News Dump Saturday: I thought that Russia had lost the war edition
Every single American news source, both liberal or conservative, tells us that Russia has already lost in Ukraine. Al Jazeera tells a different story.
Russian soldiers pummeling Bakhmut with artillery are slowly edging closer to the eastern Ukrainian city.While much of the fighting in the past month has unfolded in southern Ukraine’s Kherson region, the battle heating up around Bakhmut demonstrates Russian President Vladimir Putin’s desire for visible gains following weeks of clear setbacks.
Taking Bakhmut would rupture Ukraine’s supply lines and open a route for Russian forces to press on towards Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, key Ukrainian strongholds in Donetsk province. Pro-Moscow separatists have controlled parts of Donetsk and neighbouring Luhansk province since 2014.
...
“The Russians have made some gains, but they’re still not in Bakhmut,” Baig said. “The Ukrainians have said they managed to repel those attacks.”
Another day, another quarter of a billion to Ukraine.
The Pentagon will send Ukraine another $275 million in weapons and military equipment as part of a new package meant to help shore up Kyiv’s forces ahead of winter fighting, the Defense Department announced Friday.
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The lethal aid will come via presidential drawdown authority, meaning the U.S. military will pull weapons from its own stockpiles to send to Ukraine. The U.S. has now committed more than $18.5 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden administration, Singh said.
To put that $18 Billion into context, it's equal to:
How much banks made in profits from PPP loan fees
Exxon 2nd quarter profits
It's $4 Billion more than the cost of school lunches nationwide.
File this under the category of "It's important to read the whole article" Natural gas prices dropped in Europe
CNN Business — Europe has more natural gas than it knows what to do with. So much, in fact, that spot prices briefly went negative earlier this week.For months, officials have warned of an energy crisis this winter as Russia — once the region’s biggest supplier of natural gas — slashed supplies in retaliation for sanctions Europe imposed over its invasion of Ukraine.
Now, EU gas storage facilities are close to full, tankers carrying liquefied natural gas (LNG) are lining up at ports, unable to unload their cargoes, and prices are tumbling.
The price of benchmark European natural gas futures has dropped 20% since last Thursday, and by more than 70% since hitting a record high in late August. On Monday, Dutch gas spot prices for delivery within an hour — which reflect real time European market conditions — dipped below €0, according to data from the Intercontinental Exchange.
Prices turned negative because of an “oversupplied grid,” Tomas Marzec-Manser, head of gas analytics at the Independent Commodity Intelligence Services (ICIS), told CNN Business.
So there's no problem with natural gas supplies or price in Europe, right?
Despite the recent slump, at around €100 ($100) per megawatt hour European natural gas futures are still 126% above where they were last October, when economies started to reopen from their pandemic lockdowns and demand spiked.Prices could rise sharply again in December and January as the weather turns colder, providing an incentive for some of those tankers to wait offshore a while longer before coming into port to unload, said Booth.
This story sounds familiar.
Russia appears to be eyeing up U.S.-trained troops in Afghanistan to fight in Ukraine according to reports.The hasty evacuation resulted in troops and equipment being left behind following the collapse of the Afghan government and a rapid takeover by the Taliban.
This meant that Afghan soldiers, who fought alongside the Americans and were trained by them, were left behind in the now turbulent nation.
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"They have no country, no jobs, no future. They have nothing to lose," the source said of the commandos, according to the report."It's not difficult. They are waiting for work for $3 to $4 a day in Pakistan or Iran or $10 a day in Turkey, and if Wagner or any other intelligence services come to a guy and offers $1,000 to be a fighting man again, they won't reject it.
Gosh maybe we shouldn't have stolen all of Afghanistan's money and left the country starving, but with billions of dollars in U.S. military equipment.
Meanwhile in Cuba.
When Hurricane Ian tore through western Cuba in late September, causing an island-wide blackout, it left the government grappling with a deepening energy crisis and simmering discontent among Cubans.It also once again thrust the Caribbean island into the middle of an escalating tug-of-war between its seaside neighbor, the United States, and ally, Russia.
At a time when Cuba is urging the Biden administration to ease U.S. sanctions that it says stifle hurricane recovery efforts, Russian oil has flooded into the island, providing relief to debilitating blackouts.
Russia has shipped an estimated $352 million in oil to Cuba since the start of the Ukraine war, the biggest inflow from Russia this century and enough to cover about 40% of the shortfall in the island’s supplies, according to independent estimates. The sales also potentially alleviated the weight of international sanctions on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.
Maybe we shouldn't still be trying to crush the Cuban government.
Comments
Cuban crisis 2.0?
Russia Intends to Use Military Base in Cuba in Response to NATO Nuclear Exercises (8.7 min)
“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
Hoo, boy!
Another Cuban crisis. Just like the one in my youth. Sigh...
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
As for who won or lost
...I've given up on the media.
I now just check out the online map stores, under Ukraine, to see which maps are being added or revised.
For instance:
Being from Hawai‘i, I find all the U.S. and German oinking about
the Russian annexations to be very hypocritical.
I feel an urge to raise my voice and say, “Oh, so you think the referendum there was a sham? That’s still one more referendum than the people of Hawai‘i got to have, before the U.S. Congress passed the ‘Newlands Resolution’ unilaterally purporting to annex the internationally recognized independent country of Hawai‘i.”
Russia did lose the war it began by invading Ukraine
the war to take Ukraine in 3 days was lost at the airport in Kiev and with that 40 mile long column of tanks. Included in that war was NATO, who gained 2 new members and whose members all of a sudden got religion. NATO is stronger and more cohesive than ever.
The second war Russia lost was the save face plan of taking eastern Ukraine and making those provinces Russia. They never got close to Odessa and they are losing other provinces, the entire 1300 mile front is shifting.
Yes for some reason Russians have been pouring personnel into Bakhmut which is the place advances are measured in meters. Over the past months the front there has shifted maybe a couple of kilometers. Ukrainians absorb artillery, then mow down the infantry. This is most of the reasons Russian KIAs often approach a thousand a day.
Mostly the war has settled into a war of attrition. Ukraine is unwilling to
attack and lose lots of life, but if given the opportunity for large gains they will do so.
Ukraine has precision artillery. Excalibur and Himar rounds cost a little over a hundred thousand per, tanks and armored personnel carriers are millions, aircraft and ships are tens of millions. Ukraine is winning that one at the cost of a tiny fraction of US GDP.
Russia is winning the drone cost. Drones are maybe thirty K from Iran, anti aircraft missiles can cost a million. Mostly the inaccurate drones and Russian missiles are aimed at fixed infrastructure ie civilian targets, which does little to change minds, and has almost no effect militarily.
Polling shows support to continue the war in Ukraine in the 80%s generally and in the mid 60%s amongst the Russian speaking population. Russia hardly seems popular any more in the world. Russians themselves still support Putin, the Russians left in Russia that is.
Long term, I think the west, and Ukraine, can outlast the Russians. The cost to Europe and the US is small, Russia is short on infantry, ammo, fuel, and the infrastructure to supply a large war. Support in the US for Ukraine is widespread and bipartisan as seen recently with the "Progressive" Caucus.
Something to bear in mind long term. Russian or Ukrainian, soldier or civilian, these are all human beings being killed at the rate of maybe a thousand per day. The indiscriminate use of artillery is destroying towns and cities, leveling them to the ground. The human suffering is huge, and this was and is a war of choice. Putin could end this war tomorrow.
I for one welcome the day when Ukraine joins the EU & euro zone
I can’t wait to start seeing euro coins from Ukraine in the change I get back at the supermarket, with Black Sun and Wolfsangel logos and likenesses of Stepan Bandera on them…
You can't really believe this
OK. Let's say that Putin gives up and pulls back all of the troops to pre-2014 borders. Do you honestly believe that the killing would end and the political situation would stabilize right there?
You are smarter than that.
1) If Putin dared to give up Crimea then there would be a palace coup. Putin would be kicked out (and probably killed), and then a much more hard-line politician would take over. Russia will never give up Crimea without NATO invading Russia itself.
2) But let's say Russia does give up Crimea and the Donbas. Do you think Ukrainians will live-and-let live? They will go into those regions and start slaughtering civilians. And separatists will fight back.
@gjohnsit "They will go into
"They will go into those regions and start slaughtering civilians."
That would be better phrased as ". . . resume/continue slaughtering civilians" as that has been going on since 2014.
@gjohnsit Ukraine hasn't
Ukraine hasn't retaliated in the regions they've liberated yet. I doubt they would in the future. No matter what side people were on before the war, I'd think the cessation of conflict would be welcomed by all. Polling of Russian speakers in Ukraine show support for continuing the war.
Polling within Russia is starting to show a dramatic shift against the war. Russia has experienced high casualties and the number of KIAs is increasing, it's thought that hundreds of thousands left the country to avoid the draft.
I don't think it is Russia's place to decide which parts of Ukraine to keep or not. There was a referendum, and every province in Ukraine voted for independence, including Crimea. Ukraine is it's own country for 30 years now, just like Latvia, Poland, Lithuania, etc.
All of Ukraine is very aware of what they have found in liberated areas, and what happened to POWs. Each newly liberated town brings tales of atrocities. Ukrainians support thier efforts far more than the Russians do theirs, and I can only imagine Russia's distaste for high casualties increasing.
Imagine if America had lost 60 or 80 thousand in the first few months of the Iraq invasion. Or to keep the proportions of the relative populations imagine if we'd had 120 to 160 thousand soldiers killed in the first few months and forced another 600 thousand into the service and the war with little to no equipment or training.
It's known how this war will end, what isn't known is how many will die before then.
Ukraine hasn't retaken any seperatist regions yet
How often does that happen in a civil war?
Yes, there were multiple referendums where Crimea voted for independence from Ukraine.
Political Self-Determination
The Presidential Elections won by the ethnic Russians in Ukraine was methodically overthrown by the Ukraine NAZI regime and the US State Department. When a people are disenfranchised by the nation, they can claim a collective human right to self-determination.
Since the last overthrow in 2014, 14,000 ethnic Russians have been essentially exterminated by Ukra-Nazi troops in attacks on the former Russian territories in the east — this, in defiance of the Minsk II Agreement that Ukraine signed in 2015.
This same ethnic-Russian population had also passed a referendum vote in 2014, as they faced increasing attacks after the government was violently overthrown. At that time, Russia's parliament would not agree to annexation. So, in an attempt to save the lives of the Russians under Ukraine rule, Putin, along with Macron and Merkel drafted the Minsk II Agreement. But after Zelansky was elected as Ukraine's President, the attacks began again, steadily killing the the ethnic Russians living on their former Russian homelands in east Ukraine. As a final provocation, hoping to embroil Russia in a second economy-killing proxy war, the Western alliance dangled NATO membership to the unqualified and corrupt Ukraine regime along Russia's border.
In Russian, the word 'ukraine' means a borderland or a neutral buffer zone. For too long Russia saw Ukraine as a benign borderland. They located all of the pipelines that supplied Europe with natural gas in Ukraine. Eventually, however, Ukraine's corruption and their thievery of the gas flowing through, was shortchanging both Europe and Russia. So, Russia was forced to build new pipelines to the north and south that bypassed Ukraine. Nonetheless, Russia holds a neutral view of Ukraine and they continued to loan money to Ukraine, including a $6 billion dollar loan just a few weeks before the Ukraine's government was toppled. The IMF had steadfastly refused to loan money to Ukraine because of its corruption. Russia never saw its $6 billion again.
Russia correctly believes it is fighting a strategic attack on its sovereignty by the Western alliance in Ukraine, and fighting, also, the NAZI mercenaries army, filtering in from Poland. Russia had repeatedly elucidated the existential threat to Russia's sovereignty posed by a NATO installation on Russia's border — in letters to the US State Department and in live media press events — during the months leading up to the military action in Ukraine. Russia also published open letters to the US in world newspapers inquiring about the purpose of US bio-weapons labs built along the Russian border. The US and NATO would not respond to these communications, and their stonewalling was not covered in the Western press. Thus, people living in the United States of Brain-Washington remain completely uninformed about the US' war mongering operations taking place in the world. They have no awareness of the consequences that will unfold in their lives, as their government turns its back on them.
The only referendum that counts is the one establishing
Ukraine as a country, after that any separatist areas are constrained by the laws of the country they are a part of. Kind of like the south in our own civil war, or Texas wanting to become independent. Russia has 24 non Russian Republics, imagine allowing them to vote in independence from Russia? They are the ones supplying most of the conscripts.
In the case of Crimea you also have the mass deportation or ethnic Tartars and the importation of ethnic Russians (who nonetheless voted to be part of Ukraine). Also you can't vote freely with a gun to your head. You can't take over a country by force, then force the people to vote for you and celebrate when you win by 99%, that simply doesn't pass the smell test.
Fake "history" - someone's ignorance is showing
Ukraine was not established by any "referendum", but by the Tsars currying favor with the Cossacks. The local residents had absolutely nothing to say about it.
I do not recall Lenin, Stalin or Khrushchev holding any referendums either, when they unilaterally changed the borders of what was considered "Ukraine".
If you are going to apply such absolutist standards (once established, never dissoluble), then you must also oppose the severance of Czechoslovakia into two separate republics, and the Balkanization of Yugoslavia (for which the US and Nato were EXTREMELY responsible), and many many other changes to the map of the world. Reductio ad absurdum at its most absurd.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Excellent comment.
Your knowledge of history always impresses me to no end.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981