Oh and happy birthday, nearly forgot, the big 50, I expect you did nothing as its unlikely anyone gives a shit about you so from all here who don't care about you either..
[VIDEO] Former Ukrainian president doesn't think Russia will use nuclear weapons. (@~3:30) ABC News Nightline: Former Ukrainian president speaks out against Putin
Day 11 and Kyiv still stands! Russia is calling in more mercenaries because their army is flagging. And while they are making SLOW progress, the Russians are very much in trouble of getting stretched. The more they move east the more resources they have to commit to holding what they’ve taken over.
Russians are making good progress toward accomplishing their goal of taking the country, even if they have to - and are- go full Aleppo to compensate for their poorly planned and executed operations in some places. Their convoy thing remains a mess. Yesterday a military pundit type asked a great question, to wit: "Why do we always just see all the trucks in the satellite images but no troops around them." Then there were reports by Ukraine residents living the area of the convoy that Ruskie soldiers were entering their houses to ransack and look for food. So that's a mess and a disaster. But they will just go savage in Kviev in some way to compensate for the clown show in that column. And,yes I get that some weapons and missiles are arriving and that will keep things messy - probably for years to come- but, in general, Russia is on track for Ukraine.
I don’t know. I’ve been really digging into this, this morning and I’m starting to doubt the Russians can go the distance. There’s pretty good evidence they expected a 14 day “operation” and that they expected more of an operation than a war. Take that stalled column for example, why are they all sitting on the high road in a column for day stretched for miles? If they are delayed, they should be repositioned- these are military vehicles after all and designed for off road purposes to at least some extent. There has been some evidence the Russian vehicles have not been properly maintained and are prone to blowing tires and malfunctioning in rough terrain. Look at the wheels on this Pantsir, they’re more than stuck in the mud they’re blown out: There’s lots of suspicion about their Air Force too. They are now losing more aircraft in the last 3 days than the first 7. It’s suspected the Russians really only had little more than a couple handfuls of top notch fighter jets and are now using mothballed fighters. Same with their tanks. A lot of the armored attack units coming in now are Soviet era “tanks” like real tanks, stuff used for training purposes. It’s safe to say the 300 plus “tanks” lost was the best the Russians had. Also, most estimates are that 95% of assembled forces are “in country” and progress is still very slow. Add to that the known supply problems with food and fuel. I don’t know maybe I’m being optimistic and looking for the holes but we’ll see if the Russians can really go the distance.
The Russians have bitten off more than they can chew so there are abundant examples. But they have been there before in other excursions and overcome it by going full savage. Or at least go through multi-year savage efforts and exhaust all of the before leaving. In AFG for example, they down on the level of just going from village and poisoning their wells. Classy bunch. Not. We are Americans - short attention spans- tendency to watch these things like a tv drama that is supposed to have a clean ending in the allotted period of time that matches our attention span. In reality, Viet Nam, the Mideast, AFG, etc, they often degenerate into scenarios where one side/both are on the verge of winning for decades. In regard to Ukraine holding the capital and the government, I expect that to be over pretty soon. If one wants to argue that the Ruskies are still losing in multiple areas and that the Ukrainian insurgency is on the verge of a comeback, I don't doubt that there will be circumstances and insurgency scenarios to confirm that- for years. But that Parliament meeting in Kiev like the old days because the Ruskies have been driven out? No. Not in the near term years. Unless it is a Ruskie government. As I said a few days ago: "The who lost Ukraine" debates will set in soon. I think "soon" is here or give it a week. I could change my view by a few degrees if suddenly lots of fighter planes arrived with experienced volunteer pilots. Or some verison of that. I do want to see as many Russians as possible killed, so I do not poo-poo all the weaponry arriving or minimize assertions of what it can do. And it is an area where I will be as happy as a clam at high tide, if I am wrong about the Ruskies being able to gain control. I would not put it past the Russian pigs to start doing what the germans did in response to insurgency efforts. When a kraut was killed by resistance in one of their occupied countries, they would just select twenty people from the civilian population and execute them in the town square with the villagers being required to watch. And in regard to Russian pigs raping women in Ukraine. Well, that is a given. It is what they do.
So much for the ceasefire to let civilians out. ++++++++++++++ Moscow: Russia's defence ministry said Saturday it had resumed "offensive actions" in Ukraine after announcing a ceasefire earlier in the day to allow residents of two besieged cities to evacuate. "Due to the unwillingness of the Ukrainian side to influence nationalists or extend the regime of silence, offensive actions have been resumed at 18:00 Moscow time (1500 GMT)," defence ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in a video briefing. Earlier on Saturday, Russia announced a ceasefire and said it opened humanitarian corridors for the exit of civilians from the strategic port town of Mariupol and neighbouring Volnovakha. Konashenkov said that "not a single civilian" was able to exit via the humanitarian corridors. "The population of these cities is held by nationalist formations as a human shield," Konashenkov added. He said "nationalist battalions" used the ceasefire to "regroup and reinforce their positions".