dan/california

I am starting to have real doubts about the command of the 47th. they seem to be very prominent in videos of things going badly wrong.

I don't think anybody wanted to be in that picture. Shoigu does look like he understands he is the one who might be shot tomorrow morning, though. I wonder if he had the sense to get his family out of Russia?

Mines are perhaps the single biggest factor in the second half of this war. Ugly as this is, it also reemphasizes that Ukraine is winning the counter-battery fight. If that minefield was being covered properly by the Russians it would have been infinitely worse. Thanks to the The_Capt for pointing this out the first time. Edit: and those Bradleys should have been there last fall, Before Russia had time to mine the entire FEBA.

A sober take from Galliotti

And again, he is the man with ALL of the maps.

Read the whole thing.

Leaving Girkin running around loose seems a way to all but guarantee a coup attempt from his faction as soon as Ukraine wins a major victory. The man is highly motivated and not stupid, deranged, but not stupid. To continue the 1917 analogy, the Bolsheviks were just one minor party among many, Until they weren't

All of a sudden the Germans are the ones making sense? Is Pistorious in line for Scholz's job? Or Scholz has decided that getting out of the way on Ukraine to keep his job? Butschi, please explain?

They have beaten the Russian Army to a pulp with our thirty year old leftovers, and actually indicted a justice of their supreme court for corruption. Two accomplishments The U.S. has notably not achieved.

This is a case study in in how to throw away a hard fought victory. I cannot adequately express how angry it makes me.

I think the primary theater of Russian politics moves back to the battlefield in Ukraine now. If Ukraine can cut the land bridge and inflict a real unspinnable defeat, then that will be strike two for Putin, with thirty more pitches coming in at once. If Ukraine can't do something significant by the end of August then everything might manage to stabilize at a higher level of misery.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/in-moscows-shadows/id1510124746?i=1000610187817 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/in-moscows-shadows/id1510124746?i=1000616510503 Galliotti has done a couple of excellent pods recently about the people one layer down in the Russian system he thinks could rise to power if there is a controlled process to replace Putin instead of chaos. Dyumin was one of the ones profiled. edit: I would also love to see some profiles of the more competent colonels in the Russian military, just in case.

Do we have any credible information about who was on this plane?

The Poles would be In Minsk in 3 days, The Finns in Moscow in a week. The would be shaking hands in front of the Winter Palace in St Petersburg in 24 hours, scratch that TWELVE hours. Literally, absolutely, nothing is holding Russia together except nukes.

I think the dichotomy at the very heart of the Russian state is about to bite Putin in a very sensitive place. All power flows from the barrel of a gun, or a monopoly of force if you want to be high minded about it. Yet Russia treats it owns soldiers worse than terribly. The point where that goes from not mattering at all, to mattering a very great deal has gotten much closer this weekend.

Assuming this wasn't made up to embarrass/denounce someone it is a very interesting statement.

It is much worse than that for the Russians. There is now no dam to threaten to blow up. if Ukraine thinks they have the air defense to defend a bridging operation the best way to threaten that operation is gone. It is quite possible the entire last month has been a shaping operation to pull Russian forces away from the site of the real plan. And the reach of various Ukrainian systems, and the geometry of the current front line means Russian forces rushing back towards Kherson would be very vulnerable. And the flood probably disrupted the first belt or two of mines.

Kamil has an alternative theory that I rather like, Putin and Medvedev were supposed to be at this festival in St Petersburg this weekend. There was a very special greeting planned for them. Either because they were warned, or random whatever they didn't show up. Prig had already set his piece of the plan in motion, and figured he had to proceed regardless of the failure of the first stage of the Plot. Prigs piece turned out to succeed beyond anyones wildest dreams, so he isn't dead, yet. Edit: No one will be able to insult the plot of a bad novel ever again. Second edit: Given the tone of the WaPo article, did the U.S. warn him?

The whole Kamil thread is well worth your time. Also, why do people think it will be a better transition in a year or five when Putin dies of natural causes, and the Russian economy is even more wrecked? Meaning the hyena's will have to fight over ever less money.

Someone in Washington is still afraid of winning.