Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

They are slightly as in longer range radar and AA missiles. The F16 can detect and fire on Russian aircraft before being detected themselves.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I’m not sure that’s the case.

https://www.rand.org/blog/2023/05/wh...r-ukraine.html

Much will depend on what aircraft Russia can still put in the air and is happy to risk, or, perhaps, what their air crews are prepared to risk - they have been notably risk-averse for a lot of this conflict, since it’s become apparent that they can be taken out by MANPAD-type missiles, and now also by Patriots.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

My bad Chris. Was coparing it to the wrong Mig. You are correct.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Wagner boss Prigozhin killed in plane crash in Russia

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66599733

https://i.imgflip.com/7wovxh.jpg

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Breaking … aircraft down in Russia’s Tver region was connected with the Wagner private military company and had Evgeny Progozhin listed as a passenger. Reports that the plane was brought down by Russian air defence missiles.

Which, if true, is quite a riff on the Russian authorities usual ‘fell out of a window’ method for dealing with troublemakers.

---------- Post added at 18:15 ---------- Previous post was at 18:14 ----------

Scooped :D. I actually looked for a news report to link to, they must have posted that moments after I failed to find it and came here to post Tw*tter rumours instead …

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Oh dear, looks like Putin got his revenge.

Prigozhin was aboard the plane that was downed by the Russian air defenses, per Tass.

More to follow.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Idiot. What did he think would happen? The die was cast when he started the coup attempt, after that it was either all or nothing.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

tbf, he still fell out of a window, it just happened to be at 30,000 feet…

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

If he had a few final seconds to reflect as he was being blown out of his seat he might perhaps have realised that if you start a coup against the Russian state machine you don’t just stop it on the outskirts of the capital territory and try to convince the Tsar of your goodwill. Warlord betrayed his sovereign, chickened out and paid the price. A tale as old as time.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

In Russia, the plane does not crash, it undertakes a Special Aircraft Operation…

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

You actually couldn’t make this stuff up though could you. If you tried to write it people would accuse you of writing two dimensional pantomime villains who are so stupid they couldn’t possibly exist in real life.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I suppose until there’s confirmed remains he theoretically could have faked his death.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Hard to have much sympathy given the crimes his rentamob thugs have meated out.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

It’s hard to rule anything out in the lunatic asylum called Russia. However, there are already some quite grizzly crash scene videos doing the rounds on Tw*tter so I imagine it won’t be long before there are confirmed remains.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Probably.

I’m not sure it’d be lunacy for an enemy of Putin to fake their own death though, it’d be perfectly rational. After all it’s the only way to truly know you can walk near windows in the future.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I expect Putin is hoping that Prigozhin’s troops in Belarus don’t have access to those nuclear weapons of his!

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

It would be, but I’m not sure Pigozhin is (was?) that subtle. His success was due to ruthless brutality. When he tried to organise a coup it didn’t go at all well and his behaviour ever since has been chaotic. He popped up in Africa the other day bragging about how much success he was having there, apparently having regained his taste for the limelight.

Whoever was on that plane, though, may well have been alive as it came down in more or less one piece in a flat spin, according to one of the videos doing the rounds.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

It was always a matter of when not if. I'm surprised he survived this long, to be honest.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Who packed his carry-on bag?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I don't understand why they even go through the fell out of a window or accidentally shooting a plane down charade etc. They know the world sees it for what it is and I'm sure there's not that much coverage of state sponsored murder on state TV. The only thing i can think is Vlad really fancies himself as a James Bond villain, but if that's the case he must also realise it never ends well for the bad guy in the films.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Considering it’s the cleanest way to fake a suicide the advantages to the window fall are obvious. You don’t need to pay off/coerce investigators into ignoring evidence of poisoning/bullets/other.

The CIA (I know, of all the people) get widely credited with coming up with the idea.

https://www.fff.org/2022/09/02/myste...igh-buildings/

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Alledgedly confirmed.

.

No doubt more will be revealed.

Here we go again perhaps.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I can't see that happening, they'll probably be internal fighting now for command or we might see the whole group disband now?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Thing about mercenaries is that they aren't really interested in goodies and baddies. They are just interested in themeselves/money. Why should they risk their lives for the rest of the world to overthrow Putin, unless it brings them personal gain

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Doesn't look that way.

https://kyivindependent.com/national...r-fatal-crash/

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

The source isn't that convincing, propaganda can come from both sides. Some independent verification is needed.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Given the heavy losses Ukraine are taking in the meat grinder fighting for a few square miles and with rusty F-16s some months away it’s perhaps the best chance for the counteroffensive if Wagner do.

Hence there will be a lot of clamour and excitement from the usual suspects.

Given this would be a reasonably anticipated response from Wagner PMC you’d expect Russia to be better prepared than last time - if indeed it’s a thing at all.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

FT's reporting that Norway will supply an unknown number of F-16s to Ukraine.
https://www.ft.com/content/c935ab4e-...2-8993ad52c797


And Putin has sent 'condolences' to Yevgeny Prigozhin's family.
https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-l...dates-12541713


And some US analysis just in:
https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-l...dates-12541713

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

"Boss level" trolling here - listen to the end (it’s only 37 seconds long)

https://x.com/gerashchenko_en/status...Fx9lsEXWlOa1jg

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Hilarious. :D:D:D

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Solovyov looks so deflated! Such a shame.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Only two submarines have been destroyed by hostile action since the end of World War 2, both of them by British missiles (the last one was the Argentine vessel Santa Fe, damaged and forced to surface near South Georgia during an extensive attack by RN helicopters that dropped an entire arsenal on it, including an AS-12 missile that went right through it, holing it on both sides).

Gotta love Solovyov’s show though. The UK realiy does live rent free in his head.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Well at least he admits "this is war" !

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Could Swedens Grippen jets appear before F-16's?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Possibly, but there are not an awful lot of spare Gripens sitting around, whereas there are an enormous number of F-16s. In the long run the F-16 is going to become the backbone of the UA air force.

Ironically the transfer of Gripens would still require US re-export approval because they have GE engines (licensed from the Yanks and built by Volvo).

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Didn't know that about the engines Chris but agree about the F-16's.

Meanwhile UK being blamed for WWI and WWII on Russian media and Zelensky is an MI6 agent!

https://twitter.com/francis_scarr/st...59296208076944

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

It's such a boost to our national self-esteem that Russia credits us so much.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I have to admit while watching it I felt a glow of pride!

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Are you sure its 2? AFAIK it is only the Santa Fe and that was scuttled sometime after engagement when being towed out of South Georgia so not really hostile action.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARA_Santa_Fe_(S-21)

Meanwhile.

Ukraine’s Third Storm Brigade on the Bakhmut front says it has encircled and routed Russia’s 72nd Brigade, killing three batallion commanders and the Russian brigade’s intelligence chief as it retook the village of Andriyivka in a two-day operation.

And

Russia accidentally drops aerial bomb on occupied Nova Kakhovka

https://kyivindependent.com/national...nova-kakhovka/

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Santa Fe was forced to the surface by naval aviation, then strafed, then finally had a missile through its hull that went in one side and out the other, forcing the crew to make for land and abandon ship. It absolutely was destroyed by the RN, even though it didn’t sink immediately. It would be churlish to deny the RN a kill in those circumstances - though I did say ‘destroyed’, not ‘sunk’. Rostov-on-Don was likewise destroyed, but not sunk, being in dry dock at the time.

After surrendering to British forces a skeleton crew, under guard, was ordered to move Santa Fe to a different pier. It sank during that manoeuvre, though nobody drowned (one Argentine sailor was mistakenly shot and killed because his captor believed he might be trying to scuttle it). The Argentines never claimed to have scuttled the boat - they said a hatch had been left open in the confusion leading it to take on water and sink. The harbour was shallow enough that the conning tower remained above the surface.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Apologies Chris, just noticed the nuance in "both destroyed by British" missiles. Don't know how I missed that.

---------- Post added at 19:55 ---------- Previous post was at 18:32 ----------

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

@jimmyrushton

https://kyivindependent.com/blinken-...vided-weapons/

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Again, the US administration has been dragged kicking and screaming to its present position by facts on the ground.

It’s pretty clear by now that US policy is to wear down Russia but prevent a total collapse of Russia itself. The spectre of the break-up of the USSR still haunts Washington and they don’t want a repeat of it. So Ukraine can win, but not so spectacularly that Mother Russia itself implodes.

Unfortunately for the US, they’re not the only ones with a say in all this. Europe, and especially Eastern Europe which has lively and recent memory of what it’s actually like to live under Moscow’s shadow, has been throwing everything it can into Ukraine. In terms of sheer quantity of kit that might not be as much as the US, but in terms of capability, German-built Leopard tanks and Franco-British Scalp-Storm Shadow cruise missiles represent capabilities the US has attempted to keep out of the theatre. Furthermore the Ukrainians have had an incentive to develop long-range strike capabilities of their own.

And the end result of all this is that none of the long-range strike capability Ukraine now has, is under any sort of political control or influence from Washington. In acknowledging Ukrainian agency in this area, Blinken is really just acknowledging the inevitable failure of a short-sighted policy that has achieved nothing for the US and has cost a lot of Ukrainian lives as the war has ground on when deep-strike capability just might have hastened Russia’s collapse and shortened the conflict.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Tell us we’re at war with Russia, without saying we’re at war with Russia.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

In 1982 we were told we were in conflict with Argentina, not at war. In Russia right now they’re still being told a special military operation is underway on the territory of Ukraine. A state of war does not exist, apparently.

Declarations of war went right out of fashion in the middle of the last century. But this walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, and we refrain from calling it a duck only because nobody wants to end up barbecued, crispy and shredded.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

The Zelensky regime is down to conscripting the disabled previously exempt and asking for the EU to return Ukrainian men who don’t want to fight. I give it another 12 months max and they run out of meat for the grinder.

Longer range weapons just makes for good PR to distract from what’s happening on the ground.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I see you’re not even bothering to hide the fact that you’re laundering Russian talking points now :rofl:

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Is it true or not? If it’s true I’m not laundering anything.

For someone who predicted the collapse of Russia a mere five posts ago I get a sense of a man in a glass house throwing stones.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

An interesting question, but the real kicker in Jfman’s post is his giveaway use of the phrase ‘Zelensky regime’ - casual delegitimisation of the sort used by Russian trolls, bots, state TV propagandists and anyone else interested in undermining what is after all a democratically elected and internationally recognised government.

Whoever he’s getting his talking points from is ultimately being fed by the Russian propaganda machine and any ‘facts’ he lays down here ought therefore to be treated critically.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

He is only power due to a coup in 2014 though. It suited the West to support him at the time. Does that make him legitimate ? I dunno

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

He probably means this…

https://kyivindependent.com/ukraines...-mobilization/

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

He’s banned opposition parties, trade unions and (as far as I can tell) elections. In no way, shape or form can that be considered democratic. Especially when your number one policy is to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian men by conscription.

Both of my claims have been reported in the Ukrainian press.

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/21242
https://kyivindependent.com/ukraines...-mobilization/

---------- Post added at 00:13 ---------- Previous post was at 00:11 ----------

:clap:

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Zelensky was elected President in 2019 not 2014.

It was his predecessor Poroshenko who was elected after an uprising overthrew Ukraine's pro-Russian government.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

While the coup didn’t directly elect Zelensky it laid the ground work.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Zelensky was elected in 2019. Again, the idea that the present Ukrainian government is illegitimate because of events in 2014 is a talking point actively promoted by Russia.

These sorts of things ought to be beyond question. Indeed, the OSCE monitored the 2019 election and while it had concerns about the conduct of some candidates its overall conclusion does not dispute the veracity of the final outcome.

https://www.osce.org/odihr/elections/ukraine/439574

Be careful that your healthy desire to be a free-thinker isn’t being exploited for propaganda purposes by a country presently engaged in an illegal invasion of a sovereign neighbour and widespread war crimes.

---------- Post added at 07:28 ---------- Previous post was at 07:26 ----------

You are Margarita Simonyan and I claim my ₽5,000,000,000.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

So how, democratically, do the people of Ukraine remove Zelensky if they decide they’ve paid enough in blood for tens of square kilometres in the months of the counteroffensive?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Unusual interpretation of "trying to stop the Russian invaders by doing the same as the U.K. and USA did the last time they had the same existential threat"…

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

You clearly favour the present occupation but why? I am curious.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I am not naïve enough to think for one second I am a free thinker. I know all about the propaganda machine but it cuts both ways, I also believe we are victims of the same propaganda but from the opposite side. We are not furnished with the whole truth in the West just not to the same extremes as those in Russia

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Wow!

Why don’t you ask Ukraine if they’ve stopped beating their wife, if you’re in the mood for loaded questions?

Or to put it in your terms - "have you actually started believing your own* lies?

*may be from other sources…

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

The short answer is there’s no way to remove Zelensky. Except by a bullet.

That’s not a democracy and you know it. That answer would be sufficient.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Much like the U.K. during WW2, then…

Zelensky didn’t ban the opposition. He banned pro-Russian polical parties after Russia invaded Ukraine (wonder why…).

All toghether thiose parties accounted for 49 of the 450 seats in Ukrainian parliament, or aproximatelly 11%.

Calling this “ban opposition political parties” is just another narrative from Russian propaganda.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Where do I say I favour the present occupation? You’re taking my legitimate questions and portraying them as representing something they don’t.

It’s a straightforward question that - in a true democracy - would be easy to answer.

Ironically the safest place for a Ukrainian man who doesn’t want to die on the front line is Russia.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Probably not - he’d be conscripted…

You are constantly overlooking the existential threat the war has on Ukraine.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I don’t recall the UK banning opposition parties that actually sat in the House of Commons.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I recall them banning pro-Fascist parties.

In Britain in 1940 we did the same thing it was called Regulation 18B of the Defence (General) Regulations 1939.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

But not ones that sat in the House of Commons - you know the ones that could call for a vote of no confidence and push out the PM.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

You are assuming that the Ukrainians, as a nation, are being forced against their will to defend their homes, children, etc. This is not true.

The reason you favour the present occupation is that you criticise the defence against it. You can't have it both ways: either they defend themselves or they allow the current invasion to stand. There is no third way here

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I mean that’s literally the definition of conscription.

Let the ones that don’t want to fight flee to the west then arm everyone who remains to the teeth then.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Ok, I see, you are just against conscription. If you look back through history, wars fought by countries invaded by an aggressor rarely, if ever, were won by small volunteer armies. The nature of war at a national level is that it is actioned by assets raised at a national level. Conscription is an inevitable consequence of this.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

As is the suspension of democracy, evidently.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

In some ways, yes. If you are called up to fight, you are not able to exercise your "democratic" rights and decline. It is always a balance.

The majority can run away and ask the 'volunteers", whoever they are, to die defending their homes. Interesting ....

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

The UK also didn't have elections during WW2. When you're facing an existential threat to your existence as a country then it's not business as usual.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

It’s not “in some ways, yes” it’s in every way.

I do like your scepticism about the volunteer army. That’s an area where I’m sure we agree they would be very few.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

It’s interesting to see a real-world example of just how ideologically captured certain sections of the British Left have become by Russia’s information ops. Ironic that in the US it’s the hard right that exhibits these symptoms. I’m sure there’s a political science PhD study in there somewhere.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

There's probably a more interesting one in armchair war experts willing to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of Ukranians in a military experiment from the safety of their own sofa.

People who disagree with you haven't been "captured" by information ops if what they actually say is true. Its no more credible to claim them to have been captured by propaganda than the "fight for every inch" brigade who are wilfully ignoring that very few border disputes ever resolve themselves with one, larger, force being fully repelled. At some point the human and financial cost of doing so creates diminishing returns. However, it's a much easier judgement to make when it's not your own blood.

At least we are all agreed there's no democratic mechanism for Ukranian people to remove Zelensky if they decided negotiating a peace agreement was a better strategy than throwing more meat into the grinder.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Some of the US hard right seeps into our own. You'll find people sympathetic to Putin on the British Right as well. I think it's because some of them are simply anti-establishment and that a contrarian approach to anything their institutions (government, media) say rather than any deep ideological belief.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

As per usual you prefer to ignore the inconvenient question of Ukrainian agency, which clearly you think only exists to the extent that it aligns with Western policy. Your hypotheticals aren’t addressing it - they’re just regurgitated Russian obfuscation. I don’t know which corners of the internet you frequent when you’re not here but clearly wherever it is has been thoroughly infested by the ‘just asking questions’ tendency, which curiously never seems to want to deal with the answers, even when they are readily available.

There is very, very solid support for continuing to fight from within Ukraine. Sure, without Western arms that would be very hard but the willingness to thoroughly expel Russia from the entire internationally recognised sovereign territory of Ukraine is a Ukrainian desire and a Ukrainian project. That has not wavered, nor is there any evidence of it being likely to do so. Watching your relatives get raped and tortured will do that to you.

Ukraine is in an existential struggle, and your petty obsessions with matters the Ukrainians themselves seem remarkably unconcerned with is distasteful in the context of what they are fighting against.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

You prefer to ignore the inconvenient question of Ukrainian democracy, so it’s swings and roundabouts really.

Ironically hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian men will be denied agency on the way to their deaths in the killing fields yet you will not bat an eye.

At some point if Ukraine doesn’t achieve the aspiration for every inch and they run out of men or second hand NATO apparatus the legitimate question will have to be asked if there were missed opportunities for a better settlement, and what decision making processes existed to rule it out.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Would be nice to see you defend as strongly the "denied agency" of the 10,000 Ukrainian civilians killed so far by the Russian invaders…

Tankies got to tankie…

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I like the fact it took 22 minutes to add the jibe at the end.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

How is that relevant in any way ?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

It was the same for Churchill. You don’t have time for elections when you are at war.

We’ve all seen the dedication of the Ukrainian people in support of their country. Trust you to deny the obvious, jfman.

They want Putin gone. Why is that not clear to you?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I'm wondering what an architect of ideas actually means.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Ukraine give up their land, then in eight years or so, once Russia have built their military back up, Russia invades again…

In related news…

https://us.firenews.video/war-in-ukr...an-federation/

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

did he say it in the style of the Black Knight, from the Holy Grail?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

The only one I got was to allow Ukrainians to run away and ask someone else to die defending & liberating their homes.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

In 2014, Putin’s stated justification for invading Crimea was to prevent Russia’s military facilities there from falling into Western hands. This was of course a thin pretext for imperial ambition; Ukraine had no desire to join Nato in 2014 and only a distant aspiration to even be in the EU.

Having invaded whole chunks of the rest of Ukraine last year, it seems all Putin will ultimately achieve is the inevitable loss of Sevastopol, and control over the entire Black Sea. Today’s destruction of the HQ of his Black Sea Fleet has now been revealed to have been launched from a Ukrainian fast jet; this means they fired a Western (either French SCALP or British Storm Shadow) cruise missile at it. The destruction of an amphibious assault ship and an attack sub in dry dock were also achieved using SCALP/Storm Shadow.

Even if it takes Ukraine a while to fully liberate its entire sovereign territory, the utility of Russia’s Black Sea naval base in Crimea has been fatally undermined by Ukraine’s ability and willingness to attack it relentlessly. And in the long run the only way this war ends permanently is with, at the bare minimum, a highly visible and credible security guarantee by Nato nations in Ukraine. Russia has already de facto lost Crimea to the West. The only question now is how great a cost in lives and equipment it’s willing to bear in trying to deny that reality.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Looks like Russia might be aiming to re-broadcast one of its useless idiot's Twitter broadcasts without his consent.
https://www.ft.com/content/5e204059-...7-b5d7fd81e48f

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

And just when Russia thought things couldn’t get any worse tonight:

- It seems there might finally have been some movement on US supply of ATACMS long-range artillery rockets. A ‘small number’ is said to have been approved for transfer to Ukraine. This seems to have followed a meeting between Ukrainian Gen. Budanov and generals at the Pentagon where he shared his tactical plan and explained specifically what he could achieve with them.

- It also seems the attack on Russia’s naval HQ in Sevastopol has decapitated the Admiralty in the Black Sea. Admiral Viktor Sokolov is said to have been in the building when it was hit by at least 2 Scalp/Storm Shadow cruise missiles and was killed. Sokolov was a nasty piece of work known to have personally authorised missile attacks on civilian targets in Ukraine. Had he survived the war he would likely have been indicted for war crimes.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

On the first use of American ATACMS tactical ballistic missiles in Ukraine this week:

Russia’s position this time last year on their potential supply to Ukraine by the US:

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/atta...1&d=1697629810

Vlad’s position the day after one of his airbases (and up to 9 helicopters) is destroyed by the first use of ATACMS in Ukraine:

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/atta...1&d=1697630484

It seems Russia’s red lines are only red until you cross them.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Did Putin just call his "Special Military Operation" a War ?

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Yes, I think he slipped up a bit. To be honest though the media commentary within Russia has increasingly been calling it that as well. I think the justification is that the ‘war’ is the one NATO and the ‘collective West’ is waging against Russia, whereas the Special Military Operation refers specifically to Russia ‘denazifying’ and ‘demilitarizing’ Ukraine. Whatever helps him sleep at night I guess.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

I think Putin should be referred to as the thing and not an he.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Doesn't sound like the most reliable source but Vladimir may be in his last days (fingers crossed).
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-...utins-31151365

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Interesting that this has found its way into the mainstream media - these rumours have been circulating for many months now, and some people thought they’d actually caught proof of the existence of the double when ‘Putin” attended two engagements in Moscow, but didn’t seem to have quite had enough time to travel from one to the other.

These same sources have been claiming Putin is ill, in constant pain and never far from his personal physician for a while, and have recently started saying things have got worse.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

Putin convenes major meeting over anti-Semitic riots in Makhachkala

https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/10/30/7426340/

Go figure.

Re: Russia has invaded Ukraine
 

https://wapo.st/48cTI6b

Straight from the horse’s mouth (to the horse’s arse)