dan/california Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 Quote https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/03/22/congress/dems-could-back-mike-johnson-motion-vacate-house-00148564 House Dems could have Johnson's back on ouster threat — if Ukraine aid gets a vote 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billbindc Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 59 minutes ago, dan/california said: It isn't that I think our relationship with the Ukrainians is excessively dysfunctional given the circumstances. It is that I think Jake Sullivan has had the wrong strategic conception from the beginning. That isn't to say he it isn't seven orders of magnitude (edit: better) than it would be with Trump, but it is still a problem. And this situation much more like our relationship with Great Britain before Pearl Harbor, instead of after it. That time we came all the way in, eventually. If this is correct the French and Germans have agreed just agreed to waste a lot of money on class of systems that is well on its way to being obsolete. Although it sounds like this at the agreeing to have a design committee meeting stage. How do we know Jake Sullivan has anything to do with this discussion? This could just as easily have been a Pentagon analysis or any of 20 other agencies involved. I have my issues with Sullivan but generally speaking, the idea that everything is an out growth of Sullivan's foreign policy outlook or chops is just not on. This is a large, complex effort not the sandbox of the NSC adviser. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vet 0369 Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 22 hours ago, Haiduk said: Several days ago Russian media reported about strange incident - fire with victims on the board of trawler "Capitan Lobanov". As became knowingly the vessel was mistakingly hit by the missile during Baltic Fleet practice shooting. As result of incident three sailors were killed, four wounded. Interesting, that this trawler already had "experience" of sinking, but this happened in the port and it was raised up and repaired. The fate. Wow! I guess we can safely say that Russia is Ukraines best asset for taking out Russian ships, vehicles, aircraft, etc. with the Black Sea Fleet and AD really jacking up the numbers of “kills!” 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hapless Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/shooting-blast-reported-concert-hall-near-moscow-agencies-2024-03-22/ Quick tinfoil hat take: Putin secures election 'legitimacy' Peskov says it's no longer a Special Military Operation, it's a War Terror attack in Moscow ... Mobilisation 11 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 39 minutes ago, billbindc said: How do we know Jake Sullivan has anything to do with this discussion? This could just as easily have been a Pentagon analysis or any of 20 other agencies involved. I have my issues with Sullivan but generally speaking, the idea that everything is an out growth of Sullivan's foreign policy outlook or chops is just not on. This is a large, complex effort not the sandbox of the NSC adviser. I would agree with that, mostly. But I have read several things I don't have time to go looking right now for about his approach to Ukraine in spring 2022 that set a trajectory I think we have been on ever since. Then there was his little faux pax in the Atlantic a week before Hamas kicked off that mess. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beleg85 Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 14 minutes ago, Hapless said: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/shooting-blast-reported-concert-hall-near-moscow-agencies-2024-03-22/ Quick tinfoil hat take: Putin secures election 'legitimacy' Peskov says it's no longer a Special Military Operation, it's a War Terror attack in Moscow ... Mobilisation Most probably, but is could also be some Caucasus issue- these dangers ddn't go away by fact of state waging war.What we know so far clips with shooters clearly show coordination among them (not some gangs infighting) and are now widely spread by accounts of katsap propaganda. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hapless Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 Yeah. There are plenty of possibilities, not all of them false flag and if there's anything Putin has shown himself to not be it's the 4d chessmaster Bond villian we all thought he was before 2022. No doubt more details (and 'more details') will come out, but the timing seems awfully convenient. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beleg85 Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 7 minutes ago, Hapless said: No doubt more details (and 'more details') will come out, but the timing seems awfully convenient. That's true; several days after elections, concretization of creation of new armies by Shoigu and Peskov comments is dense chain of events. On other side if these will be proven to be Caucasians/Arabs, it will be difficult to blame attack on Ukrainians even for Kremlin. No doubt we will see postcards with Bandera near them, but overall not many people will buy it even there. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 (edited) Major terrorist attack (gunmen) underway in Moscow. Not posting footage, it's horrible. 4 x Gunmen, don't look Ukrainian, darker skins, so not a false flag op. Those US/UK embassy warnings weren't kidding. Almost two hours later, Spec Forces still not on scene. Building is fully on fire. Edited March 22 by Kinophile 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVulture Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 7 minutes ago, Kinophile said: Major terrorist attack (gunmen) underway in Moscow. Not posting footage, it's horrible. 4 x Gunmen, don't look Ukrainian, darker skins, so not a false flag op. Not necessarily. "False flag" doesn't have to mean "we did it ourselves"; it can equally be 'helping' a genuinely hostile group to carry out an attack by supplying funding, gear and making sure the security apparatus remains ignorant and unprepared to respond. But we don't even have enough information for speculation at the moment. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beleg85 Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 (edited) Good points from guy from intelligence specialising in Russian securty topics, naturally just observations, not analysis despite first sentence: https://twitter.com/Maciej_Korowaj/status/1771250686065328470 MASSACRE IN MOSkVA - own analysis All the following assumptions are based on my own experience and observation of open Russian sources. The first factor is a lot of "good filming" of materials and the speed of appearance on the Russian network strongly reminds me of the информационный каскад "information cascades" way of promoting information by the Russian services... Let us remember that the Russian network is heavily controlled by Moscow. Another is the time of carrying out the operation, i.e. right after the president's post-election position was established, which indicates that it would not cause image problems during the elections. The actions of the Russian services and the means used to control the situation indicate that these services were very well prepared for this particular operation (which is not the Russian rule). I noticed the lack of the typical "healthy nervousness" in the operation of special units, which indicates that they were previously ready for this type of operation... I estimate that if this was an operation of "Putin's opponents" or "armed opposition" it would have had a greater impact during the elections... than now From a cold perspective, this points to "False Flag" operations and of course there are questions about how it will be sold in the media in Russia and around the world... The Russians are building tension and the message is spreading to the world. Best regards and thank you. It may not be relevant who is perpetrator, but how Kremlin plans to use it. Edited March 22 by Beleg85 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grigb Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 12 minutes ago, Kinophile said: Almost two hours later, Spec Forces still not on scene. Building is fully on fire. RU Nat says Shpeznaz started clearing operations 30 minutes ago, which is at least an hour late. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grigb Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 The primary issue now is that, according to rumours, the attackers do not resemble Ukrainians but rather Chechens. Ru Nats are currently confused. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beleg85 Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 6 minutes ago, Grigb said: RU Nat says Shpeznaz started clearing operations 30 minutes ago, which is at least an hour late. Not that it would be famous for its organizational culture and speed of reactions, so all arguments for supposed false flag pointing to the fact services were passive does not sound legit. It's the same bardak like in the army, possibly even worse. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grigb Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 According to FSB 40 dead and 100 wounded. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kraft Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 (edited) US intelligence is quite impressive in their ability to know of these things ahead of time Edited March 22 by Kraft 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 I think someone posted this video a little while ago, but I just managed to watch it. In particular there is an intense first person view of being inside a YPR being hit by small arms fire as the troops try to exit. It doesn't go well and then while trying to move out some sort of AT weapon its it. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVulture Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 3 minutes ago, Kraft said: US intelligence is quite impressive in their ability to know of these things ahead of time Some people will take that as conclusive proof that the US is behind it, some people will take it as conclusive proof that they said that as a public warning to the Russians that they knew the Russians were planning a false flag attack, and majority will take it as evidence that whatever they already believed is correct. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grigb Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 Interesting Quote Quote According to preliminary information, the terrorist attack involves an Islamic factor. Indirectly it is confirmed by the attackers' look, beards, and the fact that they did not try to hide their faces. However, it is worth mentioning that, according to witnesses, the militants did not yell any phrases during the attack, but rather attempted to push individuals into a specific concert rooms. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 27 minutes ago, Grigb said: The primary issue now is that, according to rumours, the attackers do not resemble Ukrainians but rather Chechens. Ru Nats are currently confused. FSB is perfectly capable of arranging corpses for the final presentation that are not the people who did the attack. They would just have the propaganda machine say any video to the contrary was fake. The "investigation" will have about as much integrity as the "election" that was just concluded. Which is to say both were dictated in advance. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billbindc Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 54 minutes ago, Kinophile said: Major terrorist attack (gunmen) underway in Moscow. Not posting footage, it's horrible. 4 x Gunmen, don't look Ukrainian, darker skins, so not a false flag op. Those US/UK embassy warnings weren't kidding. Almost two hours later, Spec Forces still not on scene. Building is fully on fire. Just a complete **** up by Russian security forces. And the extremely slow response says something about stresses on the security apparat in Moscow. It is very likely that the response was so slow because paranoia in the Presidential administration wouldn't let them go. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billbindc Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 (edited) 27 minutes ago, Kraft said: US intelligence is quite impressive in their ability to know of these things ahead of time By law, the US government has to inform other nations if they know of a terrorist attack. As a political matter, Putin dismissing the warning only for a Mumbai style attack to break out three days later is a very bad look for the regime. And...the regime is reacting accordingly: Edited March 22 by billbindc 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 (edited) Quote https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/03/22/congress/gallagher-leaving-early-00148586 Johnson's margin drops to one vote as Gallagher heads for early exit Allies of the Wisconsin Republican say he was long jaded by the antics of the House following the ouster of Speaker Kevin McCarthy. It is not Mike Johnsons week. It remains to be seen if Gallagher wants to take a parting shot on the way out. There are scenarios where one vote could matter, a lot. Edit: The sheer volume of news today is overwhelming. I hope nobody that matters in DC had weekend plans... Edited March 22 by dan/california 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akd Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 8 minutes ago, billbindc said: Just a complete **** up by Russian security forces. What could have distracted them…? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Butschi Posted March 22 Share Posted March 22 9 minutes ago, billbindc said: Just a complete **** up by Russian security forces. And the extremely slow response says something about stresses on the security apparat in Moscow. It is very likely that the response was so slow because paranoia in the Presidential administration wouldn't let them go. Huh? March 7th + 48h is off by about two weeks. That could have been anything or nothing and not related to this incident at all, I think? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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