Tag: ukraine

UKRAINE DARKNESS: Zelensky’s Mandate Expires Today – Streets Are Empty as Men Hide From New Conscription Law – MSM Questions the Power of Presidential Aide Andy Yermak – Power Outages All Over the Country

And so we’ve come to the point of the war in Ukraine in which the west’s ‘Knight in Shining armor’, the ‘defender of democracy’ Volodymyr Zelensky has outrun his Constitutional Presidential mandate, and is now in power only by virtue of the martial law he enacted.

That is just the most dramatic of the absolutely disheartening (for Kiev) series of developments.

To begin with, a series of videos have surfaced showing how the streets of Ukraine now are deserted, with men hiding from conscription into the army – and somehow, everyone else seemed to have stayed at home, too.

In the context of the rapidly progressing Russian Federation forces, even deep-state aligned papers like WaPo feel compelled to report on the shitshow.

They are catching up to TGP’s report on the abnormal powers held by Zelensky’s top aide Andrey Yermak. So now, they’ve come as far as writing:

“If actor and comedian Volodymyr Zelensky’s top credential when he was elected in 2019 was that he’d played a president on TV, the top qualification of his all-powerful chief of staff, Andrey Yermak, was being Zelensky’s friend.”

Ouch. WaPo discusses how martial law, has concentrated extraordinary authority in the presidential administration, ‘making Yermak perhaps the most powerful chief of staff in the country’s history — virtually indistinguishable from his boss’.

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The Slapstick Horror of Drone Warfare

The Russia/Ukraine war will no doubt mark the beginning of the age of drone warfare in earnest. Reuters reports that Ukraine has orders placed for 300,000 drones of various types and 100,000 are being sent immediately into combat. Russia is set to produce 32,000 drones per year while also currently buying in bulk directly from Iran. The meme that goes around is that a slight young woman sitting in an office block somewhere uses a Nintendo joypad to kill brave men in mud hundreds of miles away, and there’s not much they can do about it. Drone warfare gives off the whiff of dishonour and underhandedness. Still, it is difficult to say exactly why. After all, is dropping bombs out of an airplane or launching ballistic missiles or machine-gunning men desperately climbing out of a trench any more honourable?

Eighty years after Dresden and Nagasaki, can we still even be shocked or depressed by the realities of industrial, mechanised warfare in which armies and entire populations are mere quanta to be erased from a spreadsheet using the “strikethrough” function?

Nevertheless, seeing the realities of drone warfare via the grainy footage on social media left me at least with an uneasy feeling, but one that I could not pinpoint or explain sufficiently or adequately. Typically, such footage consists of soldiers of either side milling about in the oddly featureless Ukrainian landscape and then being hit from a distance or up close by drones or explosives fired from drones. In May 2023, footage was taken of a Russian soldier surrendering to a drone; we bore witness to the fear, dread, and utter helplessness of the man in the face of a remote-controlled gadget the size of a football.

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Pentagon sounds alarm over Ukraine corruption

The conflict with Russia has created new opportunities for bribes, kickbacks and theft in Ukraine, the US military’s inspector general told Congress in the quarterly report on the $113 billion in aid sent to Kiev.

Department of Defense Inspector General Robert Storch also serves as the special inspector for Operation Atlantic Resolve, the US-led operation to arm Ukraine.

“The ongoing war with Russia has created new opportunities for corruption, with several recent scandals within the defense sector revealing the misuse of wartime resources and weapons procurement funds,” the report said.

“Endemic corruption persists” in Ukraine, which remains “one of the least accountable governments in Europe,” according to the Pentagon’s inspector-general.

“Bribes, kickbacks, and inflated procurement costs are common risks for corruption within the Ministry of Defense,” leading to purchases of “inferior equipment” or “diversion of funds” intended for food and ammunition, according to the report.

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Closer to Nuclear War

I can’t help but wonder what proponents of America’s participation in the old Cold War dinosaur known as NATO are thinking about NATO officials who are contemplating sending NATO military personnel into Ukraine to train Ukrainian troops in their war against Russia. Those who relish the idea of nuclear war between the United States and Russia undoubtedly must be ecstatic over the possibility of such a move.

It has been clear for some time that Ukraine is losing its war with Russia. Ukraine has lost countless young soldiers and their front-line troops are now largely composed of middle-aged men. Its production has plummeted. Its supply of weapons is low, which is why it continues to desperately seek replacement weapons from the United States. Ukrainian forces continue to retreat. And there is the increasing possibility that Russian forces will achieve a breakthrough in Ukrainian defense lines.

Obviously feeling desperate over the battlefield situation, European officials within NATO are contemplating sending military personnel into Ukraine to help train Ukrainian soldiers.

But wouldn’t that put NATO and Russia into direct military conflict? After all, what happens if a Russian missile kills a bunch of NATO soldiers inside Ukraine?

According to the New York Times, “So far the United States has said no, but Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said on Thursday that a NATO deployment of trainers appeared inevitable. ‘We’ll get there eventually, over time,’ he said.”

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Ukraine Formally Asks NATO To Send Troops For First Time, Pentagon Mulling

The continued inevitable and disastrous slide into a WW3 nuclear-armed confrontation between Russian and the West continues as The New York Times reports NATO appears to actually be seriously mulling sending troops to Ukraine to serve in the role as ‘trainers’ at a moment Kiev is desperate to tap and train up new manpower. And this would be closer to front line positions as well.

“NATO allies are inching closer to sending troops into Ukraine to train Ukrainian forces, a move that would be another blurring of a previous red line and could draw the United States and Europe more directly into the war,” NY Times wrote Thursday. What has changed? The Zelensky government is now directly requesting it, apparently on a formal level for the first time of the conflict, according to officials.

The Times confirms “Ukrainian officials have asked their American and NATO counterparts to help train 150,000 new recruits closer to the front line for faster deployment.”

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Revealed: Pensioner poet, 71, accused of shooting Slovakian PM was filmed chanting ‘long live Ukraine!’ – after he gave up his steady life and book club to form anti-violence party when he was attacked at the supermarket by a drunk man

Alleged gunman Juraj Cintula, 71, is facing life in prison if convicted of the ‘lone wolf’, ‘politically motivated’ attack that rocked Europe.

Populist allies of Robert Fico have tried to seize on the shooting with calls to close the Liberal Party and crack down on the free media with some characterising the would-be assassin as a liberal.

But enquiries reveal the poet and retired security guard has a muddled political background having rallied against communism, migrants, and violence – with links to a pro-Russian militia.

Friends in Cintula’s hometown of Levice, western Slovakia, described him as ‘rebellious when he was young, but not aggressive’.

The grey-haired, bearded grandfather wrote poems while chairman of the Duha Literary Club in his hometown and published a racist book on ‘eyeless gypsies’ in 2015.

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Mock-Up Patriot System Sparks China-Ukraine Conspiracy Theories

An image has emerged on social media that some widely followed Twitter accounts claim to be a U.S.-made Patriot air defense missile launcher that Ukraine sold to China. One expert, however, tells The War Zone that the undated photograph instead shows a mock-up.

The picture depicts what some have claimed is a Patriot launcher on the back of a flatbed truck being moved in China. This sparked the spread of conspiracy theories on social media.

However, what the undated photograph actually shows is a mock-up a former commander of the Army’s Air Defense Artillery School at Fort Sill tells The War Zone.

“Those are what we call dummy canisters on that launcher,” retired Army Col. David Shank told The War Zone. “The umbilical cables coming from the back end of the launchers clearly show it’s either a training launcher or a decoy. Plus, it is so green. Ukrainian launchers, like other nations, get dirty as you maneuver them on hardball roads and/or dirt roads.”

He also noted that the launcher in question is marked “inert” on the side. The image, he said, shows a mock-up of a Patriot PAC-3 system, evident by the four canisters each holding four interceptors a piece.

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Thoughts on Russia

The main reason that “the West” (USA/Europe/NATO) does not want a defeat or an end to the “Ukraine crisis” is that once it stops, Russia will most surely stop its “Special Operation” in Ukraine and pull out its forces (at least its “offence” forces, leaving perhaps some “defence” in strategic positions).

But the point here is that the lies and bullshit of “the West” would then be plainly exposed.

Because what in truth was the reason for all this money, etc. that “the West” has being pouring into this “fight against Russia”??Jeffries, DonaldBuy New $21.99(as of 07:17 UTC – Details)

The idea is that Russia/Putin want and intend to capture the former Soviet satellite countries (Eastern Europe) and then march into central and Western Europe (hence the ridiculous Putin/Hitler analogy).

But once the truth is revealed that Russia has no interest in and no intention of doing any of this, then there is nothing left to support the demonisation and punishment (sanctions, etc.) of Russia, no?

Demonise and punish a country that is simply going about the business of peacefully supporting its own interests absent any actual aggression on others?

Most of the dumbed-down public (and that, for sure, is much of the public) really does confuse present-day Russia with the former Soviet Union, not realising that the whole “Communist” thing was strictly speaking a Bolshevik (Khazarian?) enterprise and that present-day Russia has happily left its Communist past behind, returning to Christian Orthodoxy, traditional values, love of country, etc. (See Tucker Carlson interview of Aleksandr Dugin).

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Ukraine using British weapons for terror attacks – Moscow

Ukrainian forces are actively using weapons supplied by Britain to carry out terrorist attacks against Russian regions, Foreign Ministry official Sergey Belyaev has said.

London remains one of the largest donors of weaponry to Kiev, providing £7.1 billion ($8.9 billion) in assistance since the start of the Russia-Ukraine conflict in February 2022, Belyaev, who heads the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Second European Department, said in an interview with TASS news agency, published on Saturday.

“UK-supplied weapons are being actively used by the Ukrainian military in terrorist attacks on civilian infrastructure and the civilian population of Donbass, as well as other Russian regions,” he stated.

According to the diplomat, last month’s announcement by British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak of a £500 million ($617 million) military aid package for Ukraine was an attempt by Britain to gain a more prominent role in NATO and among European countries.

“The British acted in a similar manner when they began deliveries of Storm Shadow cruise missiles and Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine,” becoming one of the first countries to provide Kiev with such types of hardware, he explained.

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Biden admin expected to announce additional $400 MILLION in weapons for Ukraine

The United States is expected to announce another $400 million in military aid for Ukraine on Friday, a source familiar with the matter told the Associated Press.

It would mark the third round of assistance provided to Ukraine by the Biden administration since the president signed a $95 billion foreign aid bill into law last month.

According to the AP, the latest installment will be provided via the presidential drawdown authority and is set to include High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, artillery, air defense, anti-tank munitions, armored vehicles, and other necessary military equipment.

Whether the package included another round of Army Tactical Missile System long-range ballistic missiles, ATACMS, was not revealed.

On Thursday, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky warned that his nation was facing “a really difficult situation” on the eastern front, where soldiers are working to prevent Russian troops from advancing further into their territory.

“With an increase in the supply of weapons,” Zelensky said, per the Washington Post, “we will be able to stop them in the east. As of now, they seized the initiative there.”

Following the passing of the aforementioned $95 billion foreign aid bill, the Biden administration moved to send $1 billion via the drawdown authority, then approved $6 billion in long-term contracts with defense industry companies to provide weapons in the future.

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