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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 10:39:54 GMT -5
Former US Commander in Europe Ben Hodges:
There's "irreversible momentum" for Ukraine in the war with Russia. "In my view, the defeat of Russia, Ukrainian victory, which means total restoration of all of its sovereign territory, including Crimea, is inevitable."
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Post by scumbuster on Oct 16, 2022 11:08:46 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 11:12:24 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 11:19:22 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 12:03:46 GMT -5
Vladimir Kokorev (Attorney from Odessa now living in Spain)
I've been scared of nukes since I was a kid. See, I grew up in Soviet Russia in the 80ies, and was educated - together with the rest of the Soviet people - to fear nuclear war even more than our Motherland. As everyone knew back then, America was losing the Cold War badly. The rotten capitalist system was inefficient and incomparable to the excellent performance of 5-year plans under socialist economics. Most Americans were homeless, barely fed, and on drugs. American pathetic army, not even trained to parade properly, was too meek to fight the unstoppable tide of worldwide communism. Rather obviously, the US's only way out was to plunge the planet into a nuclear winter (by the way, the USSR propaganda department coined the concept of "nuclear winter" together with the rest of this paragraph). My kids are all about the Diary of a Whimpy Kid; I grew up watching Dead Man's Letters. Fast-forward to 2022. Putin threatens the west with nuclear weapons because they won't let him invade Ukraine in peace. His sock-puppets on Russian TV yell to each other about how it takes only one missile and 202 seconds (very precise for Russian equipment) to destroy Britain. Then one nuke for each of the US coasts (under the assumption that Putin's sympathizers reside between the coasts and, therefore, can be spared - for the time being), and mission accomplished. The little peace-loving communist boy in me is going WTF at such reckless disdain for people's lives. My older cynical-capitalist-swine self is going WTF at the reckless disdain for people's intelligence. Because while the "nuclear crisis" is unfolding on the Russian TV, Sergei Lavrov, Russia's Minister of Foreign Affairs and Antisemitism, is in Turkey negotiating peace with Ukraine (not the UK or the US, mind you), requesting to include the lifting of economic sanctions in the peace package. So what's going on here? You have Russian TV talking world apocalypse while the Russian government is asking to return yachts to its oligarchs. Do you notice a certain dissonance here? Boris Johnson dismissed the nuclear threats as a distraction. The US government sent Blinken and Austin to Ukraine, increased the sanctions, and passed the lend-lease for an answer. What was Kremlin's reaction? Putin stated that Russia would never use nuclear weapons first, and atomic talk shows went off the air. From one day to another, Russia dropped all mention of nuclear exchanges and relied on a more powerful weapon - Kremlin's lobbyists. Immediately, Macron called "not to humiliate Russia," Italy came up with a cease-fire proposal, Henry Kissinger resurfaced with a master lecture in appeasement, and Germany made another excuse for not delivering any of the promised weapons. I also noticed more Russian trolls on social media; maybe they finally woke from their slumber after receiving a paycheck. If that's not "our nuclear blackmail did not work, so let's try something else," I don't know what is. Nuclear threats resurfaced with the news of the US commitment to deliver MLRS to Ukraine while the battle for Donbas remains undecided. It is apparent Washington and Kremlin have been talking to each other. That's the only explanation for the administration's contradicting statements: • No MLRS deliveries, • Yes to MLRS, but no long-range (300km) ammunition, • Yes to all ammunition, but with Zelensky's commitment not to shoot on Russian territory • Yes to MLRS, but only four • These four MLRS are for training, but more are on the way. There's no further information on the MLRS quantities and delivery schedules. And we probably won't know anything until the MLRS are on the frontline or out of the US aid package. We can probably assume that the Russian nuclear blackmail worked if it is the latter. If the MLRS arrive in serious quantities in the following weeks, Russia's offensive on Donbas will likely run out of steam, and I'd expect another round of nuclear threats. Naturally, Kremlin is interested in a nuclear escalation and a nuclear crisis. An ideal scenario for Putin would be to sit at a negotiation table with NATO leaders, Kruschev-like, and reach a settlement that will allow him to save face, get time and resources for re-armament, and maybe, a piece of Ukraine (arguably, that's the only way to save face, too). However, getting to the point of a Cuban Missile Crisis is not as easy as it seems. Giving your propaganda team an order to "talk nuclear on TV" and making veiled threats of "unpredictable consequences" is not enough. By the way, some analysts argue that Kruschev, unlike Putin, was a rational person when it came to nuclear blackmail. The benefit of hindsight, I guess: According to RF nuclear protocols, the only viable pretext for using atomic weapons is an existential threat to Russian Federation. Having just changed his name to Vlad the Great, Putin would have to announce to the Russian public that not only had he lost the special military operation, but the Motherland was about to disintegrate. Since Russia is the Upside-Down of logical thinking, Putin might be able to spin it somehow (I've already written about why a general mobilization will be Putin's death sentence, so shameless self-promotion here), but we'll see. This admission of failure and a cry of "Motherland will die if we don't nuke someone" would only be a prelude to negotiating a nuclear crisis. So while he can technically provoke it, the consequences for Putin's standing with the Russian public, his generals, and the "siloviki" factions are a big unknown - for the world and, more importantly, for Putin himself. I think it is more likely that, in the following months, Macron or Scholtz will announce something like: "I've been talking to my friend Vlad the Great all night, and he's totally considering using the nukes now." And it will be another round of headlines, diplomacy, and TikTok memes. Precisely thanks to these long phone calls with Macron and Scholtz, I don't think Putin is seriously considering using the nukes. Russia still has ambitions to return to pre-war relations with Europe, and so do Germany, France, and Italy. A nuclear exchange would burn those bridges, because apocalypse, but even a tactical nuke in Ukraine would mean - in best case scenario - that Putin's government, their wives, lovers, and children would have to spend the rest of their lives in a bunker. There's no bunker big enough for that kind of hell. Before we get too comfortable, as much as I believe we are safe from a nuclear exchange today, the risk of a nuclear apocalypse goes up every time Russia brings their nukes to negotiation or a friendly midnight chat with a European leader. The closest historical analogy to nuclear weapons, in my opinion, is the industrialized armies amassed by European powers before WWI. Those armies were supposed to be a negotiation tool; few people considered their leaders would use them to kill millions of people and devastate Europe. WWI was unthinkable because: all the actors were related to each other, talked to each other all the time, didn't want war, and had experience preventing it. And so they did until they did not. In the same way, every time a country uses the "nuclear card" as a negotiation tool, it leads to the impression that nuclear weapons are but diplomatic leverage. Any diplomatic back-off due to nuclear threats will result in more nuclear threats and thus increase the chances of atomic war. It is even worse if the west gives up on Ukraine because of atomic paralysis. Hoping for what exactly? That Russia will not rearm itself and invade another country while airing re-runs of their "Gone in 202 seconds" TV show? Finally, what's the endgame here? • Ideally: Ukraine wins the war, and Putin is replaced (due to natural causes or else) by a slightly more moderate dictator. The west gradually lifts the sanctions in exchange for Russia's relinquishing its nuclear arsenal. • Probably: Russia escalates the nuclear conflict before losing the war, leading to a Cuban Missile Crisis-like negotiations. Much will depend on how these unfold. It will be some tense times, to put it mildly. • Unlikely: Russia wins the war or concludes a favorable peace treaty. Two to five years from then, a rearmed Russia will invade Ukraine again, and the world will go into nuclear crisis mode. • Very unlikely: Russia, about to lose the war, launches a tactical nuke at Ukraine. Independently of NATO's immediate reaction, that's a WW3 scenario.
10K views
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 18:42:44 GMT -5
The RF (Russian Federation) Nuclear Protocol
If Putin presses The Button he needs to make sure that one of the four scenarios of the Russian nuclear protocol are in play: • the use of nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction against Russia or its allies; • data showing the launch of ballistic missiles aimed at Russia or its allies; • an attack on critical government or military sites that would undermine the country's nuclear forces response actions; • the use of conventional weapons against Russia "when the very existence of the state is in jeopardy".
Because if he does so and one of those scenarios ISN'T in play the Russian General Staff will have him removed from office.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 19:33:53 GMT -5
The above scenario of Russia's nuclear protocol which is part of Russia's constitution should put even the most determined peace fighter who want to end the war, let Putin win and who are on YouTube at ease.
But it won't because they need the click-bait to earn a living on YouTube or are on Russia's payroll which definitely applies to Scott Ritter, I'm sure.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 19:38:23 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 19:53:44 GMT -5
You all can be assured Putin is not suicidal, he has too much to live for even if he decides to retire from politics, he has 3 young daughters, a very attractive young gf and is the wealthiest man in Russia. And his country will remain in tact, if isolated from the Western World. He kept the world in suspense with his nuclear might he can never use because no one is interested in invading his country and trying to control masses of heartless sub humans whose main occupation is getting drunk.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 16, 2022 20:12:32 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 17, 2022 14:21:05 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 17, 2022 15:49:08 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 17, 2022 21:35:14 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 8:52:26 GMT -5
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Post by scumbuster on Oct 18, 2022 11:15:01 GMT -5
I wonder how big a project it would be to replace 50 meters. That is very small compared to the scope of the original project.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 12:08:05 GMT -5
The problem is to make those two joints of very heavy gauge steel with a thick concrete mantel at a depth too deep for divers and machinery to work because of the water pressure that deep of roughly 80 meters (262 feet) under the surface. Russia kept pumping gas into the pipelines up to the damage location to keep sea water and corrosion out, but from that location from Denmark to Germany the pipes are full of water and most likely would need to be replaced. Those pipes were assembled aboard a special ship and lowered section by section into the bottom of the ocean. It took years to lay those pipes. It was a huge 15 billion dollar project.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 12:14:50 GMT -5
New York Times article from Sept.22, 2022
By David Leonhardt
Good morning. Vladimir Putin’s call-up of more troops highlights Russia’s continuing struggles in Ukraine. Ukrainian solders in Kupiansk, Ukraine. Nicole Tung for The New York Times Setback after setback
The war news has gone from bad to worse for Vladimir Putin over the past two weeks.
Russia’s recent run of problems began when Ukrainian forces recaptured parts of the country’s northeast in the most successful counterattack of the seven-month war. Since then, Russia’s struggles have grown:
Putin yesterday took a step he had been resisting and called up an additional 300,000 troops, mostly former soldiers. Doing so forced him to acknowledge, at least implicitly, that the war was not going as well as he had hoped. The mobilization was “necessary and urgent,” Putin said in a nationally televised speech, because the West had “crossed all lines” by providing weapons to Ukraine.
As The Times has reported: “After mostly defending for months, Ukraine is now dictating the war, choosing where it wants to press new offensives.” Russia is on defense.
Data as of Sept. 19. | Sources: Institute for the Study of War; C.N.A. Russia Studies; Rochan Consulting
Russia’s setbacks in Ukraine have emboldened a small but growing number of dissidents to speak out. More than 40 local elected officials have signed a petition demanding that Putin resign. A Russian pop star has criticized the war to her 3.4 million Instagram followers. Yesterday, Russian police detained more than 1,200 protesters; in Moscow, crowds shouted, “Send Putin to the trenches!”
Some Putin supporters have also grown frustrated and have called for a more aggressive war effort. My colleague Anton Troianovski, The Times’s Moscow bureau chief, says that some of these hawks were particularly alarmed by the unsolved assassination in a Moscow suburb last month of Daria Dugina, a pro-Putin television commentator, viewing her killing as a sign of Putin’s weakness. These hawks were even more alarmed by the Russian military’s stunning retreat in northeastern Ukraine this month, Anton said.
During a face-to-face meeting last week with Xi Jinping, China’s leader, Putin acknowledged that China had “questions and concerns” about the war. The comment suggested that Russia’s most important global ally had grown less comfortable with the war.
India, which has longstanding military ties with Russia, has also grown more critical. “Today’s era is not of war,” India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, told Putin during another recent meeting. India’s discomfort, in turn, gives China more reason to be concerned about the war: If India moves diplomatically closer to the U.S. and Western Europe, it would create a more powerful bloc to counter China’s rise.
What’s next?
These developments help explain why Putin has chosen to call up additional troops.
For months, he had resisted doing so, partly out of a concern that the move would increase public opposition to the war. Putin calibrated his past public comments to downplay the war at times, and polls suggest that many Russians are not paying much attention to it. He still has declined to institute a full military draft, although yesterday’s order was so broad that he could eventually expand it. Putin’s national address yesterday.Russian Presidential Press Service, via Associated Press
Western officials called the move an act of desperation and noted that Russia may need months to train and equip the troops. But Julian Barnes, who covers intelligence agencies in Washington for The Times, says that the troop mobilization does help address one of Russia’s biggest military problems. “Russia has the equipment but not the manpower,” Julian said. “Ukraine has the manpower but not the equipment.”
Julian added: “The potential countermove for the West is going to be to send more artillery tubes and tanks to Ukraine.”
The U.S., the E.U. and other allies have already sent billions of dollars worth of weapons to Ukraine. Those weapons, especially shoulder-fired and longer-range missiles, have been enormously helpful. President Biden, speaking at the United Nations yesterday, trumpeted this assistance while also warning Putin not to use nuclear weapons.
Still, Ukraine’s leaders say they need additional equipment to force Russian troops out of the country. The Biden administration has requested more funding for Ukraine from Congress.
One question is whether the U.S. would be willing to send longer-range missiles and more modern tanks to Ukraine than allies have previously sent. So far, the West has chosen not to, partly out of a desire to avoid making Putin believe that an invasion of Russia was plausible. In that scenario, Putin might choose to escalate his attacks. Without more tanks, however, Ukraine would likely be at a military disadvantage.
Amid all of Russia’s problems, has anything been going well for Putin lately?
“Militarily, not much has gone right since the summer, when Russia took control of most of the Donbas, in eastern Ukraine,” Julian said. “That said, Russia’s economy is doing better than expected. The sanctions have not totally ground things to a halt. High energy prices mean they can keep the economy going and discontent down. But will the partial mobilization unleash that unrest?” More on the war
In a video to the U.N., President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine called for Russia to lose its Security Council veto. Putin said he would support the results of referendums on annexation by Russia in occupied Ukrainian regions. NATO’s secretary general called such votes a “sham” on Bloomberg TV. As Ukraine wins back towns, officials are working to identify — and punish — residents who helped the enemy. Putin has indicated that he’s willing to escalate the war to win, Anton says on today’s episode of “The Daily.” In Times Opinion, Marlene Laruelle of George Washington University writes that Putin’s mobilization is a response to criticism from Russia’s pro-war commentators.
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Post by scumbuster on Oct 18, 2022 14:51:33 GMT -5
The problem is to make those two joints of very heavy gauge steel with a thick concrete mantel at a depth too deep for divers and machinery to work because of the water pressure that deep of roughly 80 meters (262 feet) under the surface. Russia kept pumping gas into the pipelines up to the damage location to keep sea water and corrosion out, but from that location from Denmark to Germany the pipes are full of water and most likely would need to be replaced. Those pipes were assembled aboard a special ship and lowered section by section into the bottom of the ocean. It took years to lay those pipes. It was a huge 15 billion dollar project. 80 meters is well within the working depth of divers. Normally the limiting factor of deep dives is the decompression time. But to mitigate this on big projects they use diving bells to house the divers at depth, eliminating the need for decompression between dives. I just read an article that it can be repaired but at least for now Germany said they dont see a need. However I can see that changing mid winter. The German citizenry may have a contrary opinion as the cost has risen 308% in the last year.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 16:43:57 GMT -5
Yes of course, I've heard of sustained dives by commercial divers of 1800 ft. using hot water suits, looking for treasures. Working hard on these huge pipes, Nordstream I has an internal diameter of a meter and a half while Nordstream II has twin lines of a little of a meter each may be to risky and against European Union strict safety regulations. Besides the German government is no longer interested in financing Putin's war. They are a lot closer to the scene of the crime than Americans, Canadians and Australians and have enough of Russian brutality and their air-war on civilians. They also promised to support people and industry who can't afford to pay their energy bills. If all else fails they can fire up their nuclear and coal burning power plants and set their enthusiasm for green energy aside for a couple, three years.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 16:50:38 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 16:56:00 GMT -5
Russia admits tense shelling of Kherson
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 17:12:35 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 18, 2022 20:00:03 GMT -5
Sickening to hear a communist pig obviously chumming it up tu Putin. Who cares what Putin wants? For his massive country with half the GDP of tiny Japan or Germany? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal) Why doesn't the FBI investigate these jerks where their earnings are coming from? YouTube is full of Russian propaganda videos. Why is Putin's propaganda even allowed in the West?
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Post by vikingo on Oct 19, 2022 8:52:26 GMT -5
Zelenskyy highlighted that the German IRIS-T system is already integrated into Ukrainian’s air defense system and “showed itself well” in fending off Russian attacks.
Can't wait to hear more about this German wonder weapon if it's as effective as the manufacturer Diem claims. Where is Wernher von Braun, the father of rocket science, when we need him? Unfortunately he died of cancer age 65 in 1977.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 19, 2022 8:57:28 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 19, 2022 15:00:29 GMT -5
Israel offers help with air attack alerts, but Ukraine wants interceptors (AlJazeera)
Israel has offered to help Ukrainians develop air attack alerts for civilians, signalling a softening of a policy of non-military intervention in the war. Kyiv has appealed for ways to counteract Iranian-made drones that Russia is using to carry out attacks across Ukraine. Ukraine’s ambassador to Israel asked for systems that would shoot down the drones instead, but Minister of Defence Benny Gantz said Israel was firm on not supplying Kyiv with weapons.
Although it has condemned the Russian invasion, Israel has limited its Ukraine assistance to humanitarian aid, citing a desire for continued cooperation with Moscow over war-ravaged neighbour Syria and the well-being of Russia’s Jews.
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Post by vikingo on Oct 19, 2022 15:40:54 GMT -5
People of Ukraine honored by EU Parlament
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Post by vikingo on Oct 19, 2022 15:42:18 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 19, 2022 15:49:07 GMT -5
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Post by vikingo on Oct 19, 2022 16:04:12 GMT -5
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