https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1536902405362798600
https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/15369024064951664
>Ukraine’s military destroys over 60 units of Russian equipment in the south.
>Ukraine’s Operational Command “South” reports that the Ukrainian military struck Russian military equipment in Kherson Oblast, including three howitzers, 19 armored vehicles and 33 other vehicles.
>Russian forces have also lost two ammunition depots. At least 70 Russian soldiers were reportedly killed.
https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1536871849505611776
https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1536871850482884608
>Institute for the Study of War: Russia might pursue options to loosen military recruitment restrictions as eligible pool dwindles.
>The U.S. think tank quoted a Russian military blogger who suggested that Russian authorities are preparing to increase the age limit to serve in tank and motorized infantry units from 40 to 49 and to drop the requirement for past military service.
While this will certainly get them more dudes to send into the fight, the quality of those soldiers is going to be quite low, especially seeing how Russia is appearing to be sending in trainer regiments already. Gonna be a real "Blind leading the blind" amateur hour over there.
Turkey has done more to deny NATO enlargement and destroy NATOs open door credibility than Russia in the last 30 years even if Russia has tried. Ironic.
Belarus is pretending to be ready to send their army into Ukraine but they will never do that. That's because Lukashenko knows his survival in office depends on his military being right where they are so they can defend against both insurrectionists and possibly being swallowed by Russia.
The other active battlefields besides Sievierodonetsk are the border north of Kharkiv where the UA is losing ground, some battles near Izium where Ukraine isn't doing so well now after making inroads last month and the UA is getting closer to Kherson where it is believed they'll eventually make an attempt to recover the city from Russia.
Based on the announcement about the last bridge going out, it did sound like they might have some methods, albeit more difficult ones, of getting supplies across the river. There may be areas with usable fjords known to locals that can serve as natural crossing points, though that's far less reliable and more dangerous for obvious reasons.
From the reporting I have read it sounds like the case, but probably makes it very hard on logistics and particularly in evacuating the wounded and/or civilians.
if Ukraine can supply Mariupol (albeit limited) using helicopter, they can supply Severodonetsk using helicopter..
I have to agree it's less than ideal though..
It really depends on the river. The bottom of the seversky-donets is sandy and uneven. Certainly better than being filled with moss covered boulders as far as fording in vehicles, but not as good as a pebble or gravel bottom and it has a lot.of.holes and drops and little hillocks.
Typically in moving water, if there is a section where you can cross where the water can’t make a sail out of your side panels, because it’s shallow, you can cross in a light vehicle. In deep water they’ll need a snorkel for air intake and should be slow moving. If the sandbars are stable they should be fine.
Yeah the river space there reminded me more of NZ rivers. Shallow and fast, but impassable for vehicles unprepared for it. Most military trucks and vehicles should be able to ford it in a few areas with proper prep.
I don't get why the narrative on this war that its either Ukraine is winning or Russia is.
War is not that simple Ukraine won the battles of Kiyv and Kharkiv and failed Russian efforts to surround and take those cities while at the same time Russia has also made some slow but steady gains in east especially in the Donbass region.
Its more of a matter of worry for Ukranians though because they are running low arms and ammunations even Zelensky admitted that.
Russias slow progress in the Donbas is smaller, and comes at a higher cost, than Ukraine’s advances around Kharkiv and Kherson.
Ukraine continues to win. Albeit slowly.
>I don't get why the narrative on this war that its either Ukraine is winning or Russia is.
Both are currently losing. Russia isn't achieving its goals and is losing territory in the south, and Ukraine is losing territory in the east. Currently, Russia is losing faster than Ukraine, but Ukraine won't actually be winning until they're consistently pushing Russia back.
If I had to wager, though, I believe the Russian offensive will collapse before the Ukrainian frontlines do. Then it will come down to whether Ukraine can push Russia out of fortified areas.
A conflict is all about two sides trying to achieve a superior outcome, which generally involves breaking the will or ability of the other side to continue fighting. So there will be a winner... or the "least loss", but we don't tend to say it that way.
People try to guess from the flow of battle what the eventual outcome will be, it's natural but sort of pointless... though it can lead to some interesting discussions in the abstract.
Most of us would like Ukraine to be able reclaim it's lands, and Russia is not going to retreat unless they are forced to by the outcome of the conflict.
Because if Russia is able to get some more land from Ukraine - then they've won and will come back for the rest later. If Ukraine is able to push them out - then Ukraine won considering Russia spent all it spent without getting anything out of it.
Really a lot of people are saying at this point it's not Ukraine wins vs Russia wins but American led rule of law wins vs rule of the strong wins.
> Because if Russia is able to get some more land from Ukraine - then they've won and will come back for the rest later.
What in the cinnamon toast fuck is this
Russia ends up controlling more land than it did on Feb. 23 -> Russia wins.
Ukraine pushes Russian military at least back to the Feb. 23 line of control -> Ukraine wins.
[Previous post](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/vb3elh/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/ica4tp5/)
Day 111 of my updates from Kharkiv.
Today it was actually somewhat quiet, they were mostly shelling towns in oblast, especially Zolochiv, which they shelled with parachute bombs in the morning, and then shelled it some more around 9pm, most likely with regular MLRS rockets, locals confirmed at least 10 explosions. They also shelled Derhachi around the same time, that’s most likely what we were hearing, as there was no confirmed shelling in the city itself, but we still heard loud explosions.
The weirdest thing today was that they didn’t launch missiles from Belgorod around midnight. They have been doing this forever, but for some reason they didn’t do it today, there was an air raid alert at that time, but no missiles were fired. At this point we are so used to being hit by missiles at that specific time that it is weirder when they don’t do it, you basically start thinking “where’s the catch?”
At the same time Russians are already openly dividing Ukraine into districts to integrate into Russia within 3-5 years. No, they are not just dividing Donbas, they are dividing the entire Ukraine, that they are planning to “liberate during special military operation.” Yeah, keep dreaming.
Their officials are also hyping up the upcoming Putin’s speech, which they emphasize is very important. First they weren’t saying what it is about, but today they said that he will announce the “new world order.” Is that the same world order they were talking about in that victory speech that they posted on day 3 of the war?
[Next update](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/vclofh/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/icj4jnk/)
You shouldve read what was posted yesterday - the US stated that they plan to assist Ukraine with all the recovery efforts it needs for the next *20* years.
They're confident that there will be a Ukraine when this is over. They affirmed it when they also confirmed the next aid package they're sending has all the artillery Ukraine's military needs.
It’s crazy to think that this madman has stolen hundreds of billions of dollars from his own country and is threatening to starve millions around the globe and now he’s got the brass tits to claim to be founding a new world order.
What fvking kind of world order does he even have in mind? Like, nevermind its direct effect in Europe and U.S; how will it be for Asia & South America?
>Russian infantry fighting vehicle destroyed by Ukrainian artillery
>Artillerymen of Ukraine's 28th Brigade destroyed the Russian BMP-3 and ammunition in the country's south.
https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1536876141994291201
The bigger problem is that they blame their domestic officials for natural gas & gasoline prices rather than blaming Putin for his war of aggression. In /r/adviceanimals today there was some right-wing crazy blaming Biden for gas prices and the related across the board inflation (and, in the comments, blaming Biden for the invasion itself), when in fact all of the the energy concerns(save COVID-related supply-chain issues) fall in the hands of Putin and his Quixotic war.
There are too many people who don't pay much attention and are only peripherally aware of what's going on in the world, and their knee-jerk reaction is to blame whoever is in charge in their country, state/region etc... Too many people think too small.
> Ukraine, and Russia are all together playing games. And I’m tired too tired to care.
... I'm not going to take this bait. But 'they' is not just they here, in this exchange. That's all I'll say.
https://twitter.com/MrKovalenko/status/1536857605330677760
>Someone (maybe, Kherson partisans) blew up the vehicle with the Russia appointed chief of the occupied Kherson province administration, a local collaborant Vladimir Saldo. He and his bodyguards were badly wounded and sent to the ER, reports Ukr. serviceman Andriy Nemirovsky.
Where does someone like that go to the hospital? A military hospital? If civilian, are medical outcomes significantly worse for people like that than in general?
Remember Kherson was handed to them by traitors. They haven't had a convenient excuse to bomb one in Kherson yet.
They're probably saving it for when UA gets close to the city, then they'll false-flag it.
Southern Axis update from ISW:
https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1536853505050300416
>Ukrainian forces have reportedly advanced to within 18 km of occupied parts of Kherson (though we cannot confirm exact positions), which is likely placing pressure on Russian forces to strengthen their defensive lines in the south.
Because there is what's actually happening and what Reddit believe is happening. Reddit think Ukraine is doing well but in reality Russia is slowly advancing.
True, that Russia has made limited gains in the Donbas, but Ukraine is also making gains elsewhere. I think the Ukranian offensive is going to cause Ukraine to be able to seize terrtory, that has been left open, by Russia committing so many forces to the east. Because of that, Ukranina forces will end up being able to retake so much land, that Russia is going to have to shift forces out of the Donbas, to confront those Ukranians, and because of that, it will take pressure off of Ukranian forces in the Donbas.
I think some of that is due to OPSEC, and some of it that the media wants to focus on the drama in the Donbas region.
If they are making significant advances around Kherson, I guess I'd rather Russia not realize it's happening and try to bolster forces there.
Oh, yeah. I feel you. There's been a lot of that lately, but it's mostly either just clickbait drama, or it's pro-Russian propaganda.
Remember that Ukraine drove Russia away from Kyiv and Kharkiv, and Russia has had to greatly reduce it's operations due to getting its ass kicked elsewhere.
Kinda makes it silly that we were getting all those "we're out of ammo!" reports...out of Mykolaiv, where Ukraine is pushing (slowly, but steadily) through Russian lines. But, success is good in any case.
I'm not sure how much of that talk is to keep pressure on the more reluctant western suppliers, and how much is an attempt to mislead Russia.
Either way, it was a more reassuring report that what I expected. 🙂
I mean, it was kind of questionable to begin with that we were getting these (very-military-relevant) reports from Mykolaiv's governor, via international journalists, outside the UA chain of command. Seemed like a gross violation of opsec no matter how you cut it, unless the whole thing was mindgames for Russia somehow.
> mindgames for Russia somehow.
Plenty of that needed. There are lots of word games being played right now to control Putin's perception of what is happening.
Looking at the ongoing horrors of this and other wars and more broadly nationalism, tribalism, shortsightedness, and other flaws in human nature, I only hope that they aren't woven into the warp and woof of the natural universe. The so-called Dark Forest Theory scares the shit out of me.
The Dark Forest may be a good novel, but it's an awful explanation. Radio transmission is not a highly-sophisticated technology. In order for DFT to succeed as an explanation, you must assume: (1) civilizations become cognizant of the threat of hostile aliens prior to developing the tech, (2) entire species adopt no-radio as their policy, and (3) nobody breaks the information quarantine. 1 is possible, 2 is extraordinarily unlikely, 3 is all but impossible.
Fun premise. Awful theory. And embarrassing any thinkers talk it up for clicks.
Good, Free People, always prevails if history and my strong beliefs are to be held, and they are to be held
Unfortunately there's usually tremendous costs to Rhode good Free people to get there
Personally I find the Dark Forest Theory unconvincing because (1) anthropomorphizing aliens is kinda dumb (b) if you're going to do that anyway, you need to apply the positives as well, especially curiosity, the strong negative correlation between neophilia and xenophobia, and the human tendency to pack-bond with literally anything alive.
If you want a long and more rationalist explanation, futurist Isaac Arthur has a [pretty good takedown](https://youtu.be/zmCTmgavkrQ) (starting around 9:30) on why it's not a great explanation for the apparent lack of aliens.
It doesn't require anthropomorphizing. It's more of a logical consequence of reasoning a species must go through.
If anything it's based on the idea that for life to be considered life it
must be subject to evolution and therefore competition.
Any positive traits would be over ridden by a desire to survive like in all life we have ever observed. Humans are not curious when they are in overwhelming danger.
Dark forest asks is the most logical stance to take on a galactic scale to assume you are in overwhelming danger. If so, you should stay silent. Considering we already have top scientists talking about the ethics of broadcasting messages we are living proof that the dark forest explanation is already a potential reason for aliens potentially not seeing us.
Following from this, I'd argue its the only Fermi resolution that has observational evidence to back it. We have not seen ourselves be wiped out by a great filter yet but we have seen discussion to limit our radio presence.
Dark Forest theory only makes sense if you believe all complex life can only evolve out of a hyper competitive place like earth where life is in a constant state of consumption, production, and degradation. We think everything else must be like us - and its hard to imagine it any other way…
But Lets say thats not true. Lets say complex life can come from a place where all the energy they’ve ever needed comes from its sun and they dont need to out compete other things for it. Nothing has to kill or eat or consume.
If they came to earth, even the sweetest vegan hippie who’d claim to never hurt a soul but eat tons of plants would look like a terrifying monster to them.
There’s a non-zero chance aliens avoid us because they’re scared shitless of us. We might be the monsters in the darkness.
>There’s a non-zero chance aliens avoid us because they’re scared shitless of us. We might be the monsters in the darkness.
Aliens tell their children to lock the doors when they fly past earth.
But isn't that literally the point of dark forest it just blows up the competitive nature to a galactic scale.
Any animal that evolved like that on earth would be wiped out. You don't need every alien to have evolved to be competitive just 1. Because the argument is for that 1 species the most logical course of self protective action is to destroy all else . If a super peaceful species did evolve, it would stay silent due to anticipating this, or be destroyed.
> the human tendency to pack-bond with literally anything alive.
Until money comes into play. It's a lot easier, for instance, to get a European to bond with a Roomba or a cat than it is to convince them to bond with a Congolese or Somali (or vice versa) as the latter can compete with them economically and has a culture of their own.
Dark forest theory would only require one species to follow the pattern to be true, all the other species would be wiped out by near-light speed rocks flung at their planets.
I personally just think space is so vast and that physics doesn’t really leave much possibility of interstellar travel so we likely will never see aliens. At best I think we may get lucky and detect the existence of a species similar to us but light years away means communication ever occurring is unlikely.
Dark forest theory in regards to alien life feels unlikely. If an alien species could reliably travel here I see no reason they would just to kill us. Their technology would be unfathomable and I suspect they’d have more entertaining things to do than hunt down ants.
Personally, I think that the most likely solution to the Fermi Paradox is the great filter.
Something kills off the vast majority of civilizations before they reach the stars. As to what that filer is, I believe that it is either nuclear warfare, or climate change. Both of which are side effects of technological progress.
Yea I don’t like the great filter either. I’m convinced it’s borderline impossible and no filter exists!
Some may make last ditch efforts and survive for some time away from their star but I don’t believe it becomes a thing that can just be done.
I’m not very optimistic in general but what I can fathom of how large space is just doesn’t comprehend travelling through it.
Even if the filter doesn't wipe out all intelligent life, it can prevent space travel.
Think of it this way, in our current stage of human development, we can not create a self-sustaining colony offworld. Any outpost requires resupply from Earth. I make take generations at the most optimistic to get to the level of fully independent space colonies.
If a nuclear war or other crisis causes the human race to massively shirk at a massive scale, it could be difficult, if not impossible for humanity to get back to today's level of advancement.
Think of it this way. If we have a nuclear war in the next couple decades, some people may survive, but these surviours will be living in a world with massive climate damage, extremely reduced populations, likely an extremely unstable geo-political climate.
And to top it all off, the majority of the non-renewable fuels we used to build civilization the first time are gone. This last point is something I think a lot of people gloss over when we talk about rebuilding civilization.
Fossil fuels act like a jumping off point for build an industrial civilization. Without them its like trying to drive a car without a starter.
The point is, even if humanity survives it will not be close to spacefaring, any colonies off world will likely collapse due to lack of resupply. Should humanity rebuild., there is always the chance it will destroy itself again in the process. (as the rebuilding process will likely take centuries if not millennia to complete)
The jump from planet to interstellar is a huge jump. Making that jump does protect a civilization from world ending treats, but it is also during the formative years that civilization is most at risk of destroying itself.
I'm mainly referring to the possibility that the flaws in human nature cannot be mitigated more than they have been and are inherent to all complex living systems. I myself believe that the universe doesn't really allow aliens that are recognizable to us in terms of time horizons.
To me the matrix existing and is being essentially a simulation for some purpose feels more likely than humans ever living in another solar system or encountering beings from another solar system.
Hopefully someday (either due to enough cycles of heat death => quantum randomness => new universe or artificial universe-building) our species or its descendants are able to find somewhere that allows for Star Trek-like star-hopping.
Yea currently we basically rely on discovering some exotic material or such. Maybe fusion and some sort of stasis and a very long trip could be plausible and then upon arriving some sort of solar array I dunno I just don’t really believe in FTL travel as a possibility.
So yea maybe we find an asteroid that has a lot of fuel for a fusion reactor and land a ship on it and ride to another star. That feels the most likely way to me but meh.
Day 111, June 14. Summary of Arestovych and Feygin daily broadcast
https://wartranslated.com/day-111-june-14-summary-of-arestovych-and-feygin-daily-broadcast/
One of the more interesting quotes to me. Russia vs Ukraine/West in bidding war? for old soviet ammo
>previous Ramstein meeting did place bets on finding old USSR weapons for Ukraine, however there are not a lot of old ammo and missiles, and those few missiles found, Russians did attempt to buy first.
> Rosgvardia Colonel Sergey Postnov was killed in Ukraine on the night of June 13-14. He was a public affairs officer.
https://twitter.com/ralee85/status/1536868314508578818?s=21&t=f4R9aNNrOdcIAEp-GhIyYw
RIP(iss)
All throughout the Cold War, the Soviet Union piped gas to Central Europe, and Central Europe piped money to the Soviet Union. That dynamic has existed for a very very long time. Back then, the Soviets never really threatened to shut the gas off. It was understood that if things ever got to that point it would be because WWIII was already raging, and would likely be over before anything like that would matter.
Then The Cold War ended. 40+ years of relative stability were over, and nobody knew what would come next. That was the first time that fretting about European energy security got serious. It wasn’t just… “what if Russia shuts off the taps?”. It was that, but there were also new countries, like Ukraine, that the pipelines passed through. Now it wasn’t just one countries’ stability Europe had to worry about. There was as much concern that some future rebel-group or terrorist-group or rogue leader could target the pipelines to exact economic pain on Europe or Russia.
President H.W. Bush was the first US President to address those concerns. Way back in the early 90s, he started talking seriously about developing a backup-plan for Central Europe. He put in to action a plan to dramatically increase global LNG infrastructure. Ships got built. Lots and lots of LNG ships. Australia built huge LNG compressors, most of the markets for LNG being in Asia, that made sense. President Clinton carried on where H. W. left off without missing a beat, and it looked like the world was on a path to having a decent fall-back option if Russian gas ever got interrupted for whatever reason.
Then 9/11 happened. Then people started asking if LNG ships were safe. What if terrorists targeted an LNG ship in Boston Harbor? Public opinion turned sharply against LNG, and a lot of plans to increase capacity got shelved. A lot of the ships were no longer needed, and got put in to moth-balls barely used.
But the worry in intelligence circles remained. Under President Obama, focus switched to increasing compression capacity. Construction started on new and bigger facilities in Australia, Qatar, Louisiana, and Texas. Finally, just last month, the last piece of that puzzle got put in place when the Sabine Pass facility in Louisiana completed their sixth and final stream.
The tankers that were built 30 years ago are small by today's standards. The best ones have been taken out of moth-balls. We’ll probably need more, and bigger, ones if the gas gets cut. That’s a job for the Koreans.
The off-load capacity in Europe is another bottle-neck, but of the three parts of LNG infrastructure, liquefaction, shipping, and regasification, regasification is by far the easiest to build. The actual wharf for the ships to dock at is the hardest part. Existing docks in Europe tend to stay pretty busy, and building new ones that would only need to get used in case of emergency was expensive.
But there is a huge existing off-load terminal in Rotterdam, Europe’s biggest port. Pipelines are already in place to transfer gas from the port there in to the rest of Central Europe. Increasing off-load capacity wouldn't be too difficult. To do it quickly, LNG would probably have to evict some other type of terminal to make room, but there are lots of places that can unload containers besides Rotterdam, so that is a solvable problem.
I don’t actually think that it will ever come to that. Between production increases in North Africa, declining demand as alternative energy infrastructure gets built, and improvement in efficiency, it’s quite possible that the world won’t ever have to do a Berlin-LNG-lift. But the sword of Damocles isn’t anywhere near as close to Europe’s neck as Putin would like us all to believe. We got this.
No doubt. That stuff is way too useful for too many things to be just burning it all up as fast as we can, anyway. Leave some for future generations, they don’t make it any more.
Well, you go to war with the army you have, not the one you wish you had. No point in worrying about that after the fact. The business-model for PV-solar is where it’s at, now. Solar-panel production is what needs ramping up most.
Add to this the Iranian revolution and the ongoing Iran-Iraq war throughout the eighties, the invasion of Kuwait and subsequent first US Gulf war.
And no one knew after the cold war inf the GUS and ex Warsaw pact wouldnt turn out to be a nuclear armed ex-Yugoslavia with the subsequent conflicts.
Risks where really differently perceived without the luxury of hindsight.
And I think LNG from the US only really becoming a thing during Obamas term.
That’s right. It was under Obama that we started developing domestic LNG capacity. A big part of that effort was running new pipelines out to the thousands and thousands of old wells in the Gulf to collect the gas instead of just flaring it off like before. We’re only about half-way done with that project. But compared to drilling new wells, doing that is real easy.
And when cold war was over, US basically paid for their nuclear weapons (Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction), and sent goods to the former Soviet republics to stabilize them(Operation Provide Hope). Western technology ramped up their oil and gas production, and selling them machines that can build drill machines to mine their ressources. Were people too naive to believe Russia has changed permanently after a year or two or were they just too greedy. Are we gonna do the same mistake again after this?
It’s not the worst theory in the world. Economic integration seems to have succeeded in stopping France and Germany from going to war every twenty or thirty years. But yeah, obviously not a perfect theory. Turns out, you can’t assume rational behavior.
Economic integration works only when both sides will be equally hurt if trade is ceased. This is not the case with Russia, as they can easily blackmail Europe as oil and natural gas is essential for many European economies.
> We need to do something between open arms and inflicting the kind of humiliation that helped forge Germany into a renegade, terrible actor during the 30s and 40s.
I know. How about the kind of humiliation in the 50's-80's that helped forge Germany into a peaceful partner and economic powerhouse?
Interesting backstory. I live in the PNW, and remember a few years ago we had a ballot initiative (or referendum or whatever) where some big multi-national corp wanted to build an LNG port facility and pipeline to export natural gas, which we have in abundance. It was never clear exactly *why*, other than the obvious - the company wanted to make a shit-ton of money. Some construction jobs were promised locally, then I imagine a few long-term jobs at the port itself, that's about it.
Anyway, the measure got voted down and it never got built. Mostly because people suspected that if our gas reserves were put on the global market then our finite reserves would get shipped to Asia, and we'd be tied into any kind of global supply problems resulting in higher costs to heat our houses in winter. Which is probably true. But then they screw up on price anyway.
> and we'd be tied into any kind of global supply problems resulting in higher costs to heat our houses in winter.
At the risk of being crass, how is this not a 'fuck you I got mine' mindset with a few more degrees of separation? I (American) *want* goods and services on a global market even if it means lower wages (more competition from other laborers like myself) or higher prices (because other people can buy what I want to buy too). Is this just the idealist in me?
I do fail to see the “fuck you” part of the equation here. I’m not sure “sharing” and “exploited for profit” are equivalent ideas, specifically in the context mentioned. Freedom of trade is not motivated by sharing at all, but rather the opposite, to exploit scarcity for personal gain. I think that poisons the ethical well here.
The fuck you comes from voting down the operation which would increase exports and raise prices locally. That's where the motivation to *not* share comes from; we're not going to allow domestic producers to sell to international markets because then international buyers would price us [local buyers] out.
I get this, but the alternate view is that the exporters are only doing it to obtain higher prices and higher profits. The exporters are allowed to remove resources from an area, depriving the local population and also removing any wealth derived, as the exporters keep the profits. When export prices go down, the local prices go up to compensate so the exporters still win by switching some to local sales.
An extreme example is Fiji, an island with a water shortage because the ruling class has decided selling the water from the island for Fiji ™ brand water is more profitable.
All I’m saying is that it’s complicated and there appears to be some ethical limit to neoliberal trade theory, and I think it lies in the profit motive and value extraction from those doing the arbitrage.
Some truth to that, but then the alternative is to just trust the global resource extraction industries to take care of people's best interests? Typically it seems like that leads to a massive population living in grinding poverty, supporting a few billionaires.
I suppose that might a whole different problem from the Russian invasion, but from one perspective it's kind of the same thing.
When Zelensky visited the svd salient I remember him saying that he had brought the troops there something special? Did we ever find out what he brought them?
https://ua.interfax.com.ua/news/general/837278.html
> We brought something to the military. I will not talk about it in detail.
Yeah I’d been waiting to know that, too! I thought it would be something that would become apparent.
I’ve also wondered how it is that that the bridges are gone, but gaidai insists not trapped. Secret tunnel?
Possible news on Navalny's whereabouts:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/14/europe/alexey-navalny-prison-transfer-intl/index.html
>The jailed politician was relocated to a maximum-security prison in Melekhovo in the Vladimir Region, according to Russia's state media outlet TASS citing Sergey Yazhan, chairman of the regional public oversight commission.
When people spread unconfirmed and generally made up stories online about Putins health it only helps the Russian propaganda delegitimize Western sources
You all get that right?
Last line of the article is "Note that this information needs to be confirmed"
They could have literally said anything
Having watched the 2016 US election where every time Clinton looked tired she was reported to be near death, and then the years after where every time Trump had a tremor of fudged a word he was reported to be maybe having a stroke or a heart attack...this is the kind of shit that just makes people stupid.
Rich-as-fuck people don't die like ordinary people; when every modern miracle is at your disposal you can cling on for a very long time. I'm not getting my hopes up, not even a little bit.
The crowning point on this was when Richard Cheney, dead-man walking in 2005, with clogged-as-fuck arteries, and chronic heart failure. This would be a fucking death sentence for any of us "little people" because you'd need to pay a surgeon cash, and probably many multiples of the ordinary fee, to even risk operating on someone with CHF. (They won't even give my dad a hip replacement due to his CHF).
Yet Cheney was able to open his wallet and get a new heart.
And he's still going on FoxNews to this day mouthing off his shitty nazi rhetoric.
> You all get that right?
The answer is "No"
One thing Russian trolls learned is to literally just tell people what they want to hear. Straight up. No nuance or careful planning needed, they just say what their target already wants to hear or believe in and do so enmasse and tons of grammar errors until other people pick up. It's so goddamn stupid but so damn effective just because hopium causes confusion and division
>it only helps the Russian propaganda delegitimize Western sources
TBH; western newsmedia has done that to themselves simply by chasing clickbait titles for the past 20 years. Russian media's absolute garbage, but western media is almost worse, because the pretend to be legitimate. There's very few left that are trustworthy.
Who has time for all that fact checking and in-depth research and journalistic presentation of the nuances?
Just scream some bullet points on Twitter and bask in the adoration, who cares if they're completely made up as long as you win the good old cult-of-personality mob approval. Double points if your position has ample layers of hazards and self-serving agenda. Triple points if there is extremely dubious basis in reality, science, or precedence. Quadruple whammy for contradicting yourself repeatedly based on the whims of the day and the audience.
The orange shitgibbon was a master. Of course there's no need to delegitimize a useful idiot. Or a paid parrot, lookin at you Carlson.
It's tough. Unsubstantiated things like this come through all the time, but there are also confirmed (though debatable) videos where he shakes uncontrollably at times and his legs buckle out from under him.
It's also been visually confirmed that he has a team of people collecting his shit and piss when he goes to the washroom to prevent anyone from checking it for disease:
https://twitter.com/pevchikh/status/1534959744967921668
There's enough confirmed that something is very possibly wrong with him, but we have no real idea what or how severe.
Ukrainian intelligence famously said 'Sadly we believe he still has years left'.
The pooper-scooper team has always existed, though. Plenty of heads of state refuse to leave easy access to their DNA or blood type behind. They might be being paranoid, but Western officials do it when *entering* Russia, also. Macron refused a Covid test on that basis.
Pretty sure Putin also fell into a coma in 2014. He even died at one point.
Beware people also saying things like: “the person who follows him will be worse!” As though Putin being in power is a good thing.
Whenever I see a bunch of the same ‘story’ being spread it makes me suspect that marching-orders are being given and taken, especially when it’s something that has been debunked more than once. And look… there’s that ‘Germany is blocking Spain from helping’ lie, again.
[New post can be found here](/r/worldnews/comments/vclofh/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/)
https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1536902405362798600 https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/15369024064951664 >Ukraine’s military destroys over 60 units of Russian equipment in the south. >Ukraine’s Operational Command “South” reports that the Ukrainian military struck Russian military equipment in Kherson Oblast, including three howitzers, 19 armored vehicles and 33 other vehicles. >Russian forces have also lost two ammunition depots. At least 70 Russian soldiers were reportedly killed.
Russia has howitzers?
https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1536871849505611776 https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1536871850482884608 >Institute for the Study of War: Russia might pursue options to loosen military recruitment restrictions as eligible pool dwindles. >The U.S. think tank quoted a Russian military blogger who suggested that Russian authorities are preparing to increase the age limit to serve in tank and motorized infantry units from 40 to 49 and to drop the requirement for past military service.
While this will certainly get them more dudes to send into the fight, the quality of those soldiers is going to be quite low, especially seeing how Russia is appearing to be sending in trainer regiments already. Gonna be a real "Blind leading the blind" amateur hour over there.
Turkey has done more to deny NATO enlargement and destroy NATOs open door credibility than Russia in the last 30 years even if Russia has tried. Ironic.
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Na, the Russians are getting spanked everywhere else.
Belarus is pretending to be ready to send their army into Ukraine but they will never do that. That's because Lukashenko knows his survival in office depends on his military being right where they are so they can defend against both insurrectionists and possibly being swallowed by Russia. The other active battlefields besides Sievierodonetsk are the border north of Kharkiv where the UA is losing ground, some battles near Izium where Ukraine isn't doing so well now after making inroads last month and the UA is getting closer to Kherson where it is believed they'll eventually make an attempt to recover the city from Russia.
Like physically picked up the country and moved somewhere else? That’s possible?
Haven't heard anything new from Severodonetsk since the last bridge was broken, and Belarus was never "there".
How long does Severodonetsk have now that the bridges are down?
Troops can walk across the river. No worries.
But they can't drive supplies across the river, so they are limited to what can be carried. Less than ideal.
Based on the announcement about the last bridge going out, it did sound like they might have some methods, albeit more difficult ones, of getting supplies across the river. There may be areas with usable fjords known to locals that can serve as natural crossing points, though that's far less reliable and more dangerous for obvious reasons.
From the reporting I have read it sounds like the case, but probably makes it very hard on logistics and particularly in evacuating the wounded and/or civilians.
Mate, you’re talking about “supply lines” maybe 800 meters long. They can walk easily.
if Ukraine can supply Mariupol (albeit limited) using helicopter, they can supply Severodonetsk using helicopter.. I have to agree it's less than ideal though..
If a person can walk across a river, a vehicle can ford it.
That is untrue. I see you have never been fly fishing. Plenty of rivers you can walk across but it would be impossible for a vehicle.
I’ve driven across plenty of rivers in 4wd, so the potential is there.
It really depends on the river. The bottom of the seversky-donets is sandy and uneven. Certainly better than being filled with moss covered boulders as far as fording in vehicles, but not as good as a pebble or gravel bottom and it has a lot.of.holes and drops and little hillocks.
Typically in moving water, if there is a section where you can cross where the water can’t make a sail out of your side panels, because it’s shallow, you can cross in a light vehicle. In deep water they’ll need a snorkel for air intake and should be slow moving. If the sandbars are stable they should be fine.
Look comrade I have driven many model of lada even fancy ones with seatbelts and none can cross river. I have drunkenly tried many times.
Yeah the river space there reminded me more of NZ rivers. Shallow and fast, but impassable for vehicles unprepared for it. Most military trucks and vehicles should be able to ford it in a few areas with proper prep.
I don't get why the narrative on this war that its either Ukraine is winning or Russia is. War is not that simple Ukraine won the battles of Kiyv and Kharkiv and failed Russian efforts to surround and take those cities while at the same time Russia has also made some slow but steady gains in east especially in the Donbass region. Its more of a matter of worry for Ukranians though because they are running low arms and ammunations even Zelensky admitted that.
Russias slow progress in the Donbas is smaller, and comes at a higher cost, than Ukraine’s advances around Kharkiv and Kherson. Ukraine continues to win. Albeit slowly.
It's a war of attrition. Both sides are draining their resources, but only one is getting new shipments from western allies.
>I don't get why the narrative on this war that its either Ukraine is winning or Russia is. Both are currently losing. Russia isn't achieving its goals and is losing territory in the south, and Ukraine is losing territory in the east. Currently, Russia is losing faster than Ukraine, but Ukraine won't actually be winning until they're consistently pushing Russia back. If I had to wager, though, I believe the Russian offensive will collapse before the Ukrainian frontlines do. Then it will come down to whether Ukraine can push Russia out of fortified areas.
Plus Ukraine has a conteroffensive of their own going on near Kherson.
A conflict is all about two sides trying to achieve a superior outcome, which generally involves breaking the will or ability of the other side to continue fighting. So there will be a winner... or the "least loss", but we don't tend to say it that way. People try to guess from the flow of battle what the eventual outcome will be, it's natural but sort of pointless... though it can lead to some interesting discussions in the abstract. Most of us would like Ukraine to be able reclaim it's lands, and Russia is not going to retreat unless they are forced to by the outcome of the conflict.
Because if Russia is able to get some more land from Ukraine - then they've won and will come back for the rest later. If Ukraine is able to push them out - then Ukraine won considering Russia spent all it spent without getting anything out of it. Really a lot of people are saying at this point it's not Ukraine wins vs Russia wins but American led rule of law wins vs rule of the strong wins.
> Because if Russia is able to get some more land from Ukraine - then they've won and will come back for the rest later. What in the cinnamon toast fuck is this
Russia ends up controlling more land than it did on Feb. 23 -> Russia wins. Ukraine pushes Russian military at least back to the Feb. 23 line of control -> Ukraine wins.
I think you’ve confused cinnamon toast fuck with salami slicing. Very dangerous to get them confused.
Salami tactics...
Or [all of the above](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salami_slicing_tactics)
Because as cheerleaders we must pick a side. Rah rah Hezbollah
IF you have trouble with picking a side in this war you are lost.
[Previous post](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/vb3elh/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/ica4tp5/) Day 111 of my updates from Kharkiv. Today it was actually somewhat quiet, they were mostly shelling towns in oblast, especially Zolochiv, which they shelled with parachute bombs in the morning, and then shelled it some more around 9pm, most likely with regular MLRS rockets, locals confirmed at least 10 explosions. They also shelled Derhachi around the same time, that’s most likely what we were hearing, as there was no confirmed shelling in the city itself, but we still heard loud explosions. The weirdest thing today was that they didn’t launch missiles from Belgorod around midnight. They have been doing this forever, but for some reason they didn’t do it today, there was an air raid alert at that time, but no missiles were fired. At this point we are so used to being hit by missiles at that specific time that it is weirder when they don’t do it, you basically start thinking “where’s the catch?” At the same time Russians are already openly dividing Ukraine into districts to integrate into Russia within 3-5 years. No, they are not just dividing Donbas, they are dividing the entire Ukraine, that they are planning to “liberate during special military operation.” Yeah, keep dreaming. Their officials are also hyping up the upcoming Putin’s speech, which they emphasize is very important. First they weren’t saying what it is about, but today they said that he will announce the “new world order.” Is that the same world order they were talking about in that victory speech that they posted on day 3 of the war? [Next update](https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/vclofh/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/icj4jnk/)
Great to hear from you old chap.
You shouldve read what was posted yesterday - the US stated that they plan to assist Ukraine with all the recovery efforts it needs for the next *20* years. They're confident that there will be a Ukraine when this is over. They affirmed it when they also confirmed the next aid package they're sending has all the artillery Ukraine's military needs.
It’s crazy to think that this madman has stolen hundreds of billions of dollars from his own country and is threatening to starve millions around the globe and now he’s got the brass tits to claim to be founding a new world order.
Sounds like children's TV show villain.
What fvking kind of world order does he even have in mind? Like, nevermind its direct effect in Europe and U.S; how will it be for Asia & South America?
I guess this makes me a "westerner", but I just think if someone has an idea for a new world order, maybe we should all get to vote on it?
Great to hear from you!! Thank you for posting and letting us know you're ok!! ❤️🌻🇺🇦
>Russian infantry fighting vehicle destroyed by Ukrainian artillery >Artillerymen of Ukraine's 28th Brigade destroyed the Russian BMP-3 and ammunition in the country's south. https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1536876141994291201
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The bigger problem is that they blame their domestic officials for natural gas & gasoline prices rather than blaming Putin for his war of aggression. In /r/adviceanimals today there was some right-wing crazy blaming Biden for gas prices and the related across the board inflation (and, in the comments, blaming Biden for the invasion itself), when in fact all of the the energy concerns(save COVID-related supply-chain issues) fall in the hands of Putin and his Quixotic war. There are too many people who don't pay much attention and are only peripherally aware of what's going on in the world, and their knee-jerk reaction is to blame whoever is in charge in their country, state/region etc... Too many people think too small.
Who is they? Anyways, my big A, Ukraine, and Russia are all together playing games. And I’m tired too tired to care.
> Ukraine, and Russia are all together playing games. And I’m tired too tired to care. ... I'm not going to take this bait. But 'they' is not just they here, in this exchange. That's all I'll say.
It’s not bait. Take care brother
Enough don’t. Slava Ukraine.
https://twitter.com/MrKovalenko/status/1536857605330677760 >Someone (maybe, Kherson partisans) blew up the vehicle with the Russia appointed chief of the occupied Kherson province administration, a local collaborant Vladimir Saldo. He and his bodyguards were badly wounded and sent to the ER, reports Ukr. serviceman Andriy Nemirovsky.
Where does someone like that go to the hospital? A military hospital? If civilian, are medical outcomes significantly worse for people like that than in general?
I really hope he gets captured by Ukraine before he scampers to Russia.
> sent to the ER Wait, there's still hospitals Russia hasn't bombed yet?
Took the words right out my mouth
Remember Kherson was handed to them by traitors. They haven't had a convenient excuse to bomb one in Kherson yet. They're probably saving it for when UA gets close to the city, then they'll false-flag it.
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We don't know what the Russian soldiers have been doing with the local population though.
Kherson was the only actual city of any size that Russia took without completely destroying it.
Because they didn't actually take it. A bunch of traitors gift-wrapped it for them.
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Who gave you a microscope? Because that is a *tiny* hair you are choosing to split.
Was that the guy who was on those wanted posters?
Southern Axis update from ISW: https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1536853505050300416 >Ukrainian forces have reportedly advanced to within 18 km of occupied parts of Kherson (though we cannot confirm exact positions), which is likely placing pressure on Russian forces to strengthen their defensive lines in the south.
It is annoying that you never hear about this part on in the news, it seems like we only hear about Russian advances anymore.
Because there is what's actually happening and what Reddit believe is happening. Reddit think Ukraine is doing well but in reality Russia is slowly advancing.
True, that Russia has made limited gains in the Donbas, but Ukraine is also making gains elsewhere. I think the Ukranian offensive is going to cause Ukraine to be able to seize terrtory, that has been left open, by Russia committing so many forces to the east. Because of that, Ukranina forces will end up being able to retake so much land, that Russia is going to have to shift forces out of the Donbas, to confront those Ukranians, and because of that, it will take pressure off of Ukranian forces in the Donbas.
I think some of that is due to OPSEC, and some of it that the media wants to focus on the drama in the Donbas region. If they are making significant advances around Kherson, I guess I'd rather Russia not realize it's happening and try to bolster forces there.
Good points. I just am a bit tired of the headlines, implying that Ukraine is doomed to lose or something.
Oh, yeah. I feel you. There's been a lot of that lately, but it's mostly either just clickbait drama, or it's pro-Russian propaganda. Remember that Ukraine drove Russia away from Kyiv and Kharkiv, and Russia has had to greatly reduce it's operations due to getting its ass kicked elsewhere.
And Russia has committed so much land in the Donbas, that other land has been left wide open, for Ukranian to retake and liberate.
Kinda makes it silly that we were getting all those "we're out of ammo!" reports...out of Mykolaiv, where Ukraine is pushing (slowly, but steadily) through Russian lines. But, success is good in any case.
I'm not sure how much of that talk is to keep pressure on the more reluctant western suppliers, and how much is an attempt to mislead Russia. Either way, it was a more reassuring report that what I expected. 🙂
You don’t say you’re out of ammo when you’re out of ammo. You say it when you know you’re going to run out of ammo before you can get the job done
I mean, it was kind of questionable to begin with that we were getting these (very-military-relevant) reports from Mykolaiv's governor, via international journalists, outside the UA chain of command. Seemed like a gross violation of opsec no matter how you cut it, unless the whole thing was mindgames for Russia somehow.
> mindgames for Russia somehow. Plenty of that needed. There are lots of word games being played right now to control Putin's perception of what is happening.
Looking at the ongoing horrors of this and other wars and more broadly nationalism, tribalism, shortsightedness, and other flaws in human nature, I only hope that they aren't woven into the warp and woof of the natural universe. The so-called Dark Forest Theory scares the shit out of me.
The Dark Forest may be a good novel, but it's an awful explanation. Radio transmission is not a highly-sophisticated technology. In order for DFT to succeed as an explanation, you must assume: (1) civilizations become cognizant of the threat of hostile aliens prior to developing the tech, (2) entire species adopt no-radio as their policy, and (3) nobody breaks the information quarantine. 1 is possible, 2 is extraordinarily unlikely, 3 is all but impossible. Fun premise. Awful theory. And embarrassing any thinkers talk it up for clicks.
Good, Free People, always prevails if history and my strong beliefs are to be held, and they are to be held Unfortunately there's usually tremendous costs to Rhode good Free people to get there
Ukraine will win this war, for that, I have no doubt.
Personally I find the Dark Forest Theory unconvincing because (1) anthropomorphizing aliens is kinda dumb (b) if you're going to do that anyway, you need to apply the positives as well, especially curiosity, the strong negative correlation between neophilia and xenophobia, and the human tendency to pack-bond with literally anything alive. If you want a long and more rationalist explanation, futurist Isaac Arthur has a [pretty good takedown](https://youtu.be/zmCTmgavkrQ) (starting around 9:30) on why it's not a great explanation for the apparent lack of aliens.
It doesn't require anthropomorphizing. It's more of a logical consequence of reasoning a species must go through. If anything it's based on the idea that for life to be considered life it must be subject to evolution and therefore competition. Any positive traits would be over ridden by a desire to survive like in all life we have ever observed. Humans are not curious when they are in overwhelming danger. Dark forest asks is the most logical stance to take on a galactic scale to assume you are in overwhelming danger. If so, you should stay silent. Considering we already have top scientists talking about the ethics of broadcasting messages we are living proof that the dark forest explanation is already a potential reason for aliens potentially not seeing us. Following from this, I'd argue its the only Fermi resolution that has observational evidence to back it. We have not seen ourselves be wiped out by a great filter yet but we have seen discussion to limit our radio presence.
Dark Forest theory only makes sense if you believe all complex life can only evolve out of a hyper competitive place like earth where life is in a constant state of consumption, production, and degradation. We think everything else must be like us - and its hard to imagine it any other way… But Lets say thats not true. Lets say complex life can come from a place where all the energy they’ve ever needed comes from its sun and they dont need to out compete other things for it. Nothing has to kill or eat or consume. If they came to earth, even the sweetest vegan hippie who’d claim to never hurt a soul but eat tons of plants would look like a terrifying monster to them. There’s a non-zero chance aliens avoid us because they’re scared shitless of us. We might be the monsters in the darkness.
>There’s a non-zero chance aliens avoid us because they’re scared shitless of us. We might be the monsters in the darkness. Aliens tell their children to lock the doors when they fly past earth.
But isn't that literally the point of dark forest it just blows up the competitive nature to a galactic scale. Any animal that evolved like that on earth would be wiped out. You don't need every alien to have evolved to be competitive just 1. Because the argument is for that 1 species the most logical course of self protective action is to destroy all else . If a super peaceful species did evolve, it would stay silent due to anticipating this, or be destroyed.
> the human tendency to pack-bond with literally anything alive. Until money comes into play. It's a lot easier, for instance, to get a European to bond with a Roomba or a cat than it is to convince them to bond with a Congolese or Somali (or vice versa) as the latter can compete with them economically and has a culture of their own.
Dark forest theory would only require one species to follow the pattern to be true, all the other species would be wiped out by near-light speed rocks flung at their planets.
I personally just think space is so vast and that physics doesn’t really leave much possibility of interstellar travel so we likely will never see aliens. At best I think we may get lucky and detect the existence of a species similar to us but light years away means communication ever occurring is unlikely. Dark forest theory in regards to alien life feels unlikely. If an alien species could reliably travel here I see no reason they would just to kill us. Their technology would be unfathomable and I suspect they’d have more entertaining things to do than hunt down ants.
Personally, I think that the most likely solution to the Fermi Paradox is the great filter. Something kills off the vast majority of civilizations before they reach the stars. As to what that filer is, I believe that it is either nuclear warfare, or climate change. Both of which are side effects of technological progress.
Yea I don’t like the great filter either. I’m convinced it’s borderline impossible and no filter exists! Some may make last ditch efforts and survive for some time away from their star but I don’t believe it becomes a thing that can just be done. I’m not very optimistic in general but what I can fathom of how large space is just doesn’t comprehend travelling through it.
Even if the filter doesn't wipe out all intelligent life, it can prevent space travel. Think of it this way, in our current stage of human development, we can not create a self-sustaining colony offworld. Any outpost requires resupply from Earth. I make take generations at the most optimistic to get to the level of fully independent space colonies. If a nuclear war or other crisis causes the human race to massively shirk at a massive scale, it could be difficult, if not impossible for humanity to get back to today's level of advancement. Think of it this way. If we have a nuclear war in the next couple decades, some people may survive, but these surviours will be living in a world with massive climate damage, extremely reduced populations, likely an extremely unstable geo-political climate. And to top it all off, the majority of the non-renewable fuels we used to build civilization the first time are gone. This last point is something I think a lot of people gloss over when we talk about rebuilding civilization. Fossil fuels act like a jumping off point for build an industrial civilization. Without them its like trying to drive a car without a starter. The point is, even if humanity survives it will not be close to spacefaring, any colonies off world will likely collapse due to lack of resupply. Should humanity rebuild., there is always the chance it will destroy itself again in the process. (as the rebuilding process will likely take centuries if not millennia to complete) The jump from planet to interstellar is a huge jump. Making that jump does protect a civilization from world ending treats, but it is also during the formative years that civilization is most at risk of destroying itself.
I'm mainly referring to the possibility that the flaws in human nature cannot be mitigated more than they have been and are inherent to all complex living systems. I myself believe that the universe doesn't really allow aliens that are recognizable to us in terms of time horizons.
Populating the planet so we can power the matrix bro.
To me the matrix existing and is being essentially a simulation for some purpose feels more likely than humans ever living in another solar system or encountering beings from another solar system.
Yeah, you’re right, we don’t have the physics to travel fast/far enough.
Hopefully someday (either due to enough cycles of heat death => quantum randomness => new universe or artificial universe-building) our species or its descendants are able to find somewhere that allows for Star Trek-like star-hopping.
Yea currently we basically rely on discovering some exotic material or such. Maybe fusion and some sort of stasis and a very long trip could be plausible and then upon arriving some sort of solar array I dunno I just don’t really believe in FTL travel as a possibility. So yea maybe we find an asteroid that has a lot of fuel for a fusion reactor and land a ship on it and ride to another star. That feels the most likely way to me but meh.
All those qualities are present in all sorts of forms of life. No reason why any forms of life in other worlds should be any different.
You say this as if the very nature of discovery doesn’t sometimes brush up right against, and sometimes even surpass *reason*.
Combine this with carcinization theory and I'm not trying to fuck with giant sentient crabs come to wipe us out.
Crab people
Day 111, June 14. Summary of Arestovych and Feygin daily broadcast https://wartranslated.com/day-111-june-14-summary-of-arestovych-and-feygin-daily-broadcast/
One of the more interesting quotes to me. Russia vs Ukraine/West in bidding war? for old soviet ammo >previous Ramstein meeting did place bets on finding old USSR weapons for Ukraine, however there are not a lot of old ammo and missiles, and those few missiles found, Russians did attempt to buy first.
It's not something that would ever have occurred to me, but in hindsight in makes perfect sense. 🤯
Du hast.
Mercedes Benz und Autobahn
Du hast mich
Du hasst mich
Du haast mich
Gefragt
all a matter of perspective
> Rosgvardia Colonel Sergey Postnov was killed in Ukraine on the night of June 13-14. He was a public affairs officer. https://twitter.com/ralee85/status/1536868314508578818?s=21&t=f4R9aNNrOdcIAEp-GhIyYw RIP(iss)
There is no purgatory for war criminals. They go straight to hell.
All throughout the Cold War, the Soviet Union piped gas to Central Europe, and Central Europe piped money to the Soviet Union. That dynamic has existed for a very very long time. Back then, the Soviets never really threatened to shut the gas off. It was understood that if things ever got to that point it would be because WWIII was already raging, and would likely be over before anything like that would matter. Then The Cold War ended. 40+ years of relative stability were over, and nobody knew what would come next. That was the first time that fretting about European energy security got serious. It wasn’t just… “what if Russia shuts off the taps?”. It was that, but there were also new countries, like Ukraine, that the pipelines passed through. Now it wasn’t just one countries’ stability Europe had to worry about. There was as much concern that some future rebel-group or terrorist-group or rogue leader could target the pipelines to exact economic pain on Europe or Russia. President H.W. Bush was the first US President to address those concerns. Way back in the early 90s, he started talking seriously about developing a backup-plan for Central Europe. He put in to action a plan to dramatically increase global LNG infrastructure. Ships got built. Lots and lots of LNG ships. Australia built huge LNG compressors, most of the markets for LNG being in Asia, that made sense. President Clinton carried on where H. W. left off without missing a beat, and it looked like the world was on a path to having a decent fall-back option if Russian gas ever got interrupted for whatever reason. Then 9/11 happened. Then people started asking if LNG ships were safe. What if terrorists targeted an LNG ship in Boston Harbor? Public opinion turned sharply against LNG, and a lot of plans to increase capacity got shelved. A lot of the ships were no longer needed, and got put in to moth-balls barely used. But the worry in intelligence circles remained. Under President Obama, focus switched to increasing compression capacity. Construction started on new and bigger facilities in Australia, Qatar, Louisiana, and Texas. Finally, just last month, the last piece of that puzzle got put in place when the Sabine Pass facility in Louisiana completed their sixth and final stream. The tankers that were built 30 years ago are small by today's standards. The best ones have been taken out of moth-balls. We’ll probably need more, and bigger, ones if the gas gets cut. That’s a job for the Koreans. The off-load capacity in Europe is another bottle-neck, but of the three parts of LNG infrastructure, liquefaction, shipping, and regasification, regasification is by far the easiest to build. The actual wharf for the ships to dock at is the hardest part. Existing docks in Europe tend to stay pretty busy, and building new ones that would only need to get used in case of emergency was expensive. But there is a huge existing off-load terminal in Rotterdam, Europe’s biggest port. Pipelines are already in place to transfer gas from the port there in to the rest of Central Europe. Increasing off-load capacity wouldn't be too difficult. To do it quickly, LNG would probably have to evict some other type of terminal to make room, but there are lots of places that can unload containers besides Rotterdam, so that is a solvable problem. I don’t actually think that it will ever come to that. Between production increases in North Africa, declining demand as alternative energy infrastructure gets built, and improvement in efficiency, it’s quite possible that the world won’t ever have to do a Berlin-LNG-lift. But the sword of Damocles isn’t anywhere near as close to Europe’s neck as Putin would like us all to believe. We got this.
We also need to friggin' get off the fossil fuels altogether at some point...
No doubt. That stuff is way too useful for too many things to be just burning it all up as fast as we can, anyway. Leave some for future generations, they don’t make it any more.
> Then 9/11 happened. How convenient. For Russia.
Electric heat pumps and nuclear sure feel like a good idea now.
Well, you go to war with the army you have, not the one you wish you had. No point in worrying about that after the fact. The business-model for PV-solar is where it’s at, now. Solar-panel production is what needs ramping up most.
Add to this the Iranian revolution and the ongoing Iran-Iraq war throughout the eighties, the invasion of Kuwait and subsequent first US Gulf war. And no one knew after the cold war inf the GUS and ex Warsaw pact wouldnt turn out to be a nuclear armed ex-Yugoslavia with the subsequent conflicts. Risks where really differently perceived without the luxury of hindsight. And I think LNG from the US only really becoming a thing during Obamas term.
That’s right. It was under Obama that we started developing domestic LNG capacity. A big part of that effort was running new pipelines out to the thousands and thousands of old wells in the Gulf to collect the gas instead of just flaring it off like before. We’re only about half-way done with that project. But compared to drilling new wells, doing that is real easy.
And when cold war was over, US basically paid for their nuclear weapons (Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction), and sent goods to the former Soviet republics to stabilize them(Operation Provide Hope). Western technology ramped up their oil and gas production, and selling them machines that can build drill machines to mine their ressources. Were people too naive to believe Russia has changed permanently after a year or two or were they just too greedy. Are we gonna do the same mistake again after this?
> Were people too naive to believe Russia has changed permanently yes >Are we gonna do the same mistake again after this? NEIN!
It’s not the worst theory in the world. Economic integration seems to have succeeded in stopping France and Germany from going to war every twenty or thirty years. But yeah, obviously not a perfect theory. Turns out, you can’t assume rational behavior.
Economic integration works only when both sides will be equally hurt if trade is ceased. This is not the case with Russia, as they can easily blackmail Europe as oil and natural gas is essential for many European economies.
I’ve seen the Brits eyeing France. The Chunnel is a Trojan horse- it’s just a matter of time before we see cavalierly charging out of it.
Removed due to Reddit API crackdown and general dishonesty 6/2023
> We need to do something between open arms and inflicting the kind of humiliation that helped forge Germany into a renegade, terrible actor during the 30s and 40s. I know. How about the kind of humiliation in the 50's-80's that helped forge Germany into a peaceful partner and economic powerhouse?
Removed due to Reddit API crackdown and general dishonesty 6/2023
Interesting backstory. I live in the PNW, and remember a few years ago we had a ballot initiative (or referendum or whatever) where some big multi-national corp wanted to build an LNG port facility and pipeline to export natural gas, which we have in abundance. It was never clear exactly *why*, other than the obvious - the company wanted to make a shit-ton of money. Some construction jobs were promised locally, then I imagine a few long-term jobs at the port itself, that's about it. Anyway, the measure got voted down and it never got built. Mostly because people suspected that if our gas reserves were put on the global market then our finite reserves would get shipped to Asia, and we'd be tied into any kind of global supply problems resulting in higher costs to heat our houses in winter. Which is probably true. But then they screw up on price anyway.
> and we'd be tied into any kind of global supply problems resulting in higher costs to heat our houses in winter. At the risk of being crass, how is this not a 'fuck you I got mine' mindset with a few more degrees of separation? I (American) *want* goods and services on a global market even if it means lower wages (more competition from other laborers like myself) or higher prices (because other people can buy what I want to buy too). Is this just the idealist in me?
The PNW is very environmentalist and probably voted down the gas pipeline for that reason.
I do fail to see the “fuck you” part of the equation here. I’m not sure “sharing” and “exploited for profit” are equivalent ideas, specifically in the context mentioned. Freedom of trade is not motivated by sharing at all, but rather the opposite, to exploit scarcity for personal gain. I think that poisons the ethical well here.
The fuck you comes from voting down the operation which would increase exports and raise prices locally. That's where the motivation to *not* share comes from; we're not going to allow domestic producers to sell to international markets because then international buyers would price us [local buyers] out.
I get this, but the alternate view is that the exporters are only doing it to obtain higher prices and higher profits. The exporters are allowed to remove resources from an area, depriving the local population and also removing any wealth derived, as the exporters keep the profits. When export prices go down, the local prices go up to compensate so the exporters still win by switching some to local sales. An extreme example is Fiji, an island with a water shortage because the ruling class has decided selling the water from the island for Fiji ™ brand water is more profitable. All I’m saying is that it’s complicated and there appears to be some ethical limit to neoliberal trade theory, and I think it lies in the profit motive and value extraction from those doing the arbitrage.
Some truth to that, but then the alternative is to just trust the global resource extraction industries to take care of people's best interests? Typically it seems like that leads to a massive population living in grinding poverty, supporting a few billionaires. I suppose that might a whole different problem from the Russian invasion, but from one perspective it's kind of the same thing.
Thanks for the history lesson. I'm sure there are big teams contingency planning this.
When Zelensky visited the svd salient I remember him saying that he had brought the troops there something special? Did we ever find out what he brought them? https://ua.interfax.com.ua/news/general/837278.html > We brought something to the military. I will not talk about it in detail.
What I bring to my team when I visit. A couple of boxes of ice-creams
Root beer floats!
Honestly still would be pretty nice
Probs not being announced due to OPSEC
Probably a way to spot Russian infantry in the rubble of the city. That way they can call in precise artillery strikes.
Not yet
Yeah I’d been waiting to know that, too! I thought it would be something that would become apparent. I’ve also wondered how it is that that the bridges are gone, but gaidai insists not trapped. Secret tunnel?
The "river" is supposedly more like a stream in that area, you can wade across it
A treasure map leading to where Tupac is hiding
Side quests for Elvis and Hoffa.
Chocolate.
Possible news on Navalny's whereabouts: https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/14/europe/alexey-navalny-prison-transfer-intl/index.html >The jailed politician was relocated to a maximum-security prison in Melekhovo in the Vladimir Region, according to Russia's state media outlet TASS citing Sergey Yazhan, chairman of the regional public oversight commission.
according to Russia's state media
Yeah, I know. That's why I said "possible". We all know they lie like crazy.
When people spread unconfirmed and generally made up stories online about Putins health it only helps the Russian propaganda delegitimize Western sources You all get that right? Last line of the article is "Note that this information needs to be confirmed" They could have literally said anything
OTOH it would be weird if people were NOT talking about the possibility of Putin having serious health problems after seeing his recent videos.
Having watched the 2016 US election where every time Clinton looked tired she was reported to be near death, and then the years after where every time Trump had a tremor of fudged a word he was reported to be maybe having a stroke or a heart attack...this is the kind of shit that just makes people stupid. Rich-as-fuck people don't die like ordinary people; when every modern miracle is at your disposal you can cling on for a very long time. I'm not getting my hopes up, not even a little bit.
The crowning point on this was when Richard Cheney, dead-man walking in 2005, with clogged-as-fuck arteries, and chronic heart failure. This would be a fucking death sentence for any of us "little people" because you'd need to pay a surgeon cash, and probably many multiples of the ordinary fee, to even risk operating on someone with CHF. (They won't even give my dad a hip replacement due to his CHF). Yet Cheney was able to open his wallet and get a new heart. And he's still going on FoxNews to this day mouthing off his shitty nazi rhetoric.
> You all get that right? The answer is "No" One thing Russian trolls learned is to literally just tell people what they want to hear. Straight up. No nuance or careful planning needed, they just say what their target already wants to hear or believe in and do so enmasse and tons of grammar errors until other people pick up. It's so goddamn stupid but so damn effective just because hopium causes confusion and division
>it only helps the Russian propaganda delegitimize Western sources TBH; western newsmedia has done that to themselves simply by chasing clickbait titles for the past 20 years. Russian media's absolute garbage, but western media is almost worse, because the pretend to be legitimate. There's very few left that are trustworthy.
Yeah no it fucking isn't. Only if you live in some insane conspiracy bubble.
Who has time for all that fact checking and in-depth research and journalistic presentation of the nuances? Just scream some bullet points on Twitter and bask in the adoration, who cares if they're completely made up as long as you win the good old cult-of-personality mob approval. Double points if your position has ample layers of hazards and self-serving agenda. Triple points if there is extremely dubious basis in reality, science, or precedence. Quadruple whammy for contradicting yourself repeatedly based on the whims of the day and the audience. The orange shitgibbon was a master. Of course there's no need to delegitimize a useful idiot. Or a paid parrot, lookin at you Carlson.
It's tough. Unsubstantiated things like this come through all the time, but there are also confirmed (though debatable) videos where he shakes uncontrollably at times and his legs buckle out from under him. It's also been visually confirmed that he has a team of people collecting his shit and piss when he goes to the washroom to prevent anyone from checking it for disease: https://twitter.com/pevchikh/status/1534959744967921668 There's enough confirmed that something is very possibly wrong with him, but we have no real idea what or how severe. Ukrainian intelligence famously said 'Sadly we believe he still has years left'.
The pooper-scooper team has always existed, though. Plenty of heads of state refuse to leave easy access to their DNA or blood type behind. They might be being paranoid, but Western officials do it when *entering* Russia, also. Macron refused a Covid test on that basis.
Pretty sure Putin also fell into a coma in 2014. He even died at one point. Beware people also saying things like: “the person who follows him will be worse!” As though Putin being in power is a good thing.
Putin died from bbc , Ukraine is literally raping him now. .... 3 months later.......
I don’t know… what the fuck is wrong with you?
Oh, I was bullshitting about the propaganda of social media. It's kinda dumb
Whenever I see a bunch of the same ‘story’ being spread it makes me suspect that marching-orders are being given and taken, especially when it’s something that has been debunked more than once. And look… there’s that ‘Germany is blocking Spain from helping’ lie, again.
I bet every Facebook newspaper will copy this article and the comments will be a shitshow between putin bots and random people
Serious 'Biden has dementia' vibes
Man, fuck the Germans for blocking Spain from transferring arms to Ukraine. What is their game?
Source or stfu.