Aragorn2002

Given the ever increasing efficiency of totalitarian repression, I have serious doubts about rolling back any gains Xi and 
 
Send several hundred of them at every refinery in Russia, and then start on airfields, electrical substations, and train control boxes.

Interesting visualization of a propaganda projection process. 
 

😆

It's because they are all familiar with the default Combat Mission UI and think that rifles should be green. They are probably wondering if it turns yellow when the owner is injured.

If the guys they are parading around with missing bits, broken bones, and worse are in fact the guys that did it? Then my only question what were they thinking letting themselves be taken alive? The scary thought is that the guys they are more or less publicly torturing to death are four random guys they grabbed off the streets who had the misfortune o resemble the guys in the video. That would be uhm...BAD.
That said the treatment these guys are getting in Russian detention is no different than what they have done to tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of of thousands of others in both Ukraine and Russia. They are just posting video of it in real time. That of course is the reason why Russia is going to get to pay a thousand casualties for every square kilometer of Ukraine they even temporarily occupy. Because the Russians have demonstrated beyond clearly that giving up is just not an option.
Edited: for clarity
 

Been a minute since i dipped my toes into this thread, but I have questions about the Moscow attack I cannot figure out.
 
So, according to one of the Tajiks confessing after a thorough beating, he was a rando contracted for the attack via Telegram two weeks ahead of time and subsequently armed for it by persons unknown to him.
But recalling the video of the attackers entering the hallway calmly and at a steady interval, I am somewhat dubious these are randos with a mere two weeks notice. The behaviour just doesn't line up with what I would expect from a bunch of untrained strangers roped into the attack. To me, it looks like trained fighters who know what to do and are familiar with each other.
And then, in a rare act of competence, Russian security services manage to identify and find the guys involved (who I remind you seem to have had no previous terrorism ties!)  and who aren't lying low or heading to the Stans but headed to a place they'll stand out more than in Moscow.
 
Now, Russia grabbing the first ethnically appropriate patsies to beat a confession out of is hardly unheard of, but that might become inconvenient if ISIS-K starts parading the actual perpetrators around. So that doesn't make sense.
My other line of thinking is that ISIS are not known for working directly but via middlemen. What if the middlemen were Russian? But then, what exactly is their play? Sowing chaos? They hardly needed terror attacks to get their security services more power to do whatever they want.
To blame Ukraine? Maybe, but then ISIS-K claims it and taints that scenario, even though clearly they are trying to play the Ukraine card anyway. But it seems a lot of trouble to go through for dubious payoff. Not that confusion isn't bread and butter of Russian PsyOps.
 
I don't know what to make of it all except that assuming the Russians are lying scumbags capable of any depravity has so far served me too well to start believing their official line.

Damn! What a huge BOOMs I heard! At least three. Russians launched something fast from Crimea and this something tried to hit center of the city and probably Kyiv hydro energy plant north from the city. My wife has seen SAM launches. This couldn't be Iskander -  too far for Crimea, either N.Korean sh...t or Onix-M (800 km). Reportedly all missiles were intercepted, debrises of onе of them fell down in central part of Kyiv. 

Once again proving that everything is funnier when there's a duck involved, no matter how unfunny it is at its core.

How To Enjoy Hassle Free Convoying in CM. 
https://youtu.be/3Lz97ZDXSWs
The video uses Red Thunder but techniques shown apply equally to all the CM games. 

No, they actively supported Putin. Though, most of Russians are indifferent to this. On their perfomance there were both "putinists" and "liberals", but more those who "we are out of policy". But in this time a policy came to them.  
Maybe you will be surprised, but even in Ukraine enough people continue to listen Russian rap, rock, watch their movies etc even these groups or artists openly supoprted the war. "I just like them, music/cimema is over the war and policy". These speeches you can hear even among UKR soldiers.  

Il fascisti.  Yes it's true, I can't speak Italian. 
While in Rome and its more modern suburbs, I found some Mussolini buildings which were quiet bombastic, like this:

As a building, I don't mind it.  And I kinda like that it hasn't been erased.
And now I'll shut up as I'm obviously not condoning the Mussolini regime 😱.

And now for something completely different...
Italy.
Firefight!


The rarely seen Italian fascists!

 

My favorite light tank of the war.

German airborne amongst the rubble.

Really good ISW today, but the most interesting part is quoted above. It quotes several sources about Russian recruiting issues, and highlights several issues that might occur if Russia conducts another mobilization.

I can't get it to copy and paste to save my life but Medvedev just did a Telegram post that seemed to imply the Russians are going to blame it the Ukrainians regardless of what happened, and then go full Reichstag Fire with it. Of course it is Friday night in Moscow, and Medvedev may simply have already been to drunk/high to check what the party line actually is supposed to be.

The Economist seems to think Russia only has a about a years worth of barrels left, and new production isn't even making a dent.

Thanks, Netherlands!
 

Two Russian BREM-1 ACRVs tried to steal our abandoned Leo2 near Terny (Kreminna direction), but "Azov" FPVs didn't allow to do this
Later "fat FPV" of 1st National Guard brigade "Bureviy" finished off one BREM completely
 

🫣😵‍💫🫢
do not, under any circumstances go past the eagle cartoon. You have been warned. 

“Why didn’t they just fly the Giant Eagles all the way to Mordor?”
”ISR Billy, ISR”.

There is one estimate by a Russian exile newspaper that roughly half of the votes for Putin were faked based on released counting numbers vs. times when people usually go to a polling station.
That would mean Putin got something like 43%, missing an absolute majority.

800.000 plus another 700.000, mostly 155mm with some 122mm (?) apparently.
Didn't read anything about 105mm for the light howitzers or 152mm for the soviet legacy equipment (the latter seems to be supplied to a large degree from Bulgaria).
Still needs a lot of funding. Only one third is funded so far.
 
 

Here are the key parts.  Basically Scholz may come across as waffling on materiel support to Ukraine, Germany is the second largest supplier after the US and Macron doesn't want to be shown up.  I think this gets Germany a handful of get-out-of-bashing-day cards.