danfrodo

Flippin' psychopath. A country where all the sane people fled or are afraid to speak out and all that's left are the lunatics doing the talking.

Yeah, dimwits from very rural Oregon counties want to leave evil liberal Oregon and go to Idaho. YES PLEASE! Your counties take in WAY more state money than you pay in taxes. So take your stupid a--es to Idaho and let them pay to keep your roads open & maintained & your power on & all your medicaid expenses and law enforcement. The evil liberals thank you for reducing their tax burden . I just did my taxes and owe the state an extra $2800, which I suppose would be less if I wasn't subsidizing these folks. Beleg85 video above was great. I read what it was first and don't understand ukrainian and still burst out laughing when he was stuffing his mouth w sushi. Great one. Meanwhile, more mud. Maybe this is OK for now. I bet UKR would like more time to prepare for the spring offensives and this mud will make RU attacks that much more difficult.

A summary for today from my usual source. Says a russian frigate reported to have been hit? Not war changing but always fun to punch RU navy. Plus some good visuals. And a video at the top that makes my blood boil at what Putin has done. https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/1/2161475/-Ukraine-Update-Battle-of-Kyiv-was-the-most-decisive-battle-but-Bakhmut-may-be-just-as-important While I am typing, I may as well share something I've been thinking about. I think there's actually a lot of comparisons b/w UKR & Vietnam wars, politically. Both were wars of choice that were initially sold as a modest operation but massively escalated and later sold as existential (stop commies in VN instead of San Fran!). Both were undertaken for political reasons -- wars of choice. Both wars continued because the highest level leaders felt they'd lose face and would be ruined w/o some kind of victory, despite the ruinous cost to the country of continuing. Both are wars where one side could simply choose to walk away from a foreign land.

Short video of UKR soldier in trench fighting first w grenade launcher then w rifle. Interestingly he seems adept at firing both right & left handed -- is that normal in training nowadays or is he just special?

I think no matter what happens there will be a pervasive 'stabbed in the back' mythology that most russians will believe. They were sabotaged by NATO, gays, intellectuals, the underground satanist movement, etc, whatever each idiot picks & chooses from what I am sure will be a long list. The bigger the loss, the bigger the conspiracy to explain it. They won't go from thinking RU is a world power to realizing their world view is a great big lie. Some will, but most won't. The funny thing is that there is actually a conspiracy to defeat RU in Ukraine. The actual one which is NATO, EU, US all working to stop this terrorist nation.

Crimea independent. Interesting. They don't even have their own water. They can't grow much food. They have no oil. No one w any valuable skills would want live there. Gonna be a real economic powerhouse. I am w Milley on 2023 likely outcomes. Land liberation of Crimea is really problematic, same w breakaway Donbas. I am hoping for returning to 2022 borders & RU military collapse such that RU is not a threat for many years. The dream for me is regime collapse where various RU republics spin off. RU becomes a bigger NKorea but with no oil. Well, a fella can dream, can't he?

Interesting thought. And by the time the ground dries maybe there's a number of the same replacement vehicles so these units don't just dwindle down to nothing due to combat & breakdowns. Gonna be fun to watch UKR make Putin's head spin as to exactly where the real counterattack will be.

THis is weird, I checked Bakhmut weather yesterday & saw just one day of light snow and high just above freezing. Guess I used the wrong weather site. Gonna really hamper mobility for at least a few days. Benefits UKR maybe? Since RU is trying to move across fields & dirt roads around Bakhmut & Adiivka more than UKR.

Looks like heavy, wet snow. That's gotta be miserable.

Yeah, this is what I keep thinking about also. Yes, some RU sectors will be strong, w good troops, gear, supply & leadership. Other sectors..... exhausted older, unfit mobiks w bad leaders, insufficient gear, poor supply and inadequate defenses. Just gotta find the right places to exploit.

So is not wired guided? Am I understanding this correctly?

Slow news day here on the forum, so I'll throw this summary for today in. bar chart again showing decreasing # of attacks per day. Reports of signs that RU going over to the defensive. Melitopol hit by something, plus some nice traffic jams in that area. https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/3/29/2160849/-Ukraine-Update-Russia-looks-to-be-hunkering-down-as-everyone-waits-for-Ukraine-s-counteroffensive RU on the defensive. What shape are their troops in, overall? I get that some will be fine but others probably have been freezing & half starved w bad gear and bad food and bad medical help and no rotations for months. Hopefully there's a high percentage of those. And T55s on the way! As Perun mentioned, it's got some armor & a gun, so is still a dangerous weapon. I bet RU will place these at various roadblocks along roads to help the mobiks hold. If there's ammo available I suppose this isn't any dumber than those panther turrets buried in roads in 1945.

Maybe extend that to the general case: what your enemies want for you is the opposite of what is good for your country. Specificially, as in candidates for high office.

And UKR will be watching to see how much RU material moves to counter this alleged buildup, which may be real or may be a feint. And that may depend on whether RU takes it seriously -- if yes, don't attack. If no, attack. (though I'd be shocked if UKR did anything more than a raid across that great big river)

Great post, Ithikial. I was one of the dimwits who thought that modern leaders would not be so stupid as to wreck their economic interests for some extra territory. I think we can safely say I was wrong. I still have a hard time understanding how someone could be so stupid, could be so ego-driven reckless. But it is the reality. When I look at China attacking Taiwan, I think "that would be beyond stupid, no sane person would do that". And then I check myself and say "yes, dictators are that stupid and power hungry and have the unilateral power to make it happen". -- like having over 1 Billion people under your control is somehow not enough????

Deserves a like and a shout out. Nicely played

I was always a Sgt Rock man, myself. But they have a lot in common. They both seem to be fiction, on the level of comic book fiction.

Anyone else shedding some tears of joy right now? Thanks for sharing this CesMonkey. I am hoping to see a thusly equipped unit driving through Starobilsk or Tokmak soon (meaning May or June). So how many challengers do we think have been sent? are being sent? Hopefully it's actually more than what is being disclosed by UK & UKR.

Yeah, I concur. I am picturing UKR 'unintentionally' having leaks about locations of units w western MBTs & AFVs. This would signal to RU where the new offensive is coming while it's all just a show. Hopefully RU would bite on this trick and move their reserves away from the real offensive. And some talk of logistics here today, detailing why we won't see abrams in combat anytime soon. https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/3/27/2160465/-Ukraine-Update-Why-sending-31-M1-Abrams-tanks-is-harder-than-just-sending-31-tanks It seems we might see some western IFVs in May/June, but it sounds like that MBTs are probably later in summer or autumn. While logistics will decide the outcome, the quality of soldiers & weapons will decide how far & how fast UKR can push and at what cost. Still gotta dig folks outta trenches. Still gotta take villages and overrun roadblocks.

I think right now waiting for mud to end, but maybe also waiting for the new units to be ready

I think it's very clear that under Trump the support would stay the same. It would just go to the other side in the conflict.

Putin's peace proposal trial balloon via what is normally a TV lunatic: F that, it's so absurd. There is nothing for UKR to agree to even if they wanted to, which they don't. Putin will agree to pay and never pay, or try to pay w worthless rubles his treasury prints up for just this purpose. He certainly can't come up with hundreds of billions of $. His economy is a wreck and he's lost much of RU's economically vibrant workers. He could promise 10 years of free oil but he'd never deliver. What could UKR do if he made a deal and didn't deliver? NOTHING -- outside of starting a new war. To summarize, this is ridiculous.

Summary from this feller today. Not a lot new but it's a slow day on the forum so here it is. Has bar chart showing # of RU attacks per day starting March first. Trend is most definitely down. We'll see if this continues, but like I mentioned in earlier post we don't know the size of the attacks. Could be same average size, could be getting smaller (most likely). If the bars were also weighted by size of the attacks then I bet we'd see even great trend downward. Be fun to also see RU shells fired per day. Re-reports the story of RU tank factories shut down due to electronic parts shortages. https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/3/25/2160121/-Ukraine-Update-Russian-assaults-appear-to-be-declining-as-wind-runs-out-of-Russian-offensive

I suspect UKR will be putting out lots of messages, but will start to coalesce around some main theme. Lots of noise outside the theme in order to keep RU guessing. But RU won't know if the main theme is real or a feint and UKR will probably have flexible plan to attack where RU doesn't expect. I still suspect UKR will try to get RU reserves to the far left or right of the front and then attack other extreme.

Thanks Haiduk for that truly heartwarming post. I was worried that maybe Andiivka could be another Bakhmut, but so far sounds like another attempt by RU to destroy it's own army.