Very comprehensive study on the events by the US Institute for the Study of War (I'll c&p just the key points): The Kremlin announced late on June 24 that Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko negotiated a deal under which Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin will travel to Belarus without facing criminal charges in Russia; some portion of Wagner Group fighters will sign contracts with the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD); and no Wagner personnel will be charged for their involvement in an armed rebellion. The Wagner Group encircled the Russian Southern Military District (SMD)’s headquarters in Rostov-on-Don and drove to within 330km of Moscow City prior to the announcement of the deal. Wagner forces will reportedly begin withdrawing to their bases soon, and footage reportedly depicts Prigozhin departing Rostov-on-Don. The Kremlin struggled to cohere an effective rapid response to Wagner’s advances, highlighting internal security weaknesses likely due to surprise and the impact of heavy losses in Ukraine. Putin unsurprisingly elected to back the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and its ongoing efforts to centralize control of Russian irregular forces (including Wagner) over Prigozhin. The Lukashenko-brokered agreement will very likely eliminate Wagner Group as a Prigozhin-led independent actor in its current form, although elements of the organization may endure under existing and new capacities. Prigozhin likely gambled that his only avenue to retain Wagner Group as an independent force was to march against the Russian MoD, likely intending to secure defections in the Russian military but overestimating his own prospects. The optics of Belarusian President Lukashenko playing a direct role in halting a military advance on Moscow are humiliating to Putin and may have secured Lukashenko other benefits. The Kremlin now faces a deeply unstable equilibrium. The Lukashenko-negotiated deal is a short-term fix, not a long-term solution, and Prigozhin’s rebellion exposed severe weaknesses in the Kremlin and Russian MoD. Russian forces launched their largest series of missile strikes against Ukraine in recent months on June 24, despite the armed rebellion within Russia. Ukrainian forces conducted counteroffensive operations on at least two sectors of the front and reportedly made advances on June 24, and regular fighting continued on other sectors of the line.
Hopefully this but you just know there were some deals brokered to stop what happened yesterday, war is good for business for some.
Can you please point to the point in the film and the TV series episode number where the crime families have access to nuclear, biological or chemical weapons?
There was a cat in the Godfather. Do you have ANY idea how much of a biological weapon their mouths are?
I know right, I would understand if I had said it was literally like the Godfather or Sopranos. It was more an anology into the criminal mafia gangs running Russia, just wondering who's the boss of Putin, somebody in the secret illegal worldwide government (the big mafia) probably. Things are getting very spicy at the top obviously going by world events over the last few years.
His spokesman said this and that it would determine the fate of Russia. Turned out it was a complete nothingburger, Putin did his normal ranting and probably the only newsworthy thing to come out of it is he’s going after Prigozhin.
Apparently there’s a Putin Part Deux coming up. This is all very exciting. The tension is surely building…
All of this makes me wonder what is really going on in the world, I dont believe what the meme stream media tells us.
Yes, we should all go and get our info from Youtube instead. Those people are obviously far more informed and without any visible agendas.
Oh definitely not youtube, you can see the bot accounts comments on the videos a mile off though. Whether the bots are digital or human I have no idea. Online discourse on the main outlets is pointless with how opinion can be shaped quite easily using AI.
MONDAY, JULY 4, 2022 Kononovich brothers call for MEPs and European media to attend their ‘show trial’ in Ukraine TWO Ukrainian communist brothers have appealed to the European Parliament for support after what they described as a show trial opened last week. Alexander and Mikhail Kononovich were banned from attending the hearing which took place on Thursday and Friday, instead appearing via video-link. “I want to address the European left. Comrades, we appeal to you and want the deputies of the European Parliament to visit Ukraine and attend our next court session. “So that they themselves can see and tell the whole world how people are put on trial in Ukraine,” Mikhail Kononovich said. The brothers also called on European media outlets to attend their hearing “so that the whole world can see the true face of the Zelensky regime.” Last week’s hearing opened without the presence of a lawyer who was told that there would be no trial. After he left the judge opened proceedings and heard the case without without either the defendants or their legal counsel present. “Yesterday and today we were not brought to court,” the brothers said. “They are afraid that we are telling the truth. But the truth will still come out.” They claimed that they have not been allowed to speak to a lawyer and insist that the case against them is “completely fabricated, from start to finish.” “We consider this a provocation against the state of Ukraine,” they said. “We were arrested on ethnic grounds, we are ethnic Belarusians. In the centre of Europe, people are imprisoned on the basis of nationality, that I am the leader, and Sasha [Alexander] is the deputy of the Belarusian community,” Mikhail Kononovich said. “There is no democracy in Ukraine and there can be no question. This is evidenced by our arrest, our trial,” he continued. Alexander Kononovich said that the right to criticise the government is enshrined in the Ukrainian constitution and that they should not be facing trial. The brothers were detained on March 3 soon after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Prominent communist youth leaders, they were accused of spying for Russia and Belarus. It was feared they were to be executed in the immediate aftermath of their arrest, however the European Union has ignored appeals to ensure their safety raised by the Greek Communist Party. Last month they were pictured alive for the first time, although their lawyer said they had been tortured and threatened with life in prison unless they admitted to the charges against them. There also appears to be still some threat of execution of these two brothers. Apparently the communists came 2nd in the last election, but are now banned. Membership is a crime. This all doesn't seem very democratic and I'd been led to believe the Ukrainians could do no wrong. Also I see Hungary is now refusing to send anymore money to Mr Zelensky until he "explains where the other 700 billion euros has gone". Some commentary also that France might better have spent the 100 billion it has sent so far in resolving some of tbe problems it has at home.
Some Communist Parties were banned at the start of the war because Ukraine believed they were being placed to form a post-invasion proxy Government on behalf of the Russian State. This was back in the days when Russia expected it to be over in weeks. The Russians have killed thousands of civilians, abducted tens of thousands more and sent millions into exile. A missile strike on Lviv has killed people today. Of course Ukraine should uphold due process and treat people well, but the fundamental of this conflict and everything that goes with it is Russian aggression. I find it extraordinary that leftists highlighting this case don’t also demand Russian withdrawal. But they don’t appear to and that’s the bind the brothers are in. Pro-Russian voices calling for their release will fall on deaf ears.
Quite a few of the CE, EE and FSU states have 'lustration' laws for those seeking 'high' positions in public life where they go into the Soviet era archives and if there's anything 'iffy' (particularly in the various secret police records as well as party records) you're out. A few have banned the communist party outright - mainly because the 'party' was a direct conduit to Moscow.
Hmmm. So I suppose then it would be quite reasonable to ban leftie political parties here too, in case they're a conduit to Russia. Makes me a bit nostalgic really. Back in the 80s when the Soviet Union was still going, I was accused many, many times of being on the payroll of the Kremlin. Also, anything bad said about old Tina Thatcher was often met with "if you like Russia so much, why don't you go and live there?" - always said in a whiny little voice. Usually Northern.
When I set foot in Lithuania the communists* had just been voted out of power - they had a massive majority in the Seimas which they had won on a platform of "We know how to govern" . It might be surprising to judge their democratic rule as fairly hopeless and mired in many corruption scandals. I was there for my first, and very exuberant, Kovo 11 celebrations post the communists being voted out - I remarked to my wife that subsequent Independence Day celebrations were fairly muted - she said that the whole country really went for it in '97 as the people (especially the young) really felt it really was the start of the new era - unfortunately nothing changed with subsequent governments (hopeless and corrupt) until a new political class untainted by extensive experience of Soviet rule emerged. Incidently the Seimas frequently debated having its own version of "Lustration" - so many of the politcos (and the grietinėlė , literally the 'cream' of Lithuanian society) were rumoured to have been mixed up the the KGB and high party (with very close links to Moscow) that they ordered the Communist Party and KGB archives to be sealed for 50(?) years in the name of developing "National Unity". *ISTR that they ended up being the 'protest' vote for the majority of the elderly ethnic Russian population.
The US is to supply Ukraine with cluster bombs, which kill indiscriminately and are sometimes found by children after the event, maiming or killing them. Quite how NATO believes it can counter the false moral equivalency of Ukraine and Russia if it allows the US to do this is beyond me. NATO leaders should make the US change its decision.
I really don't like this, it kinda feels like they are prepared to lower themselves to the russians levels. Given them air support by all means, but cluster bombs are not the way to go.
The trouble is that sounds great if wars were fought on paper or in some alternative universe where morality was king. I'm sure Ukraine would argue what currently kills indiscrimately and maims its children is the Russian army illegally on its soil and the war its waging. That needs to be dealt with first. The danger here is we start dictating to Ukraine what it can and can't do to defend its own territory. There's a big difference between that and something like the US invasion of Iraq using cluster munitions in my view. The Russians are dug in. Worrying about hypothetical future civilian casualties at a point where there's zero chance of any civilians living in the front line areas given the Russian army are entrenched seems like a bit of a luxury the Ukrainians don't have.
I think this is spot on. In a vacuum, it's easy to say "cluster munitions bad, civilian implications...", but Ukraine isn't in a vacuum. They're facing what is plainly an existential threat, with the Russians already having proven they are willing to engage in literal genocide and commit war crimes. If the cluster munitions help them fight back more effectively in the face of the Russian invasion then that's their decision to make, because Ukraine and it's citizens will be the ones living with the consequences. I suspect they'll likely feel like the possibility of duds killing civilians in the future is an acceptable risk versus the reality of those same civilians being raped, pillaged, killed or (in the case of children) stolen away to Russia to be reprogramed. And this is without considering the fact that Russia are already using cluster munitions, with an estimated 30-40% failure rate per US intelligence. Those duds are already going to be there en masse - adding US duds into the equation at their ~2% failure rate won't change the odds much in terms of long term implications.
No wars are fought in complete isolation from civilian populations and if they were, the use of banned weapons will injure and poison civilians long after the event. I get your point, but it will be depleted uranium, phosphorus and napalm next.
I think the calculation by the US is (1) we need to give the Ukrainians munitions that can give them an advantage - rather than air support which will (a) take longer to put in place and (b) be even more provocative to the Russians. And (2) the US has huge stockpile that can be immediately shipped, whereas the current supply chain for other munitions in NATO is getting stretched by the length of the war and a large scale offensive will require huge supplies to make an impact before the end of September. Ultimately the US wants the war over before November 2024.
