Ukraine's Mystic Kherson Offensive Did Not, And Will Not Happen
There has been much talk in 'western' media about a Ukrainian offensive in the southern Kherson region. However most of the claims made about it seem to be divorced from the observable realities on the ground. The detailed look below provides that there is no such offensive and that there is little chance that there will ever be one.
The purported offensive has for months been a core talking point:
- Ukraine Battle Expands as Kyiv Launches Counteroffensive - New York Times - May 29, 2022
- Ukraine Regains Some Territory in Counter-Offensive in Kherson Area - Defence Ministry - Reuters - Jun 9, 2022
- Near Kherson, Ukrainians regain territory in major counteroffensive - Washington Post - Jun 29, 2022
- Ukraine prepares a counter-offensive to retake Kherson province - Economist - Jul 3, 2022
- Kherson cut off: Ukrainian counter-offensive gaining momentum in southern city - Fox News - Jul 29, 2022
Lets look at the map of the Kherson area and how it has changed over time. LiveUAmap, the source used here for these maps, is know to be more in favor of Ukrainian claims than Russian ones. The red parts are held by Russian forces.
This is the Kherson area as depicted on May 13, 2022:
Source LiveUAmap 13.5. - bigger
This is the Kherson area as depicted on May 14, 2022:
Source LiveUAmap 14.5. - bigger
We see that the maintainers of LiveUAmap kept the front line as it was, but added a gray zone on the Ukrainian side. I am not sure what it is supposed to show. It may designate the extend to which forward Russian reconnaissance units had been observed during their February-March offensive in the area. Since then the gray area has for some become the 'success' of a 'Ukrainian counter-offensive'. But Russian forces had never held onto that gray zone nor was there any significant fighting about it.
This is the Kherson area as depicted today, August 12, 2022:
Source LiveUAmap 12.8. - bigger
I see two small differences between the May 14 map and the current one. On the west side the minor settlement of Pravdyne and the fields around it have changed hands.
Source LiveUAmap 14.5. - bigger
Source LiveUAmap 12.8. - bigger
Another change happened around a small river at the norther part of the front line south of Kvkaz. The May 14 front line there was simplified as being straight. The real front line ran along the winded Ingulets river in that area.
Source LiveUAmap 14.5. - bigger
At the beginning of June Ukrainian forces crossed the river around the towns Davydiv Brid, Bilohirka and Adriivka only to get slaughtered by Russian artillery. The area has since been no man's land.
Source LiveUAmap 12.8. - bigger
One small town retaken and a failed river crossing attempt is all the much vaunted Kherson offensive has achieved since May.
That may well be because, despite the noise, there has been and will be no Ukrainian Kherson offensive. For the Ukrainian leaders in Kiev that offensive is only a joke.
On August 9 Zelenski advisor Mikhail Podolyak talked with a Ukrainian language BBC outlet. The Ukrainian Ctrana online news site reported about it (machine translation):
Podolyak called the words about the counterattack on Kherson "part of the information and psychological operation"Reports of counteroffensives of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the southern direction are part of the "information-psychological special operation."
This was stated by adviser to the head of the OP Mikhail Podolyak in an interview with the BBC.
"Was it the IPSO? Of course, today all public comments are part of the IPSO. We need to demoralize the Russian army. They must understand that there will always be a territory of fire," he said.
Nevertheless, Podolyak clarified that "the events on the Antonovsky bridge show that it is essential for us to liberate Kherson" (as the only regional center that was under the occupation of the Russian Federation after February 24).
"And therefore, our army is already taking certain actions for this today," he said.
That news did not reach the Washington Post propagandist David Ignatius. On August 11 he still lauded the non-existing 'southern offensive':
A southern offensive opens in the Ukraine war
The grinding war of attrition in Ukraine might be entering a new phase as the Ukrainian military prepares an offensive to recover occupied land in the southern region surrounding Kherson, and Russia escalates its rhetoric by charging that the United States “is directly involved in the conflict.”Ukraine appears to have begun its new southern campaign with a bold attack Tuesday on a Russian air base in Crimea, along the Black Sea coast.
...
With its long-anticipated southern offensive, Ukraine evidently hopes to regain momentum against Russian forces that have suffered heavy losses of soldiers and equipment since they invaded on Feb. 24. At a time when Russia is strained and vulnerable, Ukrainian leaders want to show that they can reclaim lost ground and ultimately prevail.
On August 12, a day after the Ignatius screed was published, four Washington Post reporters painted a different picture:
On the Kherson front lines, little sign of a Ukrainian offensive
MYKOLAIV REGION, Ukraine — On the front line in southeast Ukraine, there is little sign that a major counteroffensive is brewing.For weeks, Western intelligence and military analysts have predicted that a Ukrainian campaign to retake the strategic port city of Kherson and surrounding territory is imminent. But in trenches less than a mile from Russia’s positions in the area, Ukrainian soldiers hunker down from an escalating onslaught of artillery, with little ability to advance.
...
The progress Ukrainian forces had made here in recent months — recapturing a string of villages from Russia’s control — has largely stalled, with soldiers exposed in the open terrain.The roads that soldiers zip along among the scorched wheat fields at the front lines are pockmarked with craters from previous strikes, guided by Russia’s Orlan drones that allow them to pick and choose targets.
“There is nowhere to hide,” said Yuri, who has fought here without a break since the beginning of the war, and like other soldiers did not give his last name, in line with protocol. His unit has a hodgepodge stock: modern antitank weapons and a Soviet machine gun manufactured in 1944, and the focus here is holding the line.
Ukrainian military officials are tight-lipped on any timeline for a wider push, but say they need more supplies of Western weapons before one can happen. Ukraine lacks the capacity to launch a full-scale offensive anywhere along the 1,200-mile front line, one security official conceded.
The area north of Kherson is flat land with open fields. There is no place where one could securely assemble a force big enough to punch through the frontline. Ukrainian units went into hiding in Mykolaiv (Nikolaev in Russian writing) where they have dispersed among the civilian population after several of their concentrations had been attacked by Russian missile forces:
One woman took me to see her daughter’s school, smashed by Russian missiles. Through the broken concrete you could see a shelf of library books exposed to the sun and rain. Instead of blaming Russia for firing missiles at the school, she blamed Ukraine for quartering soldiers there. (..)When I asked her about Putin’s aims, she said: ‘I don’t know. He must have his reasons for what he’s doing.’ Did she think what he was doing was right? ‘I never get involved in politics.’ She mentioned that salaries in Russian-annexed Crimea were higher than in Ukraine. She’d been angry, earlier on in the fighting, when Russian troops were approaching Mykolaiv, about how close Ukrainian armoured vehicles were to her house. She was Russian-born. She was unhappy that Russian language teaching was disappearing from Ukraine. She said people were punished for using Russian.
...
Another well-informed man told me what most locals would not say, that after a devastating strike on a Mykolaiv barracks in March, which killed scores and perhaps hundreds of marines, the authorities adopted a policy of dispersal, with small groups of Ukrainian personnel spending the night in a wide array of buildings, including schools.
The above quoted LRB piece, which mostly takes the Ukrainian side, details the difficulties the Ukrainians have in launching any offensive. (Sorry for the length of the quote but the details matter as they confirm the take above):
When Sasha’s company got to Posad-Pokrovske, they spent the first night in a school. The next day it was flattened in an air strike. They spent the next three and a half months living in concrete pipes under a bridge. ‘I’m already used to it,’ he said. ‘A typical day is they shell and bomb us from morning to night. Mum says, “Where are you?” and I say: “I’m home.” It’s our home now. People say, “We’re looking forward to you coming home,” and we say: “We are home.”’Bodies of dead civilians have been lying unburied in Posad-Pokrovske for months. The soldiers aren’t allowed to collect them; since they’re civilians, it has to be done by the police, and the police don’t come.
...
A handful of villages have been liberated in the north of the Russian bridgehead, and Ukraine has won a toehold on the hostile side of a smaller river, the Ingulets. But mainly the two sides remain a few miles apart, with more lines of artillery further back. In the flat, open landscape, with little cover except the trees along the roads, any attempt by one side to breach the other’s lines is subject to withering fire from anti-tank missiles and guns, or shelling. Both sides launch drones to spy out artillery targets; when the artillery fires, it becomes the target for the other side’s artillery.Russia has an overwhelming advantage in all these areas. It has more artillery guns and rockets than Ukraine, by a large margin. It has more attack planes and helicopters. It has more anti-aircraft missiles to shoot down Ukrainian drones, and a crushing advantage in electronic warfare systems to jam them. ‘It’s easier for them,’ Sasha said. ‘They haul in shells by rail, by the wagonload. They unload them with cranes. They dig shelters with bulldozers. They shoot rockets from morning till night as if they came out of a machine. It’s shameful to admit – they have drones flying over us 24/7 and we have one. Sometimes we can see what they’re up to ... but it’s embarrassing. We don’t have the capability.’
Ukraine has been good at hiding its military, but even so, the absence in Mykolaiv and the surrounding countryside of the signs of a build-up of equipment, troops and supplies that you might expect for a counter-offensive is striking. There’s only so much you can move by night. If Ukraine is using its much vaunted mobilisation to expand its army with new units to retake Kherson, it’s being done with extraordinary stealth – or it’s simply taking a long time to integrate a chaotic array of foreign weapons and untrained recruits. Sasha was coy about his unit’s losses, but he did say they hadn’t been replaced.
No new weapons are coming into the Mykolaiv area. Front line units are depleted and have not been rotated out since March. Russian forces have overwhelming material superiority in the area.
There is no Ukrainian Kherson offensive. There will be no Ukrainian Kherson offensive.
If there will be an offensive in the general area it will be launched by the Russian side which will overrun the few exhausted Ukrainian forces which hold that frontline.
The few Ukrainian operations, missile strikes on bridges that are easily replaced by ferries, sabotage acts on a Crimean air base, are minor pin pricks to the Russian side. They will not change the imbalance of forces or the outcome of the war.
Posted by b on August 12, 2022 at 10:17 UTC | Permalink
« previous pageColonel Khodarenok
The future tribunal of war criminals taken prisoner has caused a new wave of hysterics in Ukraine. After the HIMARS missiles failed to kill all the Azov prisoners, the RF Armed Forces and Russia as a whole are accused of militarizing civilian facilities. In particular, the Mariupol Philharmonic.In reality, everything is simpler - the building of the Philharmonic on Metallurgists Avenue suffered less than the others during the hostilities. In addition, in Ukraine they are very worried that the trial can take place on the country's independence day, August 24, that is, in 2 weeks.
Parallels with Nuremberg are visible to the naked eye. The first trial of major war criminals was held in Nuremberg because for many years this city was a stronghold and a symbol of fascism.
Mariupol was a stronghold of Nazi groups like Azov for 8 years, and now it is a peaceful city where you can live and not be afraid of anyone. Now the main task is to ensure the safety of the process itself and all those who should be brought to justice.
I have almost no doubt that Ukraine will try to disrupt the process and kill all the defendants, as it already happened in Yelenovka.
Posted by: rp | Aug 13 2022 11:32 utc | 202
Posted by: joe9211 | Aug 13 2022 9:35 utc | 202
There are two conflicting narratives on the SMO.
The first is given here. Saw it today. It's the standard narrative we get in England and looking around the sites it's more or less standard elsewhere in the West:-
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-62520743
The second is summarised here. I've no idea whether "Marinus" is genuine or not. I assume not until it's shown otherwise. Nevertheless that second narrative is closer to the truth:-
Baud, Meersheimer, Generals Richards, Twitty and Kujat, Mcgregor, Johnson, Martyanov, "b" here, many others, all confirm this or that aspect of the second narrative. But in truth we need none of them, nor the alleged Marine officer above, to confirm the obvious.
That is, that although the Kiev forces are NATO trained, are numerous, and fight with courage and determination, they were neither trained nor equipped for the type of war they are now facing. As Kujat remarks, they fight best from the shelter of settlements and when they move into the open they are rapidly disposed of. When there are no civilians around, they are disposed of whether they're in settlements or not.
They are fighting an unwinnable war and are only continuing to do so because of pressure from the West. There are also internal political pressures that force a continuation of the fighting.
So that first narrative is not only erroneous. It is leading to the carnage we're seeing at the moment. And General Lord Richards, in an interview with Times Radio that should be far more widely disseminated, raises the moral question of whether it is right to use our proxies so:-
""But what we've then ended up doing is stoking the (Syrian) war by feeding in weapons and resources and some advice, but never giving our proxies the means of winning it; and I thought at the time that that was morally questionable because it would result in a huge number of deaths; which is exactly what happened."
"We've got to be very careful that with our current approach to Ukraine, we don't end up with the same result."
Which narrative should we go with? Hockenhull, working to keep the pointless slaughter continuing, or Richards, knowing that we have pitched our proxies into an unwinnable war?
Posted by: English Outsider | Aug 13 2022 11:34 utc | 203
Derek @206: "Territories, liberated from Russian forces"
So the Ukronians can add a grey area on their maps whenever they need to support the narrative that they are beating the Russians. Just mark grey areas further west each time. This way they can "win" all the way to Poland!
Posted by: William Gruff | Aug 13 2022 11:39 utc | 205
Zaporizhia NPP and the city of Energodar are again under fire from Ukrainian militants
Posted by: rk | Aug 13 2022 11:40 utc | 206
What happened in Tianjin?
Posted by: Moaobserver | Aug 12 2022 20:35 utc | 129
Safety rules governing the storage of hazardous chemicals were ignored.
A fire in a storage unit was fought using water. A nearby storage unit held calcium carbide. Water plus calcium carbide produces acetylene. Other storage areas contained ammonium nitrate fertiliser. The resulting explosions were devastating.
Posted by: Ranelagh | Aug 13 2022 11:58 utc | 207
"A number of sources in the morning fully confirmed the departure of the entire civil and military administration from Nikolaev and Zaporozhye. The population of the cities is confident that the Russian army will enter there from day to day.
It all looks very strange, but as it is. If you have any information from there, please write in the comments."
and
"A very tense moment
As a number of commentators note, the exodus of the Ukrainian occupiers from Mykolaiv and Zaporizhia, indeed, may mean not only our imminent offensive, but also, on the other hand, preparation for a monstrous provocation from the Zaporizhia NPP. Moreover, the terrorists are already sending out messages about an allegedly impending provocation. Although we all understand and know for sure that, as experience shows, provocations in such cases are prepared only by Ukrainians."
Posted by: monstrousprovocation | Aug 13 2022 12:14 utc | 209
... Russia needs to make it clear that if the attacks continue then Lvov and Kiev will be targeted. ...
Posted by: bevin | Aug 12 2022 22:00 utc | 149
I hate to say it but we both know that Z’s controllers don’t give a fig about anything or anyone in or near Ukraine.
I can only think that a private, ambassador to ambassador promise that any deliberate nuclear contamination in UA will be met with a military technical solution that produces the same or greater contamination in each and every Z sponsoring nation, that they should all expect a full portion..
Posted by: anon | Aug 13 2022 12:14 utc | 210
I’ll tempt fate - it seems when I write a comment, b manages to post a new thread, by the time I hit post - correlation, coincidence no doubt 😄.
Anyway having spent many hours catching up on many posts around that I haven’t got to reading here are a couple that stand out
Abby Martin
https://youtu.be/qG2G5sC7qWA
She tells us about Corporate Media (msm) and Economic Terrorism ( unilateral sanctions) of the US gangsters and their henchmen of the WB/IMF. Excellent 10 mins.
Also if you haven’t come across one of the shining stars of world statespersons - the grown ups of the human race , India has their Foreign minister Jaishankar
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j2EdQD_Eag0
“I am one fifth of the World, don’t tell me if I am not with you I am with Russia - you damned American accented coconut!” Or some such put down.
He is no buddy like Modi buddy is to the Collective Waste
Finally as the Ukrainians oldest frontlines are ready to crack it is heartwarming that Givi and Motorola’s, these I hadn’t even heard of until a few months ago, ‘Somali’ troops are there to deliver their martyred commanders victories.
All ms Ellen skiii can do is demand that Russia and Russians get ever more cancelled , she/it can have endless cocaine, and blows the largest nuke plant in central Europe so that nobody can have use of the black soil. He/her/thing wants to go spend the billions of soon to be useless dollars, they’ll at least be good for rolling up and stuffing up whatever nasal passages that mutant still has.
Right’o back to enjoying scorchio as climate liars cry wolf again as a diversion from all the FAIL’s of the dumb dead Empire. Hail to all my fellow humans and remember if you see any Nazi, including Covid, climate, inflation etc Nazis- give them the best salute 🖕 and then a gentle slap - that normally makes them cry like little boys who have had their ball taken away. If they have a gun, well … I won’t say here but I don’t like dangerous frothing dogs walking my streets.
Posted by: DunGroanin | Aug 13 2022 12:23 utc | 211
In other words Europe no longer matters, nor can it until it declares its independence and indicates an aspiration to, eventual, sovereignty.
There is no reason for Russia or China to care what the monkey perched on the organ grinder's shoulder is thinking, their business is with the organ grinder, old, drunk and ragged as he may appear to be.
Posted by: bevin | Aug 12 2022 19:06 utc | 115
Perfectly put!
Earlier you went into various modes rightly concluding that 'extreme Neoliberalism' now rules the roost as the latest evolution of the 'left.'
I think that is overly generous on your part for it is classic wolf in sheep's clothing. To me it's all materialist bankster-corporate -fascist-mind-control evil. It's the opposite of 'left.' it's not even human but some sort of power-obsessed asura mentality driven by conceptual fixations resulting in their sincerely believing their own bullshit.
They can shape perception of reality with speech and mind. So their lies Are reality. This they believe and so this they know.
Their lies and brainwashing must be exposed so that the spell they have cast for more than a century now can be broken. Russia's SMO resistance and manner of speech about it is deliberately exposing these lies but it needs time to sink in. Germany will shift first. Then England and France. America is now a lunatic asylum so there is no telling. Break-up is probably the only viable option.... just walking away from the corrupt, failed attempt at federalism and starting over on the level of the States with the entire corporation known as 'USA' simply vernichted.
There is a lot of tedious comment which I suspect emanates from US blowhards.
As for NATO training Ukrainians to fight a war NATO has never actually dared to fight that is the point.
NATO has been debunked and with that the U.K. role in Europe.
If the threat to a nuclear facility is so dire Russia should eradicate the source of the incoming and sacrifice civilian collateral damage for the greater good
Posted by: Paul Greenwood | Aug 13 2022 12:28 utc | 213
Yes, Anon,
Washington and London as well as other NATO cities should be prepared for a similar reciprocal action
Posted by: Blue Dotterel | Aug 13 2022 12:30 utc | 214
WESTERN TECH IN RUSSIAN WEAPONS
I often hear Martyanov et al speak confidently about Russia's weapons industry independence from the West as if it were a fait accompli, however i also hear that many high tech components are imported from the West.
For example, this report:
https://static.rusi.org/RUSI-Silicon-Lifeline-final-updated-web_0.pdf
Is there anyone familiar with the subject matter than can either confirm or debunk these claims?
I cross checked RUSI with Bellingcat, no names that matched. It does however feature what appears to be a who's who of Western military, think tankers and spooks... so, caveat emptor.
As a fake news exercise, i wonder to whom it would be aimed, since your average Joes don't read long reports, and as as far as i'm aware it didn't hit the Western news outlets, which makes one wonder if there may be some truth to it.
It mentions front companies and many sanction circumventing measures etc. and up until recently even Italy's IVECO supplied vehicles to Russia, so makes sense that for more critical technologies it would take time to develop and copy it domestically across the board.
I suspect in the end it's a case of tacit approval, too much money to be made, and the possibility of retaliation by Russia's control of key essential raw materials upon which Western companies depend, which means that while Russia is doing all it can to become 100% independent, for now it may continue relying on partner countries like china and India to supply it with sanctioned tech for some time. Probably why they get such nice discounts on their oil...
Posted by: Et Tu | Aug 13 2022 12:36 utc | 215
Something has changed in Ukraine. SBS broadcasts yesterday's BBC News At 10 at noon each day. Today's broadcast made NO MENTION of Ukraine. Similarly, ABC.net.au's main bulletin at 7pm didn't mention it either. This was the first time, since February, that Ukraine drivel and balderdash has been omitted from a main or feature TV News broadcast in Oz. And Oz MSM is just as Jewed-up, aka Neoconned, as US & UK and every other 'Christian West' Mock Democracy.
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Aug 13 2022 12:36 utc | 216
I often hear Martyanov et al speak confidently about...
Posted by: Et Tu | Aug 13 2022 12:36 utc | 220
---
He is one of the problems, we have in this information bubble. Just don't forget the he was a KGB officer in the former Azerbaijan SSR border patrol, who happen to get a visa to come to the US, after serving in the KGB for about 5 years. Ever heard of how former KGB officers get the US entry visa, and then get the US citizenship? Know any other such former KGB officers in the US/UK? Like Skripal, for example?
Posted by: rp | Aug 13 2022 12:55 utc | 217
"Der Spiegel said 100 shots a day was considered a 'high level of shooting intensity' for the howitzer."
Can we start calling such things Snowflake Weapons? Seems about right coming from the West. I doubt it anyone in the West would fight if called on to do so, they would wear themselves out arguing over who gets to wear the combat dress.
Posted by: BrightIdea | Aug 13 2022 12:57 utc | 218
So the Ukronians can add a grey area on their maps whenever they need to support the narrative that they are beating the Russians. Just mark grey areas further west each time. This way they can "win" all the way to Poland!
Posted by: William Gruff | Aug 13 2022 11:39 utc | 210
lol
Posted by: ld | Aug 13 2022 13:02 utc | 219
@Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Aug 13 2022 12:36 utc | 221
Maybe it's the quiet before the storm as the plan now seems to poison the Dniepr with radioactive waste, or worse.
'If we can't have East Ukraine, then no one will' must be the reasoning behind the daily shelling of Zaparozhye NPP. The only thing worse than being a war torn shithole country would be a radioactive shithole country.
Reminds me of the biblical tale of King Solomon and the 2 women fighting over what both claimed to be their baby. When the king suggested cutting it in half, the real mother was revealed as the one who preferred letting it live with the other woman... We are seeing this in reverse, except there is no King Solomon even at the UN today to settle things.
You would think at least one of them could point out the absurdity of claims that Russia bombs the territory it has controlled since March. If they can't inspect the site, at least they could try debunk the narrative before a potential disaster happens for everyone in Europe, not just bloody Ukraine.
Posted by: Et Tu | Aug 13 2022 13:06 utc | 220
Re: Iron Curtain 2.0
Barflys might contemplate the period circa 1955 - 1970 with a focus on the measures enforced as part of the Iron Curtain 1.0.
Essentially all contact was severed - no plane flights, nil academic exchanges, nearly impossible to place a telephone call.
Posted by: Exile | Aug 13 2022 10:35 utc
It's not just about geography anymore, the intention is to fracture all societies into "useless people" and "useful people". Useful to whom? Those who will own everything, and magnanimously ration it out by allowing you to "rent everything", and "be happy" that the technological overlords (human and AI) let you continue to live. Dystopian movies are far too hopeful.
But for the WEF vaunted Great Technobabble Screwup Fest (sorry, Reset) to work, it will require resources in short availability in US/ZATO countries.
And besides, you think for one second Russia and China don't know "all wars are bankers' wars"? They certainly know EXACTLY who each member of the Rothschild-class is, and where they live. I'm not talking about useful fools like Trudy, Macron and Bojo.
The Rothschild-class have made it more than clear that in their demented
minds, the masses have no purpose beyond serving them, all the earth's resources should be under their control. In the words of Schwab's right-hand-man at Davos 2020, as the Covid Plandemic/Medical Genocide was being implemented:
"Those who fail in the struggle against irrelevance would constitute a new “useless class” – people who are useless not from the viewpoint of their friends and family, but useless from the viewpoint of the economic and political system. And this useless class will be separated by an ever-growing gap from the ever more powerful elite."
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/01/yuval-hararis-warning-davos-speech-future-predications/
I am against capital punishment, but if they can't control themselves and continue to try to genocide 7/8ths of the planet, they have written their own demise. It is they who are irrelevant, not the rest of the world.
Posted by: Old canadian | Aug 13 2022 13:08 utc | 221
@ Posted by: rp | Aug 13 2022 12:55 utc | 222
Well, i know how a lot of Nazis got US visas got them after WW2... many helped create NASA and many other US technologies.
As far as i know, Martyanov works in Aeronautics in Seattle area running a research lab. Nice theory, but I'd say his qualifications and expertise are most likely how he got his visa...
Posted by: Et Tu | Aug 13 2022 13:11 utc | 222
Et Tu @ #220.
(Russian weapons rely on Western Tech).
I don't believe it because Western chip manufacture is more about miniaturisation than "smartness". The S-300 AA system has been around for 20 years or more, does what it needs to and couldn't be described as miniature by any stretch of the imagination.
If Russians have become reliant on Westerm Tech for any defense paraphernalia then it serves them right. And we're all effed 🤣
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Aug 13 2022 13:13 utc | 223
[email protected] only real good from unions is that they keep the pay scale of non unionized trained workers comparable to Unionized. Also worker safety has improved. Otherwise the shleps who own the businesses would have every employee bound in slavery. Worked in the shmata for a while, paying non unionized staff 25-35% less than Canada's minimum wage. Taking advantage of new immigrants esp. That's how the chosen few get ahead, another form of usury.
Cheers M
Odd but from the same group who run the business side of most of the planet, that same group gave birth to trade unions. Guess some of them didn't like being abused by their own.
Posted by: sean the leprechaun | Aug 13 2022 13:13 utc | 224
You would think at least one of them could point out the absurdity of claims that Russia bombs the territory it has controlled since March. If they can't inspect the site, at least they could try debunk the narrative before a potential disaster happens for everyone in Europe, not just bloody Ukraine.
Posted by: Et Tu | Aug 13 2022 13:06 utc | 225
---
Well, why should Russians care about the bloody Europe? After all those sanctions? It is not only denazify and demilitarise the Ukraine, but also deindustrialise the EU and defeat the NATO/US/UK with any means available.
Best for you, Et Tu, to move out of Europe and go live in Asia or Africa..
Posted by: rp | Aug 13 2022 13:16 utc | 225
As far as i know, Martyanov works in Aeronautics in Seattle area running a research lab. Nice theory, but I'd say his qualifications and expertise are most likely how he got his visa...
Posted by: Et Tu | Aug 13 2022 13:11 utc | 227
--
Oh, research how to sell your country? Even, if he claims he didn't have one in the 90s.
Posted by: rp | Aug 13 2022 13:18 utc | 226
Those Russians, who worked with the US in the 90s and after were traitors, period!
Posted by: rp | Aug 13 2022 13:22 utc | 227
[email protected] only they had said it with the broad Belfast brogue, then they'd be speaking on behalf of all Paddys, that abhor colonialism delivered on the end of a pointy Imperial stick.
Cheers M
Posted by: sean the leprechaun | Aug 13 2022 13:23 utc | 228
point a nuke at tel aviv
one more attack on the nuclear power plant will result in vapourizing israel
peace on earth
Posted by: ld | Aug 13 2022 13:33 utc | 229
IMO for Westerners, the place to be, after the Déluge, will be Latin America.
Spanish is much easier to learn, and less of a culture shock than Russia or China.
If I were in better health, I’d start with Cuba. Then go to Venezuela. Maybe swing by Nicaragua’s new « Museum of US Shame. Then a pilgrimage to Bolivia, to be amongst those… non-European Aborigines.
Then pick one of those to live in. My guess would be Venezuela.
But part of me likes the idea of Mariupol or Zaporizhia. Cause I like the names.
Posted by: Featherless | Aug 13 2022 13:39 utc | 230
@Posted by: Old canadian | Aug 13 2022 13:08 utc | 226
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/01/yuval-hararis-warning-davos-speech-future-predications/I am against capital punishment, but if they can't control themselves and continue to try to genocide 7/8ths of the planet, they have written their own demise. It is they who are irrelevant, not the rest of the world.
These guys standard MO is to talk about the very trends that they have put consciously in place, and the technology decisions they themselves have made, as if they were "acts of God" that are simply inevitable and therefore must be dealt with. There is nothing inevitable about all the things this propagandist talks about, all of these trends are fully managed/caused by the filthy greedy elites working to extract yet more wealth from the planet and the working classes.
Posted by: NewWorldDisorder | Aug 12 2022 20:25 utc
"Some of the orbital weapons systems that don't exist are directed energy weapons which super heat a target causing fire and explosions for instance of ammo dumps and air fields where witnesses saw no incoming missiles (Crimea) ..." etc
PLEASE give some LINKS to this wonderstuff for us curious barflies!!
Posted by: LongCovid | Aug 13 2022 13:42 utc | 232
Posted by: Featherless | Aug 13 2022 13:39 utc | 235
----
Sure, you can go there, or any other place, but without the dollars or euros. You leave them back home...you learn to live like the natives...😏
Posted by: rp | Aug 13 2022 13:43 utc | 233
Economist Michael Roberts argues that one of the primary motives behind the Maidan was the corporate desire to get rid of constitutional restrictions on the sale of Ukrainian land: it was all about that
"...32 million arable hectares of rich and fertile black soil (known as “cernozëm”), has the equivalent of one-third of all existing agricultural land in the European Union. The “breadbasket of Europe,” as it is called, had an annual production of 64 million tons of grain and seeds, among the world’s largest producers of barley, wheat and sunflower oil (for the latter, Ukraine produces about 30 percent of the world total). "
"Last week, Ukraine’s foreign private creditors agreed to the country’s request for a two-year freeze on payments on about $20bn of foreign debt,..." writes Michael Roberts who adds that there was a
"price to pay for this limited largesse by foreign creditors.: the accelerating demand of foreign multi-nationals and governments to take control of Ukraine resources and bring them under the control of foreign capital without any restrictions and limitations.
"In a past post, I had outlined the plan to privatise and hand over the vast agricultural resources of Ukraine to foreign multi-nationals. And for several years now, a series of reports by the Oakland Institute economic observatory has documented the takeover of foreign capital. Much of what is below comes from Oakland.
"Post-Soviet Ukraine, with its 32 million arable hectares of rich and fertile black soil (known as “cernozëm”), has the equivalent of one-third of all existing agricultural land in the European Union. The “breadbasket of Europe,” as it is called, had an annual production of 64 million tons of grain and seeds, among the world’s largest producers of barley, wheat and sunflower oil (for the latter, Ukraine produces about 30 percent of the world total).
"As I explained in my previous post, the planned takeover of Ukraine’s resources partly provoked the conflict: the semi-civil war, the Maidan revolt and the annexation of Crimea by Russia. As the Oakland Institute has outlined, to limit unrestrained privatization, a moratorium on the sale of land to foreigners had been imposed in 2001. Since then, the repeal of this rule has been a main goal of Western institutions. As early as 2013, for instance, the World Bank provided an $89 million loan for the development of a deed and land title program needed for the commercialization of state-owned and cooperative land. In the words of a 2019 World Bank paper the aim was an “accelerating of private investment in agriculture.” That agreement, denounced at the time by Russia as a backdoor to facilitating the entry of Western multinationals, includes the promotion of “modern agricultural production … including the use of biotechnologies,” an apparent opening towards GMO crops on Ukrainian fields..."
https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2022/08/13/ukraine-the-invasion-of-capital/#respond
Posted by: bevin | Aug 13 2022 13:46 utc | 234
English Outsider | 208
Well put!
Posted by: Arthurdent | Aug 13 2022 12:12 utc | 213
____
Yes, Outsider's logic is impeccable and self-evident, to which trolls like sub-average joe9211 are impervious. However, it steels the rest of us.
I like karlof1's tack. He rarely addresses trolls directly, but rather spotlights and disses their naked repugnance to the larger audience.
Posted by: Doug Hillman | Aug 13 2022 13:49 utc | 235
Sputnik: Ukraine hit the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power plant in the Kherson region, it is operating in emergency mode now. Constant shelling and failures of the units can lead to a disaster at the NPP.
Can't wait to see what happens when all 4 npps are in controlled territory and all subject to terrorism at the same time. Though I expect the one closest to Pooland won't have any problems.
Posted by: rk | Aug 13 2022 13:55 utc | 236
@rp 238
I’d convert all my assets into solid gold, then melt it into a buttplug which I would wear proudly, as part of my Religious Heritage.
Hopefully there is some maybe Bolivian indigenous tribe who do that already, or else I’d have to invent it.
And then I’d sell it and buy a villa or something. Then live like the locals.
Posted by: Featherless | Aug 13 2022 13:58 utc | 237
It's rare indeed that the the good guys triumph by being more peaceful than the bad guys. In Hollywood, maybe.
Posted by: Immaculate deception | Aug 13 2022 14:02 utc | 238
Posted by: Tom SteChatte | Aug 12 2022 16:11 utc | 67
Get a load of this guy who believes DoD press releases. The only military advantage the US has over Russia is naval, which is rather pointless in Ukraine, and airframes. The latter is why Russia has air defenses that it does. Russia has fired more cruise missiles in six months than the US has fired in 30 years. The idea that Russia is only having success because the US isn’t trying is copium addiction. As is the idea that the US has a bunch of weaponry so far advanced that it changes the equation. The reason the US uses dumb bombs with depleted uranium everywhere it goes is because it doesn’t have very many of these “smart” weapons that do not have the actual track record American media portrays.
Tom, the US makes 250K artillery shells per year at maximum output. That’s like a week of usage at this level of intensity. It makes 4-13 tanks per month. It’s equipment requires massive amounts of maintenance which is mostly provided by contractors. The US military is designed to impress people like you on paper, not actually fight a war against an armed nation that lasts more than 3 weeks at any level of intensity. It would take at least 6 months of the US to aggregate enough men and material to even think about fighting Russia; it took that long to prep an invasion of Iraq. It is the most expensive military in world history, not the most fearsome. All its smart weaponry couldn’t handle Iraq or Afghanistan but you think it could take on Russia and win?
Posted by: Lex | Aug 13 2022 14:17 utc | 239
Zelensky, at an emergency meeting, gave the command to Zaluzhny to withdraw combat units from Donbass, reservists should be introduced in their place as fodder.
Posted by: more wtf | Aug 13 2022 14:18 utc | 240
The Kherson Offensive is an IPSO alright, but not targeted at the Russian troops; it is targeted at millions of clueless NPCs believing the Western propaganda.
Posted by: Old Brown Fool | Aug 13 2022 14:20 utc | 241
Posted by: Melaleuca | Aug 13 2022 9:42 utc
"karlof1 | Aug 12 2022 20:03 utc | 123
… Like our newest troll @123.
This^ is why the timestamp is necessary."
This is why you shound NEVER use the POSTNUMBER as a backlink: it might not exist after B deletes some previous posts.
You can only use it's HTML POINTER … but then you must include it in a HTML command "HREF" (at the very bottom of the MoA page).
Try clicking on "Melaleuca" in the very first line of this post.
Posted by: LongCovid | Aug 13 2022 14:28 utc | 242
I’d convert all my assets into solid gold, then melt it into a buttplug which I would wear proudly, as part of my Religious Heritage.
Posted by: Featherless | Aug 13 2022 13:58 utc | 242
--
Lusia likes plugged butts
Posted by: RK | Aug 13 2022 14:38 utc | 243
Posted by: bevin | Aug 13 2022 13:46 utc | 239
Great post. The devil is in the details and the US must always lay the groundwork for its expansion which your post so clearly establishes. It's local laws in nations and in states that allow corporate plunder.
I remember once earlier in my life attempting to lobby one of my state senators to add a code of corporate responsibility to the RCW (Revised Code of Washington). She didn't exactly laugh in my face, but politely mentioned the name of a couple of big companies chartered in our state, and told me that it would never happen. Since all corporations in the US are incorporated by state law, real corporate reform can occur locally. Delaware is one of the states that has the most lax corporate laws, and it is no coincidence that we have a president who is based in that state.
Also, the international corporate land grab graft is an ongoing project of the US. Once, in the not so distant past, I also helped investigate how the US was attempting to gain control of more land in Honduras through creating Zones of Economic Development (ZEDEs) which would cede Honduran sovereignty to foreign entities. I remember asking the US Ambassador in the US Embassy in Tegucigalpa if the US would establish separate embassies or consulates in each of the new ZEDEs if they were established. She laughed and did not directly respond. As far as I know, the ZEDEs have not been established.
Link to NLG Report on Honduran ZEDEs
But the game goes on.
Posted by: Objective Observer | Aug 13 2022 14:44 utc | 244
@Immaculate Deception
Maybe they can’t win BY being more peaceful.
Maybe they can win WHILE being more ethical.
Posted by: Featherless | Aug 13 2022 14:59 utc | 245
Posted by: A.L. | Aug 12 2022 11:33 utc | 7
Texas or (team rybar) is wrong here. Indeed, they better left deep techy details to "fans of rods and shells".
1. Agree, chances that conventional artillery blast their way to reactor vessel is minimum
2. Agree, it takes several days from "reactor shutdown" to active isotopes decayed and residual heat falling to levels needing no more active cooking.
Fukusima-1 was an example. All of 5 reactor were scrammed okay. Most recent two reactors were built away from the ocean and could mantain emergency electro-generation and cooling and were not harmed by the tsunami/qoake.
Posted by: Arioch | Aug 13 2022 15:05 utc | 246
...But the earlier 3 reactors (one more was cold, disasesembled for refuelling) could not be cooked and exploded in 3-4 days.
3. Yet there is no ocean on ZapNPP and there is no reasonable way all the power wires get shortcicuited by sea water there.
4. That is why UkrArmy shells spent fuel depots. The spent fuel rods stating from the first days of NPP work are stored there in concrete huge "barrels". And it is that depot that UkrArmy is aiming at.
There probably would be no global catastrophe like Chernobyl or Fukusima-1.
But there perfectly can be a regional disaster.
There would be no light radioactive gases aomked out of reactors and moved by winds into EU/USA. But heavy chemical elements of spent fuel, dust and debris, can be moved by local winds and rains.
Creating no man land around ZapNPP similar to Chernobyl exclusion zone, forcing people to give up on their property and homes, and then blaming it on Russia - that is the game.
Shutting down reactors is good measure, not marking the problem yet worse, but it is not solving it.
Posted by: Arioch | Aug 13 2022 15:14 utc | 247
@RK - I resent your comment. F Arestovich and all those WHORES.
I was talking about my retirement plan. Pleaze do not sully that with any garbage.
Posted by: Featherless | Aug 13 2022 15:16 utc | 248
Objective [email protected]
I was thinking of Honduras. It has now become a favoured tourist destination for Ontarioans. The coastal lands on which the resorts have been built having been stolen from the displaced locals. As to the ZEDES!! (Follow the link at 249) The ultimate neo-liberal nightmare.
Posted by: bevin | Aug 13 2022 15:24 utc | 249
Seems to me the problem with the threat to the Zap. NPP can be mitigated by Russia proactively creating a neutral zone by bombing the hell out of the north bank of the river/lake. If any residents still live there, sorry.
Turn the northern part into a wasteland now, before radiation becomes a problem, or let the Ukie and the US psychopath handler do it with nuclear waste.
It will be a wasteland in any event.
Posted by: Simplicius | Aug 13 2022 15:38 utc | 250
Posted by: LongCovid | Aug 13 2022 14:28 utc | 247
Good example and you are right on.
But that problem is pointed out on a regular basis here.
Posters who do not use the timestamp are only interested in what they themselves say,
they're not really looking for discussion.
Posted by: waynorinorway | Aug 13 2022 16:29 utc | 251
@ sean the leprechaun | Aug 13 2022 13:13 utc | 229
thanks m... those are novel ways to look at this, that i hadn't thought of!
Posted by: james | Aug 13 2022 16:51 utc | 252
Posted by: Et Tu | Aug 13 2022 12:36 utc | 220
For example, this report:https://static.rusi.org/RUSI-Silicon-Lifeline-final-updated-web_0.pdf
I commented on the RUSI report in the next thread about Iranian drones. See:
The 1980s called. They want their computer back.
Posted by: Petri Krohn | Aug 13 2022 17:32 utc | 253
OttoE @198--
Agree with your accusations and remedies. As I've mentioned, Russia's MFA's diplomats are very busy with all Persian Gulf actors, but little of substance is said in the readouts, so I don't bother posting them. Russia's Security Council met yesterday, but there was no readout of topic(s) discussed, although Medvedev hinted it centered on the power plant shelling. It's almost Sunday in Ukraine now, so we'll see if they repent.
I use the post # out of years of habit. But I did switch to blockquote, so I'll try to be mindful and use copy/paste for my addressee.
Here is some more information:
"Ukrainian officials confirmed that Russia is using Iranian-provided drones in Ukraine. Advisor to the Ukrainian President’s Office, Oleksiy Arestovych, stated on August 5 that Iran handed 46 drones over to Russia and that the Ukrainian government has already noted the use of these drones in combat in Ukraine.
At least a portion of the provided drones are older-generation “Shahed 129” heavy strike drones, which Russian forces may seek to use to attack US-provided HIMARS in Ukraine.
It is unclear whether the 46 drones represent all the drones that Tehran has agreed to send, or the number of Iranian drones that are currently operating in Ukraine."
Source: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-august-5
Posted by: Mikkado | Aug 13 2022 20:33 utc | 257
I use the post # out of years of habit. But I did switch to blockquote, so I'll try to be mindful and use copy/paste for my addressee.
Posted by: karlof1 | Aug 13 2022 19:51 utc | 261
You're a good man karlof1, even if you are a rhubarb advocate.
I hope others will follow you in that. Thanks.
Posted by: waynorinorway | Aug 13 2022 20:38 utc | 258
Hmmm. My understanding of things is that an 8"/200mm artillery shell with the appropriate construction (HESH) will likely blow a hole through a yard, yard and a half, of reinforced concrete. If it doesn't, it will spall off enough inside to where the integrity of the vessel's containment function will be ended. Comments from someone more up to speed on artillery's current effectiveness against reinforced concrete here welcome, as are someone more up to speed on repairing reinforced concrete containment vessels as well, would be appreciated.
Now the Ukrainians are firing rockets, which don't currently have HESH warheads (that I've ever heard of, at any rate), or what would more likely be needed, a two-stage warhead to blast through the exterior structure with a two-stage delay-fused HESH primary warhead. Probably not enough time or talent in Ukraine to produce such a two-stage warhead for this war; plain HESH warhead, that'd be easy. Elsewhere doing it, dunno.
In regards to the LRB article, my read on it is that the Ukraine defenders are ripe for being savaged by aggressive infantry patrol actions, particularly at night. Russia isn't doing this, no doubt because of its desire to avoid casualties. Things will get much worse in this regards once it gets colder. Underequipped soldiers hunkered down indoors around a fire/primus won't be paying attention and will be literal cold meat to an aggressor. If Russia wanted the Ukraine forces to crack without a big armor offensive, this operational strategy would work. It would cost more lives upfront than current operations continued would. I am sure the military professionals on both sides know this, and therefore the war is continuing its current path because of this. Ukraine's military will be defeated, later than sooner, and everyone knows it there, if not here.
Posted by: Daniel N. White | Aug 14 2022 0:47 utc | 259
Posted by: Old canadian | Aug 12 2022 15:51 utc | 63
Let's get the Trudy Cabal to face the ballot box first, and if THAT doesn't happen or work, you are correct.
Except there is no one who will run against him (and his party) who will be different - vote Conservatives in and hand even more of Canada to USA, or vote NDP in and get chaos.
Posted by: Lorna MacKay | Aug 15 2022 18:53 utc | 260
The comments to this entry are closed.
We see that the maintainers of LiveUAmap kept the front line as it was, but added a gray zone on the Ukrainian side.
If you click on the mystery gray zone you will find they are - Territories, liberated from Russian forces
You can believe that if you want. Forgive me if somebody has already answered this but there are a lot of comments to read through.
Posted by: Derek | Aug 13 2022 11:09 utc | 201