Breaking (multiple levels) Red on Red!

[John Kettler]

Here's a remarkable take on what went down, courtesy of former U.S. Army intelligence officer Ralph Peters, the successful author of a stack of books.

http://books.google.com/books?as_auth=Ralph+Peters

Not sure where this first appeared, but I found it on an international commentary board. No sourcing listed. Fair Use. Simply too important not to share. He pulls no punches!

______________________________________________________________________________

A CZAR IS BORN: BAD VLAD WINS WAR, DUPES WEST & PROVES HE'S GENIUS

Ralph Peters

Posted: 3:43 am

August 14, 2008

THE Russians are alcohol-sodden barbarians, but now and then they vomit up a genius.

Prime Minister - and now generalissimo - Vladimir Putin is Mother Russia's latest world-class wonder.

Let's be honest: Putin's the most effective leader in the world today.

That doesn't mean he's good news for anybody - not even for the Russians, in the long run. His ruthless ambition and gambler's audacity may end terribly.

But, for now, give the devil his due: After a long string of successes, from his personal mastery of Russia's government and media to his coldblooded energy brinkmanship, Putin has capped his performance with a stunning success in Georgia.

Not a single free-world leader currently in office can measure up to Czar Vladimir the Great.

Following his turnaround of Russia from bankrupt kleptocracy to flush-with-cash autocracy, he's now openly determined to restore Moscow's old empire.

And he's getting away with it.

As a former intelligence officer, I'm awestruck by the genius with which Putin assessed the strategic environment on the eve of his carefully scripted invasion of Georgia.

With his old KGB skills showing (he must've been a formidable operative), Putin not only sized up President Bush humiliatingly well, but precisely anticipated Europe's nonreaction - while taking a perfect-fit measure of Georgia's mercurial president.

Putin not only knew what he was doing - he knew exactly what others would do.

This is intelligence work at the hall-of-fame level. (For our part, we had all the intelligence pieces in our hands and failed to assemble the puzzle.)

On the military side, the months of meticulous planning and extensive preparations for this invasion were covered by military exercises, disingenuous explanations - and maskirovka, the art of deception the Red Army had mastered. The Russians convinced us to see what we wanted to see.

Equally as remarkable was the Kremlin's ability to lead the global media by the nose. (Oblivious to the irony, a BBC broadcast yesterday portrayed tiny, poorhouse Georgia as a propaganda powerhouse and Russia as an information victim - an illustration of the Russian propaganda machine's effectiveness.) From the start, every Russian ministry was reading from the same script (try to orchestrate that in Washington). Breaking off his phony play date with Bush in Beijing, Putin rushed back to the theater of war.

Upon arrival, he publicly consoled "refugees" who had been bused out of South Ossetia days in advance. Launching the war's Big Lie, Putin deployed dupe-the-rubes code words, such as "genocide" and "response."

Wearing his secret-policeman's stone-face, Putin blamed Georgia for exactly what his storm troopers were doing to the Georgians. And lazy journalists around the world served as the Kremlin's ad agency.

Strategy and conflict hinge on character. Putin's character is ugly, but he's certainly got one: On the world stage, he comes across as a man among munchkins. When French President Nicolas Sarkozy flew in to Moscow to demand a cease-fire, Putin - busy with his war - couldn't be bothered.

He fobbed Sarko off on Russia's play-pretend president.

Sarko thought he was grandstanding as a statesman, but Putin saw him as a "useful idiot" (in Leninist parlance).

Carla Bruni's husband got the cease-fire the twittering European Union demanded, all right. He returned to Paris holding in his hands a piece of paper that "guarantees peace in our time." Putin's thugs kept on killing. And they're still killing as I write.

Putin makes promises blithely to make flies go away. But the promises are worthless.

Russia's troops will find excuses to stay right where they are - or they'll fake a withdrawal, leaving behind "South Ossetian volunteers" from Russian airborne units.

Want a straightforward indication of what the Russians intend? Putin's code-name for this operation is Chistoye Polye. Literally translated, that means "clean field." In military parlance, it means "scorched earth."

The empire of the czars hasn't produced such a frightening genius since Stalin.

Ralph Peters' latest book is "Looking for Trouble: Adventures in a Broken World."

_____________________________________________________________________________

If this man's right, and he certainly makes an impressive case, then virtually everyone, whether actively involved or simply watching, has been had. Repeatedly! Not only has everything been stood on its head or turned inside out, but the U.S. is once again in the position of defending one right wing despot, albeit one cloaked in the rhetoric of liberty,

from a bigger, more powerful, left wing equivalent. It's long been observed that when it comes to strategy, the Russians are a nation of chess players. Clearly, Putin is, for he's forked us. Here's how.

Saakashvili is, by normal American citizen standards, wholly unacceptable. He happens, though, to be a very useful pawn in the game of global and regional power, so with a little

arm twisting and political coaching, can be made marginally palatable to the American people, provided no one looks too closely. Now, this new "hero of democracy" rightly fears the hungry Bear next door and is looking for protection. Unfortunately, he's not too bright, either. So while waiting to see whether U.S. sponsorship will actually get his country NATO membership, in the face of both German and French opposition, he foolishly walks up to the Bear's den entrance, thinking the Bear's way in the back, asleep. Nyet! Tovarisch Bear comes roaring forth, bites a big chunk from the "hero of democracy's" backside, and sends him fleeing. He now attempts to get everyone to stop the Bear he so foolishly got close to, and in its view, poked.

Do we, the U.S., does NATO, now stand behind someone who, if Peters is right, fell squarely into the Bear's jaws and triggered/seemed to trigger an incident with the very real potential to start a superpower conflict when the U.S. is already gravely overextended? If so, Putin can then portray us as being both hypocritical and antidemocratic. Not hard with Saakashvili's record!

Further, given what's happened, should we in fact rush the approval process in order to forestall another such move? Bear in mind, Europe did nothing but ritual arm flapping the first time around. Clearly, it'll take a lot to overcome real and valid concerns about having its oil and natural gas supplies turned off by Russia. Certainly, it was irrational to expect anything given Georgia's nonmembership status in NATO.

If we, if NATO, does nothing, then the credibility of one or both is severely damaged, another Putin win. This stops the dreaded "encirclement" that gives Russian military planners nightmares, and puts any other NATO prospects on notice of where the real power lies in the region, as well as a pointed reminder, a la Mob firebombing tactics against shopkeepers, that "bad things can happen." As we've seen on several occasions, that includes masterful use of deniable cybernetic attacks on offending parties. And amid this comes news that U.S. troops will be crewing BMD sites in Poland. Bet that'll go over well at the Kremlin! Since the news reports indicate that Russian forces are not exactly stampeding to leave and have, in fact, advanced from where they were to deeper into Georgia, not to mention wrecking what small military capability Georgia has, it seems reasonable to conclude there's rather more going on here than just South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Just today, the U.S., while fulminating over Russian reinforcements entering the region, steadfastly refused to do the one thing which might bring these apparent Russian expansionist tendencies to heel: It officially said military action was off the table. Nothing to worry about! And there are things we could do. Historically, the Bear has always done outrageous things while fully prepared to retreat if confronted. We now know, for example, that had we made an issue of it when the Russians were putting up the Berlin Wall, the Russian tanks were under orders to not engage and retreat. We flunked that test. Putin must be laughing so hard he's had to change trousers from wetting himself! He's swept the board--while the opponent sleeps!

Russian victory everywhere he looks! Media dominance, regional military dominance, geopolitical dominance, and just today, the U.S. showed itself as possessing neither a spine nor cojones. Basically, not only did he fork us, but we pushed over our own king. Worse,

all of us seem to be clueless. So, what's to stop him from taking another bite? Who'll believe our guarantees? What credibility will NATO have, in any number of eyes, when this is over? Who'll trust either?

Maybe I'm overstating the problem, but it seems to me a very good case can be made that

this is, in fact, what we're facing. I hope I'm wrong, but right now, it's not looking good.

Putin has not only won across the board, at least in his terms, but seems poised and of a mind to do a great deal more along the same lines. I'll close by observing that containing a land power while having none of your own available and frightened allies to boot is tough.

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

It occurs to me there's another aspect of this matter that bears discussion. That is the very real value the emerging Russo-Sino-Indian-Venezuelan-Brazilian alliance, of which I've written repeatedly, has in checking at least some of the worst insane predation by the U.S. and its allies, not least by pointing out we have no moral leg to stand on! Just how much those chickens have come home to roost may be seen in this blistering Russian rejoinder to President Bush personally. Frankly, I've never seen anything like it.

http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/106094-bushenough-0

This quote says it all (Fair Use)

"Listening to you, your Vice President, Condi Rice and US and western officials complain about "regime change," "invasion," "bloodshed" and "suffering civilians" (in the light of their crimes across the world) have become nothing but laughable at best and highly infuriating and enraging at worst.

You are an idiot!"

Res ipsa loquitur.

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

To add to our analytical confusion, GlobalResearch.ca has now put its oar in the water, coming down firmly on the side of "It's another Neo-Con master stroke and provocation."

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9831

Believe I'll leave and have a nice, quiet nervous breakdown, or whatever they call it now. Have so much conflicting data I may de-res, else!

Seriously, I think so many different agendas are being played out at once, on so many different levels, behind so many smokescreens, cover stories and outright lies, that it's not only almost impossible to sort the rat manure from the coffee, but also to remember which was what pile after sorting! Layers within layers, wheels within wheels, all bouncing around in a hall of shattering mirrors.

Regards,

John Kettler

[kipanderson]

Hi,

I think this is a sign of how the Russian army is changing.

“Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said in June 2008 that monetary allowances for servicemen in permanent-readiness units will be raised significantly.[41] Enlisted pay will rise to 65,000 rubles ($US2,750) per month and the pay of officers on combat duty in rapid response units will rise to 100,000-150,000 rubles ($US4,230-$6,355) per month.”

To the limited extent that someone living in England and not being a Russian speaker can follow these things I have followed Russian army wages for years. It is a very important identifier of the direction of travel of any army in peace time. These are very big figures. At parity purchasing power… taking into account prices in a given country.. this means Russian contract soldiers will be as well paid as western ones. Then consider that the average real wage in Russia is one third that of the US.

i.e. relative to civilians … Russian fulltime/professional soldiers will soon be far better paid than US or UK ones…

Quality in all its forms will follow in the Russian army…

All the best,

Kip.

[The_Red_Rage]

I can assure you that Russian contract soldier serving in Chechnya is NOT getting paid close to 3k a month. There are still alot of problems with soldiers not getting combat bonuses on time. Realistic figure would be somewhere between 800-1200$ in best case scenario. "Contract" service is still considered either a "rock buttom" form of employment for socially disadvantaged classes (particularly people from smaller towns and villages plagued by unemployment, and to whom the oil dollar doesn't reach) OR the only way to realise themselves for adrenaline war junkies (turbulent '90s produced alot of youth who had experienced war at 18 and simply couldn't find themselves in civilian life).

There is still great debade within the military whether switching to contrat basis is a good idea. Russian army traditionally depended on its officer corps rather than NCOs, and dedicated officer corps is pretty much what held it together during complete collapse of the '90s.

[kipanderson]

Hi,

“Russian army traditionally depended on its officer corps rather than NCOs, and dedicated officer corps is pretty much what held it together during complete collapse of the '90s.”

Yup…. I understand that…

When it comes to pay it is very difficult for someone from the UK to know what to believe from official sources.

One of the great things about CM forums such as this is that one can learn so much more from those with local knowledge. .

“There is still great debade within the military whether switching to contract basis is a good idea.”

Well when it comes to “bang for the buck” the way to go is clear… smallish professional army with conscripts bolted on. Professional armies such those in the US and UK are massively cost ineffective. However… the lack of conscripts means the politicians can use their military without any obvious national interest at stake. This is not possible with conscript armies. With conscript armies an obvious national interest must be at stake otherwise the populations will not tolerate casualties.

Look at the “bang for the buck” the Israelis get… small number of well paid professional with conscript army is the way to go…

All the best,

Kip.

[John Kettler]

I understand BBC Hard Talk interviewed Russian Deputy PM Ivanov, and he didn't give an inch. Anyone here catch it? From what I can tell, the audio is available in England only.

I saw something on another site, believe it was sourced from Rense.com, which had at least excerpts. Am trying now to determine whether the extremely incendiary statements regarding U.S. military, U.S. mercenary and Israeli involvement in the fray were things Ivanov said, or were commentary in the article about the interview and what really happened.

Does any of this ring any bells? SOFAIK, the U.S. had only 100 trainers in Georgia when the fighting began in earnest. Is anyone here aware of any evidence of combat use of any of the above non Georgian personnel?

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

Remember when I expressed concern Putin had rather more in mind than South Ossetia and Abkhazia? Reuters reports what we'd call a motor rifle company (10 x APC, type unspecified, mit troops) has moved to with 30 miles (55 km) of Tbilisi, after being escorted to Igoeti by no less than three Russian military helicopters (suspect HIND)--as Condi arrives for cease fire talks! Details at link.

http://earthboppin.net/talkshop/international/messages/41922.html

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

Russian claims of direct U.S. military involvement and more here, as reported in Foreign Policy.

http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/node/9496

South Ossetia's president is also talking about this. Claims African-American bodies were found and that lots of mercenaries were involved.

http://english.pravda.ru/hotspots/conflicts/106111-0/

And now, it's in Digg!

http://digg.com/political_opinion/US_Fingerprints_all_over_invasion_of_South_Ossetia

I close with The Beeb's Early Lessons Learned

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7553390.stm

Thoughts?

Regards,

John Kettler

[leakyD]

Today Georgia.

Tomorrow, Ukraine.

You heard it here first, folks.

Germany, wisely, said NO WAY to Georgia (and Ukraine) in NATO.

Hmmm.... perhaps the Germans have a better understanding of Russian resolve than the rest of us?

Nah... history will teach us nothing.

The US NEEDS Russian support to couter Iran. Russia will exploit this as much as possible. Watch how this plays out, especially if Obama gets elected.

[John Kettler]

According to THE WASHINGTON TIMES, Human Rights Watch is reporting the Russian Air Force used cluster munitions on civilians. CBU was RBK-250, and there was a picture of an expended carrier accompanying the article when I saw it. Submunition was PTAB 2.5M. This thing was in common use in the 1980s when I was a military analyst.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/aug/16/group-accuses-russia-of-using-cluster-bombs/

The MRR I mentioned earlier is BMP-2 equipped and can be seen in this slideshow.

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2008/08/15/world/0815-GEOR_index.html

In other news, Georgia signed a cease fire with Russia. Condi assures us the Russian president will sign an identical document.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gQYe039zkquHxitiI6u4M_TRr_BAD92IQHOG2

Regards,

John Kettler

[The_Red_Rage]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5idQm8YyJs4

This is appaling... I don't recall Saaskashvili's vile face being interrupted by "sudden" commercial breaks.

To make the situation even more ugly - this girl gave 4 recorded interviews prior to agreeing only to a live interview. Previous 4 twisted her story making it into "American Girl rescued by Georgians from Russian tanks".

Bravo to the girl, for both surviving and speaking the unpopular truth. Someone should punch the a-hole host in the face if given a chance. "There are grey areas in war..."....

New find - Gorbachev's article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/11/AR2008081101372.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

[purpheart23]

Yeah, hmmm.....think i'll take my inside information from someone other than a 12 year old girl who obviously has the ability to identify the nationality of inbound rockets and bombs? Don't get me wrong I'm not saying she's lying, just want something other than word of mouth from some one who let's say, doesn't have a biased opinion on the subject mayhaps.

[John Kettler]

Er, my 9:17 a.m. post from yesterday was supposed to read MRC, Motor Rifle Company, rather than MRR, the much larger and more powerful Motor Rifle Regiment. Sorry about that!

The_Red_Rage,

Now you know why some of us have such a low opinion of that network. A powerful, devastating interview, albeit with an outcome the anchor clearly didn't want to hear.

Didn't know we had American civilians in the middle of this mess.

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

The cease fire's now official on both sides! Medvedev signed it about ten minutes ago. Details here.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080816/ap_on_re_eu/georgia_russia

Regards,

John Kettler

[costard]

Kip, where is the call for conscription in the West? Is anyone seriously contemplating it?

[kipanderson]

Costard…hi,

“Kip, where is the call for conscription in the West? Is anyone seriously contemplating it?”

There isn’t one… nor am I calling for it… I was just pointing out that if Russia is still debating whether to go for a fully professional army or stick to a conscript one from where Russia is they should stick to their conscript model.

Israeli spends about $18.5 billion on defense at ppp…. from memory the US army share of the defense budget is about $88 billion…. Give each country about a month to mobilize for war and look at the amount of bang for the buck the Israelis get compared to the US.

In the west we can…sort of… afford a small professional armies. But Russia with its huge land borders and the type of countries it is surrounded by needs to go for bang for the buck… Israeli model…

Even at the figures Red Rage gave…. Around $1000 a month for an enlisted contract soldier they are starting to pay their military wages just as high as in the west relative to their contemporary civilians.

All interesting stuff,

All the best,

Kip.

[The_Red_Rage]

Yeah, hmmm.....think i'll take my inside information from someone other than a 12 year old girl who obviously has the ability to identify the nationality of inbound rockets and bombs? Don't get me wrong I'm not saying she's lying, just want something other than word of mouth from some one who let's say, doesn't have a biased opinion on the subject mayhaps.

She said that they were running not from bombs but from Georgian soldiers who were shooting people on the streets (she is Ossetian, don't you think they know how Georgians look like... I was born in St.Petersburg and even I can spot and distinguish any ex-Soviet ethnicity a mile away). During the initial bombardemnt they were hiding in a Russian peacekeeper bunker, aided by Russian soldiers (or "Putin's thugs" as Mr. Peters called them in his article). So far we only heard Georgian voice - a voice that had been carefully staged by Belgian PR firms that worked with Mr. Saaskashvili for the last 2 years. Now finally an Ossetian speaks, and it is immidiately dismissed as Russian propaganda. Speaking of propaganda tricks - doesn't cutting people off with commercials happen to be one? Or lowering the number of hits for this particular video on YouTube (read Google)?

She is a US citizen - it doesn't get any more unbiased than that if you want word-to-mouth. I believe her alot more than i do Saaskashvili/Bush/McCain/Chainey clique, who would happily start WW3 over this issue. But then again, McCain will be happy to start WW3 over anything.

[John Kettler]

If the below article is correct, then the mercenary matter may be a huge issue, for DEBKA.com is a very important site when it comes to matters pertaining to Israel. The article alleges DEBKA.com confirms 1000 Israeli mercenaries were involved in Georgia's attack on South Ossetia.

http://www.rense.com/general82/begin.htm

That, though, isn't the significant news, if the above is right. That consists of three items. The first is that there's a huge U.S. and smaller European naval contingent en route to conduct an illegal blockade of Iran, while we're all engrossed in the Olympics and Georgia. I've been encountering reports of large scale covert U.S. naval doings for some time now. Second, there is real concern Russia, China and India may move to stop said blockade. Third, we've apparently been given a red herring threat when it comes to Iran, but its capabilities are even nastier than nukes, and it's got company everyone on this board will instantly recognize: Syria! This brings me to BFC's previously unknown and now scary gift of military prophecy.

Remember how we carped and moaned about the Theater of Operations for CMSF? "Why Syria?" "We'll never fight there." And BFC agreed with us, too. But take a look now at what's reproduced below from the tail of the above article. Forget nukes. Iran and Syria evidently have Advanced Bio Warfare (ABW)!

I can definitely confirm the existence of such a technology. "Ken Alibek" (Dr. Kanatjan Alibekov) defected to the U.S., bringing with him the staggering insider (was Deputy Chief of one biowarfare manufacturing facility) information on Russian biowarfare programs later revealed in the book he coauthored, BIOHAZARD. In what I read, one of the things he talked about was how the Russians had managed to cross anthrax with the gene that makes cobra venom, upping lethality by 4x, then added insult to injury by figuring out how to package the superbug into microscopic, instantly dispersing, free floating particles. Here's an interview with him on the state of the relevant technology when he defected.

l

http://www.emergency.com/1999/alibek99.htm

And here's a much more detailed article about him and the very scary breakthroughs made.

Note particularly, even though the article's a bit dated, what he has to say about the "migration" of biowarfare seed cultures to places they shouldn't be, the development of chimera agents and the terrorism angles. Note clearly that Syria's name comes up during the discussion.

http://cryptome.org/bioweap.htm

Here's the tail end of the first article I mentioned. It should have great significance, now that you grok the technology being discussed.

Addendum 2

The two-ton elephant in the living room of the neo-con strategy is the advanced biowar (ABW) that Iran, and to a lessor extent Syria, has. This places the motherlands of the major neo-con nations (America, France, the United Kingdom), as well as Israel, in grave danger. When the Soviet Union fell the Iranians hired as many out-of-work former Soviet advanced biowar experts as possible. In the last 15 or so years they have helped to develop a truly world class ABW program utilizing recombination DNA genetic engineering technology to create a large number of man made killer viruses. This form of weapon system does not require high tech military delivery systems. The viruses are sub-microscopic and once seeded in a population use the population itself as vectors. Seeding can be done without notice in shopping malls, churches, and other public places. The only real defense to an advanced global strategic biowar attack is to lock down the population as rapidly as possible and let those infected die off.

If this were more widely known, it would be a great casus pax, a reason for peace, as war between enemies both having weapons of mass destruction (WMD) is insane. Hence the aptly named "MAD", for mutually assured destruction, where both sides can cause truly massive fatalities on their enemy in the event of a all out war.

My recent article, WAR ON IRAN: THE PERFECT STORM FROM HELL, carried by several of the leading on-line/non-MSM sites, and read by hundreds of thousands world wide was a frightening eye opener for many to the intense danger from a all-out war between US/EU/Israel on one side and Iran/Syria/Hezhollah/Hammas on the other side. The public has been largely ignorant about the rise of a new type of global strategic warfare based on Advanced Biological War (ABW). Most people understand Biological War (BioWar or BW) as powered anthrax or smallpox and the like. That is really "your grandfather's biowar". Over the last twenty-five or so years, an entire new level of mass killing has evolved. Only this new ABW has a technology base that is far less expensive than than required for entry into the "nuclear club" of nuclear weapon producing nations. Where it costs approximately $1 million to kill a person using nuclear weapons, it only costs approximately $1 to kill one person using ABW weapons. Comparing BW to ABW is like comparing a old Model T Ford to a 2008 Rolls Royce Phantom ~ both are automobiles (or types of biological warfare) but there is a difference of several orders of magnitude. ABW has a kill level in global strategic warfare similar to that of nuclear war.

It is a known fact that when the Soviet Union fell, the Iranians offered US$5,000 a month salaries to a large number of destitute out-of-work former Soviet biowar experts. Not all took Iran up on the offer, but many did. The Iranians have built up, over the last 15 plus years a truly world class ABW program, as well as co-developing with Syria the Earth's largest chemical warfare program. ABW weapons do not require ICBMs and $2 billion dollar per copy B2 bombers to kill hundreds of millions. The genetically engineered viruses are sub-microscopic and can be spread unnoticed in public places and continue spreading, through replication from person to person. An advance global strategic biological war, like a global strategic nuclear war, cannot be kept in control. In fact, the horrific massive death from global strategic biowar will certainly lead to all-out nuclear war between Russia/China and NATO/Israel.

______________________________________________________________________________

Do I know for a fact that everything reported in the Rense.com article is true? No, I do not.

As noted, though, a former Russian biowarfare facility deputy chief specifically named both Iran and Syria as having biowarfare programs, with both "probably" having genetically engineered smallpox. DEBKA.com has been, in the past at least, a phenomenal source of all but impossible to obtain information in its area of expertise, so there may well have been Israeli mercenaries in Georgia . I've seen a number of reports indicating the U.S. had some massive naval event brewing. The article confirms it. And the cherry on this fecal sundae,

the forces likely to oppose the reported planned blockade, Russia, China, and India, all apparently have biowarfare programs, with China's being huge. If even a fraction of the article is correct, we may well find ourselves pining for the good old days of the Russo-Georgian War!

Regards,

John Kettler

[The_Red_Rage]

Here is for all the non-believers. Uncensored pictures from Tskhinvali - just a warning: some are very graphic.

http://flickr.com/photos/29507379@N06/

[akd]

Here is for all the non-believers. Uncensored pictures from Tskhinvali - just a warning: some are very graphic.

http://flickr.com/photos/29507379@N06/

What are you alleging anyone here didn't believe? That Tskhinvali was a battleground over several days?

[The_Red_Rage]

Alexander Babkin's pictures from 4 days in the warzone:

http://www.navoine.ru/forum/viewtopic.php?p=551#551

[John Kettler]

The_Red_Rage,

Impressive pics, especially the second batch! Am intrigued by #19 in the latter, for the unfortunate shown would appear to be Afro-Caucasian, if not African-American. The countryside's beautiful, and those searing images of war have their own twisted beauty, too. It lies in their honesty and unaffectedness, in showing the brutal reality so carefully hidden from us here in the States, lest we recoil in horror. This man knows his craft, and his images can teach us many things, depending on how they're approached. Would love to know the story regarding those two guys in civvies the soldiers have face down in the field, their hands tied behind them.

As for the first batch, what I see is damage so widespread even Hollywood would be hard put to come close. I see precisely the random blows from the widely scattered Grad rockets, which punch right into larger buildings, sometimes several times, and wipe out the small ones. I see clear evidence of bomb damage in the blown off shingles/tiles, but the buildings still stand. It's not Stalingrad, not even close, but the

area was indeed savaged.

People,

I'm astounded not one of you has said a word about my 9:23 a.m. post, on which I labored long while terminally sleep deprived. Was it too much to bear, to hard to accept, or are you still integrating the information? I think the issues I raised are real and may be vitally important.

Here, for example, is one set of short article I found on just such a naval move against Iran. The JERUSALEM POST says Kuwait's gone on war alert as a result of what it learned was occurring.

http://stopwaroniran.wordpress.com/category/us-navy/

Regards,

John Kettler

[kipanderson]

Hi,

Yup…. Very impressive photos…..

All should see them…

All the best,

Kip.

[purpheart23]

Probably too deep to fathom John. Very scary stuff indeed. If what you say is true the "Western World" could be in for a very ugly surprise in the near future. It's a shame really. Hopefully cooler heads will prevail especially given the ABW as the U.S. only carries one response to any type of NBC warfare.