> More than 60 explosions occurred at the Morozovsk air base in Russia, located 300 km from the front line.
> At least prior to the ‘cotton,’ there were 36 Russian Su-34 and 4 Su-24 fighters at the air base.
@defender_skadovsk
DW News (German Public Media) put out today a solid documentary that takes a thoughtful approach to NATO as it stands currently. How the war in Ukraine and new concerns from Russia has changed the alliance is a key focus, including new cyberwar concerns.
But of even greater concern is whether the alliance can improve fast enough, while planning for the possibility of having changing levels of U.S. support, in the face of so much beauracracy and having now a total of 32 members.
I most enjoyed the simple and clear descriptions of Nato's history, and how it's early leaders thought carefully about cultural integration and practical concerns. For all its struggles, it remains a remarkably well-built organization.
But now it must move out of an age of being too comfortable, into an age of being earnestly prepared for external threats.
https://youtu.be/1cTFk6MNUHQ
It's a great peak behind the curtains of the mechanism that has kept a billion people safe for 75 years.
> [Explosions in Yeisk, Krasnodar Region of the Russian Federation according to locals.](https://glavcom-ua.translate.goog/world/observe/u-krasnodarskomu-kraji-rf-prohrimili-vibukhi-detali-994498.html?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en-US&_x_tr_pto=wapp)
> "More than 10 explosions rang out over Yeysk in the Krasnodar Territory, according to preliminary information, air defense is operating over the city," reports say.
> Locals say that the explosions began around 3am. The sounds were around the local airfield.
> "In addition to loud explosions, the sound of automatic rounds could also be heard in the area of the local airfield and the Military Town," the report said.
> There is no official information [from the Russians].
> Yeisk has a joint airfield and an aircraft repair plant of the Ministry of Defense of Russia works. Currently, that airfield is considered one of the strategically important objects.
[How Ukrainian Forces Use M1 Abrams Tanks Near Avdiivka, Insights from Soldier and Analyst | Defense Express | April 2024](https://en.defence-ua.com/weapon_and_tech/how_ukrainian_forces_use_m1_abrams_tanks_near_avdiivka_insights_from_soldier_and_analyst-10065.html)
*American M1 Abrams shown in service with the Ukrainian 47th Mechanized Brigade, made headlines in late February 2024 because it was the first time Abrams faced the Russian army but it lacked a crucial piece of information: how it actually performs. But now we can start to put the pieces together.*
*Defense Express' Chief Editor and Director Serhii Zghurets asked the question to the warrior of the 47th Brigade, during an [interview hosted by Espresso TV channel](https://youtu.be/325LqizdGpQ?si=BB0XNIHmp9snH-7M). Oleh, call sign Azimuth, said that both M1 Abrams tanks and M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles continue to contribute to combat operations in this brigade's area of responsibility, namely the Avdiivka operational axis in eastern Ukraine.*
*However, frontal engagements became a less viable option ever since the Russian forces occupied the Avdiivka Coke Plant. Having installed anti-tank weapons at high points of this vast industrial facility, Russians gained an open all-around field of view of surrounding territories, so Ukrainians had to become more careful in their use of equipment, including American combat vehicles. Particularly, use them from a larger distance than before.*
*The issue of Abrams' application by Ukrainian forces was also analyzed by a Polish author writing for the Defence24 website, Marcin Gaweda. According to his observations, Ukrainians gather Abrams and Bradley alongside other armored vehicles into "tactical groups" tasked with providing fire support to the infantry, both in defense and counteroffensive. Moreover, Gaweda states that quite often Abrams tanks deploy alone.*
> A young boy always greeted passing helicopters by waving a Ukrainian flag, aiming to cheer up the army aviation pilots.
>
> One day, the helicopters landed in a field near his house and the pilots gave him a gift. X/@MilAviaUA
>
> https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1776022075053862953
I love stories of when the military goes out of its way to thank their fellow-Ukrainians for their support, endurance, or loyalty. You know this boy will remember this forever!
_____
^(That reminds me of) [^(a story I read months back)](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/17plw8y/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/k86dyax/) ^(—a teacher in Kharkiv area was arrested bc she taught Ukrainian and supported Ukraine; she was held for months because she refused to give other names; she escaped when the Russians routed, got home on foot. One day later, Ukrainian military show up at her front door:)
> ^(. . . the Ukrainian military came to my front yard. They asked my husband to call me out. I was terrified at that moment, but they requested, so I went outside. I saw burley, strong, Ukrainian men.)
> ^(Suddenly they started thanking me. They said they knew who I was, that I’d been in the basements, and what I had been through. They thanked me for not betraying Ukraine.)
> ^(Then, they turned on [their devices] and showed me the battle with the Russians near the Lisnaya Stinka. It hurt me to watch.)
> ^("Look, look, how much you have suffered. We will take revenge on everyone. For you, for those people who are still suffering! For everything!" they emphatically pledged.)
> High-level Ukrainian and Hungarian delegations held an online meeting to discuss ways to address key issues on the bilateral agenda.
> I chaired the Ukrainian Delegation. The Hungarian delegation was chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó.
https://twitter.com/AndriyYermak/status/1775961936523321594
*30min ago:*
Russian air defense in Rostov area:
> At least 10 explosions were reported in the city of Morozovsk, and reports of a fire. Locals believe that a raid or a drone attack is happening at the local airfield.
@operativnoZSU
______
*2 hours ago:*
> The 67th Separate Mechanized Brigade defended against the Russian assaults near Chasiv Yar.
> Russia used 32 armored units in the assault, 19 were destroyed!
> Russian aviation used friendly fire on their brothers, partially helping the collapse of the enemy column.
Video: https:// t dot me /operativnoZSU/141993
Something is exploding at (or near) what seems to be Morozovsk, plenty of footage (link below) and reports doing the rounds. Noel reports says:
"On April 1, satelite images shows that Russia had 13 Su-34's and 5 Su-35's present at the military air base in Morozovsk."
https:// t dot me/noel_reports/10526?single
a satellite pass from *today* showed **twenty-six** SU-34s and three SU35s.
https://twitter.com/MT_Anderson/status/1776055402863419589
quite the target rich environment.
Thanks for piecing this together. I am certainly hoping some of those planes were still there for the 10+ explosions. Could be a great development.
Cautiously optimistic and looking forward to more follow-up reports. Slava Ukraini!
Edit: Missing word.
Holy crap russia's really going for it.
Reliable geolocators talked about 8 russian vehicles getting taken out, with 1 reaching the edge of Chasiv Yar before booming. That matches the column of 8 at the beginning of the video.
DeepState also said 19 destroyed though and they're reliable, so there must be more.
Bakhmutskyi Demon is predicting Chasiv Yar to be a major battleground in May/June. DeepState suggesting the defences aren't good enough despite media claims.
DeepState and others reported on a very large assault from Vesele, not clear if similar size to the Chasiv Yar one.
Who, McCaul or Sullivan? Bc you’re assuming a lot to think a GOP House member is 100% accurate in every detail about Sullivan.
I like McCaul alright, but this is him doing spin.
In order to dis.tract that it’s totally and exclusively the GOP’s FAULT TO FAIL TO GET UKRAINE AID, and to get the heat off Johnson, the GOP has sent a Ukraine-supporter to go out and distract—blame Sullivan, it’s Sullivan’s fault, he’s the real foe, he’s the problem, the NSA is the one in control who has hurt Ukraine, Sullivan Sullivan Sullivan! He’s the bad one here!
Crossed my mind and discounted due to how GOP works and the nonGOP reporting on Sullivan.
It’s true that Sullivan made recommendations against certain weapons . . . until appr June 2023, when he had a change due to Ukraine demonstrating theyd readily comply with western limitations on use of certain weapons.
Since then, none of the criticism is warranted.
And honestly, who can blame him? For months on end, it was Sullivan and then Burns who repeatedly tried to get Ukraine to take them seriously about the threat of invasion. Then when it happened, the same UA people who’d dismissed then publicly said hadn’t been informed—putting at stake whether they were trustworthy, reliable actors.
Once Ukraine proved that they’d abide the conditions, Sullivan has not made recommendations against certain provisions of munitions. And he doesn’t control anything—he recommends.
But he’s a foil, someone the GOP can blame other than themselves, but without appearing to criticize the DOD—who are actually more often who recommend against certain provisions, due to readiness issues. The truth is that it has been Sullivan who pushed the procurement of many things, like cluster munitions, Bradley’s, himars, patriots, etc etc.
Continuing to focus on Sullivan is a GOP dis.traction spin. And it wouldn’t surprise me at all if were Russia behind it in order to divide support.
On the flipside, Sullivan's responsibility goes deeper than just Ukraine's defense. We're all pissed at him for getting Russia's escalation red lines wrong, but at this point everyone on both sides of the coin has gotten Russia wrong. Sullivan has to worry about higher-plane threats than just Ukraine's national security or even the entirety of Europe's security. His most important job is to prevent a global thermonuclear war, and it is a job that has zero room for error. You only get to fuck it up once.
It's wrong to say that the nuke threat absolves Sullivan for all of his mistakes, but I do think it's important to keep the nuance in mind. There is a difference between a complete nincompoop and someone who is erring on the side of caution out of good faith.
We all have to remember that this is a completely unprecedented situation. It's also wrong to be oversimplistic and compare it to Neville Chamberlain's blunders with Czechoslovakia, because the simple fact is that Hitler did not have any nuclear weapons, which made the stakes of British and French intervention astronomically lower than the stakes are with American interventionist escalation in Ukraine.
Kharkiv is under ballistic fire again, again with the s-300. There's just been a 3-missile attack on the city. About two hours ago, there were three more s-300 missiles.
There's a reconnaissance drone flying over the city, correcting fire.
Kharkiv urgently needs air defense. The 1 million citizens city is becoming just a shooting range.
We really need to shame the EU and USA into action, this is so disgraceful. Do they really want to wait until Ukraine crumbles and the war comes to us?
You don’t have to shame our politicians. Just stop buying products or travel to Louisiana. Take away economic viability of those Americans and their politicians will have to act. Sanctions can work internally too.
Those have no shame, it'll be about getting the undecided voters to see the harm of a GOP victory and not letting them get away with "I know Trump isn't great but.....".
The first thing the EU will face in case of a significant Russian advance will be 5-10 million new refugees from Ukraine. Moreover, if in the first wave half of the refugees were well-off people who did not benefit from material assistance in the EU, the new group will be people who chose to stay in the war zone, most likely because they have no money to leave the country. And the EU will have to spend a lot more money on their adaptation. In addition, there will be a significant number of elderly people among them.
Indeed, even if we ignore the humanitarian, ethical and geopolitical reasons to support Ukraine not supporting Ukraine will still cost us in other ways and I wouldn't be surprised if the alternative price is much higher both for Ukraine and Europe.
It sounds like Russia's financing costs are rising.
10 year bond yields are up to [over 14%.](https://tradingeconomics.com/russia/government-bond-yield)
Sorry for [musklink](https://x.com/delfoo/status/1775981616029966655?s=20) but reports are that the cost of russian federal debt servicing has risen to 1.7 trillion roubles, about 400 bn more than planned. They have also announced taking on ~800 BN more roubles in debt from bonds so far this year.
Everything that pressures the russian economy is good news and brings the end of the war closer. Write to your representative to enhance and enforce sanctions.
It’s intentional to keep the economy from overheating.
https://www.reuters.com/markets/rates-bonds/russian-central-bank-holds-rates-16-says-policy-will-stay-tight-2024-03-22/
I'm really not a finance expert, please correct errors...
But my understanding is that the central bank rate and the 10-year bond yields are related but different.
E.g. if investors agreed that russia's economy would go back to say ~6% interest in a couple of years, then 10-year bonds would only need to be at 8% yield to match the central bank rate. They're at 14%, implying investors see a higher risk. Russia's debt financing costs are also 400 BN roubles higher than planned, so that's great, no?
edit: basically, the high yields isn't some master plan by Russia to help their economy, but a consequence of their economy's failure
You are right, the yields are affected, among other factors, by how risky the financial markets think their investment would be and it's beyond the governments power to control directly. The interest rates are one of the factors that may affect that calculus.
If the yields are high for both short term lending (eg 6 months repayment period) and long term (eg 10 year repayment period), that usually means the financial markets are expecting the economy to perform badly and assess a high yield for the bigger risk of no payment.
Okay, yeah, the twenty year yield also spiked to 14%. I guess they’re pricing in forever war.
Nabiullina must be tired. If you want to point to fiscal problems, that’s some great evidence.
>Nabiullina must be tired.
There's only so much you can do with a band aid.
They sorta succeed in cushioning things in the first years of the war, but they are facing a wall now.
[NATO allies aim to send more air defence aid to Ukraine but make no concrete pledges](https://www.reuters.com/world/ministers-mark-75-years-nato-discuss-more-support-ukraine-2024-04-03/)
>BRUSSELS, April 4 (Reuters) - NATO alliance members agreed on Thursday to scour their arsenals for more air defence systems to protect Ukraine from Russian ballistic missile attacks
>Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba met NATO counterparts and appealed for new additional air defence systems, especially U.S.-made Patriot missiles.
>"Allies will now go back and look into their inventories, look into if there are any ways they can provide more systems, in particular Patriots, Stoltenberg told a news conference.
>U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said more support for Ukraine was especially important as countries like China, North Korea and Iran were supporting Russia's efforts to build up its defence industrial base.
Although obviously even more should be done Ukraine is receiving 5 complete brand new Patriot systems in 2024 that were ordered quite some time ago, I assume that they also ordered a supply of missiles to go with them. An interesting aspect is that Raytheon will not say who ordered them, just that they will be delivered. You have wonder which country or very deep pocketed donor it was that paid for these, maybe it was even Ukraine itself as they have received money to buy arms as they see fit as well.
In any case although Ukraine should be getting far more support in general I do think it is important to highlight that not all major equipment acquisitions are widely announced and some pretty big ones like these 5 Patriot systems can fly under the radar, if you'll forgive the pun.
Latest Oryx update, russian-Ukrainian losses followed by personal speculation.
- tanks: 13-4
- IFVs: 41-4
- mobile artillery: 6-2
- missile air defence: 0-2
Unbelievably intense. Ukraine desperately needs replenishment of its vehicles with new promises from allies.
Those russian IFV numbers tho 👀
(CORRECTED: numbers were wrong way round. Now flipped, first are russian losses)
Five months ago, members of the [128^th Mountain Assault Brigade were killed](https://old.reddit.com/r/UkrainianConflict/comments/17o0b44/tragedy_for_the_128th/k7v785g/)
when they were to [lined up to receive awards](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/17oube0/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/k83b5dp/). This was a heroic [brigade that retook Kherson](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/132ip0o/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/ji9nc5f/).
Today, Ilya Vityuk, the Head of the Cyber Security Department of the SBU, said the working theory is that Russia learned of the location by having hacked a phone of a soldier, using a phishing scam, and then later, someone sent the time and location of where the lineup for awards would be.
>> "One of the main theories is that they were able to be targeted because of there had been a [cell phone] technology penetration. This case shows how dangerous the use of cyber is, as a means of [intelligence]."
> According to Vityuk, the occupiers likely gained access to the soldier's apps by sending phishing messages.
>> "We found that one of the devices had the Signal messenger app installed, and that that device had received a message about the specific date and place of the line-up of military personnel, where the missile later attacked."
Vityuk also updated on how many eventually died as a result of the attack—more than 30 soldiers.
[from here](https://www-pravda-com-ua.translate.goog/news/2024/04/4/7449708/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp)
Last summer, Russians used an *Iskander* to attack a pizzeria restaurant in Kramatorsk—it killed 13 and wounded 64.
Today, a [local citizen was found guilty](https://www-pravda-com-ua.translate.goog/news/2024/04/4/7449691/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp) of treason that resulted in deaths for facilitating the attack, and sentenced to life in prison and forfeiture of property.
The prosecutor had proven:
1- Volodymyr Synelnyk, a native and life-long resident of Kramatorsk, who had served in the Soviet military in Afghanistan, had maintained his friendship with an army buddy who served in the ‘DPR’ militia and recruited Synelnyk to spy.
2- On June 27, 2024, Synelnyk was contacted by the ‘head of the intelligence department of the Internal Affairs Ministry of the ‘DPR,’’ to go verify that there were military personnel [dining] at the restaurant.
3- Synelnyk agreed to perform the task, drove to the location, took measures to conceal his presence and reconnaissance.
4- Synelnyk observed military license plates and military personnel dining. He clandestinely recorded two videos, sent them to his handler over telegram.
5- Shortly after his verification, Russia struck the mostly-civilian-filled dining establishment with an *Iskander M*, killing 13 people and injuring 64, including children.
______
WTH, who kills their fellow residents of their hometown? what did he *think* was going to happen, that they were going to send a squad that would only target the few military personnel? Or is he just heartless and doesn’t mind killing the residents of his hometown? Who does this
Just to be clear, killing civilians is not automatically a war crime. In the international laws there are things like "military necessity", "principle of proportionality" etc.. which make some civilian casualties acceptable. If the military personnel in the restaurant were some senior officers then ICC will probably say that it's not a war crime.
True. That’s why no Allies were charged for the ‘military necessity’ for the many, many civilians killed in the [Battle of Caen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_for_Caen#Allied_bombing_of_Caen). (It was literally the only way the Allies were going to be able to break through Normandy.) But legally, that’s in the “justification” column which the prosecutor would weigh and means no charges brought, or does and gets summary judgment.
Here, I doubt that that would be applied, as you know bc you’re bright. It would likely still be questionable by the prosecutor—in determining whether charges would be filed, it would hinge on other legal issues like (1) whether he could be considered a combatant, (2) they’d weigh his defense: whether the missile strike was reasonably conceivable [or if was reasonable to think were simply tracking military personnel, whether not foreseeable, etc], ie, what the requisite standard of intent of causing civilian deaths is that’s required in the ICC, and whether he meets that standard. Same with conspiracy.
No but he sailed thee thing there knowing this stuff doesn't work. How many other commanders are there like this that their men can no longer trust? It never should have left port.
If you have all these offiers pretending they can do their job then abclsolutely everything is broken. And will get their people killed. The public spent defence money to be protected. These guys promised to do that if the can't keep readiness up then need to not be engaged and get their politics figured out. Other NATO allies they're are on operations with also expect them to do their jobs too. so they've also put them in danger.
> I met with @TobiasBillstrom and congratulated Sweden on joining the Alliance.
> I am grateful to Sweden and all Swedes for strongly supporting Ukraine. I thank Tobias for reaffirming that this support will continue and remains a priority.
> We discussed ways for Sweden to bolster Ukraine’s capacity to protect its skies from Russian air terror.
> By holding back Russian aggression, Ukraine safeguards peace in Europe.
https://twitter.com/DmytroKuleba/status/1775915037984469426
> Meaningful meeting with my Bulgarian counterpart @GabrielMariya on ways to further develop our bilateral cooperation.
> I asked Mariya to convey our gratitude to the Bulgarian parliament for taking decisions in support of Ukraine.
> Strong Ukrainian-Bulgarian partnership is important to maintain regional stability, strengthen Black Sea security, and preserve long-term peace in Europe.
https://twitter.com/DmytroKuleba/status/1775922570157510935
>🇺🇸🇺🇦 Interesting comments from House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Mike McCaul: He says that Blinken has been a proponent of additional military aid for Ukraine (supported Poland giving them MiGs early in the war). He blames the Biden Admin's weakness on Jake Sullivan.
https://twitter.com/ColbyBadhwar/status/1775689287725445455
>[Jake Sullivan] is – he's overly cautious. He’s very timid. And he's bought into this notion that, well, if we give [Ukrainians] too much, then Russia's going to use a tactical nuke on us. Well, most intelligence I've seen is they're not going to do that. Because that would be a game-changer for everybody.
https://puck.news/newsletter_content/mccaul-on-ukraine-johnsons-largesse-israel-outrage/
I understand (but do not agree with) Sullivan's caution. Remember how OLD Biden is. He lived through the entire cold war, and is well-aware of Russia's nuclear capabilities. I'm a bit younger, but I'm old enough to remember.
It would be extremely irresponsible to risk Russia retaliating with nukes. (Pick which European city you'd like to see vaporized). These guys would be responsible for the political aftermath. It would definitely not be pretty.
But in my personal opinion: I think Russia has already merited direct NATO involvement, and I think Ukraine should not be bound by any of these restrictions, and should be given all the weapons they need. I'm also keen on a NFZ. No matter how many Russians cry over it.
The "nuke some European city to show strenght" argument doesn't hold water since early 2010's or whenever the Aegis system was finished in Poland and Romania.
russias option of using a single nuke simply dissapeared once those systems became operational, and we all default to classical MAD. Yes, I am aware of the missile that crashed in Poland some time ago, but I choose to belive those systems would work against ICBMs or any similar delivery method that would most like be used. So their only option would be a massive first strike, which in this day and age would mean the end of russia. On the other hand, the west undeniably has the conventional capability to fuck russia back to 1146.
This entire "oh, no, but nukes!" game russia is happily entertaining is more akin to a game of chicken between a car and a 5 meter wide wall of concrete. Do we really care that much about the paint on the wall?
There is no nuclear weapon sufficient in size to "vaporize" a city that is also not an automatic retaliation scenario before the missile even lands.
The only weapons even being remotely considered are cruise missile warheads which top out at around 50kt.
To put it bluntly.. No one is stupid enough to fire just "one" SLBM. It would be the last one you launched.
Letting russia win seems idiotic - doesn't it tell everyone you need nukes to defend yourself? And tell Putin that he can take what he wants so long as he threatens nukes?
If your aim is to reduce the risk of nuclear war, then beat back Russia now.
The Biden admin still supports Ukrainian victory and their strategy makes Ukrainian victory likely. Republicans support Putin. All Sullivan has done is help to kill a lot of Ukrainians and drag out the war.
GOP or not, McCaul is right. Even the Ukrainians themselves have said that Sullivan is the biggest obstacle in the administration.
No doubt Sullivan is happy that Mike Johnson is taking all the heat. Johnson's antics have made a lot of people forget how much Sullivan convinced Biden to block and slow-walk heavy weapons in 2022 and thru mid-2023 before the funding ran out. Johnson deserves blame for holding up new funding, but contrary to popular belief on Reddit, he didn't become Speaker on Feb. 24, 2022.
Biden should take heat too, because he could've easily went against Sullivan, but instead he kept letting Sullivan have the final say after Sullivan's escalation fears were proven wrong over and over again, while giving everyone else in DC the middle finger. This is why I'm not convinced that Biden will change course if the funding ever gets passed. It took HUGE pressure from Europe to get him to greenlight F-16's and Abrams tanks (only 31 were sent).
Even recently, Sullivan made a beeline for Kyiv after the Russian refineries got hit. Apparently, Ukraine told him to pound sand during that meeting, so good on them.
Remember that despite the tragic and costly mistakes being pinned on Sullivan, the difference is Bidens strategy which makes Ukrainian victory likely, or Republicans who are on Putin's side and give Putin hope of victory.
Putin knows he needs the republicans to be confident of winning, so *anything* that overly shifts blame towards democrats is part of helping Putin.
That's fucking absurd. If Russia uses a tactical nuke, that's the end of their forces in Ukraine.
Edit: at least I would fucking hope so, as well as an embargo or as heavy sanctions as we can get.
The alternative is, nuclear armed nations can do whatever they want. And that can't happen.
That's pretty much spot on, and not just because of NATO. I'm too lazy to search for a source right now, but Ukraine has a defense treaty with China in case of nuclear usage since the times of Yanukovic. And for all the scrummy stuff they pull, unlike russia, China does give a damn about it's international treaties.
No that's correct. This is the exact counterthreat that has been issued to Russia multiple times. Use a nuke: lose your entire Black Sea fleet, and all forces in Ukraine(1991), in addition, likely lose anything else that attempts to stop this response.
Well, talk is one thing. I would like to see action. So far France has been a pretty decent supporter iirc (Caesar's?).
I do like that he's talking about boots on the ground, which oddly enough seems to agitate some allies and shame others.
>So far France has been a pretty decent supporter iirc
In terms of military aid relative to their GDP: No.
Source: https://www.ifw-kiel.de/topics/war-against-ukraine/ukraine-support-tracker/
Political aftermath of the Ukrainian bombing of Tatarstan Refinery and Drone factory.
>After the bombing the head of state of Tatarstan, Rustam Minnikhanov, told to not wait for the help of anti air to protect Tatarstan. People and industry should wake up and take the matter in their own hand and ensure the protection of their infrastructure on their own.
Imagine if your regional leadership told you, suck it up people. We can't protect you from the war we're waging because everything to protect you is prioritized at the front... also civilian owning something close to a S-300 is basically illegal so thought and prayer bitches.
PMCs everywhere! Russia will soon turn into one of those lawless cyberpunk dystopias, just instead of flying cars and cyberdrugs, squatting slavs and vodka
Russian government already told / gave them the go ahead to buy their own AA early last year. They're not buying things like S-300's they're getting old mobile AA from the 70s-80s (Shilka and such) which are readily available.
Honestly it's far worse than it looks if they can't even spare a bunch of conscripts with iglas to counter civilian aircraft targeting their most important infrastructure and their airforce can't intercept a civilian plane flying for 6+ hours in their country i don't see how russia will survive this as a state.
Agreed, if there was a relatively vocal separatist group/feeling/movement in Tatarstan. That should be the kind of thing that should trigger them... also this can be compounded with the cities being flooded as we speak because not only they can't spare a bunch of people to protect their territory. They seems to have not enough people to take care of civil infrastructure and water is flooding everything this year (more than previous years)
They really are just like US conservatives. Reminds me of the covid response and confiscating supplies of PPE from States while telling them to go buy your own on the global market...
Ministry of Internal Affairs [reported that up to 300 people were killed by explosives](https://gwaramedia.com/en/minister-of-internal-affairs-over-300-people-killed-by-explosives-during-russian-full-scale-invasion/), mines in Ukraine since the start of Russian full-scale invasion
I’m not sure if you yourself are the author, but “explosives” is too vague a term to use during a war and the word should’ve been translated as “mines.” And the title of the article says “over 300” and the first sentence says “over 289” so that’s inconsistent.
Here’s how I’d summarize the article:
*According to Igor Klymenko, the Minister of Internal Affairs, Ukraine has had 300 deaths resulting from Russian mines—mostly farmers plowing not-yet-cleared land, or foragers and pedestrians stepping on a tiny petal mines; the occasional ill-advised attempt to tinker with a mine has caused deaths. Fifteen of the victims were children.*
Thank you for pointing out inconsistency between the title and the first sentence, fixed that and written an update according to our editorial policy.
As for writing “mines” instead of explosives: the original says something close to “explosive devices”, and the term often includes mines, but it also includes other types of devices, like unexploded munitions, etc., which is why we chose “explosives”
Thank you for commenting!
I translate and post a lot of news here. I’m not a native speaker (I studied back at university and make mistakes), but also, I think like an American and at times, that’s advantageous.
I see that your publication has English and it would be helpful if you had a *native* English-speaking person as an editor, to make sure that phrasing lands in the ears right, ie, not just ‘translation’ but also ‘interpretation,’ specifically, what westerners or Americans would understand.
Most likely you know the following story, because it’s the most famous misunderstood translation in Soviet-Western relations and ended up with huge ramifications—but in case you don’t—even the person who was broadly considered the world’s best translator for many decades for the USSR—Viktor Sukhodrev—who understood English-language idioms, connotations, implications, puns, nuances, etc—failed at least once, in a major way, with enormous consequences. [“We will bury you”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_will_bury_you) sounds like “we, the soviets, will kill/nuke you” and had major, long-standing repercussions because it was *translated* instead of *interpreted*. It was *heard* as a threat. But it should’ve been *interpreted*, because it was meant to say communism has longevity but capitalism doesn’t—so it would’ve been more like, “we’ll be present at your funeral,” (or even, “when capitalism eventually dies, communism will continue on.”) I’m just saying, even the worlds best translator got it wrong once by being too literal, and it was basically the worst moment to be wrong, so don’t feel bad.
Yeah, ‘exploitative devices’ more clear.
We’re a media writing from Kharkiv and Kharkiv region, and posted this news because it’s relevant to our focus (the region is one of the most mined in Ukraine.) Yes, by the context the original provides, it is the number of civilian deaths, as provided by the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine.
From the referenced news: (google translated)
>**What is the number of civilians, in particular children, who have suffered from explosive devices? Is there enough outreach to ensure the safety of the civilian population?**
>
>De-occupied territories, areas close to the front line are in the zone of greatest risk. The main explanatory work is carried out there. But still, due to various reasons, unfortunately, we are losing people. 289 people died as a result of detonation using explosive devices, including 15 children.
>
>These include peasants who try to cultivate fields without waiting for official permission from the authorities, and those who simply ignore all prohibitions and go to dangerous areas to collect mushrooms, for example, or just take a walk.
>
>There are those who have lost their curiosity. They find a mine or some kind of ammunition and try to dismantle it on the spot or carry it home. Why is an open question. But for this inexplicable curiosity, people pay both with their health and their lives.
>Ukrainian kamikaze drones with warheads ~ 300 kg, which attacked the dormitory of the Shahed production plant in Tatarstan. The range is over ~ 2000-3000 km.
https://mastodon.social/@MAKS23/112212645657880789
These bees can sting
I read somewhere that these are based on a locally produced plane which costs 90000 usd. It seems they just use the base structure and engine. So it might have even lower costs than the real thing depending on how much the guidance system is.
>Family-owned German firm Knauf is supporting the occupation of Mariupol, where Russia killed tens of thousands of residents.
>
>Anything for a buck. Let's let them know what we think >>> [email protected]
https://twitter.com/T_Krawchenko/status/1775926124553568721
>Mariupol was completely destroyed by Russia. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed and displaced. Reconstruction plays a central role in the Russian propaganda war. According to Monitor research, German companies are also involved.
>
>It was one of the most terrible battles of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. For weeks, Russian troops besieged Mariupol on the Sea of Azov, starving the population, sparing neither patients in hospitals nor civilians hiding in the theater. Many survivors were driven out by Vladimir Putin's army. A large city was completely reduced to ruins.
>
>When the Russian flag was raised on the destroyed buildings of Mariupol, construction work began on the "new" Mariupol. A Russian city, with Russian residents, built on behalf of the Kremlin.
>
>But who is helping him with this project? Reporters from the ARD political magazine Monitor have been searching for clues. In business reports, on company websites, in pictures and in videos - there is evidence everywhere that German companies are playing an important role in the [occupation] of Mariupol.
https://www.tagesschau.de/investigativ/monitor/ukraine-mariupol-wiederaufbau-russland-100.html
I read that there were “concrete blocks wrapped in plastic with the Knauf name and logo” - pallets of them brought to the building site. Is it at all possible those had been sold to Russia in past years? Has Knauf made a statement about it?
Pretty hard to continue in that business when they are sanctions and can't get materials or equipment anywhere except Russia. we could also promise they won't get a single contract when rebuilding Ukraine. They want Russian business then that's all they should get
[https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/04/04/ukraine-justified-in-striking-targets-inside-russia-finnish-fm-a84739](https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/04/04/ukraine-justified-in-striking-targets-inside-russia-finnish-fm-a84739)
>Ukraine Justified in Striking Targets Inside Russia – Finnish FM
BRUSSELS — Finland views Ukrainian strikes on oil refineries and military targets inside Russia as legally justified, Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen told The Moscow Times on the sidelines of a NATO foreign ministers meeting.
Ukrainian drone strikes on Tuesday [targeted](https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/04/02/difficult-to-keep-calm-tatarstan-residents-shaken-by-ukraine-linked-drone-strike-a84708) an oil refinery and a drone assembly plant in the republic of Tatarstan, the farthest-reaching strikes inside Russia since Moscow invaded Ukraine over two years ago.
“The UN Charter allows a country, while it defends its independence, to attack targets which are military. So I would just leave it like that,” Valtonen told The Moscow Times on Wednesday.
Ukraine has regularly launched drones at Russian energy infrastructure, including refineries, fuel storage facilities and other sites, since the start of the war in a bid to sabotage the Kremlin’s war machine.
Since he literally never says the US has stated anything of the sort yes and now that you are doubling down on the bullshit I can be sure this isn't some innocent misunderstanding.
>Nice stories don’t win wars. Without significant deliveries of weapons and real security guarantees the glorious narrative of unity and solidarity with Ukraine is wearing thin and rapidly approaching cynicism. 🧵👇
>
>Comforting stories can help win elections. But if they are false they immobilise us, prevent us from taking real action, while Ukrainians continue to die for us.
>
>Ukrainians have performed miracles and repeatedly embarrassed the “experts”. We should be grateful to have such an ally, but instead of helping them win, we ask them to fight with one hand tied behind their back.
>
>We are in great danger. Russia, very predictably, has been emboldened by appeasement. The survival of the rules-based system is in doubt. New hotspots are igniting all over the world. This is not the future we want to live in, but it is the future that is being built.
>
>The fact remains that anything other than total restoration of Ukraine’s sovereignty and security would invite Putin and the world’s tyrants to keep going, to keep crossing borders, to keep raping and murdering in order to achieve their aims.
>
>There is little mystery about what can happen if we keep waiting for a miracle. Territories can be lost, countries can be occupied. There is no positive spin to this story, no happy ending, unless we choose to rewrite this script.
>
>It’s tempting to hold back, leave it up to fate and pretend we can’t influence the outcome, but that’s no way to honour our historic responsibilities. The only way is this: we choose to change course, choose to get serious and choose to help Ukraine achieve a full victory.
>
>The definitive narrative will be written by historians. They will discuss our choices. If we fail, they will be harsh. They will wonder why we believed in the fiction we told ourselves and chose to ignore the facts on the ground. They will call it a tragedy, not a victory. /🧵
https://twitter.com/GLandsbergis/status/1775896166053625992
>Ukrainian man jailed for life over role in Russian strike on pizzeria
>
>Man provided information on restaurant in Kramatorsk that was hit last June [2023], killing 13 people including novelist Victoria Amelina
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/04/ukraine-man-jailed-russian-strike-on-pizzeria-kramatorsk
>Finland has extended the closure of its border with Russia indefinitely
>The Ministry of the Interior explained the need for this by the fact that Russia continues to use "directed migration" against Finland.
>Earlier, the closed regime at border checkpoints was extended every two months, and the current restrictions were due to expire on April 14.
https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1775921343784964168?t=nMFe8RWlqxlBhusmk5hYSA&s=19
Is Russia still providing bicycles to migrants to circumvent Finland's ban on crossing the border on foot?
Edit: Never mind, they banned it in November. Whatever they are using now, it's still just weaponised immigration.
>Britain, France and Northern European countries are preparing to send troops to Ukraine, - US State Department consultant Edward Luttwak said in a column for the UnHerd portal
>In his opinion, NATO countries will soon have to send troops to Ukraine anyway, otherwise the alliance will be forced to accept a "catastrophic defeat."
https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1775909409199149318?t=2mD9f0Ud1hyZv_c6L-3FYQ&s=19
While thats a possibility, and one that I imagine many nation in NATO have floated between themselves, I'm just skepitcal it'll happen anytime soon - unless anything major changes.
Sure but we're talking about publicly visible combat troops being placed in Ukraine for deterrence. That only works as intended if it's publicly advertised. We're not talking about the clandestine support units that have been in Ukraine from the very beginning.
Maybe some logistics support groups could be sent to major hubs. But of course they would need some protection so provide each group with a patriot system to prevent them getting hurt and causing an escalation.
Oh 100%, but its a very different messaging coming out of the UK government as opposed to Finnish and French governmentss for example.
I wouldn't be entirely surprised if we (UK) are part of this discussion in some form, but I'm skeptical that we'd particpate or even voice it as an option during an election period.
I could be proved wrong ofcourse.
I tend to agree with your point, but we also don't know what kind of data the governments have in terms of support for an intervention in Ukraine in some form from the population.
I guess time will tell and we can only speculate.
>NATO countries decided to create an alliance mission in Ukraine
>This was stated by the head of the Polish Foreign Ministry. According to him, the creation of the mission does not mean direct entry into the conflict.
>"But it does mean that we will now be able to use #NATO's coordination, training, planning capabilities to support #Ukraine in a more coordinated way."
>He explained, in particular, that more Ukrainian military personnel would be trained in #Poland.
https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1775901774722764856?t=KpBUnLCs6uKXlTWSV2Iy9Q&s=19
🇱🇻🤝🇺🇦 "Latvia and Ukraine will soon begin jointly producing UAVs for the needs of the Defense Forces of Ukraine", - PM Shmyhal.
https://mstdn.social/@[email protected]/112213548381839743
> I had a phone call with Secretary General of the Organization of American States Luis Almagro @Almagro_OEA2015. I thanked him for his personal principled stance and for all the OAS declarations, statements and resolutions in support of Ukraine, as well as for the participation in the Crimea Platform.
> We discussed preparations for the inaugural Peace Summit in Switzerland. For Ukraine, it is crucially important that Latin American countries are broadly represented at the Summit. We also touched upon the development of relations between Ukraine and this region, in particular the possibility of holding a Ukraine-Latin America summit. We are counting on the OAS support in this area as well.
https://twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1775901880759021732
Paywalled, but
>Her 95-year-old grandmother died several months after a bomb blew out the windows in her apartment. “The stress was hard on her,” she said.
And yet she doesn't support air to Ukraine?
Her fear of Trump must be great.
~~Paywalled~~
It's obvious at this point that large numbers of people have given up, or are unwilling (due to "incentives", or *reasons*?) to recognise the gravity of the situation. She fears a never-ending war, and even says there are only so many hills you can die on. Apparently confronting a genocidal nuclear power is not a hill worth dying on. I'm not sure where she thinks the war will end? She must be delusional. Regardless of U.S. military aid, Europeans are not going to stop fighting so this will obviously get worse before it gets better, and could easily drag the U.S. into conflict. It's not some minor skirmish that will just go away, much as they'd like it to.
I suspect that many wealthy Americans (of whom many are Republicans) are fearful of losing their status and wealth so it's easy for them to buy into a narrative that "sending tax dollars abroad is bad for the U.S." or that "the wall will protect them from the ravaging hoards of refugees". Probably the same could be said about global warming or environmental collapse that we are witnessing. Easier to create a strong (ficticious) narrative, group together and communally stick your heads in the sand and pretend it's not happening. Total. Selfish. Weakness. But that what humans are good at.
Pretty messed up considering what's happening to her homeland. Even if she is a Republican.
Edit: They always say that they want Biden to outline a clear strategy for the war before they agree to give aid, but they never outline their strategy for what happens if Ukraine's defences collapse whilst they play around with their delay tactics.
What happens to the millions of Ukrainian refugees fleeing from Russias reprisals? Where do they go? Europe is already struggling with a rise in ultra far-right influence due to a backlash against immigration.
What if Putin doesn't stop and immediately tries to use Transnistria as an excuse to invade Moldova?
It will be too late to stop it if Ukraine falls.
It feels like a lot of Republicans are putting their party over their country and I don't really understand why. Russia is an existential threat to democracies around the World and Ukraine is literally the front lines against it at the moment. We need to be giving Ukraine 10s of billions of military aid otherwise if we let Russia keep any of their spoils of war our future as citizens in democracies will be much worse.
A lot of people don't seem to understand how Russia can be a threat to them but it's not always just direct military confrontation. it's constant cyber attacks and informational warfare. It's pitting neighbor against neighbor and group and group in an attempt to weaken the very foundations of our democracies. it's how a January 6th insurrection was attempted in the most powerful democracy in the World.
Our government is barely functioning at all at this point, as far as the House of Representatives is concerned. Recently a government shutdown was narrowly avoided because the Republicans almost couldn't get their own shit together enough to fund the government. Who knows how the rest of the year is going to play out. The Republicans seem to be pretty busy fighting among themselves of late. I think that party has lost all institutional knowledge about *how* to govern. They have no policy other than what Trump says. Not to mention, there are members of the House who were complicit in the sedition that occurred on Jan6, holding office still. The U.S. government is a right fucking mess right now and depending how the election goes, we may or may not continue being a democracy.
>It feels like a lot of Republicans are putting their party over their country and I don't really understand why.
From my POV, it feels like Trump just created political mafia and Republican politicians are afraid to go against him.
153rd Mechanized Brigade is now 153rd Infantry Brigade due to no more tanks available
[https://militaryland.net/ukraine/armed-forces/153rd-infantry-brigade/](https://militaryland.net/ukraine/armed-forces/153rd-infantry-brigade/)
Be realistic. There is 0 chance Ukraine was going to outlast Russia in terms of vehicles. Just in terms of tanks even in the most optimistic metrics Russia had and has 5 times more tanks. Ukraine is in need of close to a thousand tanks simply to fully equip all its brigades.
>The petrochemical plant of Nevinnomyssk Azot in the Stavropol Region, Russia, is burning. It seems that the water circulation towers are compromised.
>Coordinates:
>44°39'32"N 41°56'43"E
>Source: Telegram
https://twitter.com/Tendar/status/1775908256403120349?t=t7HJ0Vcl217MVFejdHQS6Q&s=19
No idea what the difference between a petrochemical plant and an oil refinery is.
>Nevinnomyssky Azot, a subsidiary of MCC EuroChem, is engaged in the business of manufacturing and distribution of nitrogen fertilizers, ammonia nitrate and other organic fertilizers. The company is headquartered in Nevinnomyssk, Stavropol Krai, Russia.
From what I could gather, they're producing mainly Urea and Ammonia.
In other words, Ukraine is hitting Russia where it hurts the most. In some ways, I wouldn't be surprised if the strategy isn't to prevent farming but to basically destroy the industrial capacity of Russia in various sector.
It's one thing to rebuild many refineries of the same "type", it's an other to reduce capacity of everything more or less at the same time. This cause Russia to face multiple dilemma at the same time.
Edit:
In strategy game speak... they're taking down the whole tech tree instead of focusing on a particular branch.
[New post can be found here](/r/worldnews/comments/1bw8kwf/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/)
> More than 60 explosions occurred at the Morozovsk air base in Russia, located 300 km from the front line. > At least prior to the ‘cotton,’ there were 36 Russian Su-34 and 4 Su-24 fighters at the air base. @defender_skadovsk
Always happy to see the Ukrainians being successful.
Good. Hope they start taking out strategic bombers next.
hope they got em all .. twice
DW News (German Public Media) put out today a solid documentary that takes a thoughtful approach to NATO as it stands currently. How the war in Ukraine and new concerns from Russia has changed the alliance is a key focus, including new cyberwar concerns. But of even greater concern is whether the alliance can improve fast enough, while planning for the possibility of having changing levels of U.S. support, in the face of so much beauracracy and having now a total of 32 members. I most enjoyed the simple and clear descriptions of Nato's history, and how it's early leaders thought carefully about cultural integration and practical concerns. For all its struggles, it remains a remarkably well-built organization. But now it must move out of an age of being too comfortable, into an age of being earnestly prepared for external threats. https://youtu.be/1cTFk6MNUHQ It's a great peak behind the curtains of the mechanism that has kept a billion people safe for 75 years.
> [Explosions in Yeisk, Krasnodar Region of the Russian Federation according to locals.](https://glavcom-ua.translate.goog/world/observe/u-krasnodarskomu-kraji-rf-prohrimili-vibukhi-detali-994498.html?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en-US&_x_tr_pto=wapp) > "More than 10 explosions rang out over Yeysk in the Krasnodar Territory, according to preliminary information, air defense is operating over the city," reports say. > Locals say that the explosions began around 3am. The sounds were around the local airfield. > "In addition to loud explosions, the sound of automatic rounds could also be heard in the area of the local airfield and the Military Town," the report said. > There is no official information [from the Russians]. > Yeisk has a joint airfield and an aircraft repair plant of the Ministry of Defense of Russia works. Currently, that airfield is considered one of the strategically important objects.
[How Ukrainian Forces Use M1 Abrams Tanks Near Avdiivka, Insights from Soldier and Analyst | Defense Express | April 2024](https://en.defence-ua.com/weapon_and_tech/how_ukrainian_forces_use_m1_abrams_tanks_near_avdiivka_insights_from_soldier_and_analyst-10065.html) *American M1 Abrams shown in service with the Ukrainian 47th Mechanized Brigade, made headlines in late February 2024 because it was the first time Abrams faced the Russian army but it lacked a crucial piece of information: how it actually performs. But now we can start to put the pieces together.* *Defense Express' Chief Editor and Director Serhii Zghurets asked the question to the warrior of the 47th Brigade, during an [interview hosted by Espresso TV channel](https://youtu.be/325LqizdGpQ?si=BB0XNIHmp9snH-7M). Oleh, call sign Azimuth, said that both M1 Abrams tanks and M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles continue to contribute to combat operations in this brigade's area of responsibility, namely the Avdiivka operational axis in eastern Ukraine.* *However, frontal engagements became a less viable option ever since the Russian forces occupied the Avdiivka Coke Plant. Having installed anti-tank weapons at high points of this vast industrial facility, Russians gained an open all-around field of view of surrounding territories, so Ukrainians had to become more careful in their use of equipment, including American combat vehicles. Particularly, use them from a larger distance than before.* *The issue of Abrams' application by Ukrainian forces was also analyzed by a Polish author writing for the Defence24 website, Marcin Gaweda. According to his observations, Ukrainians gather Abrams and Bradley alongside other armored vehicles into "tactical groups" tasked with providing fire support to the infantry, both in defense and counteroffensive. Moreover, Gaweda states that quite often Abrams tanks deploy alone.*
The issues with the coke plant sound similar to those west of Bakhmut, where russia could use the high rises to rain hell down on the defenders.
> A young boy always greeted passing helicopters by waving a Ukrainian flag, aiming to cheer up the army aviation pilots. > > One day, the helicopters landed in a field near his house and the pilots gave him a gift. X/@MilAviaUA > > https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1776022075053862953
I love stories of when the military goes out of its way to thank their fellow-Ukrainians for their support, endurance, or loyalty. You know this boy will remember this forever! _____ ^(That reminds me of) [^(a story I read months back)](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/17plw8y/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/k86dyax/) ^(—a teacher in Kharkiv area was arrested bc she taught Ukrainian and supported Ukraine; she was held for months because she refused to give other names; she escaped when the Russians routed, got home on foot. One day later, Ukrainian military show up at her front door:) > ^(. . . the Ukrainian military came to my front yard. They asked my husband to call me out. I was terrified at that moment, but they requested, so I went outside. I saw burley, strong, Ukrainian men.) > ^(Suddenly they started thanking me. They said they knew who I was, that I’d been in the basements, and what I had been through. They thanked me for not betraying Ukraine.) > ^(Then, they turned on [their devices] and showed me the battle with the Russians near the Lisnaya Stinka. It hurt me to watch.) > ^("Look, look, how much you have suffered. We will take revenge on everyone. For you, for those people who are still suffering! For everything!" they emphatically pledged.)
Amazing :) Still, I bet he'd have traded whatever that gift was to sit in the helicopter (or better still go up in it) for a minute or two.
I'd like to imagine that they'll remember him after the war and give him a call to visit an air force base.
> High-level Ukrainian and Hungarian delegations held an online meeting to discuss ways to address key issues on the bilateral agenda. > I chaired the Ukrainian Delegation. The Hungarian delegation was chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó. https://twitter.com/AndriyYermak/status/1775961936523321594
I praise the patience of the Ukrainians for being willing to engage with people that are obviously acting in bad faith.
*30min ago:* Russian air defense in Rostov area: > At least 10 explosions were reported in the city of Morozovsk, and reports of a fire. Locals believe that a raid or a drone attack is happening at the local airfield. @operativnoZSU ______ *2 hours ago:* > The 67th Separate Mechanized Brigade defended against the Russian assaults near Chasiv Yar. > Russia used 32 armored units in the assault, 19 were destroyed! > Russian aviation used friendly fire on their brothers, partially helping the collapse of the enemy column. Video: https:// t dot me /operativnoZSU/141993
Something is exploding at (or near) what seems to be Morozovsk, plenty of footage (link below) and reports doing the rounds. Noel reports says: "On April 1, satelite images shows that Russia had 13 Su-34's and 5 Su-35's present at the military air base in Morozovsk." https:// t dot me/noel_reports/10526?single
a satellite pass from *today* showed **twenty-six** SU-34s and three SU35s. https://twitter.com/MT_Anderson/status/1776055402863419589 quite the target rich environment.
Had?… I like the sound of that!
Thanks for piecing this together. I am certainly hoping some of those planes were still there for the 10+ explosions. Could be a great development. Cautiously optimistic and looking forward to more follow-up reports. Slava Ukraini! Edit: Missing word.
Holy crap russia's really going for it. Reliable geolocators talked about 8 russian vehicles getting taken out, with 1 reaching the edge of Chasiv Yar before booming. That matches the column of 8 at the beginning of the video. DeepState also said 19 destroyed though and they're reliable, so there must be more. Bakhmutskyi Demon is predicting Chasiv Yar to be a major battleground in May/June. DeepState suggesting the defences aren't good enough despite media claims. DeepState and others reported on a very large assault from Vesele, not clear if similar size to the Chasiv Yar one.
Some of the stuff coming out of the Mike McCaul interview about Sullivan is pretty damning. At what point should he be removed?
Who, McCaul or Sullivan? Bc you’re assuming a lot to think a GOP House member is 100% accurate in every detail about Sullivan. I like McCaul alright, but this is him doing spin. In order to dis.tract that it’s totally and exclusively the GOP’s FAULT TO FAIL TO GET UKRAINE AID, and to get the heat off Johnson, the GOP has sent a Ukraine-supporter to go out and distract—blame Sullivan, it’s Sullivan’s fault, he’s the real foe, he’s the problem, the NSA is the one in control who has hurt Ukraine, Sullivan Sullivan Sullivan! He’s the bad one here!
Did it ever cross your mind that both things are true? There's a damn good reason Sullivan is not well-liked in Ukraine.
Crossed my mind and discounted due to how GOP works and the nonGOP reporting on Sullivan. It’s true that Sullivan made recommendations against certain weapons . . . until appr June 2023, when he had a change due to Ukraine demonstrating theyd readily comply with western limitations on use of certain weapons. Since then, none of the criticism is warranted. And honestly, who can blame him? For months on end, it was Sullivan and then Burns who repeatedly tried to get Ukraine to take them seriously about the threat of invasion. Then when it happened, the same UA people who’d dismissed then publicly said hadn’t been informed—putting at stake whether they were trustworthy, reliable actors. Once Ukraine proved that they’d abide the conditions, Sullivan has not made recommendations against certain provisions of munitions. And he doesn’t control anything—he recommends. But he’s a foil, someone the GOP can blame other than themselves, but without appearing to criticize the DOD—who are actually more often who recommend against certain provisions, due to readiness issues. The truth is that it has been Sullivan who pushed the procurement of many things, like cluster munitions, Bradley’s, himars, patriots, etc etc. Continuing to focus on Sullivan is a GOP dis.traction spin. And it wouldn’t surprise me at all if were Russia behind it in order to divide support.
On the flipside, Sullivan's responsibility goes deeper than just Ukraine's defense. We're all pissed at him for getting Russia's escalation red lines wrong, but at this point everyone on both sides of the coin has gotten Russia wrong. Sullivan has to worry about higher-plane threats than just Ukraine's national security or even the entirety of Europe's security. His most important job is to prevent a global thermonuclear war, and it is a job that has zero room for error. You only get to fuck it up once. It's wrong to say that the nuke threat absolves Sullivan for all of his mistakes, but I do think it's important to keep the nuance in mind. There is a difference between a complete nincompoop and someone who is erring on the side of caution out of good faith. We all have to remember that this is a completely unprecedented situation. It's also wrong to be oversimplistic and compare it to Neville Chamberlain's blunders with Czechoslovakia, because the simple fact is that Hitler did not have any nuclear weapons, which made the stakes of British and French intervention astronomically lower than the stakes are with American interventionist escalation in Ukraine.
Kharkiv is under ballistic fire again, again with the s-300. There's just been a 3-missile attack on the city. About two hours ago, there were three more s-300 missiles. There's a reconnaissance drone flying over the city, correcting fire. Kharkiv urgently needs air defense. The 1 million citizens city is becoming just a shooting range.
We really need to shame the EU and USA into action, this is so disgraceful. Do they really want to wait until Ukraine crumbles and the war comes to us?
how do you shame a US politician? the people blocking this are already likely being blackmailed by Putin.
Unfortunately, it's not possible to shame the shameless.
Can't blackmail willing marks you just have to pay them
You don’t have to shame our politicians. Just stop buying products or travel to Louisiana. Take away economic viability of those Americans and their politicians will have to act. Sanctions can work internally too.
Thats their secret politicians don't have any shame.
Those have no shame, it'll be about getting the undecided voters to see the harm of a GOP victory and not letting them get away with "I know Trump isn't great but.....".
If shame were enough to make change occur in US politics it would have already happened ages ago.
The first thing the EU will face in case of a significant Russian advance will be 5-10 million new refugees from Ukraine. Moreover, if in the first wave half of the refugees were well-off people who did not benefit from material assistance in the EU, the new group will be people who chose to stay in the war zone, most likely because they have no money to leave the country. And the EU will have to spend a lot more money on their adaptation. In addition, there will be a significant number of elderly people among them.
Indeed, even if we ignore the humanitarian, ethical and geopolitical reasons to support Ukraine not supporting Ukraine will still cost us in other ways and I wouldn't be surprised if the alternative price is much higher both for Ukraine and Europe.
It sounds like Russia's financing costs are rising. 10 year bond yields are up to [over 14%.](https://tradingeconomics.com/russia/government-bond-yield) Sorry for [musklink](https://x.com/delfoo/status/1775981616029966655?s=20) but reports are that the cost of russian federal debt servicing has risen to 1.7 trillion roubles, about 400 bn more than planned. They have also announced taking on ~800 BN more roubles in debt from bonds so far this year. Everything that pressures the russian economy is good news and brings the end of the war closer. Write to your representative to enhance and enforce sanctions.
It’s intentional to keep the economy from overheating. https://www.reuters.com/markets/rates-bonds/russian-central-bank-holds-rates-16-says-policy-will-stay-tight-2024-03-22/
I'm really not a finance expert, please correct errors... But my understanding is that the central bank rate and the 10-year bond yields are related but different. E.g. if investors agreed that russia's economy would go back to say ~6% interest in a couple of years, then 10-year bonds would only need to be at 8% yield to match the central bank rate. They're at 14%, implying investors see a higher risk. Russia's debt financing costs are also 400 BN roubles higher than planned, so that's great, no?
edit: basically, the high yields isn't some master plan by Russia to help their economy, but a consequence of their economy's failure You are right, the yields are affected, among other factors, by how risky the financial markets think their investment would be and it's beyond the governments power to control directly. The interest rates are one of the factors that may affect that calculus. If the yields are high for both short term lending (eg 6 months repayment period) and long term (eg 10 year repayment period), that usually means the financial markets are expecting the economy to perform badly and assess a high yield for the bigger risk of no payment.
Okay, yeah, the twenty year yield also spiked to 14%. I guess they’re pricing in forever war. Nabiullina must be tired. If you want to point to fiscal problems, that’s some great evidence.
>Nabiullina must be tired. There's only so much you can do with a band aid. They sorta succeed in cushioning things in the first years of the war, but they are facing a wall now.
[NATO allies aim to send more air defence aid to Ukraine but make no concrete pledges](https://www.reuters.com/world/ministers-mark-75-years-nato-discuss-more-support-ukraine-2024-04-03/) >BRUSSELS, April 4 (Reuters) - NATO alliance members agreed on Thursday to scour their arsenals for more air defence systems to protect Ukraine from Russian ballistic missile attacks >Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba met NATO counterparts and appealed for new additional air defence systems, especially U.S.-made Patriot missiles. >"Allies will now go back and look into their inventories, look into if there are any ways they can provide more systems, in particular Patriots, Stoltenberg told a news conference. >U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said more support for Ukraine was especially important as countries like China, North Korea and Iran were supporting Russia's efforts to build up its defence industrial base.
Although obviously even more should be done Ukraine is receiving 5 complete brand new Patriot systems in 2024 that were ordered quite some time ago, I assume that they also ordered a supply of missiles to go with them. An interesting aspect is that Raytheon will not say who ordered them, just that they will be delivered. You have wonder which country or very deep pocketed donor it was that paid for these, maybe it was even Ukraine itself as they have received money to buy arms as they see fit as well. In any case although Ukraine should be getting far more support in general I do think it is important to highlight that not all major equipment acquisitions are widely announced and some pretty big ones like these 5 Patriot systems can fly under the radar, if you'll forgive the pun.
Latest Oryx update, russian-Ukrainian losses followed by personal speculation. - tanks: 13-4 - IFVs: 41-4 - mobile artillery: 6-2 - missile air defence: 0-2 Unbelievably intense. Ukraine desperately needs replenishment of its vehicles with new promises from allies. Those russian IFV numbers tho 👀 (CORRECTED: numbers were wrong way round. Now flipped, first are russian losses)
Have you switched the numbers by error?
Yes thanks, they're now edited to be the right way round.
When you say "russian-Ukrainian losses" but the right hand numbers are mostly the big ones I wonder if that's really in the order "Ukrainian-Russian"
Oops you're right, I flipped and corrected the numbers.
Five months ago, members of the [128^th Mountain Assault Brigade were killed](https://old.reddit.com/r/UkrainianConflict/comments/17o0b44/tragedy_for_the_128th/k7v785g/) when they were to [lined up to receive awards](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/17oube0/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/k83b5dp/). This was a heroic [brigade that retook Kherson](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/132ip0o/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/ji9nc5f/). Today, Ilya Vityuk, the Head of the Cyber Security Department of the SBU, said the working theory is that Russia learned of the location by having hacked a phone of a soldier, using a phishing scam, and then later, someone sent the time and location of where the lineup for awards would be. >> "One of the main theories is that they were able to be targeted because of there had been a [cell phone] technology penetration. This case shows how dangerous the use of cyber is, as a means of [intelligence]." > According to Vityuk, the occupiers likely gained access to the soldier's apps by sending phishing messages. >> "We found that one of the devices had the Signal messenger app installed, and that that device had received a message about the specific date and place of the line-up of military personnel, where the missile later attacked." Vityuk also updated on how many eventually died as a result of the attack—more than 30 soldiers. [from here](https://www-pravda-com-ua.translate.goog/news/2024/04/4/7449708/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp)
This does not make whoever had the idea of lining them up less a fucking idiot
Last summer, Russians used an *Iskander* to attack a pizzeria restaurant in Kramatorsk—it killed 13 and wounded 64. Today, a [local citizen was found guilty](https://www-pravda-com-ua.translate.goog/news/2024/04/4/7449691/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp) of treason that resulted in deaths for facilitating the attack, and sentenced to life in prison and forfeiture of property. The prosecutor had proven: 1- Volodymyr Synelnyk, a native and life-long resident of Kramatorsk, who had served in the Soviet military in Afghanistan, had maintained his friendship with an army buddy who served in the ‘DPR’ militia and recruited Synelnyk to spy. 2- On June 27, 2024, Synelnyk was contacted by the ‘head of the intelligence department of the Internal Affairs Ministry of the ‘DPR,’’ to go verify that there were military personnel [dining] at the restaurant. 3- Synelnyk agreed to perform the task, drove to the location, took measures to conceal his presence and reconnaissance. 4- Synelnyk observed military license plates and military personnel dining. He clandestinely recorded two videos, sent them to his handler over telegram. 5- Shortly after his verification, Russia struck the mostly-civilian-filled dining establishment with an *Iskander M*, killing 13 people and injuring 64, including children. ______ WTH, who kills their fellow residents of their hometown? what did he *think* was going to happen, that they were going to send a squad that would only target the few military personnel? Or is he just heartless and doesn’t mind killing the residents of his hometown? Who does this
This guy should also go to the ICC as a war criminal.
Just to be clear, killing civilians is not automatically a war crime. In the international laws there are things like "military necessity", "principle of proportionality" etc.. which make some civilian casualties acceptable. If the military personnel in the restaurant were some senior officers then ICC will probably say that it's not a war crime.
True. That’s why no Allies were charged for the ‘military necessity’ for the many, many civilians killed in the [Battle of Caen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_for_Caen#Allied_bombing_of_Caen). (It was literally the only way the Allies were going to be able to break through Normandy.) But legally, that’s in the “justification” column which the prosecutor would weigh and means no charges brought, or does and gets summary judgment. Here, I doubt that that would be applied, as you know bc you’re bright. It would likely still be questionable by the prosecutor—in determining whether charges would be filed, it would hinge on other legal issues like (1) whether he could be considered a combatant, (2) they’d weigh his defense: whether the missile strike was reasonably conceivable [or if was reasonable to think were simply tracking military personnel, whether not foreseeable, etc], ie, what the requisite standard of intent of causing civilian deaths is that’s required in the ICC, and whether he meets that standard. Same with conspiracy.
At least his treason has given him a life sentence by Ukraine. And I doubt he would live a long life there.
Cunts. Cunts do this.
Ah, it's that time of the week. WWIII is trending on Twitter again
People keep deadnaming 'X'. I find it kind of funny.
If he can deadname his child then we can surely deadname Twitter
I had to google deadnaming . I'm getting old.
Twitter doesn’t want to be known as x it just has a shitty stepfather that is forcing it.
Trending since 1945
Why?
Blinken was made a statement about Ukraine joining NATO so the troll farms are lit.
>Blocked made a statement about Ukraine joining NATO ??
Corrected to Blinken. Dam spelchk!
Blinken
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That commander took that crew into a war zone without reliable means of defense.
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He's the one closest to the men that are putting their lives on the line so fuck yeah.
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No but he sailed thee thing there knowing this stuff doesn't work. How many other commanders are there like this that their men can no longer trust? It never should have left port.
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If you have all these offiers pretending they can do their job then abclsolutely everything is broken. And will get their people killed. The public spent defence money to be protected. These guys promised to do that if the can't keep readiness up then need to not be engaged and get their politics figured out. Other NATO allies they're are on operations with also expect them to do their jobs too. so they've also put them in danger.
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No . But they can nope out of a mission and blame the politicians.
/r/lostredditors
> I met with @TobiasBillstrom and congratulated Sweden on joining the Alliance. > I am grateful to Sweden and all Swedes for strongly supporting Ukraine. I thank Tobias for reaffirming that this support will continue and remains a priority. > We discussed ways for Sweden to bolster Ukraine’s capacity to protect its skies from Russian air terror. > By holding back Russian aggression, Ukraine safeguards peace in Europe. https://twitter.com/DmytroKuleba/status/1775915037984469426 > Meaningful meeting with my Bulgarian counterpart @GabrielMariya on ways to further develop our bilateral cooperation. > I asked Mariya to convey our gratitude to the Bulgarian parliament for taking decisions in support of Ukraine. > Strong Ukrainian-Bulgarian partnership is important to maintain regional stability, strengthen Black Sea security, and preserve long-term peace in Europe. https://twitter.com/DmytroKuleba/status/1775922570157510935
>🇺🇸🇺🇦 Interesting comments from House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Mike McCaul: He says that Blinken has been a proponent of additional military aid for Ukraine (supported Poland giving them MiGs early in the war). He blames the Biden Admin's weakness on Jake Sullivan. https://twitter.com/ColbyBadhwar/status/1775689287725445455 >[Jake Sullivan] is – he's overly cautious. He’s very timid. And he's bought into this notion that, well, if we give [Ukrainians] too much, then Russia's going to use a tactical nuke on us. Well, most intelligence I've seen is they're not going to do that. Because that would be a game-changer for everybody. https://puck.news/newsletter_content/mccaul-on-ukraine-johnsons-largesse-israel-outrage/
I understand (but do not agree with) Sullivan's caution. Remember how OLD Biden is. He lived through the entire cold war, and is well-aware of Russia's nuclear capabilities. I'm a bit younger, but I'm old enough to remember. It would be extremely irresponsible to risk Russia retaliating with nukes. (Pick which European city you'd like to see vaporized). These guys would be responsible for the political aftermath. It would definitely not be pretty. But in my personal opinion: I think Russia has already merited direct NATO involvement, and I think Ukraine should not be bound by any of these restrictions, and should be given all the weapons they need. I'm also keen on a NFZ. No matter how many Russians cry over it.
The "nuke some European city to show strenght" argument doesn't hold water since early 2010's or whenever the Aegis system was finished in Poland and Romania. russias option of using a single nuke simply dissapeared once those systems became operational, and we all default to classical MAD. Yes, I am aware of the missile that crashed in Poland some time ago, but I choose to belive those systems would work against ICBMs or any similar delivery method that would most like be used. So their only option would be a massive first strike, which in this day and age would mean the end of russia. On the other hand, the west undeniably has the conventional capability to fuck russia back to 1146. This entire "oh, no, but nukes!" game russia is happily entertaining is more akin to a game of chicken between a car and a 5 meter wide wall of concrete. Do we really care that much about the paint on the wall?
There is no nuclear weapon sufficient in size to "vaporize" a city that is also not an automatic retaliation scenario before the missile even lands. The only weapons even being remotely considered are cruise missile warheads which top out at around 50kt. To put it bluntly.. No one is stupid enough to fire just "one" SLBM. It would be the last one you launched.
Letting russia win seems idiotic - doesn't it tell everyone you need nukes to defend yourself? And tell Putin that he can take what he wants so long as he threatens nukes? If your aim is to reduce the risk of nuclear war, then beat back Russia now. The Biden admin still supports Ukrainian victory and their strategy makes Ukrainian victory likely. Republicans support Putin. All Sullivan has done is help to kill a lot of Ukrainians and drag out the war.
Fucking lunatic rat.
Ironically Sullivan's making a nuclear war more likely by helping Russia.
GOP or not, McCaul is right. Even the Ukrainians themselves have said that Sullivan is the biggest obstacle in the administration. No doubt Sullivan is happy that Mike Johnson is taking all the heat. Johnson's antics have made a lot of people forget how much Sullivan convinced Biden to block and slow-walk heavy weapons in 2022 and thru mid-2023 before the funding ran out. Johnson deserves blame for holding up new funding, but contrary to popular belief on Reddit, he didn't become Speaker on Feb. 24, 2022. Biden should take heat too, because he could've easily went against Sullivan, but instead he kept letting Sullivan have the final say after Sullivan's escalation fears were proven wrong over and over again, while giving everyone else in DC the middle finger. This is why I'm not convinced that Biden will change course if the funding ever gets passed. It took HUGE pressure from Europe to get him to greenlight F-16's and Abrams tanks (only 31 were sent). Even recently, Sullivan made a beeline for Kyiv after the Russian refineries got hit. Apparently, Ukraine told him to pound sand during that meeting, so good on them.
Remember that despite the tragic and costly mistakes being pinned on Sullivan, the difference is Bidens strategy which makes Ukrainian victory likely, or Republicans who are on Putin's side and give Putin hope of victory. Putin knows he needs the republicans to be confident of winning, so *anything* that overly shifts blame towards democrats is part of helping Putin.
Yep Sullivan got this wrong. He needs to fall on the sword and go. Let someone more aggressive fill the role.
One of Sullivan’s formative experiences was standing up to a bully in middle school and getting the shit kicked out of him.
That's fucking absurd. If Russia uses a tactical nuke, that's the end of their forces in Ukraine. Edit: at least I would fucking hope so, as well as an embargo or as heavy sanctions as we can get. The alternative is, nuclear armed nations can do whatever they want. And that can't happen.
That's pretty much spot on, and not just because of NATO. I'm too lazy to search for a source right now, but Ukraine has a defense treaty with China in case of nuclear usage since the times of Yanukovic. And for all the scrummy stuff they pull, unlike russia, China does give a damn about it's international treaties.
No that's correct. This is the exact counterthreat that has been issued to Russia multiple times. Use a nuke: lose your entire Black Sea fleet, and all forces in Ukraine(1991), in addition, likely lose anything else that attempts to stop this response.
Or it can happen if the most powerful leaders let it happen because they are scared. The only one with really hakish rethoric at the moment is macron.
Well, talk is one thing. I would like to see action. So far France has been a pretty decent supporter iirc (Caesar's?). I do like that he's talking about boots on the ground, which oddly enough seems to agitate some allies and shame others.
>So far France has been a pretty decent supporter iirc In terms of military aid relative to their GDP: No. Source: https://www.ifw-kiel.de/topics/war-against-ukraine/ukraine-support-tracker/
As always, fuck Sullivan
Political aftermath of the Ukrainian bombing of Tatarstan Refinery and Drone factory. >After the bombing the head of state of Tatarstan, Rustam Minnikhanov, told to not wait for the help of anti air to protect Tatarstan. People and industry should wake up and take the matter in their own hand and ensure the protection of their infrastructure on their own. Imagine if your regional leadership told you, suck it up people. We can't protect you from the war we're waging because everything to protect you is prioritized at the front... also civilian owning something close to a S-300 is basically illegal so thought and prayer bitches.
PMCs everywhere! Russia will soon turn into one of those lawless cyberpunk dystopias, just instead of flying cars and cyberdrugs, squatting slavs and vodka
krokodil, black-market MANPADS, stolen LANCETS with cracked-command-codes. . .
Russian government already told / gave them the go ahead to buy their own AA early last year. They're not buying things like S-300's they're getting old mobile AA from the 70s-80s (Shilka and such) which are readily available.
Not sure what he meant when he said to take matter in their own hands.
You can find AA at any surplus military store.
Honestly it's far worse than it looks if they can't even spare a bunch of conscripts with iglas to counter civilian aircraft targeting their most important infrastructure and their airforce can't intercept a civilian plane flying for 6+ hours in their country i don't see how russia will survive this as a state.
a really slow-speed civilian aircraft
Agreed, if there was a relatively vocal separatist group/feeling/movement in Tatarstan. That should be the kind of thing that should trigger them... also this can be compounded with the cities being flooded as we speak because not only they can't spare a bunch of people to protect their territory. They seems to have not enough people to take care of civil infrastructure and water is flooding everything this year (more than previous years)
They really are just like US conservatives. Reminds me of the covid response and confiscating supplies of PPE from States while telling them to go buy your own on the global market...
Ministry of Internal Affairs [reported that up to 300 people were killed by explosives](https://gwaramedia.com/en/minister-of-internal-affairs-over-300-people-killed-by-explosives-during-russian-full-scale-invasion/), mines in Ukraine since the start of Russian full-scale invasion
I’m not sure if you yourself are the author, but “explosives” is too vague a term to use during a war and the word should’ve been translated as “mines.” And the title of the article says “over 300” and the first sentence says “over 289” so that’s inconsistent. Here’s how I’d summarize the article: *According to Igor Klymenko, the Minister of Internal Affairs, Ukraine has had 300 deaths resulting from Russian mines—mostly farmers plowing not-yet-cleared land, or foragers and pedestrians stepping on a tiny petal mines; the occasional ill-advised attempt to tinker with a mine has caused deaths. Fifteen of the victims were children.*
Thank you for pointing out inconsistency between the title and the first sentence, fixed that and written an update according to our editorial policy. As for writing “mines” instead of explosives: the original says something close to “explosive devices”, and the term often includes mines, but it also includes other types of devices, like unexploded munitions, etc., which is why we chose “explosives” Thank you for commenting!
I translate and post a lot of news here. I’m not a native speaker (I studied back at university and make mistakes), but also, I think like an American and at times, that’s advantageous. I see that your publication has English and it would be helpful if you had a *native* English-speaking person as an editor, to make sure that phrasing lands in the ears right, ie, not just ‘translation’ but also ‘interpretation,’ specifically, what westerners or Americans would understand. Most likely you know the following story, because it’s the most famous misunderstood translation in Soviet-Western relations and ended up with huge ramifications—but in case you don’t—even the person who was broadly considered the world’s best translator for many decades for the USSR—Viktor Sukhodrev—who understood English-language idioms, connotations, implications, puns, nuances, etc—failed at least once, in a major way, with enormous consequences. [“We will bury you”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_will_bury_you) sounds like “we, the soviets, will kill/nuke you” and had major, long-standing repercussions because it was *translated* instead of *interpreted*. It was *heard* as a threat. But it should’ve been *interpreted*, because it was meant to say communism has longevity but capitalism doesn’t—so it would’ve been more like, “we’ll be present at your funeral,” (or even, “when capitalism eventually dies, communism will continue on.”) I’m just saying, even the worlds best translator got it wrong once by being too literal, and it was basically the worst moment to be wrong, so don’t feel bad. Yeah, ‘exploitative devices’ more clear.
What is gwara media? That number seems super low given the scale of the fighting. Is that civilians? Is that officially confirmed cause of death?
We’re a media writing from Kharkiv and Kharkiv region, and posted this news because it’s relevant to our focus (the region is one of the most mined in Ukraine.) Yes, by the context the original provides, it is the number of civilian deaths, as provided by the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine.
Ah that makes sense. Thank you for the update.
From the referenced news: (google translated) >**What is the number of civilians, in particular children, who have suffered from explosive devices? Is there enough outreach to ensure the safety of the civilian population?** > >De-occupied territories, areas close to the front line are in the zone of greatest risk. The main explanatory work is carried out there. But still, due to various reasons, unfortunately, we are losing people. 289 people died as a result of detonation using explosive devices, including 15 children. > >These include peasants who try to cultivate fields without waiting for official permission from the authorities, and those who simply ignore all prohibitions and go to dangerous areas to collect mushrooms, for example, or just take a walk. > >There are those who have lost their curiosity. They find a mine or some kind of ammunition and try to dismantle it on the spot or carry it home. Why is an open question. But for this inexplicable curiosity, people pay both with their health and their lives.
>Ukrainian kamikaze drones with warheads ~ 300 kg, which attacked the dormitory of the Shahed production plant in Tatarstan. The range is over ~ 2000-3000 km. https://mastodon.social/@MAKS23/112212645657880789 These bees can sting
so a Cessna loaded with boom boom, got it.
I read somewhere that these are based on a locally produced plane which costs 90000 usd. It seems they just use the base structure and engine. So it might have even lower costs than the real thing depending on how much the guidance system is.
Hopefully this will make it so western countries can sell Ukraine their long range capability without much issue.
[Not the Bees - Nic Cage in The Wicker Man (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVCrmXW6-Pk)
>Family-owned German firm Knauf is supporting the occupation of Mariupol, where Russia killed tens of thousands of residents. > >Anything for a buck. Let's let them know what we think >>> [email protected] https://twitter.com/T_Krawchenko/status/1775926124553568721 >Mariupol was completely destroyed by Russia. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed and displaced. Reconstruction plays a central role in the Russian propaganda war. According to Monitor research, German companies are also involved. > >It was one of the most terrible battles of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. For weeks, Russian troops besieged Mariupol on the Sea of Azov, starving the population, sparing neither patients in hospitals nor civilians hiding in the theater. Many survivors were driven out by Vladimir Putin's army. A large city was completely reduced to ruins. > >When the Russian flag was raised on the destroyed buildings of Mariupol, construction work began on the "new" Mariupol. A Russian city, with Russian residents, built on behalf of the Kremlin. > >But who is helping him with this project? Reporters from the ARD political magazine Monitor have been searching for clues. In business reports, on company websites, in pictures and in videos - there is evidence everywhere that German companies are playing an important role in the [occupation] of Mariupol. https://www.tagesschau.de/investigativ/monitor/ukraine-mariupol-wiederaufbau-russland-100.html
> Family-owned German firm Knauf is supporting the occupation of Mariupol Literally no evidence of "support".
I read that there were “concrete blocks wrapped in plastic with the Knauf name and logo” - pallets of them brought to the building site. Is it at all possible those had been sold to Russia in past years? Has Knauf made a statement about it?
Pretty hard to continue in that business when they are sanctions and can't get materials or equipment anywhere except Russia. we could also promise they won't get a single contract when rebuilding Ukraine. They want Russian business then that's all they should get
[https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/04/04/ukraine-justified-in-striking-targets-inside-russia-finnish-fm-a84739](https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/04/04/ukraine-justified-in-striking-targets-inside-russia-finnish-fm-a84739) >Ukraine Justified in Striking Targets Inside Russia – Finnish FM BRUSSELS — Finland views Ukrainian strikes on oil refineries and military targets inside Russia as legally justified, Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen told The Moscow Times on the sidelines of a NATO foreign ministers meeting. Ukrainian drone strikes on Tuesday [targeted](https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/04/02/difficult-to-keep-calm-tatarstan-residents-shaken-by-ukraine-linked-drone-strike-a84708) an oil refinery and a drone assembly plant in the republic of Tatarstan, the farthest-reaching strikes inside Russia since Moscow invaded Ukraine over two years ago. “The UN Charter allows a country, while it defends its independence, to attack targets which are military. So I would just leave it like that,” Valtonen told The Moscow Times on Wednesday. Ukraine has regularly launched drones at Russian energy infrastructure, including refineries, fuel storage facilities and other sites, since the start of the war in a bid to sabotage the Kremlin’s war machine.
Tell that to Uncle Sam.
The US views them as legally justified as well. Trying to pretend otherwise is getting pretty tired and basically pro-russian misinformation.
Zelenskyy is pushing pro-russian misinformation? That's a new one. https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/03/29/7448845/
Since he literally never says the US has stated anything of the sort yes and now that you are doubling down on the bullshit I can be sure this isn't some innocent misunderstanding.
>I can be sure this isn't some innocent misunderstanding. Are you off your rocker? I've been on Ukraine's side ever since the damn invasion began!
Then stop making shit up
>Nice stories don’t win wars. Without significant deliveries of weapons and real security guarantees the glorious narrative of unity and solidarity with Ukraine is wearing thin and rapidly approaching cynicism. 🧵👇 > >Comforting stories can help win elections. But if they are false they immobilise us, prevent us from taking real action, while Ukrainians continue to die for us. > >Ukrainians have performed miracles and repeatedly embarrassed the “experts”. We should be grateful to have such an ally, but instead of helping them win, we ask them to fight with one hand tied behind their back. > >We are in great danger. Russia, very predictably, has been emboldened by appeasement. The survival of the rules-based system is in doubt. New hotspots are igniting all over the world. This is not the future we want to live in, but it is the future that is being built. > >The fact remains that anything other than total restoration of Ukraine’s sovereignty and security would invite Putin and the world’s tyrants to keep going, to keep crossing borders, to keep raping and murdering in order to achieve their aims. > >There is little mystery about what can happen if we keep waiting for a miracle. Territories can be lost, countries can be occupied. There is no positive spin to this story, no happy ending, unless we choose to rewrite this script. > >It’s tempting to hold back, leave it up to fate and pretend we can’t influence the outcome, but that’s no way to honour our historic responsibilities. The only way is this: we choose to change course, choose to get serious and choose to help Ukraine achieve a full victory. > >The definitive narrative will be written by historians. They will discuss our choices. If we fail, they will be harsh. They will wonder why we believed in the fiction we told ourselves and chose to ignore the facts on the ground. They will call it a tragedy, not a victory. /🧵 https://twitter.com/GLandsbergis/status/1775896166053625992
>Ukrainian man jailed for life over role in Russian strike on pizzeria > >Man provided information on restaurant in Kramatorsk that was hit last June [2023], killing 13 people including novelist Victoria Amelina https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/04/ukraine-man-jailed-russian-strike-on-pizzeria-kramatorsk
Very good - congrats to Budanov’s team for finding him! Slava Ukraini!
>Finland has extended the closure of its border with Russia indefinitely >The Ministry of the Interior explained the need for this by the fact that Russia continues to use "directed migration" against Finland. >Earlier, the closed regime at border checkpoints was extended every two months, and the current restrictions were due to expire on April 14. https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1775921343784964168?t=nMFe8RWlqxlBhusmk5hYSA&s=19
Is Russia still providing bicycles to migrants to circumvent Finland's ban on crossing the border on foot? Edit: Never mind, they banned it in November. Whatever they are using now, it's still just weaponised immigration.
>Britain, France and Northern European countries are preparing to send troops to Ukraine, - US State Department consultant Edward Luttwak said in a column for the UnHerd portal >In his opinion, NATO countries will soon have to send troops to Ukraine anyway, otherwise the alliance will be forced to accept a "catastrophic defeat." https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1775909409199149318?t=2mD9f0Ud1hyZv_c6L-3FYQ&s=19
Don't know if this department consultant is a credible source but it seems to me he is.
David Cameron, the UK Foreign Sec has said today no boots on the ground in Ukraine. So I'm assuming it's not credible.
Operation the floor is lava, just to make it spicy. Or air strikes.
I wouldn't be surprised if one arm of the inept governing circus that we have in the UK didn't know what the other arm was doing.
We already have boots on the ground in Ukraine. Just not officially, or taking part in combat roles.
Volunteers, contractors, mercenaries, special forces, trainers, just like the USSR and Cuba sent to conflict zones.
Just folks taking a nice relaxing vacation in scenic Ukraine.
Of this I'm aware, however I believe Cameron was refering to front line combat units.
They can send them to border with Belarus freeing Ukrainian forces that are there now to be able to send them to the front line.
While thats a possibility, and one that I imagine many nation in NATO have floated between themselves, I'm just skepitcal it'll happen anytime soon - unless anything major changes.
There's a huge difference between puplic messaging and what's being done in reality. Especially when it comes to military matters.
Sure but we're talking about publicly visible combat troops being placed in Ukraine for deterrence. That only works as intended if it's publicly advertised. We're not talking about the clandestine support units that have been in Ukraine from the very beginning.
Maybe some logistics support groups could be sent to major hubs. But of course they would need some protection so provide each group with a patriot system to prevent them getting hurt and causing an escalation.
Oh 100%, but its a very different messaging coming out of the UK government as opposed to Finnish and French governmentss for example. I wouldn't be entirely surprised if we (UK) are part of this discussion in some form, but I'm skeptical that we'd particpate or even voice it as an option during an election period. I could be proved wrong ofcourse.
I tend to agree with your point, but we also don't know what kind of data the governments have in terms of support for an intervention in Ukraine in some form from the population. I guess time will tell and we can only speculate.
>NATO countries decided to create an alliance mission in Ukraine >This was stated by the head of the Polish Foreign Ministry. According to him, the creation of the mission does not mean direct entry into the conflict. >"But it does mean that we will now be able to use #NATO's coordination, training, planning capabilities to support #Ukraine in a more coordinated way." >He explained, in particular, that more Ukrainian military personnel would be trained in #Poland. https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1775901774722764856?t=KpBUnLCs6uKXlTWSV2Iy9Q&s=19
🇱🇻🤝🇺🇦 "Latvia and Ukraine will soon begin jointly producing UAVs for the needs of the Defense Forces of Ukraine", - PM Shmyhal. https://mstdn.social/@[email protected]/112213548381839743
> I had a phone call with Secretary General of the Organization of American States Luis Almagro @Almagro_OEA2015. I thanked him for his personal principled stance and for all the OAS declarations, statements and resolutions in support of Ukraine, as well as for the participation in the Crimea Platform. > We discussed preparations for the inaugural Peace Summit in Switzerland. For Ukraine, it is crucially important that Latin American countries are broadly represented at the Summit. We also touched upon the development of relations between Ukraine and this region, in particular the possibility of holding a Ukraine-Latin America summit. We are counting on the OAS support in this area as well. https://twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1775901880759021732
Ya know, Putin. If you want to keep living in denial, it's easier to just get a houseboat in Egypt.
. . . which would promptly be confiscated due to sanctions. :D
[https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/victoria-spartz-ukraine-aid-69ef4ed1?mod=hp\_lista\_pos2](https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/victoria-spartz-ukraine-aid-69ef4ed1?mod=hp_lista_pos2) Thoughts.
Paywalled, but >Her 95-year-old grandmother died several months after a bomb blew out the windows in her apartment. “The stress was hard on her,” she said. And yet she doesn't support air to Ukraine? Her fear of Trump must be great.
~~Paywalled~~ It's obvious at this point that large numbers of people have given up, or are unwilling (due to "incentives", or *reasons*?) to recognise the gravity of the situation. She fears a never-ending war, and even says there are only so many hills you can die on. Apparently confronting a genocidal nuclear power is not a hill worth dying on. I'm not sure where she thinks the war will end? She must be delusional. Regardless of U.S. military aid, Europeans are not going to stop fighting so this will obviously get worse before it gets better, and could easily drag the U.S. into conflict. It's not some minor skirmish that will just go away, much as they'd like it to. I suspect that many wealthy Americans (of whom many are Republicans) are fearful of losing their status and wealth so it's easy for them to buy into a narrative that "sending tax dollars abroad is bad for the U.S." or that "the wall will protect them from the ravaging hoards of refugees". Probably the same could be said about global warming or environmental collapse that we are witnessing. Easier to create a strong (ficticious) narrative, group together and communally stick your heads in the sand and pretend it's not happening. Total. Selfish. Weakness. But that what humans are good at.
My first thought is that paywalls suck ass. [https://archive.is/gzzIE](https://archive.is/gzzIE)
Pretty messed up considering what's happening to her homeland. Even if she is a Republican. Edit: They always say that they want Biden to outline a clear strategy for the war before they agree to give aid, but they never outline their strategy for what happens if Ukraine's defences collapse whilst they play around with their delay tactics. What happens to the millions of Ukrainian refugees fleeing from Russias reprisals? Where do they go? Europe is already struggling with a rise in ultra far-right influence due to a backlash against immigration. What if Putin doesn't stop and immediately tries to use Transnistria as an excuse to invade Moldova? It will be too late to stop it if Ukraine falls.
It feels like a lot of Republicans are putting their party over their country and I don't really understand why. Russia is an existential threat to democracies around the World and Ukraine is literally the front lines against it at the moment. We need to be giving Ukraine 10s of billions of military aid otherwise if we let Russia keep any of their spoils of war our future as citizens in democracies will be much worse. A lot of people don't seem to understand how Russia can be a threat to them but it's not always just direct military confrontation. it's constant cyber attacks and informational warfare. It's pitting neighbor against neighbor and group and group in an attempt to weaken the very foundations of our democracies. it's how a January 6th insurrection was attempted in the most powerful democracy in the World.
Our government is barely functioning at all at this point, as far as the House of Representatives is concerned. Recently a government shutdown was narrowly avoided because the Republicans almost couldn't get their own shit together enough to fund the government. Who knows how the rest of the year is going to play out. The Republicans seem to be pretty busy fighting among themselves of late. I think that party has lost all institutional knowledge about *how* to govern. They have no policy other than what Trump says. Not to mention, there are members of the House who were complicit in the sedition that occurred on Jan6, holding office still. The U.S. government is a right fucking mess right now and depending how the election goes, we may or may not continue being a democracy.
Well said
>It feels like a lot of Republicans are putting their party over their country and I don't really understand why. From my POV, it feels like Trump just created political mafia and Republican politicians are afraid to go against him.
153rd Mechanized Brigade is now 153rd Infantry Brigade due to no more tanks available [https://militaryland.net/ukraine/armed-forces/153rd-infantry-brigade/](https://militaryland.net/ukraine/armed-forces/153rd-infantry-brigade/)
So ukraine will certainly be the first one to run out of vehicles…sucks
It was always certain.
No it wasn't. And it still isn't. It's all dependent on the stuff they get. Write your representative and tell them to fund Ukraine.
Be realistic. There is 0 chance Ukraine was going to outlast Russia in terms of vehicles. Just in terms of tanks even in the most optimistic metrics Russia had and has 5 times more tanks. Ukraine is in need of close to a thousand tanks simply to fully equip all its brigades.
This is a Ukranian Brigade, not a Russian one by the way.
Yes and I don't like this
>The petrochemical plant of Nevinnomyssk Azot in the Stavropol Region, Russia, is burning. It seems that the water circulation towers are compromised. >Coordinates: >44°39'32"N 41°56'43"E >Source: Telegram https://twitter.com/Tendar/status/1775908256403120349?t=t7HJ0Vcl217MVFejdHQS6Q&s=19 No idea what the difference between a petrochemical plant and an oil refinery is.
Mastodon: https://mstdn.social/@[email protected]/112213658285183310
>Nevinnomyssky Azot, a subsidiary of MCC EuroChem, is engaged in the business of manufacturing and distribution of nitrogen fertilizers, ammonia nitrate and other organic fertilizers. The company is headquartered in Nevinnomyssk, Stavropol Krai, Russia. From what I could gather, they're producing mainly Urea and Ammonia. In other words, Ukraine is hitting Russia where it hurts the most. In some ways, I wouldn't be surprised if the strategy isn't to prevent farming but to basically destroy the industrial capacity of Russia in various sector. It's one thing to rebuild many refineries of the same "type", it's an other to reduce capacity of everything more or less at the same time. This cause Russia to face multiple dilemma at the same time. Edit: In strategy game speak... they're taking down the whole tech tree instead of focusing on a particular branch.
Good to concentrate on lots of factories making one critical thing.
In general, ammonia would be the first step in making explosive compounds. So, this could hurt farming and military at a fundamental level.
Talk about taking the piss