If the conclusion of this is that Ukraine wins because Russia waited until after the Olympics and got stuck in the mud, plus a bunch of Russians parked in a 40 mile convoy and bailed, I’m going to laugh my ass off.
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I don’t believe any of those reports that try to make us feel better about how many people need to agree before nukes fly. It is an escalating situation that goes from mass bombardments, shooting down incoming NATO planes delivering supplies, outright war between NATO and Russia, tactical nukes, the big one. Each step seeming reasonable to the people in the chain of command.
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If Adidas does the same that may cause the gopniks to rise up!
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This church schism seems like a significant and underreported aspect of the invasion and underlying motivation.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2022/03/02/world/europe/russia-ukraine-orthodox-church.amp.html
A random thought: how hard would it be for Ukraine to sabotage Russia’s oil/gas infrastructure? Blowing up a pipeline seems like it could be an extremely cost-effective counterpunch.
This question seems rather I’ll defined. Can they blow up the pipeline through Ukraine, sure. But Russian oil and gas infrastructure is a wee bit more than that. I think it’s pretty much assumed at this point that most Russia oil will ultimately heading to China through southern pipelines at discount prices.
Think it would be a strategic mistake to blow up a Russian pipeline. The environmental impact could be huge while the economic impact on Russia would be minimal at this point so it won’t help the Ukraine war effort. What they are doing now is their best option. Dig in and inflict as many losses as they can fighting in their own country. It will keep the Western support coming and Afghanistan has shown it works very well although it will be at a big cost.
I’ve often though about what it would be like to sabotage the Nord Stream 1 offshore pipeline that goes through the Baltic from Russia to Germany. One of the biggest difficulties is that Ukraine doesn’t have a Baltic coast. And Russia captured the Ukrainian navy’s only submarine in 2014, although it seems that vessel was already obsolete and lacked qualified crew. It would be easier for Ukraine to attack the TurkStream pipeline that goes under the Black Sea to Turkey.
I don`t think we have had this one yet. No idea how credible the source is, but interesting analysis nontheless:
On second read, it seems to be the letter that @suzzer99 already posted a few hours ago, but as this version seems more readable on some devices, I will leave the link here.
So one third of a yacht?
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Obviously those athletes are not to blame and don’t deserve to be punished. On the other hand any of their success will be used as propaganda to distract from the war. Also it’s one of the things that might get through the censorship and the Russian citizens must realize that something big is happening when they are even banned from an event like this.
It’s more likely than not the Russian Paralympians are doping too, right? Just because they’re handicapped doesn’t mean they have more ethics than Russian Olympians.
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Doping is a given for Russian athletes.
This is a good video. Especially the first half that details the Russian preparations which in hindsight makes it seem so obvious that this was either the greatest, most expensive bluff ever or the invasion had been decided on at least 6 months ago.
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“Just say it wasn’t you”
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Maybe the Ukrainians are not attacking the 40 mile column on purpose because by just ignoring them but keeping them stuck they are basically creating a logistical nightmare just to keep these troops fed and vehicles fueled. It’s not exactly the same as the Allies leapfrogging strategy in the WWII Pacific theater but similar in that the enemy has much of their strength in a positions from which they cannot make a strategic impact, you just ignore them, and this kills morale in many ways (troops want an enemy to fight, they want to eat or stay warm but cannot be resupplied, they are left to just protect expensive equipment in the middle of nowhere that is doing nothing). Imagine getting sent to war and it is just a giant traffic jam with no food or shelter and likely little to no communication of when that will change for days and maybe weeks.
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yeah someone described it as “a huge POW camp, except the ukranians don’t have to feed them”
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I wonder how they do feed them once they go through whatever they were initially supplied with. Do the guys at the front yell to the back, “Hey somebody pass the bread!”?
Domino’s?
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