Russia invades Ukraine {2022-02-24} (Part 1)

The US will continue helping, but it would be a lot easier to provide that help if they can access Ukraine via ground transport. Consider the beginning of the Gulf War. Turkey denying the US permission to use it’s territory caused a lot of problems with the initial US deployment to Iraq. If Poland or Germany starts to waver, it could cause a lot of problems.

I have no insight into the politics of either country, but from what I’ve read Poland sees the Ukraine war as a semi-existential fight. They’re one of the staunchest supporters of Ukraine from a mindset standpoint, because they don’t want to have anything to do with Russia ever again if they can help it.

Germany, now … I could see them waffling this winter to a certain extent. Even so, I get the feeling the person on the street in the EU is (by and large) fully supportive of Ukraine and against Russia even in the face of economic hardship.

The EU. I’m not sure how dependent Britain is for Russian fuel.

The sanctions won’t work without united EU support.

Germany is the most dependent. Markle bought into Putins bs.

That doesn’t really affect Ukraine’s willingness to fight. Ukraine is not going to end the war because Germany is importing Russian gas.

One thing that I’ll note: Russia has leverage of it can pump, process, save deliver fuel. It has no such leverage of everyone knows that, that pipeline is offline.

Interesting chart of both sides artillery/missiles and ranges.
.https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FX5Qpx7WYAAL_8x?format=jpg&name=large

Some articles from the Sunday Times.

Yes, it has. And the ship has NATO equipment, intelligence, and training on board. Putin is fighting an ever larger supply of superior weapons against his ever shrinking inventory of older weapons.

This is funny (in a manner of speaking).

The Russians Just Shot Down One Of Their Own Best Jets (msn.com)

I added bolding. Ukraine’s artillery and missiles are becoming a problem for the Russians. I remember US forces went Scud Hunting in the Gulf War. Their mobility made them difficult to find and take out.

ISW: Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, July 18 | Institute for the Study of War

They are using their newest planes in the worst possible way. Flying low makes them easy targets. Even for Russian air defense. :wink:

And Russian air defenses.

Russia Says It’s Losing Because Ukraine Has Experimental Mutant Troops Created in Secret Biolabs

So PGMs fired on shopping malls and apartments are okay but breeding troops to be bigger and meaner than ours is unfair. Got it.

That’s right up there with those arcane symbols they were finding spray-painted a few months ago.

Excerpt from linked article:

“And we see: the cruelty and barbarity with which the military personnel of Ukraine behave, the crimes that they commit against the civilian population, those monstrous crimes that they commit against prisoners of war, confirm that this system for the control and creation of a cruel murder machine was implemented under the management of the United States,” Yarovaya was quoted telling reporters."

This Yarovaya should seriously consider dropping off some resumes with Marjorie Taylor Greene or that Mypillow guy

Let’s not forget the weaponization of time travel, so that those dastardly Ukrainians knew to prepare their mutant troops for the Russian invasion 20 years ago!

That headline is so misleading, compared to the content, that I would personally have to classify it as conspiracy mongering / propaganda.

The article that they link to, as I understand it, is saying that Ukrainians are using drugs (e.g. stimulants) to enhance their effectiveness and that those drugs are provided by the USA. They can tell that, they say, because the Ukrainians have tested for a higher level of the sorts of diseases that you would get from sharing a needle with an American than you would expect from a normal person from that part of the world.

That last sentence (about diseases) is almost certainly nothing more than Russian conspiracy mongering / propaganda but, otherwise, there’s nothing particularly implausible about the idea that the US might be providing something like Modafinil to Ukraine, to help their troops stay awake longer. (Note: Modafinil is a pill, not an injection, and if the US was shipping over Americans to share needles with then they’d be among the captures.) More importantly, none of that has to do with creating mutant human beings.

This is like jumping from a false accusation that someone taught their dog to bite people - when they hadn’t - to accusing the false accuser of actually saying that the dog was a demonic vampire. If you want to point out how dishonest those other guys are, you aren’t making yourself look like no angel yourself by lying about their lies.

I’d recommend dropping that as a news source.

Even before they lost Crimea. Those bastards! It’s like they knew somehow.

I’m getting flashbacks to Baghdad Bob.

Yeah, that’s a pretty bad headline. I also don’t think Ukraine needs the US to supply them with extra strength No-Doz. I’m pretty sure uppers existed in Ukraine before the war.

The absurd hyperbole is in the original article. Among other things, it says:

“And those doping that they are still given in order to neutralize the last traces of human consciousness and turn them into the cruelest and deadliest monsters, also confirm this,” said Irina Yarovaya

I’m not going to fault the Yahoo article for perhaps not correctly interpreting the nature of absurdist Russian propaganda. Did the Russians really mean “monsters” literally? Do the Russians even know what they’re saying, or do they just spout whatever over the top garbage that comes to mind? Is “mutant” really an unfair characterization of “turn them into … monsters”? Who cares?