novoazvsky district of the DPR), negotiations are underway regarding the evacuation of civilians from the territory of Azostal. Representatives of the UN and the IWC are participating.
Earlier, the Kremlin has already outlined its position on these negotiations – the evacuation of civilians can be easily carried out, the main obstacles to the evacuation are the Nazis themselves, who do not want to let go of the human shield.
Nobody is going to let the Nazis go, there will be no humanitarian corridors for them.
The only chance for them is to surrender.”
You can see dozens of evacuation buses there: https://twitter.com/uasupport999/status/1520465607422091264
A rough calculation of ~30 buses, with maybe ~30-50 people per bus could be enough for over 1000+ people, so either the original Azov civilian estimates were right OR the UN is really hoping to evacuate their Azov terrorists as well. At the moment Azov is pleading to at least evacuate the wounded and the wives/families of trapped Azov have been rallying now for the release of their militants along with the civilians as well:
Anything could happen but there’s a chance that the entire Azovstal saga could end in the next day or two. The plant appears surrounded as Russian forces have captured everything but the main complex where they’re all hiding, and though the remaining Azov/marine militants are said to be numbered in the 2000 range, upwards of 600+ or more of them are said to be wounded or incapacitated.
Head of the DPR Denis Pushilin believes it will all end very soon. He has stated: ‘“Very soon, I really count on it, the situation with Azovstal in Mariupol will be completed, and we will see a large number of mercenaries there,”– he said on the air of Channel One.’
Pushilin also announced large construction sites in Mariupol will start as soon as Azovstal is done, and DPR spokesman Basurin said that a park in memory of those killed in Mariupol might be laid out on the site of the former Azovstal factory complex.
Though videos still come out showing some Mariupol fighting, we were told that most of them are as much as 10 days old due to the timed release method of information so that the enemy does not see current RF troop movements, so the fighting likely has already ended, though Azov/Arestovich still claim that their fighters conduct “sorties” above ground “when they are able to” – whatever that means.
With that said, one amusing video was released of close quarter fighting which shows Russian marines storming a building while attempting to communicate with some of the foreign mercenaries trapped there in both English and French:
And on the topic of mercenaries, there’s been a deluge of new updates.
Not only was another British merc named Andrew Hill captured and interrogated:
But the first American mercenary death was announced:
While Russia also captured two British NGO workers near Zaporizhzhia:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-61268817
And British press is now reporting on the death of Scott Sibley, a mercenary we reported on last time:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-61260402
Also, there was one unconfirmed report that said:
“#IMPORTANT Russian Spetsnaz unit in #Kherson captured 2 Russian-speaking British #SAS operatives on April 21, after a leak of their position from #Kiev. They were conducting recon for #London (these are not mercenaries). Leak suspected from #Zelensky’s office or #Ukrainian MFA.”
This is not unbelievable as we’ve already reported last time that SAS is openly working in Kiev and elsewhere.
A Georgian mercenary fighting for Azov was not so fortunate.
His before and after:
And a Danish mercenary was reported killed
“When luck refused the “soldier of fortune” , a 25-year-old Danish mercenary died in Ukraine, where he fought as part of a foreign legion. It happened in Nikolaev, the military commander of TV channel TV 2 Rasmus Tantoldt reported.”
Some are in fact saying it’s this guy, but there is no confirmation:
Now to segue to some of the developments from last time regarding the possible upcoming NATO escalations in Ukraine. Russian intel agency head Naryshkin, who issued the statement last time regarding Poland’s planned incursion has also now stated that, “plans to deploy a Polish “peacekeeping contingent” in the western part of Ukraine is not a version, but intelligence information obtained from several reliable sources, the Foreign Intelligence Service explained.”
In short, he’s saying this is not speculation but an accurate report based on many sources.
Also: “Military expert Yuriy Kotenok talks about plans to bring Polish, Romanian and other military contingents to Ukraine under the legend of “exercises”. The decision has already been made. BTG will be covered from the air. Their task is to prevent Russia from completing the operation to denazify and demilitarize Ukraine.”
Unfortunately this is for Russian speakers only as there’s no subtitles here: https://bastyon.com/index?v=2000ace73f9745dd7511ac5dccdee93a635aafe127381eaf08e5a54d8db2a12a&video=1&ref=PARV591XENALBB5ApkR7WcQPhEZtLHfi2A
And a Ukrainian account has stated: “Our source in the OP said that the General Staff has already prepared a military campaign to neutralize the Russian group in Transnistria.”
While Deputy Chairman of the Russian State Duma Committee on Defense, General Zavarzin, “called for missile strikes on headquarters in Kyiv and Lvov.”
And here’s one analyst’s take:
“@milchronicles
A strike force of NATO countries near the borders of Ukraine and Belarus – what is it for? Is it really about an ordinary peacekeeping mission?
In light of the latest information about the aspirations of Poland and other NATO members, several questions arise. Firstly, what contingent is now formed on the eastern borders of the bloc, and secondly, why are all these forces being accumulated?
It is impossible to accurately assess the grouping of NATO countries, drawn to the borders of the Republic of Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova and Russia, having only information from open sources.
However, from what is known, a total contingent of 50,000 to 100,000 people can be inferred. This includes units deployed by Poland, and the American contingent, and units of various NATO countries deployed in the framework of exercises in the Baltic states. There is also information about a serious Romanian group in the Moldovan direction. Just as we wrote earlier, combat aircraft are also being transferred to Europe. In the shortest possible time, the size of the NATO contingent can be doubled.
NATO’s ultimate strategy on this issue is currently unclear, but several options could be considered. Firstly, this can be done for a banal intimidation of Russia and an attempt to put pressure on the course of a special operation in Ukraine, and secondly, in the West they perfectly understand that Ukraine as a country no longer exists and see its future on the principle of occupation sectors. And the third option is the most terrible, but the least likely: NATO decided to go all the way and, if lend-lease and hybrid warfare do not stop the Russians, then regular units of Western countries will step in. This, of course, is a 100% threat of the use of nuclear weapons. It looks utopian, but in 2022 everything is possible.”
And from Colonel Cassad:
“The main topic that worries many today is the adoption by the US Congress of the lend-lease program for Ukraine. Delivery of large batches of modern weapons is expected soon. The war will reach a new level, because now we will also have to fight with the American military industry. Deliveries of American heavy weapons are expected, including F-16 aircraft. Today we wrote that Ukraine is already preparing pilots for these machines. Here you need to understand once and for all, we are at war with NATO, where Ukraine is just cheap service personnel and cannon fodder.
Also on the Belarusian-Polish border, there is a transfer of a shock group of troops from Poland. The answer to this was the sending of Belarusian units to strengthen the border.”
And John Kirby yesterday: ‘US Defense Press Secretary John Kirby:
“Today I can announce that the United States has begun training the Ukrainian armed forces to use key weapons at US military bases in Germany.”’
On the topic of Lend Lease, it became a curious discovery that on the official U.S. Congress website, the date of the submission of Lend Lease to Congress was seen as 1/19/22.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/3522
https://www.rt.com/news/554747-senate-lend-lease-ukraine-advance/
So how is it that it was proposed a full month before Russia’s invasion on 2/24?
There are more military transfers being rushed to Ukraine: https://twitter.com/AZmilitary1/status/1520170505516503040
And reports like the following:
“Kiev secretly sent Kharkiv cadets to the United States to learn to fly the F-16, which will soon enter service with the Armed Forces of Ukraine under lend-lease Kiev decided in advance to retrain its pilots for the NATO fleet. As it became known to Readovka, the cadets of the Kharkiv Higher Military School were sent to one of the European NATO countries and to the United States in early February for emergency retraining in the management of American F-16s. The cadets were taken directly from the 4th year classes. All of them were transported in complete secrecy. Thus, it is more likely that NATO, together with Kiev, knew about the imminent deployment of a special operation of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and tried to work ahead of the curve. The law passed the day before by the US Congress authorizing the lend-lease of heavy weapons to Ukraine apparently involves the supply, among other things, of American F-16 fighters. There is also information that the lend-lease announced by the United States was launched solely to legalize the transfer of F-16 fighters to Ukraine. https://t.me/readovkanews/32369”
And:
From a Ukrainian channel: “The Pentagon has begun planning military operations for the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Donbas to contain the Russian army. The Ukrainian General Staff permanently hosts several dozen NATO generals in the status of military advisers who participate in the discussion and decision-making on key issues.”
“The General Staff permanently hosts several dozen NATO generals in the status of military advisers who participate in the discussion and decision-making on all key issues.”
So all of this brings me to the following big topic. Which is that there is a lot of conversation revolving around how the Russian SMO is going, with many people unable to reconcile the two opposing sides who both claim they are winning easily. Understandably this creates a strange paradoxical dichotomy where each side says they are smashing the other, and each side posts material that conveniently reflects their stated ‘strategy’ as evidence that everything is in fact going to plan.
i.e. Russia posts its advances and mass destruction of AFU units and says this is clear evidence of ongoing victory. And AFU posts its retreats and says that these are all strategic retreats and that Russia is in fact being both bled and led into a trap from which they will never emerge.
So I wanted to address this with some new material that can shed light and contextualize the U.S./Ukraine’s overall grand strategy.
In short, it is this: it is becoming increasingly clear that the grand strategy is to slowly abandon the Donbas, but in the process, slow down and attrition the Russian forces as much as possible, while simultaneously reconstituting a massively armed new NATO-standard army in the West.
Not only has NATO and U.S. both now released statements that they are readying for a “long war” of up to 10 years in Ukraine, but there are reports like the following:
“Our source in the OP said that the Office of the President (of Ukraine) is ready for a long war that will last 2-3 years. Kiev does not consider a possible defeat on the eastern front to be critical for Ukraine,
the main thing is that the battles for Donbas exhaust the Russian army and last for several months. Using time, the Armed Forces of Ukraine will receive modern heavy weapons and will be able to launch a counteroffensive in the South of Ukraine.”
In a recent interview on his youtube channel, chief presidential advisor Arestovich openly confirms the above. In fact he plainly tells host Feigin that with all the new NATO equipment coming in, it will take them about 1 to 2 months max to arm a new army in the west, and that Ukraine will be ready to create mass counter-offensives from the west starting in mid to late June.
So in short, their entire strategy is to stall Russian forces in the east as much as possible by conducting slow, orderly retreats, even if it means eventually giving up the entire Donbas – in fact in the same interview Arestovich says that he fully expects Russia to encircle Kramatorsk/Slavyansk but that it will turn into “another Mariupol”, or so he hopes. And then by late June, even if Donbas is lost, they expect to be able to retake it with massive new Ukrainian offensives utilizing newly reconstituted reserves armed with full NATO arsenals, from German tanks to American F-16’s and everything in between.
On the RF side, some already accuse them of heavy ‘coping’ and excuse making, where the narrative is now shifting from “we’re winning in the Donbas” to “it’s ok if we lose the Donbas, we’ll retake it later.”
In fact Arestovich foresaw all of this, in his famously prescient 2017 interview he not only predicted the Russian war to happen around 2022, but he said there will be at least 2 wars, possibly 3, one following in around 2024, then another 2026+ or later. The reason being is that, he foresaw a stalemate with Russia taking Donbas but being drained and depleted, forcing to compromise in a treaty that leaves western Ukraine. Then Ukraine would get armed to the teeth by NATO and a new war would take place a year or two later, similar to Chechnya 1 and 2 where Russia had to go in to finish the job a second time.
So this brings me to the issue of military hardware and who is winning. The main problem for the Ukrainian side, is they rely entirely on the belief (real or not) that they have endless reserves of manpower. Arestovich and others have said, “our problems are opposite, we have endless manpower but no equipment, and Russia has endless equipment but not enough manpower.”
The chief problem here is the blanket assumption that Ukraine has endless reserves and high remaining morale. But there is increasing evidence that this is not the case. Not only are mass surrenders increasing, but each time they happen the troops complain of the same things, low morale, high desertion rates, resentment towards their commanders. And increasingly the troops are from the far west, old, and haggard which proves that Kiev is already tapping its absolute reserves from the west of the country, rather than local reserves held back at 2nd and 3rd echelon lines like near Pavlograd, Poltava, etc.
Secondly, there is increasing discontent amongst the populace. Today in the far west city of Khust, where these reserves are already being tapped as I just outlined, the wives, mothers, and family of soldiers being sent to the front virtually rebelled and started destroying the local military offices, and this is becoming increasingly common:
They don’t want any more war.
I already reported last time how the ‘grand popular uprising’ that Zelensky promised (read: hoped for) of the molotov-armed partisans was a complete failure. In fact now, more and more we’re seeing secret pro-Russian underground resistance cells forming in all the major cities who have released videos and are promising to help take the city once Russia arrives. Such cells now exist in Kharkov, Nikolayev, Odessa, and elsewhere:
Odessa:
Kharkov:
And in Nikolayev, one report said: “According to available information, the elite of Nikolaev, businessmen, politicians, fellow bandits, are negotiating with the Russian side on the bloodless surrender of the city. Nobody wants to repeat the example of Mariupol
They ask for guarantees for the preservation of assets, business and participation in the political life of the city. There is a bargaining going on, while guarantees will not be provided to Kim, a different fate will await him.”
Though this is speculative, we know for a fact this very thing happened several times already, including a Kharkov mayor who was arrested for trying to peacefully hand over the city at the outset of the conflict.
Also, there is the belief that Ukraine maintains the giant pre-war numbers we were all given, but in fact it’s been greatly hidden by the authorities what vast amount of people, particularly military-aged men, have fled the country or gone into hiding, refusing service.
According to the Russian MOD almost 50,000 of AFU’s manpower has already been irrecoverably attritioned whether by KIA, MIA, WIA, POW, etc.
This was posted on a Ukrainian account: “Colleagues, we published that the Kremlin handed over lists of POWs, of which there are more than 4,000 thousand. For the Office of the President, this is a big problem, which they will not be able to keep silent about for a long time, in Kiev they are now looking for a formula on how to submit information to the public. Surrender is becoming a mass phenomenon, because of some brigade commanders who simply throw the guys on the tanks, while they themselves are tens of kilometers away from the fighting. Indicative in this regard is the case of the 93rd brigade, our soldiers got into a tactical encirclement , because of the tyranny of the command, and no one comes to their aid.”
Arestovich spoke on this in his newest interview where he said there has been a problem of mass morale loss of soldiers calling their relatives and saying that everything has gone to hell, but of course he continues to say that these soldiers are playing into the hands of Russian propaganda.
Today’s newest report is that 1000 AFU soldiers are now surrounded and trapped in Oskil, pushed against the bank of the Donetsk river without any vehicles to cross it. This could soon bring another 1000 POWs as well as the 2000 that will soon come from Azovstal.
Ukraine is losing 300-400 men per day to KIA and POW alone.
From RF MOD: “Losses of the Ukrainian side as a result of a special military operation of the RF Armed Forces on April 30, 2022
▪️During the day, the Armed Forces of Ukraine lost 556 people killed, wounded and captured. The total loss of killed, wounded and captured in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, NSU and State Border Service is over 47 thousand people.
▪️According to the internal report of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, 6 tanks, 39 armored vehicles, 21 field artillery and mortars, 7 MLRS, 25 vehicles and special equipment and 23 UAVs were lost.”
Just look at today’s newest graphic losses (18+++):
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian side continues to rely heavily on the belief that Russia is simply being attritioned faster, and this is what will lead to victory. Bellingcat reports that Russia has used up 70% of all its missiles. However, commentators were quickly to point out the following inconvenient fact:
The 2nd in command of Bellingcat said Russia would “collapse” by the coming Sunday, on March 4th.
The fact of the matter is, 50k of the AFU are gone, another 50k are trapped in Donbass and are slowly being grinded down. Millions have fled the country (Russia has taken 1+ million refugees alone, and much more went west, to europe and elsewhere) so we can expect that the vast majority of the fighting age males have left or gone underground.
Based on what we’re seeing on the frontlines, the most distant reserves already being used and depleted, the riots of family members in western Ukraine proving their last reserves are already being tapped, one can only conclude that Ukraine will not have anywhere near the numbers of fighters left to arm with all the incoming ‘NATO toys’.
On that note, read this illuminating new frontline report from a highly respected source, the famous Serb fighter in the Donbas, Dejan Beric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dejan_Berić)
In short, the public is now being conditioned to move the goalposts such that losing Donbas no longer means a loss in the war, but is just a momentary strategic retreat until the mighty NATO wunderwaffens from the West allow the AFU to strike back with a vengeance.
Last time I reported the bridge being blown in Slavyansk, pictured with the purple circle on the left:
Now they’ve blown the bridge even further east (red circle) in preparation for the coming reality.
And strangely, U.S. officials are now claiming Russia is only “days” behind schedule in Donbas, when previously it was weeks if not months.
And finally, reports now indicate that the British expect Putin to formally declare war on Ukraine on May 9th and begin mass mobilization.
“The British Ministry of Defense has reportedly seen indications that Russian President Putin is preparing a Statement for May 9th during the Victory Parade in Moscow, which its expected a General Mobilization and a Declaration of War against Ukraine will be declared.”
Of course this could be complete nonsense and propaganda on their behalf, or it could be another case of predictive programming, self-fulfilling fantasy. Just like when they ‘predicted’ Russia would invade in february but in actuality pushed Ukraine to bring a massive army to the Donbas contact line, start shelling Donbas and Russian territory in order to force Russia to invade, here may be the same situation. This could be a sign that they plan to massively escalate by invading Transnistria (and perhaps western Ukraine) and forcing Putin to mobilize so they can again claim it was Russia’s plan to do it on the heroic May 9th all along.
In fact MSM is already conditioning the public with what a response might look like to Russian nuclear use:
To conclude, we see that Ukraine’s strategy is try to bleed Russia in Donbas as much as possible before the eventual collapse and pull out, then ‘hope’ for huge amounts of reserves in the far west of the country to remain so they can be armed with NATO wunderwaffen for a big summer blockbuster Barbarossa offensive to unironically start by June 22.
By NATO’s own admission that they are ready to supply and stand with Ukraine for a war lasting “3 to 10 years”, we can infer that they understand Russia is in fact not running out of anything (be it manpower or supplies) any time soon, and that the war will in fact be long – the rest is just propaganda for public consumption.
There’s no more room for now to cover the likelihood or probability of any of these plans to work, perhaps next time. But for now I’ll leave you with one last stomach-turning story. In Hostomel, near Kiev, a Ukrainian video influencer decided to go out to one of the wrecked tanks, and found himself some remains of a ‘dead Russian soldier’, which he decided to cook and eat to great internet acclaim in his country.
(18+) for anyone with the stomach to watch:
Now whether this is a staged ‘stunt’ or not, the fact of the matter is on social media he was said to have gotten greatly positive feedback from many Ukrainians who urged others to go out and cannibalize dead Russian soldiers. This is just an insightful look into Ukrainian society and their inculcated, absolute inhuman hatred of Russians.
And of course there’s the unfortunate fact that experts have determined without a shadow of a doubt that the tank from which he foraged his unholy delicacy was in fact a Ukrainian T-64 (and not a Russian T-72), a tank Russia does not use (nor was DPR/LPR anywhere near Hostomel at any time).
You can draw the conclusions to what this means for the poor, attention-seeking, self-avowed cannibal.
Filed under: NATO Alliance, Russia, Ukraine | Tagged: AFU, Donbass, Dpr, Kharkiv, Mariupol, MOD, Nazi Ukrainian "Azov battalion", Odessa, Russian Army, US proxy wars, Zelensky | Comments Off on Sitrep: Operation Z
April 29, 2022
The only antidote to propaganda dementia is served by sparse voices of reason, which happen to be Russian, thus silenced and/or dismissed.
By Pepe Escobar, posted with the author’s permission and widely cross-posted
Especially since the onset of GWOT (Global War on Terror) at the start of the millennium, no one ever lost money betting against the toxic combo of hubris, arrogance and ignorance serially deployed by the Empire of Chaos and Lies.
What passes for “analysis” in the vast intellectual no-fly zone known as U.S. Think Tankland includes wishful thinking babble such as Beijing “believing” that Moscow would play a supporting role in the Chinese century just to see Russia, now, in the geopolitical driver’s seat.
This is a fitting example not only of outright Russophobic/Sinophobic paranoia about the emergence of peer competitors in Eurasia – the primeval Anglo-American nightmare – but also crass ignorance about the finer points of the complex Russia-China comprehensive strategic partnership.
As Operation Z methodically hits Phase 2, the Americans – with a vengeance – have also embarked on their symmetrical Phase 2, which de facto translates as an outright escalation towards Totalen Krieg, from shades of hybrid to incandescent, everything of course by proxy. Notorious Raytheon weapons peddler reconverted into Pentagon head, Lloyd Austin, gave away the game in Kiev:
“We want to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine.”
So this is it: the Empire wants to annihilate Russia. Cue to War Inc.’s frenzy of limitless weapon cargos descending on Ukraine, the overwhelming majority on the road to be duly eviscerated by Russian precision strikes. The Americans are sharing intel 24/7 with Kiev not only on Donbass and Crimea but also Russian territory. Totalen Krieg proceeds in parallel to the engineered controlled demolition of the EU’s economy, with the European Commission merrily acting as a sort of P.R. arm of NATO.
Amidst the propaganda dementia cum acute cognitive dissonance overdrive across the whole NATOstan sphere, the only antidote is served by sparse voices of reason, which happen to be Russian, thus silenced and/or dismissed. The West ignores them at their own collective peril.
Patrushev goes Triple-X unplugged
Let’s start with President Putin’s speech to the Council of Legislators in St. Petersburg celebrating the Day of Russian Parliamentarism.
Putin demonstrated how a hardly new “geopolitical weapon” relying on “Russophobia and neo-Nazis”, coupled with efforts of “economic strangulation”, not only failed to smother Russia, but impregnated in the collective unconscious the feeling this an existential conflict: a “Second Great Patriotic War”.
With off the charts hysteria across the spectrum, a message for an Empire that still refuses to listen, and doesn’t even understand the meaning of “indivisibility of security”, had to be inevitable:
“I would like to emphasize once again that if someone intends to interfere in the events taking place from the outside and creates threats of a strategic nature unacceptable to Russia, they should know that our retaliatory strikes will be lightning fast. We have all the tools for this. Such as no one can boast of now. And we won’t brag. We will use them if necessary. And I want everyone to know about it – we have made all the decisions on this matter.”
Translation: non-stop provocations may lead Mr. Kinzhal, Mr. Zircon and Mr. Sarmat to be forced to present their business cards in select Western latitudes, even without an official invitation.
Arguably for the first time since the start of Operation Z, Putin made a distinction between military operations in Donbass and the rest of Ukraine. This directly relates to the integration in progress of Kherson, Zaporozhye and Kharkov, and implies the Russian Armed Forces will keep going and going, establishing sovereignty not only in the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics but also over Kherson, Zaporozhye, and further on down the road from the Sea of Azov to the Black Sea, all the way to establishing full control of Nikolaev and Odessa.
The formula is crystal clear: “Russia cannot allow the creation of anti-Russian territories around the country.”
Now let’s move to an extremely detailed interview by Secretary of the Security Council Nikolai Patrushev to Rossiyskaya Gazeta, where Patrushev sort of went triple-X unplugged.
The key take away may be here: “The collapse of the American-centric world is a reality in which one must live and build an optimal line of behavior.” Russia’s “optimal line of behavior” – much to the wrath of the universalist and unilateralist hegemon – features “sovereignty, cultural and spiritual identity and historical memory.”
Patrushev shows how “tragic scenarios of world crises, both in past years and today, are imposed by Washington in its desire to consolidate its hegemony, resisting the collapse of the unipolar world.” The U.S. goes no holds barred “to ensure that other centers of the multipolar world do not even dare to raise their heads, and our country not only dared, but publicly declared that it would not play by the imposed rules.”
Patrushev could not but stress how War Inc. is literally making a killing in Ukraine: “The American and European military-industrial complex is jubilant, because thanks to the crisis in Ukraine, it has no respite from order. It is not surprising that, unlike Russia, which is interested in the speedy completion of a special military operation and minimizing losses on all sides, the West is determined to delay it at least to the last Ukrainian.”
And that mirrors the psyche of American elites: “You are talking about a country whose elite is not able to appreciate other people’s lives. Americans are used to walking on scorched earth. Since World War II, entire cities have been razed to the ground by bombing, including nuclear bombing. They flooded the Vietnamese jungle with poison, bombed the Serbs with radioactive munitions, burned Iraqis alive with white phosphorus, helped terrorists poison Syrians with chlorine (…) As history shows, NATO has also never been a defensive alliance, only an offensive one.”
Previously, in an interview with the delightfully named The Great Game show on Russian TV, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had once again detailed how the Americans “no longer insist on the implementation of international law, but on respect for the ‘rules-based world order’. These ‘rules’ are not deciphered in any way. They say that now there are few rules. For us, they don’t exist at all. There is international law. We respect it, as does the UN Charter. The key provision, the main principle is the sovereign equality of states. The U.S. flagrantly violates its obligations under the UN Charter when it promotes its ‘rules’”.
Lavrov had to stress, once again, that the current incandescent situation may be compared to the Cuban Missile Crisis: “In those years, there was a channel of communication that both leaders trusted. Now there is no such channel. No one is trying to create it.”
The Empire of Lies, in its current state, does not do diplomacy.
The pace of the game in the new chessboard
In a subtle reference to the work of Sergei Glazyev, as the Minister in Charge of Integration and Macroeconomics of the Eurasia Economic Union explained in our recent interview, Patrushev hit the heart of the current geoeconomic game, with Russia now actively moving towards a gold standard: “Experts are working on a project proposed by the scientific community to create a two-circuit monetary and financial system. In particular, it is proposed to determine the value of the ruble, which should be secured by both gold and a group of goods that are currency values, to put the ruble exchange rate in line with real purchasing power parity.”
That was inevitable after the outright theft of over $300 billion in Russian foreign reserves. It may have taken a few days for Moscow to be fully certified it was facing Totalen Krieg. The corollary is that the collective West has lost any power to influence Russian decisions. The pace of the game in the new chessboard is being set by Russia.
Earlier in the week, in his meeting with the UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres, Putin went as far as stating that he’d be more than willing to negotiate – with only a few conditions: Ukrainian neutrality and autonomy status for Donbass. Yet now everyone knows it’s too late. For a Washington in Totalen Krieg mode negotiation is anathema – and that has been the case since the aftermath of the Russia-Ukraine meeting in Istanbul in late March.
So far, on Operation Z, the Russian Armed forces have used only 12% of its soldiers,10% of its fighter jets, 7% of its tanks, 5% of its missiles, and 4% of its artillery. The pain dial is set to go substantially up – and with the total liberation of Mariupol and the resolution one way or another of the Donbass cauldron there is nothing the hysteria/propaganda/weaponizing combo deployed by the collective West can do to alter facts on the ground.
That includes desperate gambits such as the one uncovered by SVR – Russian foreign intel, which very rarely makes mistakes. SVR found out that the Empire of Lies/War Inc. axis is pushing not only for a de facto Polish invasion to annex Western Ukraine, under the banner of “historical reunification”, but also for a joint Romanian/Ukrainian invasion of Moldova/Transnistria, with Romanian “peacekeepers” already piling up near the Moldova border.
Washington, as the SVR maintains, has been plotting the Polish gambit for over a month now. It would “lead from behind” (remember Libya?), “encouraging” a “group of countries” to occupy Western Ukraine.
So partition is already on the cards. Were that ever to materialize, it will be fascinating to bet on which locations Mr. Sarmat would be inclined to distribute his business card.
Filed under: China, NATO Alliance, Poland, Putin, Russia, Russophobia, Serbia, Ukraine, WMD | Tagged: Antonio Guterres, “Empire of Lies”, Donbass, Donetsk, Lloyd Austin, Mariupol, Odessa, Operation Z., Pepe Escobar, Russia Sarmat Missile, Russia-China strategic partnership, SMO, Ukro-Neutrality, UN Charter, War on Terror, Zircon missile | Comments Off on Empire of Lies Eager to Receive Mr. Sarmat’s Business Card
Al Manar Strategic Culture Global Research The Saker Stephen Lendman Palestine news Land Destroyer Alahed News Mouqawamah Music Syria Times
UPROOTED PALESTINIANS: SALAM ALQUDS ALAYKUM 