Russia’s Wagner Group mercenaries (who are trained at Russian military bases):
https://twitter.com/christogrozev/status/1510885041290813442
From Wikipedia:
Wagner Group logo:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/81/Wagnerlogo.png
Oh, no question, I agree completely — this was almost certainly a Ukrainian attack, and they’re basically trolling Putin by denying any knowledge of it. But the post was about making a list of the possible explanations, and this one, however remotely likely, was missing. That’s all.
Some uplifting news after a grim weekend.
A Ukrainian soldier visits parents in previously occupied town. The joy and excitement in the video made my morning. It’s the first time that I’ve seen the inside of a small Ukrainian home. Thankfully it appears undamaged.
I heard an interview on NPR about them with an audio clip in which a group of them in Syria were standing around a man as they smashed his hands with a sledge-hammer. They were joking and laughing their asses off as they did this. Then they beheaded him.
Apparently they are really, really evil.
If only the never-ending inventiveness of how to make a human being suffer was put to good use, solving actual problems.
It wouldn’t be the first time the losing side convinced themselves, for a very long time, that they had been in the right.
Not to mention the Germans after WWI.
And of course France after the very decisive Franco-Prussian War. France lost its ascendant position in Europe and a unified Germany was forged.
I’m sure there are many other examples in history.
Americans will be rationalizing Vietnam and Iraq for a very long time.
Election-wise we have our own more recent version right here in the US of A.
Pressure makes diamonds.
" Function of Understatement
An understatement is a tool that helps to develop other figures of speech, such as irony and sarcasm, by deliberately decreasing the severity of a situation, when an intense response is expected by the listeners or the readers."
How does President Volodymyr Zelenskiy walk without clanking his brass balls?
He’s visiting Bucha and seeing first-hand what the Russians did. He televised a speech from Bucha.
Russian missile launchers could still target Bucha. But, Zelenskiy is there representing Ukraine 
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraines-president-says-russian-actions-ukraine-make-negotiations-harder-2022-04-04/
Pro-Russian separatists with Nazi symbols:
Sometimes.
Unfortunately, rather too often it makes coal dust; which gets into everything and is very bad for breathing.
Wagner Group tried to take their fight against U.S. special forces in Syria in February 2018. They, and the Syrian regime forces, outnumbered the Americans around 15-to-1. But they forgot to take American airpower and rocket artillery into account, and were massacred while the Americans didn’t suffer even a single wounded.
I think Bucha is a turning point in this war and for Russia. What happened there is sickening and the International community is watching. I can’t see how Russia can ever regain its place among nations with Putin in charge.
I know Russia has done the same thing in Gronzy and Aleppo. The world wasn’t paying close attention. They didn’t have a powerful voice like Zelensky.
I normally wouldn’t link the daily mail. But they have a lot of photos of Zelensky visiting Bucha. He’s visibly shaken up. The mayor and his wife’s bodies showed torture. (no photos)
There’s some video of Zelensky addressing reporters. I haven’t seen him this emotional. The burden of his office has to be overwhelming.
I think in this respect Russia will be ostracized for a long time, even after Putin is gone. For such ostracization not to occur Putin will have to be succeeded by someone who has a strange mix of strength - in order to maintain his/her position against desperate, hard-line coup plotters - and true, visible and demonstrable repentance that is perhaps so demonstrable that he or she invites representatives from the west to audit the tear-down of all of Russia’s nuclear weapons. Otherwise there is going to be a heavily, nuclear armed failed state among us for a long time.
Ukraine denies (or at least say they don’t know anything about it) the attack on the fuel facility in Russia. Trolling Russia? Cool. Why would the U.S. confirm publicly that it was a Ukrainian attack?
Agreed. And there have been many such turning points, with Putin and Russia spiraling lower and lower with each one. At this point I don’t see how Putin can safely travel outside Russia ever again. Biden has now publicly called for him to be tried for war crimes.
Agreed. And that has to be the case for pretty much any Russian politician or military commander. Even absent the outcome of being arrested for war crimes, they’d have a target on their back anywhere in the world.