A common theme marshaled to “prove” that Russia is failing in its war with Ukraine is that Russia failed to quickly take Kiev and, in fact, was forced to retreat from Kiev. In addition, the military analysts that populate the cable news channels in the United States insist that the Russians are bogged down and not making the rapid progress they (the Russians) expected.
This is nonsense. I defy anyone to show me one statement by Putin or the Russian General Staff where a specific timeline was established or identified. This is a construct of western military analysts who do not have access to Russia’s military plan and are projecting their own wishful thinking as “evidence” of a flailing Russian military.
But it is not only western military analysts sounding the Debbie downer dirge. A blogger popular with many Russia watchers, Strelkov, also is pushing the narrative that Russia is bogged down in the Donbas. More about Stelkov in a moment.
I find it amusing that retired American Generals and Colonels who populate Fox, CNN, MSNBC and Newsmax are busy critiquing tactics they themselves have never carried out. The last time the United States was on a battlefield fighting an organized military with potent air power, artillery and tanks was in Korea. Most of these guys (e.g., General Keane) were in diapers or in elementary school. None of them were on that battlefield.
The United States’ war experience since 1960 has been against third world armies that did not have a modern air force and significant armor capabilities. The closest we have come to fighting a real army was the North Vietnamese. But the North Vietnamese relied more on human waves in combating the U.S. military and the United States had withdrawn its combat units from Vietnam with the North Vietnamese swept south and defeated the South Vietnamese. (I want to add that American troops in Vietnam, for the most part, fought bravely despite a military and political leadership that betrayed their sacrifice. It is not un-American to ask the question–what did they die for?)
Russia is not playing the United States’ game. When George W. Bush launched “shock and awe” in Iraq in March of 2003, the media briefings and images from the frontlines played an important role in convincing the American public that our multi-billion dollar military was moving like a devil’s scythe through the Iraqi forces. It was only after Bush’s Mission Accomplished speech that Americans had to come to grips with the fact that we did not control Iraq and that a viable insurgency existed.
So what is my point? The Russian military leadership and Vladimir Putin are not spending time feeding reporters with daily briefs of body counts of Ukrainian fighters or showing drone footage of Russians wiping out Ukrainian entrenched positions.
Americans indulge the delusion that we have a free, vibrant press. Yet, military analysts like Scott Ritter and Doug MacGregor are rarely invited to appear on any cable broadcast to offer a dissenting view on the narrative being force fed to the gullible, ignorant public. I will repeat a point I made early on in the Russian campaign regarding the 40 mile Russian column that lurked for more than a week north of Kiev. U.S. analysts insisted this was evidence of Russian incompetence in keeping these tanks and trucks supplied with fuel. Yet, during the entire time this big fat Russia target sat exposed, the mighty Ukrainian military failed to launch any significant attack designed to destroy that column.
This is not a minor point. No Ukrainian air assets (fixed or rotary wing) attacked the column. No Ukrainian artillery units shelled the exposed Russian tanks and trucks. And no Ukrainian tank units attacked the supposedly stalled Russians. Why? Because Ukraine had no capability to carry out such strikes.
What was Russia doing? Ritter, MacGregor and Martyanov, among others (including yours truly) saw this as a feint designed to pin down Ukrainian forces around Kiev that were dug in while Russia prepped to focus on the Donbas and the southern littoral of Ukraine.
Which brings me back to Mr. Strelkov, who writes:
It has been a week of only the tiniest gains. Furthermore, the gains have come in the wrong area. Mostly the gains have been to the north of Seversky Donets river. Meanwhile, the Izyum bridgehead to the south of the river from which the thrust is supposed to develop has been static (contained). . . .
These are facts apparent to anyone so the new copium is that Russia is supposedly killing 500 Ukrainians every day. Except there is no way that Russians would have access to this information, and if you believe that Rybar Telegram actually has access to Ukrainian documents you belong in a mental institution.
It’s the good ole Vietnam strategy I guess. When you can’t show any actual real progress on the ground resort to made-up body counts. Body counts don’t win wars, and besides Ukraine can replace its losses. Russia can not. Any men Ukraine losses will be replaced. Those lost by Russia will mostly not be.
Mr. Strelkov is assuming that Russia’s goal is to quickly conquer the Donbas without regard to casualties of Russian troops. Putin is not Stalin. Stalin did not hesitate to send literally millions of his troops to slaughter in order to stop the Germans. Putin and his Generals are moving much more methodically and caustiously. The Russians are relying on artillery and air strikes to soften up Ukrainian defensive positions. And this is paying dividends. Ukrainian troops are surrendering in significant numbers, especially those who were recently put into service and are not affiliated with the neo-Nazi mercenary forces.
I am particularly puzzled by Strelkov’s claim that, “Ukraine can replace its losses.” Mr. Strelkov cannot be this stupid. Pressing 60 year old Ukrainian men into service is not evidence of a robust military response. It smacks, instead, of Hitlerian desperation. In the final days of the Third Reich Hitler scoured Berlin for old men and young boys to man positions no longer defended by the German regular forces. Ukraine’s Zelensky has embarked on a similar strategy even before the “special operation” began:
Ukraine’s Land Forces announced on Wednesday that it was calling up members of its operational reserves, effective immediately. Reservists between 18 and 60 years of age are being mobilized for a year..
Russia is not sitting on its haunches licking its wounds. Rather than send troops against fortified positions, Russia continues to hit targets throughout Ukraine with precision missiles. Here is the activity reported on May 4:
- Russia attacked railway substation in Pyatihatki with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked railway substation in Tymkove with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked railway substation in Volovets with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked railway substation in Lviv with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked railway substation in Pidbirtsi with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Protopopovka with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Novaya Dmitrovka with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Sandjeika with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Krysino with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Volnyansk with a high-precision missile;
- Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Novoalexandrovka with a high-precision missile.
I know for a fact that U.S. military commanders were hoping two weeks ago that Russia had exhausted its stock of precision missiles. Hope is not a good strategy. The Russians apparently did not get that memo (and Ukrainian sources have confirmed these strikes).
Further evidence that Russia is opting for the “reach out and touch someone” strategy comes from a video shot tonight (May 4) of a bombardment of Mykolaev aka Nikolaev:
If you think that enduring this kind of shelling is inconsequential then you have no appreciation of the limits of human endurance to such a sustained barrage.
I am not suggesting that the Russians are not encountering fierce resistance by some Ukrainian units. But I am offering an alternative explanation for Russia’s ground strategy. They are under no deadline. They are not going to send their military units into head on assaults and risk unnecessary casualties. And they are going to bomb Ukrainian units relentlessly until they surrender or are destroyed. Time is on Putin’s side.
The biggest failure of western military analysts is to take into account the fact that Ukraine’s economy has been gutted. Ukraine is shut off from imports/exports in the south and dependent on what Europe and the U.S. can send them overland. Fuel supplies in Ukraine are becoming more scarce, not more abundant. Given these realities, can Ukraine feed its people? That will be a critical factor in the coming days.
Even when otherwise cogent commentators like Andrew Bacevich and Chris Hedges wish to make a valid point about absurd levels of U.S. military spending and ridiculously lurid demonization of foreign leaders like Vladimir Putin, they still have to get in a dig at the Russian military and its alleged failures in the current Special Military Operation vis-a-vis NATO’s proxy military canon-fodder owned and operated directly from Washington D.C. Consider the following drivel from Chris Hedges:
As for Mr Bacevich:
My respect for these two worthy gentlemen has taken a severe hit, indeed.
concur on your last statement
if both of them cannot see the obvious IO and disinformation propaganda that even small time observers like us can see broadly , then how much their analysis are wrong on everything they said / wrote before ?
is it the time for them to drop the mask and reveal their true nature as controlled opposition ?
Chris Hedges is a dour Presbyterian minister/pacifist, so he’s simply against any army. He’s also a bit weird on some other subjects not relevant to this discussion.
The moral of the story is: in this war (I guess in any war) you have to pick & choose your sources carefully.
Also, Chris Hedges had his formative experience as the New York Times correspondent in Bosnia, during the Bosnian war of the 1990’s. His first report was of an attack on Bosnian Serb civilians by Bosnian Muslim forces, which was rare for Western coverage, but then he became socialized into the typical taking-sides Western journalist found there back then. (The typical Western journalist was proud to be ignorant of the area, and thus easily bamboozled; they all stayed together at the Holiday Inn at Sarajevo, went on the same field trips with the same fixers, and almost exclusively stayed on the central govt’s side of the lines, etc.) They almost all became activists to get Western military intervention against the Bosnian and Croatian Serbs, and shaped their coverage accordingly. A great, self-stroking ego experience for all.
Later, he seemed to wise up a bit, but for a while he was indistinguishable from pro-Ukrainian Western MSM journalists now.
he is in too deep in his previous life as reporter he become a closet russophobe , the powerful conditioning got even to him , unless he is just faking it and he is really a closed pro neocon (not necessarily pro war but pro empire)
Or maybe they have a point…. to act so your enemy thinks you’re weak is a key tactic in Sun Tzu’s ‘The Art of War’ – Putin, for one, has a martial arts background.
By publicising this to the enemy Hedges and Basevich could be giving Russia an advantage…. so the Nato mob becomes complacent and less of an obstacle… ?
LJ you should be on Tucker Carlson , if he really brave enough to push against govt narrative against this insane war fever mania on US
I just saw Trevor Noah white house correspondent dinner and almost puked on my screen , i know all comedians are just bootlickers for the empire (maher , cohen , many more) but for someone who suffer racism in south africa (trevor’s mother country) he truly embrace the empire of lies by regurgiating propaganda that even the audience know it is false
Yep, Trevor is the new (South African posh) Black Lives Matter model man, with his hip ‘fro straight out of the sixties, reminiscent of the Black Panthers in look alone; long gone are the days of Malcolm X meeting up with Castro, reading and learning from Camus and Sartre, and learning how to organize community resistance a la Ho Chi Minh! Nauseous indeed, and Hunter in the corner sucking on his crack pipe….
Let’s just take everybody’s hard earned money to invest in Raytheon. Fires in New Mexico? Frack away ’cause we’re too egocentric to be diplomatic, and MH-17 stooge John Kerry don’t give a shit about pouring methane and other LNG’s into the atmosphere ’cause he got no clue what a 30 mile blow torch looks like from Calistoga to Santa Rosa, crisping everything in its path… Gavvy Newsome non plus for that matter
Lightning Complex indeed: so much methane in the air Gav. that’s all we get….Schmuck DAVOS incompetence. threads come to a junction; still too brain dead and greedy to want to try and figure it out, except for the testosterone that i need to make me what i’m not…Fear and Loathing in La La Land… Tragedy of Errors…
I think the move toward kiev not only to pin down Ukraine defense around the area but to stop some kinky false flag the ukrops planning in the area. Thats my gut feeling , and the russian MOD have no obligation to explain what they did to the press.
Bottom line the ukrop forces are pinned down and cannot move to the south east , their false flag plan shattered , their NATO minders got furious with russia and the only recourse is to made up some narrative shaping ops ridiculing Russian SMO.
Truly incredible that anyone from the west so blind to this insane propaganda level never seen before , and truly eye opening to watch western sheeple parrot the propaganda and act like they know anything about ukraine..
america really on the last stop toward totalitarian and facism , and this will come sooner than expected
It might but it looks like a total economic collapse might happen first. That will give us our change for OUR Great Reset, just not the one the Davos bunch wants.
I had an interesting conversation with G. Edward Griffin shortly before the 2016 election when everyone assumed Hillary was going to win. We decided that she would deliberately crash the system in order to usher in the Great Reset ala The WEF. We also concluded that would not be able to control the results.
We were able to run a thought experiment on the whole thing and we concluded that the real America that is what the “elites” call “flyover” country have everything. Yes the bi-coastal elites have the money, but as the saying goes you can’t eat money. We have everything else.
We assumed that Clinton would do everything the Biden bunch is doing, but the results would be disastrous – for them. They cannot really control us if we don’t want to be controlled. I live in Florida. If the Bidenistas call down and say “send us your tax money” Our response can be “come and get it”.
There is literally nothing they can do unless we let them. Washington DC is just one small city. That it can have iron fist control over 3 and half million square miles is ludicrous. We can easily tell them to pound sand and there is not a damn thing they can do about it. We speculated that they might nuke a US city as a lesson, They are certainly capable of it, our lives mean nothing to them. However we decided that they would only get away with it one time. They pay back for that would be biblical.
If the collapse happens, what then? Well we have people wanting product, food, fuel etc, we have farmers, refineries wanting to sell product, we have truckers wanting to transport product. There is no reason to let a thing like a lack of a viable fiat currency from DC or NY stand in the way of that.
It will be painful, dark and difficult at first but we will be stronger coming out of it. We will shed much dead wood (the aforementioned bi-coastal elites to name but one). The purple hairs will starve, the Antifas will prey on their own, all we need do is stand back, do our own business and enjoy the show.
They don’t have the resources to enforce totalitarianism on us, only if we allow it, and I for one will not allow and I’ll wager I am not alone.
thanks for the insight , agreed many americans are not fools especially those who voted for trump due to their disappointment with the regular DC politicians.
Hart to see how Russian forces outside Kiev would stop a false flag in Kiev. I would guess that undercover Russian Special forces / intelligence assets prevented false flags and would be independent of the forces that pinned down the Ukrainian Kiev forces.
In fact, The DLR forces also pinned down the Ukrainian forces in the east, too, which prevented Ukrainian mobility destroying the bio-labs before the Russian forces got to them. IMO, that was probably the second goal after destroying the air defense systems – an awful lot of nastiness could have been released from those labs, which would make Covid look like a walk in the park. Personally, I think that is why China is maintaining absolute vigilance against viral outbreaks.
Great work, really logical information and thanks for keeping us updated.
Eight years of digging in and shelling civilian towns and villages certainly has paid off “strategically” for NATO trained Nazis and those unfortunate souls thrown into the trenches to cover for them. Now comes their moment of Groundhog Glory, or . . .
Subterranean Coronation of the Clueless
Stud Hamster and Gopher of Prairie-dog Town
thought they’d stick their heads up, show two teeth, and frown
to terrify Russians from Putin on down
who’d quail at sight of their noses so brown
from sniffing the butts of Zelenski the clown
and NATO who promised them rodent renown
for dying in tunnels with dirt for their crown.
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2022
a good article by mr hudson
https://www.unz.com/mhudson/sociopath-neocons-sacrifice-ukrainians-and-global-poor-katie-halper/
how is the military going to affect the economy? Well, Russia cannot afford to lose, because if it loses, NATO is going to put atomic weapons right in Ukraine, right next to its border, as it wants to do in Latvia and Estonia. And the US, apparently, is taking a position, ‘We can’t lose, because if we lose, Biden won’t be reelected.’ And Biden apparently is now running the military and economic campaign with a view towards how can he be reelected in November [2024]—with the only real variable in the American strategy being the American public itself
With all respect, Biden is too busy drooling on himself to be making any of these decisions. He can barely stay on script with his earpiece and teleprompter. He is clearly a marionette in this drama.
Biden will never be re-elected, it will be a miracle if he survives his full term and the only thing protecting him from from getting the boot now is Harris – the “poison pill”.
Harris is even less competent than Biden is, and Biden is in full on dementia!
I agree, Russia is not going to lose this. But I have great fear for what is coming. The US Foreign Policy establishment is clearly in over their heads, Austin is not competent to run a Cub Scout troop much less the US Armed forces, Blinken is the perfect example of the old saying “the light is on but nobody is home”, Victoria Nuland is Exhibit A refuting that theory women are not normally psychopaths or serial killers. Her husband Robert Kagan screaming for troops, death and destruction can barely walk across from this dinner table the buffet table without breathing hard. I have never seen such a rogues gallery of incompetents and nutcases assembled in one place ever in history.
Something tells me we are not going to be able to vote our way out of this in November. A goodly number of the Republicans are as bad as the Dems, and you can see the hints setting up for more mail-in voting and Dominion machine fun and games, and what is the GOP doing about it?- A whole lotta nothing.
Who needs Democrats when you have the Romneys, Kinzingers, Grahams, McConnells and Cheneys etc wielding outsize power and influence.
I have no illusions that Trump can fix any of this, all we can hope for is Trump sowing more confusion and panic hoping they will make more mistakes, but don’t count on the GOP to press any advantages there.
My personal feeling is that all the election hanky-panky that went on in 2020 has actually been going on at a lower level for decades with the beneficiaries on both sides of the aisle making sure the entrenched always get re-elected. There used to be those “Throw the bums out” campaigns. They all failed, the bums always get re-elected. I used to think it was the peoples laziness and apathy but after 2020 I think we have a hint at the real reasons they all failed and how people that you would personally not hire to pick up dog poop from your backyard could get re-elected over and over and over again, all the while getting richer and richer in the process. Get elected broke, become a hundred-millionaire by your third term and no body asks how.
The only hope I have is a “great reset” of our own, not Klaus Schwab’s and Bill Gates’ but ours.
The system is unstable and getting worse by the day. As much as I hate seeing the American people suffer, I think it is a necessary step, and they have not suffered enough quite yet. But they will, sooner than anyone thinks.
At the tipping point, no amount of fake elections or fake news from the mainstream or “Disinformation Governing Boards” [a sure sign of weakness and desperation run by an idiot who wouldn’t know actual disinformation if it fell on her head from 30,000 feet] is going to save them.
Check out the puppet masters and California censor/cancel culture prigs in a circle jerk for propaganda:
https://news.stanford.edu/2022/04/21/disinformation-weakening-democracy-barack-obama-said/
The Pinocchio effect goes to the ears reminiscent of Dumbo; a long history of drone murders makes a man old before his time.
So says the top disinformation spreader in the country!
Regarding Ukraine’s economy, western hosts talk about how Ukraine is the bread basket of the world and ignore that Russia exports twice as much wheat as Ukraine ever did
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wheat_exports
BTW disrupting Ukraine’s wheat crop is a bad thing but we could help with that by providing some meaningful economic aid rather than just sending weapons. Looking at a map of Ukraine’s wheat producing areas, and I am surprised that a lot of it is in eastern Ukraine, although there is a good area next to Moldova which is not seriously threatened with war.
It always looked to me like the Russians were pussy-footing around most of Ukraine’s farmland, absent NATO interference I image the Russians would have helped assure that the spring planting happened without interference. I have seen vids of Russian troops clearing mines from farmland so the farmers could plant.
In every way NATO has made this war worse for everyone most especially the Ukrainians
Dear Mr Murry, great poem. Rudyard Kipling was a war monger until his son died in WW1. He then wrote this:
Epitaphs of the War (1914 – 1918)
(Appearing on a politician’s gravestone)
by
Rudyard Kipling
1865 – 1936
I could not dig, I dared not rob.
Therefore I lied to please the mob.
Now all my lies are proved untrue
And I must face the men I slew.
What tale will serve me here among
Mine angry and defrauded young
Dear Mr Chuba and Ms.? buntalanlucu,
“It’s the economy, Stupid”, Carvell’s famous line applies to both the Ukraine and the US. US voters are not buying, “It’s Putin’s fault”. Ukrainians elected the clown because he said he would make peace with Russia – instead, he and NATO pushed Russia into this war by shelling, murdering, raping and maiming Russians in the Donbass, wherever they were.
The US world is sending useless, mostly out of date weapons. The only food that is going to be available is from Russia. Moreover, the Ukrainian economy is destroyed, not entirely, just its life lines – it has ceased to function.
While it could be shorter, by the end of May, all of the lies about who is winning, as well as the economic, food tragedy for the world will be obvious.
That is why I fear an atomic or chemical false flag, which the west will jump on, and if the US is really stupid enough to send troops, WWIII
when you compare actual battlefield prowess the russian military is built for go not for show.
this will place them at advantage in every opportunity against nato/usa (both militaries are built for show not for go and for private mic profit). forget the hapless ukrainians trained by the usa and nato as they are now ground into sawdust.
i suspect the pentagon or at least the serious professionals there already know this fact and are deeply reluctant to have it proven in combat for the world to see. at present it is wiser to maintain the illusion which must make it all the harder when utter usa and european political morons are writing military prowess checks the pentagon knows can not be cashed.
Not to worry. All this disinformation will be done away with once Biden full implements his Disinformation Governance Board (aka The Ministry of Truth). Our leaders are truly amazing!
I’m looking forward to it. I can’t think of a better way to make them look ridiculous and they will do it themselves.
Most people are susceptible to propaganda and disinformation, especially if it conforms to their prejudices and world view. A good example would be how most people view WW2. The Allies are noble and righteous and the Nazis are pure evil. This cartoon version of history is a result of propaganda started before the war and continues to this day.
Furthermore, in an inculcated society, the one who points out the truth is attacked as a blasphemer.
dead on correct. as a sad example….all the japanese living in the usa most of whom were citizens and had been americans for many years if not multiple generations were summarily interned in prison camps and all legal recourse by american courts was found in the governments favor not the citizens. i do not recall any german americans being so treated.
if and when washington declares actual war with russia want to take any bets how long before the russian americans, some citizens some residents , will last walking around free before being rounded up based on the ugly demonization going on here now?
this is how authoritarian regimes deal with things when they massively screw things up.
I enjoy reading your columns, Larry. They are much appreciated. But I have one quibble about your reference to Korea where you say: “The last time the United States was on a battlefield fighting an organized military with potent air power, artillery and tanks was in Korea”. I read it several months ago but my recollection from the A.B. Abrams book “Immovable Object” is that the North Koreans had no air power and it didn’t sound as though they had much by way of artillery and tanks, either. The Chinese did lend a hand (to protect their border) but I don’t recall much by way of detail that involved anything other than foot soldiers. And the “UN” forces were still nearly driven from Korea. If you have a reference to that war that provides different information, please provide. Thanks.
My understanding is that North Korea had a tank division and an air force division. Not huge, but an organized force that did maneuver.
The North Koreans came very close to taking the whole of the peninsula until MacArthur stepped in with navy and air support; if the Koreans had been left on their own to fight it out, it would be one country today, undivided.
Many years ago, I had the privilege of taking some graduate classes in Buddhism and Sanskrit from the late Dr. Ananda W. P. Guruge, formerly Sri Lanka’s ambassador to France and the United States. On one occasion, I asked him why his country’s government had declined the U.S. military’s offer of assistance combating the Tamil insurgency then causing Sri Lanka a great deal of trouble. His succinct reply: “If the Americans come, they will just draw an arbitrary line through a temporary problem and make it permanent. The Koreans could most certainly attest to the wisdom of Dr. Guruge’s elegant observation.
Know they enemy
https://lobelog.com/neoconservativism-in-a-nutshell/
I have a serious question that’s a touch off-topic but it’s important so bear with me. Please watch (if you can) the entire clip.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4842887/user-clip-1998-biden-chastises-weapons-inspector-ritter
Now please tell me what the h*ll Biden is driving at here? Yes, I know he’s being verbose, theatrical, not to mention incredibly rude and offensive. That’s a given.
What I’m confused about is the context. Is Biden implying that Scott Ritter was calling for Saddam’s removal, i.e., war against Iraq, which would have been “above his pay grade.”
Because that’s not my understanding of Ritter at all. Ritter was blocked from an inspection in January 1998. He resigned from UNSCOM in August of 1998. The date of the above clip is September 3, 1998. At that point Ritter (with everyone else) was concerned that Saddam could easily reconstitute his chem/bio weapons program, which he had before the weapons inspection program.
Ritter resigned from UNSCOM for the failure to take action against Saddam, because yes, it was a breach of a UN resolution. (It is and was.) He was basically saying, “What am I doing here?” But at no point was he claiming to have the authority to call for war.
Link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Ritter
Obviously I am missing something here – what is it?
If you go to about 25 minutes in, Scott Ritter explains his position. Or click “Show more” which includes this paragraph..
On September 3, 1998, several days after his resignation, Ritter testified before the United States Senate Committee on Armed Services and the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and said that he resigned his position “out of frustration that the United Nations Security Council, and the United States as its most significant supporter, was failing to enforce the post-Gulf War resolutions designed to disarm Iraq.” Ritter said that Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright had supposedly “blocked more inspections in 1997 than Saddam Hussein did,” a charge which Albright disputed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R79vYVvjcVM
Right – thanks for the clip. I’ll watch it. I have some ideas about the whole fiasco. The point is: Biden wasn’t criticizing Ritter for being “anti-war” but for allegedly calling for action against Saddam, which is the meaning of the “going above your pay grade” taunt. Which is false. He never went above his pay grade – he did his job and resigned in frustration.
Gonna guess that the charge against Albright is what got his goose cooked & Biden was deputized to be the hitman.
War is a young man’s game. As one gets older – certainly 40 and above – the body cannot take the prolonged stress and abuse involved in front-line combat. Most all of the pics I see of Ukrainian troops, they are old (40 +). These troops will become combat ineffective soon, if not already, due to 2 months of near continual fighting. There is some reporting that suggests that those UKR troops who have survived to date, are already worn out.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/exhausted-ukrainian-soldiers…
Even the Ukrainian neo-Nazi fighters, UKR’s best troops, appear to be past their combat use-by date
https://sonar21.com/neo-nazis-fighting-for-ukraine-are…/
UKR is experiencing massive casualties and troops are wearing out. Russia is biding its time, keeping up the pressure. The collapse of the Ukrainian resistance is merely a matter of time. The US can send all of the weapons it wants and, aside from training and transport logistics issues, none of it matters if there is no one to man and defend the weapons systems.
Where are the young UKR men who would defend their country to the death? Where? If they can’t be found in meaningful numbers, then UKR will eventually collapse due to lack of will and lack of national pride.
Ukraine has a low birthrate – as does Russia, but lower. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, it was something like 1 child per woman. That’s half the replacement level birthrate. They just don’t have a lot of young men.
Comparing this with Afghanistan is plumb crazy. Afghanistan had and continues to have a very high birthrate. So lots of cannon fodder.
I’ve heard the young Ukrainian guys with a few bucks are having a grand old time in Berlin and Prague. Rumor was 10K and you were good to leave.
FWIW, I noted your comment on lane’s site and tried to agree and applaud but it was cut by the censors.
I noted some recent comments on this site as to what has happened to lane but I somewhat quickly became very skeptical when he was touting ISW maps and analysis and very bitterly anti-putin and the Russian operation.
I have to believe somebody really got to him with leverage. He was against the iraq war disaster but not is for the nazis in ukraine- does not compute.
Thankfully, Larry bailed quickly from posting on lane’s site.
do not see how to edit but phrase should read: “but now is for the nazis in ukraine-“
Taras 77,
I only continue to comment there for a couple of reasons. It is a well-read forum and I want to offer a counter perspective. Second, I am genuinely curious about the psychology of those people rabidly promoting the neocon line and want to probe it a little. My comments are selectively posted. Some go up and some are deleted; about 50/50.
It is sad to see people that were once capable of reasoned analysis and arguments twist themselves into stupid pretzels to keep the neocon narrative going. Most recently proposed is that the US has an unquestionable responsibility to protect Ukraine, but Putin had no right to protect the Donbas and Crimea regions because, specifically stated, the Donbas is not part of Russia. That is written, apparently, with a straight face.
Want to add, that once you sift through all of the fluff and smoke being spewed by the neocon crowd, it becomes clear that a diplomatic solution was never on the table. Russia was supposed to just shut up and take it (NATO expansion, Killing in the Donbas ramping up to a Springtime 2022 final solution by Ukraine against the ethnic Russians, endless sanctions, etc).
The meme goes that Russia had no right to invade UKR. Now that they did, we have to fight them. However, there was no diplomatic solution possible either because the US/UKR wouldn’t go that route. So it is obvious that the war was architected, deliberately, by the US. Anyone with half a brain and knowledge of the situation had to know what Russia’s response would be. Even the IC and Joe Biden stated that Russia was going to invade before the fact.
People taking the neocon stance sound stupid and crazy because they must promote a policy and a narrative that isn’t based in truth. They get tripped up on thorough cross examination. At that point they just lash out, try to silence contrary perspective, call names, etc.
Thanks, neo con delusions (and stupidity) are without end which does not portend anything rational outcome for the world.
The Empire (catergorized elsewhere as Empire of lies and hate) will not go down peacefully.
Fully agree that diplomatic solution was never an option for the thugs in state dept/cia. When blinky and nuland are at the controls, “diplomacy” becomes an extreme joke.
The TV generals must have missed the War College lectures on the movements of the Army of Northern Virginia. As I recall Lee went north in 1862 and 1863 to draw the Federals away from Richmond, with the side benefit of resupply from the rich farms of Pennsylvania.
This worked twice, but not in 1864. Grant didn’t fall for the movement of Earth’s Corps to the outskirts of DC.
A slightly younger relative (a retired high school history teacher) recently advanced the argument (via email) that the Ukrainian government in Kiev could not have tried to exterminate other Ukrainians (in Crimea and the Donbas) because “ALL Ukrainians speak Russian.” I reminded him of the American Civil War wherein both the Union and Confederate armies spoke English yet still managed to slaughter 650,000 of their fellow Americans.
I also reminded him that Grant (coming down from the north) and Sherman coming up from the south) had effectively immobilized Lee and confined him to static defensive warfare — “going gopher” as Scott Ritter says — until Lee had no choice but to make a run for it before getting surrounded and forced to surrender unconditionally at Appomattox.
The current Ukrainian Civil War (only one aspect of the NATO-Russia global war) offers several interesting and applicable historical analogies with other civil wars — especially the American one — in both their military and civilian aspects.
A feint toward Kiev makes definite sense. By threatening the capitol, the Russians drew Ukrainian forces there and away from the real targets along the Black Sea and Donbas. Now they have to keep them there because they don’t know when Russian troops will move toward Kiev again. I don’t doubt that Putin would like to take Keiv since it, along with all of the Left Bank, was given to Russia by the Poles and Lithunaians but he probably plans to secure Eastern Ukraine first.
I fear that most Americans today have the misguided idea that war is like a video game, and that taking territory is the objective rather than destroying the enemy’s capability to make war. I’m not there so I can’t say for certain but I suspect the Ukrainian military is being chopped to pieces.
I appreciate the comments about Vietnam. Americans have no clue what really went on over there. I remember being incensed at reports in the New York Times that US airpower was attacking villages without restraint while I knew better. At the time I was flying night FAC/flare missions over the Ho Chi Minh Trail complex in Laos. Whenever we’d spot a truck convoy, we had to radio for permission from the local Laotian chiefs to send in fighters (who just as often missed, hence the development of “precision” bombs.) As often as not, by the time permission came, the trucks would have moved into a “village”, which was probably fake and were protected against attack. The belief that we waged unrestricted war against the Vietnamese is a bald-faced lie.
It looks like these are the same cheerleaders who called the Iraq war a “cakewalk” that would pay for itself with oil revenues and the Iraqis would greet US troops with flowers and hugs.
No doubt the same folks who engineered the pull out from Afghanistan.
Spot on re the young. I suspect many of the young were and are economic migrants into the EU, leaving those unable to go behind.
I started following events in UKR abt 2010, after reading a Steve Sailer piece on the ethnic divisions there. None of the current events surprise me. The Western group was picking on the Russian group, the young wanted in the EU for work related access, military call ups failed. All before 2014.
An informed source told me that as of 2019 Persian Gulf areas hotels, saloons etc featured young UKR women. If whoring in the PG is seen as a way out, life in UKR must be really bad.
The media insanity and brainwashing knows no bounds. I’ve been staggered by the madness of friends of mine on the left, marching for war and arming Ukraine (and pro Nazi – as I posted on my FB page so they should have seen it).
If you join Telegram, a few minutes searching will bring up oodles of dead ukrainian soldiers. In modern war, 60-80% of soldiers are killed by artillery (I’m including mortars, rockets, and missiles in that). I have no problem guessing that 400-500 poor sods are being massacred daily. Most of these are just ordinary conscripts, not Nazis.
As some of the commenters upthread have said, there won’t be anyone left for NATO to train and arm in Poland. Part of Ukraine’s pre-2022 poverty was because of its severe working population drain (estimated at 25%). Anybody with any smarts left because wages are better elsewhere in Europe, and to avoid conscription. How are they going to be brought back to fight?
I somehow think that mercenaries, are perhaps a bit demotivated now.
30 years of neoliberalism, corruption, looting and misgovernance have wrecked Ukraine’s economy. It ought to be a rich country, given its natural wealth and assets.
Bernard has a good update today.
In a just world, Boris Johnson and Bidens handlers would swing for war crimes.
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2022/05/ukraines-forces-are-told-to-hold-the-line-where-russian-artillery-is-pulverizing-them.html
Hey Larry, you didn’t quote Strelkov but the author of antiempire, that was commenting on Strelkov’s posts on Telegram.
Strelkov’s Telegram channel : https://t.me/strelkovii
Obviously he writes in russian, but you can use some translating tools.
It’s funny to read you the American optimist about the Ukraine war and Strelkov the Russian very pessimist about it !
If you follow the link, it identifies the piece as a translation of what Strelkov wrote.
I recall a story from March 25, 2022 titled “The Ukrainian Army Has Been Defeated. What’s Left Is Mop-Up”. And yet it looks like the “defeated” Ukrainian Army is winning and it’s the Russian Army that is being ground down and defeated. The attack on Kyiv was no feint; Putin’s plan was a quick blitzkrieg to seize Kyiv, install a puppet regime, annex the Donbass and declare victory. Thanks to NATO weapons and the bravery of the Ukrainian Army he failed. Now destroyed Russian tanks litter the streets of cities and villages all over Ukraine; the Moskva sits at the bottom of the Black Sea, thousands of Russian soldiers lie in the ground, fuel and supply depots in Russia are going up in flames, the Russian economy is in tatters and Putin still hasn’t taken a major Ukrainian city. Not to mention Sweden and Finland are about to join NATO. Putin made a major miscalculation in invading Ukraine, and Russia is going to lose this war.
Thanks for the show of delusion. Can you now provide some actual evidence to support your claim or are you just a troll?
No, I’m not a troll; I just see the situation in Ukraine differently. As far as evidence, I’m not really sure what you would consider evidence. I mean the Moskva did sink and the Ukrainians claim they sank it with 2 Neptune missiles and they did provide drone footage the other day of them striking 2 Raptor patrol boats. The alternative is that the Russians sank their own flagship through sheer incompetence which is even worse. Also, the Russians have admitted that the Ukrainians have been blowing up ammo and fuel depots inside Russia. As far as Putin’s battle plan, obviously I don’t have access to their battle plans, but in 2014 Putin told European Commission President José Manuel Barroso that he could “take Kiev in two weeks.” Also, if the attack on Kyiv was a feint, it was one of the most costly feints in history and what did it accomplish? The Russians have repeatedly tried and failed to take Mykolaiv and Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv which is only 26 miles from the Russian border. They haven’t even been able to take Severodonetsk or Sloviansk after more than 2 months of fighting. And every single day that passes it becomes harder for them to do so because of the massive influx of NATO weaponry. So how is this a brilliant military campaign? And finally, we’ll see within the next week or two if Sweden and Finland join NATO. If they do it will be total humiliation for Putin, because it will have increased the NATO presence on Russia’s borders instead of decreasing it. When you add in the increased unity of NATO, the massive economic sanctions and all the Russian soldiers killed, including up to 12 generals, I don’t see how this war has been anything but a total blunder by Putin and Russia.
your posts summarised everything that MSM propaganda spouts every day
and you are here to become parrot of MSM by posting obvious ukrop propaganda
you are a troll assigned to sonar21 and smear LJ , obvious from your insulting and know it all tone typical of hasbara / astroturfer troll in every dark corner of internet
go away , you exposed yourself in that very first post.. no one here is fooled by your lame attempt at trolling
Your post makes no sense. Did the Ukrainians sink the Moskva? Is Kyiv still in Ukrainian control? What cities has Russia occupied? What are the Russian casualties? Was 2 months of fighting and thousands of Russian dead in order to control Kherson really Putin’s master plan? Please tell me how Russia is winning this war.
Clint Ehrlich had a discussion with the guys at RWA podcast and he agrees that the move in Kiev wasn’t a feint. I frankly do not recall his reasoning – you can look it up – it’s linked on his Twitter feed.
I have zero credentials or ability to judge military issues. I think both sides are high on copium and hopium. After a lifetime of being lied to by the US government, I don’t buy much of anything that comes from them. But I also mistrust the Russian government.
About the sanctions, they don’t seem to have hurt Russia at all. The ruble is up. They probably wrote off the West years ago in favor of an alliance with China.
We’re at war with Russia. The Ukraine war is only the opening act.
https://archive.ph/FUc6u
What did Russia gain by the feint? Why is the Ruble up? And if Russia is at war with NATO, how can Russia win?
What do you mean, “why is the Ruble up?” The Ruble is trading at a price better than when it started the war. Instead of having to spend 200 rubles to buy a dollar, Russia now only needs to spend 70 rubles. That is called “winning.” NATO is a paper tiger. Russia is not going to invade Europe. Russia will defend the motherland. Russia is holding aces. The US and NATO are watching their credibility evaporate each day.
Money buys lots of opinions against the facts!
Thank you very much for the update.
This reminds me a lot of Syria. U.S. Generals were thundering, ‘the Russian backed SAA has been defeated’, just because the front lines were static for months before the Jihadis finally broke. I don’t recall exactly how long it took but once the Jihadi lines broke, it crumbled very quickly. I recall it taking several months.
If our Generals were honest, instead of info, warriors, they would give the Russians at least the same amount of time before declaring victory.
New subscriber here.
Does the blog have a mailing list or an RSS feed or do I just log in randomly to find new articles?
I can add you to my list.
Regards
LJ
Thank you kind sir.
Thanks again for the great piece. I’ve been also very surprised by the median age of recent surrendering Ukrainian, which seems to be quite high. Where are all the youngsters ? Are they all already dead ? (in which case the Ukrainian body count is largely underestimated), did they leave the country en masse to avoid conscription ? Did the older men sacrifice themselves to let the younger go ? Were they too slow to flee ?
As for Strelkov, IMHO, he stills sees himself as the hero of Donbass and has become a very bitter man, angry to have been sidelined. He’s mostly rambling about how the Stavka and Putin and Shoigu and the Kremlin are incompetent and how he would do everything better and quicker, and how the Ukraine has to be annihilated because they’re subhumans. Sadly, I don’t think he’s worth listening to.
What does it matter what Americans are told by the MSM. The government is a collection of evil, insane idiots. The talking heads work for them. Ukraine is running out of fuel. So that’s it. I don’t see much point in debating what actually happened, for the final result will be determined by what did happen, not what we think happened.
I’m more worried about Sweden and Finland. They must be insane trying to join NATO. How far is Finland from St. Petersburg? Any idiot should conclude that they are much safer outside NATO. NATO’s actions, shipping arms to Ukraine, is already an act of war. It looks like the entire West is run by a handful of spies betraying their own countries. More likely they are just looking out for number one and have all been threatened with looking bad. In their minds their discomfort outweighs human extinction.