You can believe Putin is a good guy if you want, if you do, I know a Nigerian prince who needs a helping hand, just need some seed money to get started 😉
Keva
Free Member’cause everyone throws missiles at their brothers, it’s normal isn’t it.
Come round my brothers' place on christmas day at around 4pm, by that time we'll definitely be throwing things at each other.
https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2022/12/sudden-increase-in-russian-navy-activity-in-black-sea/
If anything comes if it, possibly revenge for the Washington trip.
Alleging a significant incease in Rus Naval activity
Alleging a significant incease in Rus Naval activity
If that increase equates to yet more Russian military carelessness with cigarettes in dangerous places - in this case their only aircraft carrier - then this is bob on 😃
Not that I’m rubbishing the report, but I would have thought that the RF moving their assets out of port would have the UA seeing an opportunity..
I would hazard a guess it would involve firing missiles rather than getting close to anything.
Alleging a significant incease in Rus Naval activity
Every risk provides an opportunity.
just have a look into his dealings with offshore accounts that him and his inner circle of generals etc are involved in, Pandora papers etc etc.
Would those be the offshore accounts in British tax havens,run by British businessmen, with British lawyers handling the legal aspects and ex British politicians and other members of the establishment working as part time directors ?.
I don't always agree with dyna_ti, but I share this sentiment:
Would those be the offshore accounts in British tax havens,run by British businessmen, with British lawyers handling the legal aspects and ex British politicians and other members of the establishment working as part time directors ?
Same British professional services companies that enable anyone with a few quid. Putin’s mates, whomever. One of the many modern day stains on our country (see Mone thread, NHS thread etc)
For a leader of a country bordering Russia, I can see why he would want to off shore a load of money. Imagine if they were invaded and you and you fell down some stairs in the panic. You want your family wealth accessible from anywhere. British politicians don’t have the same defence.
Just as an FYI in case no-one has seen it:
Zelensky Pandora papers: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/oct/03/revealed-anti-oligarch-ukrainian-president-offshore-connections-volodymyr-zelenskiy
TLDR:
This looks like its principally related to Kvartal95, the tv and film studio that Zelenzky and his friends set up in Ukraine back in about 2003 (point here is that was a very different time in Ukraine as it would have been during full-on state corruption). A lot of the team that set up and ran Kvartal 95 are now Zelenzky's advisors or are in some senior positions in the government. Not that surprising TBH as they were seeking to set up a completely new government and wanted to start from a a clean slate (Very interesting info on wikipedia about how they were running this, some of which looks quite smart/transparent for a new political party that is pushing an anti-corruption ticket TBH).
Interestingly as the Servant of the People party started to fully develop and moved toward gaining the govt and presidency, the assets were switched (not sure if divested) to friends and business associates plus one studio that still pays a dividend to Zelensky while he no longer owns shares in it. No info on how much though.
Probably the most important thing here is to remember that, while he was evidently a smart and successful businessman before becoming president (so the whole "he's just a comedian" jibe is not true) Zelensky opted to stay in the country when Russia invaded, rather than run and live a comfortable life in exile...
(note, thats a a life not at billionaire oligarch level: Kvartal 95's principle market outside of Ukraine looks to have been Russia and Belarus so its most likely taken a very big financial hit due to the war)
That tells you far more about the man, and the people around him, than what looks like a a bit of muck that is possibly being dragged up by some who what him out, now who could want that? Hmm....
Meanwhile, someone else spends 20+ years years skimming from the country he leads, engages in full-on corruption to breathtaking level and builds a secret $1Bn mansion...
Zelensky may have done a good job in the current situation, but he is not exactly Snow White.
https://twitter.com/trtworld/status/1392873058289995778?s=20&t=RpQFn7QDuKjRmdw_GnjQ3A
" he is not exactly Snow White."
Go and find someone who is. Might take a while...
snow white.....surely she was pretty show white?
As someone said in a comparison to Churchill above, he has a lot of faults. But he also appears to be the right man for the job just now.
Get the war dealt with and then work out if he's the right guy to be the peacetime leader afterwards
As someone said in a comparison to Churchill above, he has a lot of faults. But he also appears to be the right man for the job just now.
Exactly. The right person at the right time.
I lot of people love the get very excited about pointing out that the the world is all shades of grey and not simple black and white, as is they are the first to notice this. Well, guess what, we all know already, and have done for a looooong time.
Get the war dealt with and then work out if he’s the right guy to be the peacetime leader afterwards
Aah, ok, I hadn't realised that you were too busy digging a trench or manning a battery to have the bandwidth to consider the fuller picture of who our "allies" actually are. Maybe next time you're on leave....
Denis is a Russian expat in New York, doesn't hold out much hope for a post war Russia
https://twitter.com/betelgeuse1922/status/1606249858926612485?t=XHPkni91wV0sF8t0PBLjaw&s=19
I didnt see much verification of the gun crime numbers apart from this https://www.newsweek.com/russia-gun-crime-surge-police-kursk-ukraine-border-1761774
I guess both Ukraine and Russia ate going to have some severe PSTD issues. Theres a few here that are ex services, whats your take on how well (or not) western nations look after those with PTSD? Can't imagine anyone here has a good grip on how well set up Ukraine is?
Well, whilst we’ve been taking time off over Xmas, seems our Ukrainian friends have been very busy.
Lots of fairly horrific pics and videos circulating showing massive Wagner losses around Bakhmut, precipitating a ‘tactical’ retreat by all accounts. Given the importance the RF have placed on taking it, this is fairly serious from their point of view. So sorry for the poor sods who’ve been conscripted into that particular hell.
Perhaps more importantly lots of activity around Svatove and Kreminna, with some saying that advance UA units have entered both. That’s uncorrobarated as yet, but certainly UA are advancing, taking high ground to the west of Svatove and putting Kreminna into a box (or three sides of) with a real risk of it being cut off within days (or even hours). If these two fall it means Severodonetsk will be next. The whole Donbas line will be compromised, as will Luhansk (apparently all admin personnel have been evacuated from Svatove to Luhansk in the last couple of days..)
And the Russians keep on allowing their airfields to take a pasting.
Anyone fancy a sweep on how long it’ll be before Vlad falls out of a window..
I've never actually served in air defense, but surely it would be better to shoot down the drones over open countryside than to wait until they're over the target?
https://twitter.com/christogrozev/status/1607290086806425601
What air defense doing?
surely it would be better to shoot down the drones over open countryside than to wait until they’re over the target?
I'd assume the issue is that you have to concentrate your air defence around the obvious targets. Otherwise you need thousands or tens of thousands of AA missiles scattered around open countryside, as you never know where a drone is going to come from, or what direction its heading. And the crews would probably mostly be drowsing as a result of boredom.
An update from Mike Martin, who is in an optimistic mood:
https://twitter.com/ThreshedThought/status/1607311824566849537?t=MM3JDLTLF8CaRmMkwO1u6Q&s=19
We have two Russians for boxing day dinner today - SIL's wife (so you can understand why she has been ostracized from RU) and her younger brother. He works in IT for a US company and has fled to Serbia to avoid the draft.
We have two Russians for boxing day dinner today
Chianti? Fava beans?
Chianti? Fava beans?
I'll ask my SIL - she's eaten at the downstairs restaurant plenty of times....
anyway...RU wife was saying one reason there isn't an uprising against Putin is that everyone hates each other. Where in the UK/Europe - gay/lesbian/trans etc etc are supportive of each other in RU where homosexuality isn't supported lesbians hate gays and vice versa. Coupled with hatred class divides then there is just no unity. Putin still isn't enough to unite the populace due to his 20years of dividing people.
eaten at the downstairs restaurant
*s*****
😂
RU wife was saying one reason there isn’t an uprising against Putin is that everyone hates each other
This, I think, is the standard way that autocrats hold onto power. They ensure that other groups have to compete with each other, preventing anyone from becoming powerful enough to challenge the leader. Problem is, it weakens the country overall because everyone is battling for survival, not working together.
eaten at the downstairs restaurant
Took me a while, but I got it in the end.
Impossible to know what's going on on the ground, but I don't think the attempted offensive in Bakhmut achieved anything positive for Russia - just wasted thousands of lives and equipment that they will struggle to replace.
https://twitter.com/PhillipsPOBrien/status/1607337910079979521
Even the Wagner mercenaries must be down to battle fodder convicts by now. Wonder what happened to that Chechen leaders sons he sent down to play soldiers?
Wagner are saving their best for the Central African Republic, apparently. They can make a lot of money there by plundering the CAR economy. They don't want to waste good troops in Ukraine so they are sending conscripts and paroled criminals there to get slaughtered.
https://twitter.com/KenRoth/status/1607404078044254209
An update from the Kyiv bakery I mentioned a couple of pages back. On Christmas day they reached their crowdfund target for a new generator!
https://twitter.com/GoodBreadKyiv/status/1607325821471162368
On the subject of Bakhmut, they have been delivering bread there recently. That is 700km from Kyiv...
https://twitter.com/GoodBreadKyiv/status/1592461173043388417
I think the Wagner mercs are there simply to force thousands of conscripts to attack the town repeatedly
Its back to WW1 human wave tactics, WW2 commisars who will shoot you if you retreat.
The only way this works is if the defender runs out of ammo or melts their breaches.
Utter stupidly and the number killed is shocking, although we will never know just how many thousands it is.
Be interesting to see how far from the Russian official line (drone shot down but 3 killed-the explosion looked big)
The actual damage to Engels airbase is,
Satellite images should reveal more
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1607672850839642112?t=zl9J3Okw_92H2pir9W5l-g&s=19
Fire seems to have been right where aircraft are usually parked.
https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1607244139686404097
https://twitter.com/FriskChristian/status/1607315698648494081
Got any more links?
Links sausage magnate🤣🤣🤣
It's not funny if you have to explain it... 😜
I thought it might need explaining to a non-Scot.
Or is a link sausage just a Borders thing?
I'm new here, much more familiar with Lincolnshire pork sausage (which I initially assumed link sausage was an abbreviation for)
Anyway,
Ah. Maybe it would have been a bit flat.
I'll try not be too ..
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much more familiar with Lincolnshire pork sausage (which I initially assumed link sausage was an abbreviation for)
AFAIK, it's just a chain of sausages. Very common in North America.
I'm actually vegetarian as well as English so trying to make jokes well outside my area of expertise
