This is what the Ukrainian Armed Forces put out shortly after the 29 December Russian missile and drone attack:
Critical infrastructure, industrial and military facilities were attacked in the latest massive Russian missile attack on Ukraine. Unfortunately, there are dead and injured. According to preliminary results, the enemy used 158 means of air attack against Ukraine last night with missiles of various types and drones.
First, Russia traditionally attacked with Shahed drones from the north and southeast, followed by a move to the west. A total of 36 Shahed-136/131 drones were spotted.
Around 3 a.m., Russia took strategic aircraft Tu-95MS bombers into the air. In total, 18 aircraft launched at least 90 X-101/X-555/X-55 air-launched cruise missiles.
From Kursk region, the enemy used Tu-22M3 long-range bombers to launch eight X-22/X-32 cruise missiles in the direction of the northern and central regions.
At the same time, Russia attacked Kharkiv with S-300 anti-aircraft guided missiles. In total, the enemy fired at least 14 ballistic missiles – S-300/S-400/Iskander-M from the occupied Crimea, Kursk and Belgorod regions of Russia.
At 6.30 a.m., five MiG-31K fighter jets were spotted taking off and launching five X-47M2 Kinzhal aeroballistic missiles from Astrakhan region.
Also, four X-31P anti-radar missiles and one X-59 were used from Su-35 tactical aircraft.
Air Forces, in cooperation with the units of the Ukrainian Defense Forces, destroyed 27 Shahed-136/131 drones and 87 X-101/X-555/X-55 cruise missiles.
Source: CinCAFU
A lot was made of this strike in the media. I think this was because of the Summer lull in such strikes. I was expecting Russia to again try to freeze out Ukraine with a campaign of strikes against the Ukrainian power grid. Ukraine withstood last winter’s campaign and appears to be in a better position to do so this winter. I don’t know if this is the beginning of a renewed effort to freeze out the Ukrainians or not. It is telling that the official announcement mentioned attacks on “critical infrastructure, industrial and military facilities.” Since then, I haven’t anything other than videos of churches, maternity hospitals, shopping centers and high rise apartments being struck. Did the Russians hit anything of any military value? There were reports of several power outages, but with power fully restored since the strike.
This brings me to a true puzzlement about the Russian strikes. Is this the best they can do? Why stop with one day of strikes? Unless they overwhelm the Ukrainian air defenses, they’re not going to put Ukraine in the dark. What they’re doing so far just doesn’t cut the mustard. Compare this with the tonnage the IAF is putting on Gaza. Granted Gaza has no air defenses, but the Russian Aerospace Force dwarfs the IDF. Or are the Russians that broke down and this is the best they can do.
This is how ISW describes the Russian air campaign:
The strike package that Russian forces launched on December 29 appears to be a culmination of several months of Russian experimentation with various drone and missile combinations and efforts to test Ukrainian air defenses. Over the past several months, Russian forces have conducted series of missile and drone strikes of varying sizes, using different combinations of drones, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles. Russia was likely stockpiling missiles through fall/early winter 2023 to build a more diverse strike package + apply lessons learned over the course of recent recon and probing missions—namely using Shaheds to bypass air defense + missiles to inflict maximal damage on targets.
This would be a sound approach, but it appears the Kremlin’s air planners screwed the pooch. Perhaps if this level of strikes was repeated for at least ten days straight, the Ukrainian air defenses would be seriously degraded and the Russian bombers would be able to cross the LOC. Either the planners are too boneheaded to realize this or there are just not enough drones and missiles in the Russian arsenal to sustain such a campaign. Either way, Putin is not going to restore the glory of Russia this way.
TTG
Impossible to trust any news coming out of Ukraine or Russia but it does appear Russia is gaining ground on the frontline. I read that many of the missiles were decoys to test Ukraine defenses. That’s what I would do but nobody knows anything. There is no objective reporting. Do that on the ground over there and you’ll be locked up or worse in no time.
Your puzzlement stems from your assumption regarding the motives behind these strikes.
“I was expecting Russia to again try to freeze out Ukraine with a campaign of strikes against the Ukrainian power grid.”
What if that isn’t their aim?
“Unless they overwhelm the Ukrainian air defenses, they’re not going to put Ukraine in the dark.”
Maybe the aim is to denude and exhaust Ukrainian air defenses, and so they are making a feint towards the Ukrainian energy grid.
Worth thinking about.
I agree with you.
Maybe a look at recent events in Belgorod, might help? Simply a revenge action. But I am not really following matters closely.
I found this highly telling:
Russia was likely stockpiling missiles through fall/early winter 2023 to build a more diverse strike package + apply lessons learned over the course of recent recon and probing missions—namely using Shaheds to bypass air defense + missiles to inflict maximal damage on targets.
Paul Robinson:Consequently, the general consensus is now that Ukraine’s best hope for 2024 is to go onto the strategic defensive, husband its resources, and through a combination of mass mobilization of Ukrainian citizens and some degree of Western support, build up a new reserve force that could possibly be used for an offensive against Russia in 2025. The hope is that Ukraine will be able to survive whatever Russia can throw against it over the next 12 months so that it can then be in a position to regain the initiativ
https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/ukraine-in-2024-expect-the-unexpected
Ah, Professor Robinson, LeaNder. He was my guiding light in the early days of the war. It was a year or two later that I discovered SST. Back then, in ’14/’15, his was the most accurate assessment of the war I ever found.
He still remains so, for that early period. Where he differs from Baud, as he does in a couple of important respects, I give him the preference. I pitched in a couple of comments copied from here, the last the summary I sent to you a while back of the Western hopes of the sanctions war.
More precisely, the European hopes. For I am still not 100% sure why the Europeans gambled so much, and so heavily, on that sanctions war.
Yes, you surfaced comparatively late on SST. I recall you first caught my attention in the comment section of an article by the late Richard Sale.
I paid attention to Baud only in passing. He is hardly comparable to Paul Robinson, the historian. Never mind Paul’s partial intelligence background.
But interesting, you mention Jacques Baud.
He still remains so, for that early period. Where he differs from Baud, as he does in a couple of important respects, I give him the preference.
Would you be able to summarize those for your central aspects?
As Swizz citizen, he is perfectly multilingual. His native tongue seems French:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Baud#Publications
But his German is quite good too. Interview with his German publisher at the Frankfurt book fair in Oct. 2023.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVJOW2Yu4SE
… “for you central” & I keep misspelling Swiss. Sorry.
LeaNder,
– Their assessments of the support given by the Russians to the then federalists differed.
– Did you read the sanctions “note”? I should have referenced Merz’s firebrand speech to the Bundestag as well.
Just after the SMO started. I listened to it at the time and thought “So that’s all parties in the most powerful country in Europe gunning for Russia to the maximum. Oh well. That’s the Heimat screwed.” Haven’t changed my opinion since.
– Thanks for the Baud interview. Listening to it right now.
– Did you read the sanctions “note”? I should have referenced Merz’s firebrand speech to the Bundestag as well.
If only I knew whose ‘sanctions note’? PR’s article on matters? He had an interesting one on freezing and confiscating Russian money, and how that might backfire. What happened to that? I can’t recall one by him on the sanctions specifically. There might have been one, I don’t recall. I disliked those matters myself …
Your note? A longer comment by you here, on PL’s alternative blog, forget what it was called, your note on Irrationality? Somewhere else?
But yes, you kept referring to it. …
“Merz[‘] firebrand speech”? I thought your enemy was Scholz? But no, I wasn’t aware of Merz’ speech on 27.02.22. So they even met on a Sunday, February ’22?
This one?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqPDNn47cP4
Can’t stand the guy. So, not sure if I can promise you I’ll to watch it. I’ll try. 😉
Yeah, Right,
If the aim is just to exhaust the Ukrainian air defenses, they’re failing even at that limited objective. They are not using enough missiles and drones for a long enough period of time to exhaust those defenses.
ttg
Ukrainian AD is not easy to exhaust.
When the US was bombing Iraq or Serbia, when they lost a plane, an AD system or they ran out of missiles that was it.
With Ukraine, if they lose a system or spend their missiles they simply get resupplied by NATO.
What the Russians are doing instead is hit for example a transformer station. After the Ukrainians repair it, the Russians hit it again.
High voltage transformers are not that easy to replace or quick to produce.
This is just one example. The US did a similar thing in Serbia when it used graphite bombs to take out electrical distribution stations.
wiz,
Ukraine has also been stockpiling transformers and other equipment to keep their power system running since last winter. As long as the Russians fail to enough strikes to make a different in a timely manner, both the Ukrainian power grid and her air defense systems will remain effective.
TTG, but they should? And since they don’t they are really short of all that?
LeaNder,
The Russians are either short of the required missiles and drones or their air planners are astoundingly incompetent. The only other possible explanation is that someone within the Russian MOD is deliberately sabotaging the Russian war effort.
If you say so. It all rather depends on how many missiles the Ukrainians possess.
Which I suspect is much, much less than you believe.
Yeah, Right – it must be apparent that the Russians are holding the bulk of their weaponry back, as also the bulk of their manpower. From the start they’ve been doing that in case NATO comes in directly.
I suspect it is more doctrinal than that.
I still remember when the SMO started and western commentators – including Pat Lang – were utterly scathing regarding Russian expertise in logistics.
There were some who disputed it: Andrei Martyanov eventually gave up trying to point out that Russian military academies teach logistics both as a science and as a mathematical discipline.
But by and large the Western view was this: American manufacturing and military supplies are bottomless, so logistics is something that the West does well. The Russian military is a hopeless shambles by comparison.
I suspect that this is all completely wrong. That because Russia doesn’t do “shock and awe” that this means they must be perpetually short of everything.
TTG appears to believe (please correct me if I am wrong) that this current aerial campaign is woeful because it isn’t “shock and awe”, and the fact – and it is a fact – that the Russians haven’t launched everything plus the kitchen sink is because they don’t have enough to throw at the Ukrainians.
The contrarian in me suspects that the Russian don’t do “shock and awe” because they simply don’t want to.
Slow and steady wins the race, and the Russians are in no hurry.
I also suspect that the Russians have no real wish to destroy the Ukrainian power grid.
Too many babushka’s would freeze to death for their taste, so they prefer to do it another way.
Again, it isn’t because they DON’T understand logistics, but rather that they DO, and so are going about this is a way that is completely contrary to Western military thinking.
Here are two issues:
1. Cultural and political developments within Czarist Russia, the Soviet Union, and post-Soviet Russia.
2. American attitudes to the above.
Both issues are discussed in this review:
The Condensed Dugin
A Review of Alexander Dugin’s The Great Awakening vs The Great Reset,
by Nelson Rosit • September 4, 2023
https://www.unz.com/article/the-condensed-dugin/
TTG, since you have spent considerable time studying Russia,
I wonder if you might read that analysis and share your thoughts on it, and its subject?
Oh, and Happy New Year!
Keith Harbaugh,
That was an interesting review of what appears to be an interesting book by Dugin. Dugin’s critiques of the West, Atlanticism and globalism are fairly easy to follow and are not that controversial. It’s his alternatives that are hard to nail down. I often think even he is not quite sure what he wants. I suppose that’s the mark of an honest thinker. Sometime he appears to want to replace the hegemony of Washington, DC with a Kremlin-based hegemony. Other times he appears to long for a simpler, pre-modern time of centuries ago. As an anthropologist, I can assure him that such a Rousseau-like world of the noble savage did not exist. Whatever Dugin longs for, it does appear he wants it ruled from the Kremlin. The Kremlin will lead the “Great Awakening.”
Nelson Rosit, the reviewer, captures a lot of the contradictions in Dugin’s writings, even within this recent, slim book. I do get the impression that both Rosit and Dugin view the “Establishment” and the “Globalists” as far more unified in a quest for a single world order than they ever were or ever will be. I guess even Rosit, Dugin and other ethnic nationalists need enemies in order to define themselves.
This gets me to your first point. Sure we painted the USSR as the ultimate enemy during the Cold War, but that changed dramatically as the USSR fell. US and Western attitudes towards Russia shifted to a vision of peace and cooperation. Even Hillary Clinton was part of that shift with her clumsy reset button presentation with Lavrov. We always had our hard core Russophobes. I saw a lot of them in the CIA’s Russia-Eurasia Division. They were always resentful of their fall from being the premier division in the CIA. But they could do nothing but grumble and whine while the CTC usurped their former glory. They’re probably tickled pink with the current return to Cold War attitudes.
I think the drift back to the Cold War attitudes is rooted in the same kind of resentment in the Kremlin that grew in Berlin after the Treaty of Versailles… we were stabbed in the back. Of course the predations of the bankers, industrialists and other fortune seekers, both Western and Russian, did noting to assuage that resentment.
TTG and Leith have either read this already or want to. The info on drone warfare and jamming countermeasures at the front is rich with detail and surprisingly candid. Vital read.
Update on War’s Tech Progress – Simplicius.
https://open.substack.com/pub/simplicius76/p/end-of-2023-roundup-update-on-the
You might be overthinking it, TTG, and forgetting the abysmal lack of planning and strategic foresight on display generally since day one. There’s a high probability that this was no more than a face saving revenge strike for the humiliating Novocherkassk LST-sinking strike at Feodosia recently. Did they really purposely attack a maternity hospital? Very difficult to believe unless they are taking lessons from the insane Israeli genocide in Gaza. A dinosaur slugfest is my read.
vengeance is mine!
saith Lord Vladimort.
F&L,
I’m not at all sure Russia tried to target that maternity hospital or church. It could be that Russian missiles and drones are just not that accurate. At least one of the hits on an apartment complex was the result of a successful interception of a Russian missile. I’m sure that’s not the only such incident.
Another explanation is that the air planners don’t know what they’re targeting. I knew a defense attache who got the Budovar brewery in Czechoslovakia placed on the NATO target list because he figured that would destroy Warsaw Pact morale if struck. He knew what he was doing, but he did it anyways just for shits and grins.
I do agree that revenge played a major role in the timing of this strike as it did with the retaliatory strikes on Bryansk and Belgorod.
F&L – yup. The Russian approach to this war looks an absolute shambles. Indecisive, poorly planned and irresolutely executed by an army and a High Command that has in no sense lived up to the fearsome reputation it had during the old Cold War days. Hasn’t even lived up to what we expected in early 2022!
That’s what innumerable journalists and analysts, mostly Western but a fair few of them Russian or pro-Russian, have been dinning into us ever since February 2022
Bullshit. The opening weeks were the neatest little military operation you’ll ever see. Effective and economical as all get out. Especially since there are some signs that the Russians weren’t expecting to have to move in so quickly.
Almost immediately any possibility of the Kiev forces getting into the Donbass was knocked on the head. Command centres were taken out on day one. A number of simultaneous incursions cut into that great mass of troops and pretty well demolished them. Operating under the tightest of RoE a small Russian force incapacitated the much larger enemy forces for good. And that with a minimum of civilian casualties or damage to civilian infrastructure.
Were the errors made, failures here and there? You bet. Real war, not war that’s been tidied up for the history books or laid out in the manuals, is unpredictable and chancy. But those first few days were copy book in concept and devastatingly effective in execution.
Afterwards? In spite of all that’s been written about the peace overtures, Belarus and Istanbul etc, I don’t think the Russians ever really believed those peace overtures would come off. The Western sanctions assault was too fierce for them to have any illusions about what they were up against. And the political scene in Ukraine itself, dominated as it was by OUN visionaries and riddled with profitable corruption, was not conducive to a negotiated peace.
For all that the Russians were right to try for a settlement. It looked good, that try, and looking good to a world initially shocked by the Russian invasion was a bonus. And it might have come off. But all that was done with at Istanbul. From then on the Russians knew the score past doubt. They were fighting a proxy war with NATO. That boiled down to the grim business of killing off the NATO proxies and exhausting NATO supplies. At the least possible cost in Russian lives.
That’s what they’ve been doing ever since. It’s what they’re doing now. Previously they could sit back and rely on the Kiev forces being driven in to them to be killed. Now they’re doing Shoigu’s “active defence”, which means they’re pushing out to force the Kiev forces to push back and get killed. What they’ll do next none know but it’ll end up with what it was always going to end up with. A defanged Ukraine that will never be used by NATO for such purposes again.
But the real interest in this confrontation for me as a European is not all that. The interest for me lies in what the hell the European politicians ever thought they were doing engaging in this crazy enterprise.
Because make no mistake. That February 21st was no unexpected surprise to those European politicians. They’d been shaping up to it for years, and more eagerly than Washington. Now they’ve got the confrontation they were set on and don’t know how to get out of it. Something odd about us Europeans and Russia. We seem to’ve had the urge to go for them from time to time for centuries. Never comes off and hasn’t this time either.
EO – whatever you’re smoking, please save some for me. Two years have passed and Donetsk is still being shelled, 24 people are dead in Belgograd just yesterday – that’s a major RF city, EO, in case Liz Truss’s affliction regarding Russian geography has become endemic chez Vous (if you recall she claimed Voronezh for either Ukraine or the British Empire during her sojourn as UK Foreign Secretary), and drones have been as far as Volgograd Oblast, not to mention attacks such as Pskov and others deeper into Russia which totalled strategic aircraft. Oh – and Moscow, a building called the Kremlin, was hit at least twice. Let’s not leave out, while you’re rewriting history – Prigozhin’s rebellion, or was that Western propaganda? No it was a deviously clever .. what exactly?
I’ll give you about two more weeks with that wacky weed and then we’re going to call an ambulance.
F&L – you left out the worst one. The shelling of the ZNPP. Done with NATO equipment and almost certainly NATO ISR assistance. Admitted by both Kiev officials and US newspapers to have been done by Kiev. Horrifying, though it seems to be more under control now – even the UN’s chipped in to try to stop it!
Plus the commando attacks on the power station that we’re supposed to have been involved in. Plus attacks on Russian shipping, also using Western equipment and ISR. Plus, as the American press also informs us in detail, Western training of Ukrainian SF to raid into Russia. Plus a whole lot else.
Stunts. Mostly for PR or revenge purposes and of little military significance. I wrote into Martyanov’s site recently pointing out that these stunts seal the fate of remnant Ukraine. Forget about DMZ’s or Korean or German solutions and all the rest of the nonsense the journalists and politicians are wasting our time with. As said above, remnant Ukraine will be defanged one way or another. It’s too troublesome for the Russians to allow NATO to continue using it for such games.
Ambulances. I’m doing a lot of chainsaw work at the moment. Ash mostly. Some foul pestilence we’ve imported from the continent – no, I’m not talking about Scholz and Macron and Borrell for once – and a whole belt of them has to come down.
Steep ground and muddy. Trees leaning every damn way. Undergrowth and thorns that should, if you’re working by the book, be cleared first. I’m not working by the book because I’m hoping the ash will coppice and I need the brambles and thorns round the stumps to keep the deer off. So it’s all a bit edgy.
And then you talk of ambulances. I think I’m going to accuse you of being insensitive.
.
TTG, let me moderate what I said from
the specific request to you
to merely
“For those interested in those issues,
the Rosit article should make interesting reading.”
But of course, your thoughts would be appreciated.
TTG
10 days ?
NATO bombarded a small and weak Serbia for three months every day without being able to seriously degrade it’s ground forces.
Compared with Serbia, Ukraine is a huge country with a very strong AD and full support of NATO.
Air strikes with less than 200 missiles does not sound like a strategic attack. From the media we are to believe that Ukraine’s air defenses are so effective that every single missile is completely destroyed with zero collateral damage; none ever go off course due to defensive fire of jamming. Russia is obviously purposely targeting churches, apartment buildings, and schools. I take that to mean that none of that satellite observation of Ukraine has been able to provide Russia with the location of electric power plants, ammunition plants, nor any other military target.
The other thing to remember is that Ukrainian “heads of regional military administrations, Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine” never lies nor is wrong by commission or omission. World media asks oh so tough questions, too. Just like social media. Russia is already defeated, time to buy more of those Ukrainian war bonds with your money ’cause you are guaranteed to get paid back. Unlike all that unrestrained money given to them that your descendants will have to pay for since it is all debt financed. And don’t look at the US border, those are now legal migrants by media decree and Biden policy. Fundamentally transforming America, just like Barack promised.
Fred –
If you use Telegram – this guy analyses the US. He outlines several ensuing possible chaotic scenarios.
https://t.me/malekdudakov/6443
https://t.me/malekdudakov/6442
Within one of his posts he cites David Axelrod here:
https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/4382539-axelrod-it-would-rip-country-apart-if-trump-prevented-running/
It won’t win me any friends to say so but here’s what the Axelrod piece really means. For those in special-ed class or who are victims of American education and brainwashing it does NOT mean either that the nice man:
1) Cares one way or the other about election fair play, but that’s obvious or
2) That he could care one bit whether or not America rips itself to pieces in a bloody orgy of civil war (with a slight but important caveat explained below).
What it DOES mean is that Israel and it’s American fifth column have figured out that Trump is again, just like last time, securely and snugly in their back pocket, so that if he is elected it’s fine with them.
So pretty please America, put him on the ticket since then we have candidates who are arch Zionists on each ticket, Joe Biden being the other and Kamala Harris in the on-deck circle married to [**CENSORED Douglas Emhoff].
We can’t have you destroying yourselves what with all that wonderful weaponry and money and loans which are never repaid and your fabulous navy and five eyes espionage and surveillance systems we [**BEGIN CENSORED(control remotely using software illegally installed in every smartphone on earth) ** END CENSORED] “share” via blackmail networks such as Jeffrey Epstein’s which convince you to sign laws enshrining your loss of sovereignty.
Malek Dydakov is a sharp cookie but he sometimes omits details.
F&L,
“What it DOES mean is…” the alternate explanation is that nobody but Obama’s lefty operation gives a damn about Palestinians and they only get activated when they need to be used.
On a related note SBF’s charges got reduced by the DOJ, thus the most corrupt donor to the left and all that money laundering are getting covered up. Surprise. Oh and GAZA GAZA GAZA.
Fred … SBF – that’s a measure of the protective strength of sun screen lotion, no? I didn’t know it could act as capacitor. Something about OJ Simpson – DOJ? Fred, don’t you think GAZA GAZA GAZA is a rather long acronym? Is it a card game? Are you sure you’re not Hungarian?
Whatever you do Fred, don’t drive in this condition.
F&L,
Yes absolutely. Keep the disinformation stream going otherwise people might pay attention.
What if waging a campaign of strategic bombing across all of Ukraine was totally not the point?
What if the point is actually the reverse?
What if the point is, indeed, to let people the world over make the sound comparison with the ongoing Gaza massacre, with IDF bombing every civilian infrastructure around, with no condemnation from Western powers, with no sanctions, yet with continued aid?
What if the point is to show that even when Russia is doing light bombing across Ukraine, taregtting mostly dual-use or military installations, with most of the collateral damages being missile-defense gone wrong or actually intercepted Russian missiles falling over civilian buildings instead of destroying military-grade targets – as Ukrainians acknowledge from time to time -, Russia is still portrayed as the ultimate evil, yet when Israel is killing Gaza civilians at the very least at 10 times the rate Russia does across all of Ukraine – a country with 15 times the population of Gaza -, said Israel is shielded by the US, when not massively approved by a wide range of US political class of sociopaths?
What if Russia doesn’t give a fuck about what Western media and leaders think but is aiming for the global audience and showcasing the morally bankrupt Western elite’s duplicity and gross hypocrisy?
What if both Russia and Hamas have their stated war goals, but also have, as an added bonus, the unofficial goal of ruining forever the Western soft power and “moral high ground” for those few in the Global South who hadn’t yet noticed, and the many more among Western peoples who are still a bit delusional? (granted, the pyschopathic or downright corrupt part of the West won’t ever admit it, for obvious reasons)
Yes. Even Col Larry Wilkerson who was one of US imperialism’s chief henchmen and liars for decades now all but admits that the country he used to work for is essentially the locus of evil of our time.
Edgar Allan Poe understood long ago that they are fiends and ghouls, as he put it.
Take the “Pen” from “Pennsylvania” in Pennsylvania Avenue and replace it with the original “Tra” and those who have read Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” will experience an epiphany of understanding. More seriously, begin to accept the ancient wisdom that the devil is the ruler of this world as by definition he must because to dominate everything and everyone you must be capable of the most extreme and merciless evil. Or watch some of Brian Klaas’s YouTube videos on his years of social science research on how the worst people always are the ones in charge. SITROTW is a helpful acronym – Satan Is The Ruler Of This World. It sucks big-time, but it’s true, at least so far historically. Or try Freud’s answer to Einstein in their 1933 correspondence “Why War?” He explained why, based on human neurophysiology conditioned by 17 billion years of evolution, this horror show will never end. To get back to your specific observation – the US, being the hegemonic power, is The Devil. By definition. Israel, their mascot on which they via religious delusion and pity-invoking historical victimization claims base their legitimacy is El Devil Supremo. The criminally insane Israelis are so unabashed that they appoint themselves as actually divinely chosen – they claim the high ground as god’s stand in on earth. Fitting – the Devil was God’s right hand man or chief archangel. It’s that simple. You’re ruled by insane psychopaths. But that’s the way it has always been.
Althea – Grateful Dead.
https://youtu.be/eL2_Mdc_NfI
Lyrics to Althea: http://tinyurl.com/6skfe98m
F&L,
So Colin Powell’s water carrier is having pangs of conscience, just not over all the killing that resulted from his boss’s testimony to the world?
Yes. Poor man. I trust him. Anyone else?
He delivered a subtle nuclear threat to Russia in that video if anyone noticed. He’s so cute – only a tiny teeny nuke, maybe one tenth of Hiroshima. Seems quite stubborn concerning Odessa. Colin’s test tube was tiny too. Probably picked it up at a head shop in Manhattan on his way to the UN. Fred I shouldn’t be saying this about nice men who appear in peacenik YouTube videos.
TTG – Wilkerson, btw, is a prototypical “peace party” member of the US establishment a la Nesmiyan’s post which you read.
I wonder what on Earth did Hamas, the “mostly peaceful” rulers of Gaza, do to cause Israel to spend all the time, effort, money and international goodwill in their ongoing campaign. Maybe you could fill us in on that. While you are at it can you tell us where all the bodies Hamas has had to bury might be, I’ve never seen a photo of a cemetery but heard a lot of Vietnamesque body counts from Hamas, the “mostly peaceful” guys who did whatever it was to trigger all this bombing.
“approved by a wide range of US political class of sociopaths?”
Would that include Senate majority leader Schumer of NY and AOC’s boss in the House Nancy Pelosi of CA? (But not AOC and the Squad)?
Questions:
1] Why is Putin using the S-400 missiles for ballistic land attack if it is so effective in an Air Defense role?
2] Ukraine is saying openly they cannot easily intercept KH-22 or -32. Why admit that publicly?
3] Why is the world not crying out for the 28,000 plus Ukrainian civilian casualties and condemning the Kremlin for those deaths?
4] Did they use the Kh-101/Kh-555/Kh-55 missiles and the Shahed drones to flood Ukro air defense so that the Kinzhals and Iskanders could get through?
5] How soon will Putin’s missileers be able to apply ‘lessons learned’ and completely overcome Ukraine’s air defenses, if ever?
6] How soon will the F-16s with AMRAAM air-to-air missiles be unleashed and how effective can they be against Rashist cruise missiles and/or launch aircraft like the Tu-22?
Leith,
The situation is an unholy mess. We don’t know the answers but the urge to take revenge deep inside Russia is an extremely dangerous one because it will likely only cause further escalation and the main thing they have to escalate with is something no one wants to see. Indicting his nibs with war crimes was a stupid move imo, despite whatever emotional satisfaction it brings, because he has nothing to lose.
Leith,
Just on #6.
I suspect the value of the F16s will be in keeping the Russian jets which have been deploying those Russian version JADMed FAB 500 and 1500 b0mbs out of range. They won’t have enough F16s for wide area coverage against missile/drone attacks, but they should have enough to cover a smaller area, so my guess is they will be deployed to cover battle fields, not cities.
It appears the Ukrainians moved a Patriot battery to Kherson in order to knock out a flock SUs which had been deploying the FABs in that area. No more FABs in the Kherson region since. Those FABs have been a problem. They pack a wallop and are relatively cheap to produce, but they require large birds flown pretty close to the lines. Glide ratio is pretty steep.
Mark Logan –
You probably correct. It would be a damned fine use of those F-16s.
But in addition to that I would think they would be provided with more than just air-to-air weapons. What’s good for a Russkii Sukhoi with a glide-kitted FAB is even better for a Ukro F-16 with a MK-84 2,000 pounder guided by a JDAM-Extended-Range with 10-meter CEP accuracy. Gonna depend on which Western munitions are provided with the F16s.
TTG everything you write about the war now just comes off as sour grapes. You and Pat Lang both said it would be all over by now, that Russia would have been defeated. In fact Lang said way back in March of ’22 he thought Russia had two weeks left (I have screenshots of it all if needed).
You guys have been dead wrong.
Colonel Lang’s two week prediction back in March was close on point about the battles of Kyiv, Zhytomyr, Chernihiv and Sumy. All Russian forces there turned tail and retreated back across the border by 8 April.
Ahem. Ukraine and Russia struck a deal in March, and so Putin ordered those forces to withdraw from Kiev etc., as a de-escalation measure.
Whereupon Bozo Boris Johnson travelled to Kiev and ordered Zelensky to renege on that deal.
…”turned tail and retreated”…
Partisan nonsense. There have been more than enough examples so far during this SMO to demostrate that the Russians do not hesitate to withdraw their forces and redeploy them in order to straighten their lines and strengthen their positions.
You are insulting everyone’s intelligence when you claim that the Ukrainians inflicted a defeat on the Russians that necessitated the latter “turning tail and retreating”.
Yeah Right –
Your story of a de-escalation deal is straight from the Kremlin’s propaganda mills. Basically so Putin would not lose face.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/05/06/boris-johnson-pressured-zelenskyy-ditch-peace-talks-russia-ukrainian-paper
That’s a Ukrainian newspaper quoting Ukrainian officials.
And not a single “Kremlin Propaganda Mill” quote anywhere in there.
leith, you are deluding yourself.
Yeah Right –
You should read the entire article from Ukrainska Pravda, not just the extract and opinions of the reporter from CommonDreams. The original article clearly states that Putin was the one who “declared that the peace negotiations had reached a dead end”. The article also states that Zelenskyy, after BoJo’s visit, said to the Associated Press “we don’t want to lose opportunities, if we have them, for a diplomatic solution.” And shortly after that Zelenskyy said “in a virtual address to the British think tank Chatham House that ‘not all the bridges’ to a peaceful settlement with Russia ‘are destroyed’. “
BoJo is an idiot, but the charge that BoJo twisted Zelenskyy’s arm to stop negotiating is horsepucky. Zelenskyy was the one who originally reached out to Russia for peace. In late February 2022 he had his Aide, Andriy Yermak, contact Putin’s Deputy Chief of Staff Dmitry Kozak. They negotiated an agreement that would have ended hostilities in exchange for guarantees that Ukraine would not join NATO. Putin said no. Zelenskyy then agreed with Lukashenko for meetings with Kremlin negotiators at the border with Belarus on 28 February. That also went nowhere. Many more took place in March where Kyiv again forswore NATO membership. One March/April peace effort was by Naftali Bennett, Netanyahu’s placeholding poodle, who in an interview implied the West killed his mediation endeavors. That may be where CommonDreams got their opinion. But Bennett later retracted that statement. The event that hardened Kyiv resolve was when they found out the extent of the Bucha Massacre.
Perhaps I should not have used the words “turned tail”, sorry. Never should have used that term. It was after all not a disorganized stampede. Russian troops ‘withdrew’ from the North and Northeast of Ukraine after the Ukrainian military won the Battle of Kyiv & Hostomel and other smaller battles such as Moschun, Makariv, Okhtyrka, Irpin, Bucha, Brovary, Sumy, Chernihiv & Lebedyn.
lieth, your counter-argument is chronologically-challenged.
lieth: “The original article clearly states that Putin was the one who “declared that the peace negotiations had reached a dead end”. ”
Indeed, and he said that on April 12.
Bonkers Boris visited Kiev on… April 9.
So, yeah, within days of Johnson’s visit the Russians were aware that he had forced Zelensky to renege on the deal, and so Putin announced that the negotiations were at a dead end.
Why is that difficult to comprehend?
lieth: “Zelenskyy was the one who originally reached out to Russia for peace”
NOBODY is disputing that. Zelensky wants a deal. Putin wanted a deal. They negotiated a deal. Then Bonkers Boris swans into Kiev and puts a spike in it.
Again, why is that so difficult to comprehend?
Yeah Right –
Putin didn’t say that the deal had been broken. Putin “declared that the peace negotiations had reached a dead end”. That wording clearly indicates that no deal had been struck. Three days after or not, makes no difference. The draft peace proposal Ukraine presented to the Russian government on 7 April was never mysteriously cancelled or changed or taken off the table on the 9th, or the 10th or 11th.
Ukraine’s lead negotiator, Davyd Arakhamia, denied that Johnson stopped Kyiv from signing an agreement stipulating Ukraine’s neutrality. Arakhamia also stated that the Ukrainian delegation had neither the authority to change the peace proposal nor cancel it. The original 7 April version was still under discussion up until Putin declared it a dead end on the 12th.
I’m sure that BoJo and many other Western leaders told Zelenskyy not to rely on any security guarantees from Putin. They did not need to as Ukrainians already knew that. They learned that lesson when Putin tore up and wiped his feet on the Belavesha Accords, the Budapest Memorandum and the Russian–Ukrainian Friendship Treaty.
Why do you ignore Zelenskyy’s statement to the press where he wanted a diplomatic solution and a peaceful settlement with Russia? Those statements were made after Bozo BoJo’s visit
So again, there was no deal. Ergo there was no reneging. There is only Putin’s dezinformatsiya.
‘That wording clearly indicates that no deal had been struck.”
You do understand that he doesn’t make public remarks in English, I hope?
And you do understand that this sentence fragment “declared that the peace negotiations had reached a dead end” is clearly not his verbatim words but are, instead, what any English-speaker would recognize as “paraphrasing”.
“Three days after or not, makes no difference.”
Riiiight.
“Ukraine’s lead negotiator, Davyd Arakhamia, denied that Johnson stopped Kyiv from signing an agreement stipulating Ukraine’s neutrality.”
Well, yeah, he would. Would you really expect him to say that his boss was Boris’ Bitch?
Look, you are becoming increasingly tiresome with your fantasies. Russia and Ukraine were in high-level talks, first in Belarus and then in Turkey. So there were Belarussian and Turkish diplomats who were witness to those discussions.
Erdogan commented on March 25th that the two sides were on the same page on four out of six points of contention.
Another round of discussions were announced on March 28th (again in Turkey).
Russia announces three days later that it will withdraw troops from around Kiev and other areas, and that withdrawal was completed by April 6th.
Boris Johnson arrives in Kiev three days later, and then three days after THAT arrival the negotiations were as dead as a Dodo.
There is a clear and concise timeline to all those events, yet you insist that the Russian withdrawal from around Kiev was COMPLETELY unrelated to those concurrent negotiations and, furthermore, that the screeching halt to all negotiations were COMPLETELY unrelated to Bonkers Boris sudden appearance in Kiev.
Sure. You’ve convinced me. Just two COMPLETELY unrelated coincidences of the sort that you see happen every day during periods of warfare between nations.
leith, you really do need to get out more.
Yeah –
I’m giving up trying to convince you. That will probably never happen. But I’m happy to continue to respond. I agree that Ukraine said yes to four of Putin’s demands, but the other two were the big ones that they would not budge on.
Regarding your claim that Russia announced it will withdraw troops from around Kyiv just three days after March 28th, which would be the 31st. Of course he did, no argument. But the reason he did was because two days before that Russian troops had already pulled back from Kiev, Irpin and Bucha because of Ukrainian counterattacks. Plus Russian troops kept fighting around Chernihiv and Sumy up until the 4th of April and Kharkiv until the 14th of May. Meanwhile no ceasefire was in effect. Missiles kept hitting plus artillery barrages.
This was a shift of Kremlin strategy, not a de-escalation due to peace talks. Russian troops in those areas were over-extended. Their supply lines had been cut by Ukrainian special forces. They were running out of ammunition, fuel, and rations. The Russian attempt to take Kyiv and other areas in northern Ukraine had become a total failure. Once that became obvious in Moscow, they decided to concentrate on the S an SE where they were in an extremely better position. It had nothing to do with the peace talks.
Ukraine never agreed to a deal. Therefore they could not renege on it. Complying with only four out of six of Putin’s demands does not add up to a handshake and an agreement. Ukraine knew they could not rely on Putin to keep his word based on his long tradition of lying.
If The link Works..There is Some Back story on
https://russia-ukraine-war-battle-for-kiev
AP
“Russia’s Failure to Take Down Kyiv was A Defeat For the Ages,,” by Robert Burns,,8:40AM April 7th 2022
Jim –
Thanks! Good article. Link doesn’t work for me. But I googled your Robert Burns and found it on AP.
https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-battle-for-kyiv-dc559574ce9f6683668fa221af2d5340
leith, I find it heartening that you lean so much on the statements of Davyd Arakhamia as your source of authority because, well, because this:
https://www.intellinews.com/top-ukrainian-politician-david-arakhamia-gives-seventh-confirmation-of-russia-ukraine-peace-deal-agreed-in-march-2022-302876/
Thanks, Davyd. Most illuminating.
He’s convinced me.
Yeah Right –
Nice for you that your link only uses a 25-second extract of Arakhamia’s interview and that the BNI headline distorts Arakhamia’s answers. If you had watched the entirety you’d see that the deal was never made. Arakhamia specifically states that the negotiating team never did sign the draft. They did not have the authority to agree on Ukraine neutrality, which was Putin’s main point. Because that would have required changing the Ukrainian Constitution.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0G_j-7gLnWU
Changing the constitution could not possibly be done by Arakhamia and he did not have the authority to agree to it either. Not even Zelenskyy could agree to that. And he never did agree to it despite Putin’s lies. And for sure Bozo Bojo could not pressure anyone into doing it. That authority is only vested in Ukraine’s parliament. That legislative body (the Verkhovna Rada) voted 334 to 17 and amended the constitution declaring Ukraine’s strategic objectives are with Europe and in joining the EU and NATO. There is no way that Ukraine would do that without a guarantee. They would never trust a guarantee from Putin. He broke every guarantee ever made to Ukraine.
https://www.unian.info/politics/10437570-ukraine-s-parliament-backs-changes-to-constitution-confirming-ukraine-s-path-toward-eu-nato.html
Leith – I agree. Any Istanbul “deal” would have been a very long shot indeed!
The ultra-nationalists in Kiev knew that any such deal would put paid to their hopes for good. We forget also that this war was profitable to many in Kiev skimming Western aid. As with those we supported in Afghanistan, retaining that source of profit as long as possible was for many of them their prime consideration. Still is, I’d guess, from what the Ukrainian soldiers sometimes say about the fat cats in Kiev.
As for Washington, why would the politicians there ever have agreed to a cessation of the war?
At best some in Washington might still have been hoping the sanctions war would break Russia. At worst, as was stated explicitly by many American politicians later, a continuation of the war would enable them to wear down Russia at little cost to themselves.
And though the European politicians had thoroughly committed themselves well before Istanbul, a continuation of the war would lock them into that commitment – as it has done. With respect, I don’t think you or any other American pay sufficient attention to that all-important European dimension. Europe was all in on this attempt against Russia decades before 2022 and in many respects was more single minded than Washington in that aim. We see that the Europeans cannot be regarded as significant players now – but they certainly were before the SMO!
There was therefore no upside to Washington in a deal in Istanbul and none to the Kiev administration. Zolote, some time before, had shown in any case what would happen to Zelensky if he wavered.
As for the Russians, a deal was worth a try and it looked good for PR purposes. Putin showing that draft agreement to the African leaders maybe went a little way towards persuading them the Russians were the good guys. But I can’t believe the Russians had ever thought a deal would come off. The ferocity of the Western sanctions war must have shown them right at the start that this fight with NATO was a fight to the finish – as it now is.
Your demolition of the argument that the Russians intended to take Kiev by storm (read it yesterday) was surely justified. Supply lines too long and inadequately protected, insufficient forces, all showed that to have been impracticable. And in fact the “Battle of Kiev” that all followed with bated breath at the time never took place and was never intended to take place. It was, like the “Kherson defeat” and so many other stories given to us over the last couple of years, merely an invention by the Western journalists and politicians.
Possibly, had the negotiations preceding those in Istanbul (Belarus and I believe before) come to anything, Russian troops would have been needed to keep order in Kiev. Possibly, had the Ukrainian defence entirely collapsed, Kiev could have been taken even with that limited number of troops. But that’s all speculation. What’s clear is that holding Ukrainian troops up around Kiev rendered easier and more certain that devastatingly effective initial phase of the SMO that set the scene for the succeeding two years.
The Western journalists and politicians are still pouring out reams of material on this or that proposed “deal”. A DMZ, a “Korean solution”, a “German solution” or some vague sort of “freeze”. That’s just happy talk for the benefit of the Western publics, or those few in them who pay attention, It has been clear since February 24th the year before last that the only deal going to be arrived at is a deal on the terms of capitulation. The Russians knew that, by the latest, from the time the recognition of the self-declared Republics was rushed through on February 21st.
And the terms of capitulation merely became harder the longer we and Zelensky fed the Ukrainian troops into the killing fields. That savage and entirely unnecessary loss of life and territory both does not, I think, even now equal the damage we saw resulting from our ventures in Iraq or Syria but it was still, as “b” on MOA said long back, a “crime”.
It will be seen as such by the Ukrainians. Even the most credulous of them will have known since Vilnius at the latest (“We are not Amazon”) that they have been used and then thrown away like an old rag. Arestovich is a vicious and labile character but when he said that Kiev backed the wrong horse, and should now act in concert with Russia to seek redress, he got to the root of the matter.
EO,
After failing to quickly topple the government in Kyiv, I agree the next best hope for Moscow was a quick peace or ceasefire. That failed, too. Moscow quickly reneged on the independence of the LNR and DNR. I think it was just a political trick that didn’t pan out. Instead Putin settled for declaring several Ukrainian oblasts to be part of Russia. He even declared Kherson to be forever Russia. He couldn’t hold that. He declares Odesa to be Russian as well. That won’t happen. At this point I’m not sure rump Donetsk and Luhansk or even Crimea will forever remain under Russian control. You seem to forget the scale of Russia’s savage and unnecessary loss of life in those same killing fields that are claiming so many Ukrainians.
To Russians made a return Invasion Obvious …Lined All Ducks in a Row..Put on a Show..That The Colonel Watched with Range Finder Focus…I Predicted The April 20th Weekend As The Invasion Date..Based on Weather Reports For Ukraine That Month..
Ukraine Forces were Heavily Armed With Anti Tank..weapons..Mines..Both Flanks. .and Events…Happened…
Jim
Jim – if the Russians had left it any later the risk was that the Kiev forces would have been in the Donbas. The LDNR forces could not have held them back.
If we think this war’s mucky, and the clearing of Mariupol was about as mucky as it gets, what would have followed had the Kiev forces got themselves dug in in the cities and villages of the Donbass would have been even worse.
Here’s an interesting interview with a former US marine fighting in Ukraine.
The guy is black and yet spent some time fighting with the Right Sector units.
Interview goes into a lot of things that he has personally learned and witnessed including tactics of some Ukrainian units when attacking Russian positions.
The former marine describes the circumstances that led to the combat death of another former US army captain.
At one point he describes Ukrainian army as a collection of militias wearing the same uniform; speaks about corruption, treatment of POWs and much more. Very interesting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uSDsaPKLCQ
There is Much to The Back Story..On Russia/Ukraine/Donbas…Much More..
But To Look At The Main Line Story of The Recent Russian Attack..Multipled Target..Types nd Results..And Look At At TTGs Questions..
Russian Launched 122 Missles….87 Shot Down..35 Survived to Targets…
Russia Launched 36 Drones….27 Shot Down…9 Drones Survived…
Russia Only Launched 4 X31P Anti Radar Missles..and One X-59..
What if Russia had Used More nti Radar Missles…???
They Found out Defense Systems Effectiveness in Multiple Regions..
Infrastructure Cyber Attacks Alone Currently Cozy Bear is Hitting the
USAs Medical..and ater Supply Systems..
I the IRON Dome in Israel Worked As Poorly as this Attack..they Would be in
a Bad situation…Yes..Gaza..Homemadw Chinese Firecrac kers With a Fuse..
But..In This Fluid situation..You Have Lebanon…Which has Murdered MANY Americans..and I Will Never Forget Any of It.. You Have Syria…You Have Multiple ARMS Suppliers…You Have Erdogens Attitude…
And Someday..We Will know…”The Rest of the Story..”
Regards…Jim
Yahoo News is Running a story..with Todays Date Jan 2, 2024…
with Header..”Bundestag Calls for Provison of TAURUS Missles To Ukraine..”
Vlad Zelinkaky…Has Long Demander…Desired The Delivery of These German Missles..Wing Mounted For Aircraft…Its Called the KEPD-350…Used by the German Military uses it as thier Most Valued New Missle For “High Valued” Targets”
It has Laser Range Finders..and Infrared Seekers..The German Military Opposes
send Ukraine This Missle System..BUT…The Bundestag Defense “Committee”
(Committees…Yup..The Usual Players} Call for Sending The Missle..and If Ordered to Germany could Quickly send 150-300 Taurus Missles..
ISSUE..How to Limit Thier “RANGE” if Sent..
Regards…Jim
TTG
I appreciate your information on Ukraine – I read the Kyiv Independent -knowing well that it is going to be a Ukraian-centric viewpoint, of course. Still it is good to have other sources.
I found this today in the JPost
“Russia employs ‘superweapon’ against Ukraine for first time in months – UK
The AS-24 KILLJOY missile accelerates to Mach 4 (roughly 3,000 miles per hour) after launch and may reach speeds as fast as Mach 10 (roughly 7,673 miles per hour).”…
“On 14 December 2023, the Russian Air Force highly likely carried out the first use of an AS-24 KILLJOY air-launched ballistic missile since August 2023,” the UK Defense Ministry stated. “Russia launched at least one missile into central Ukraine, likely targeting a military airfield.”
https://www.jpost.com/international/internationalrussia-ukraine-war/article-779532
The article includes a Ministry of Defense update imbedded in the text which states the KILLJOY was used on December 14th?
Newsweek seems to believe it missed the intended target.
https://www.newsweek.com/missile-killjoy-putin-ukraine-russia-1853667
kj
KjHeart,
The KILLJOY is also known as the Kinzhal. Its failure to live up to its “invincible” reputation at the hands of the much improved Patriot system is now well known. Ukraine said it shot down ten more in the last few days. It’s an okay weapon, just far from invincible.
TTG thank you for the follow up on this – I wondered if it really had such a fail rate? Targeting issues it seems?
Good to hear Ukraine has some good Defense Systems; they need it.
kj
Kinzhal failure………according to ukraine, a country well know to always tell the Truth !
And USa who sell Patriot.
Well,well.
But their own airforce spokesman Yuri Ignat stated unequivocally that in over 300+ Kh-22 missiles fired by Russia since the start of the SMO, they have not been able to down a single ONE as this missile travels 4,000 km/h (Mach 3+).
So Ukraine’s most authoritative source on the matter says they’re incapable of taking out Mach 3+ missiles, but somehow they get a 10/10 100% kill ratio on a 12,000km/h Mach ~11 missile.
Doesn’t add up, does it?
According to ukrainians, russia destroyed churches, schools, Kindergartens, hospitals, Wallmarts, KFCs and Starbucks.
According to others, many pieces of ukrainian MIC.
Doesn’t add up, does it?
According to “experts” they will run out of misssiles.
But Ukrainian ex-general Krivonos just complained days ago that a single Russian missile corporation, according to his sources, has produced a massive 1,321 cruise missiles just this year alone.
Doesn’t add up, does it?
alexandar,
A lot more goes into a missile’s vulnerability than its theoretical top speed. Perhaps the Kh-22 doesn’t have any Western technology in it. It may be more of a black box to Ukrainian air defense folk. Or it simply may not have received the priority that the Kinzhal has received.
There’s plenty of video and photographic evidence of strikes on Ukrainian churches, schools, apartment complexes and shopping centers. Russia is free to offer similar evidence of striking military targets. In near two years of war, there’s precious little such evidence.
Plenty evidences of failed ukrainian AA striking schools, apartment complexes and shopping center.
Like in KSA.
There’s tons of evidences of Russia striking military targets on X and Telegram channels both russians and ukrainians.
Not to mention ex-Aidar deputy commander Mosiychuk likewise admitted that the authoritise are hiding the fact that major military enterprises in Kiev were destroyed with huge casualties.
Alexander –
As of this morning Ukraine has shot down a total of 25 Russian Kinzhals since May of this year. That is per Ukrainian Air Force spokesman, who spells his name as Yurii Ihnat. No ‘g’ which is the Russian spelling.
https://www.businessinsider.com/western-weapons-wins-against-russia-are-intelligence-bonanza-2024-1
I don’t know what your source was, but if valid it is pre May 2023.
Another source:
“Russia KH-22, the missile ukraine has yet to shoot down.”
Kiev Post december 29, 2023.
Happy to see that your war about spelling is going better that your counter offensive.
“Ukraine has shot down a total of 25 Russian Kinzhals since May of this year.”
Yes, sure.
As we destroyed the serbian army year 1999.
And Saddam has WMD.
Note that I don’t blame you, it takes time to get out The Matrix.
Aleksandar –
No surprises and no argument on your Kyiv Post article on the KH-22. I’ve posted previously on this blog about Ukraine publicly admitting they’ve not been able to shoot down the KH-22. See my comment above on December 31, 2023 at 2:17 pm.
Even so, the KH-22 is highly inaccurate, which is why it causes so many civilian casualties. The radar guided version appears to lock on to the largest radar-cross-section in the target area, which typically is a high-rise apartment or office building. Thereby causing massive collateral damage. Another version, unguided, is reported to be extremely inaccurate landing anywhere within kilometers of the planned target.
Your article in the KP says the Russians use them primarily in the S and E, far from a Patriot and SAMP-T site. But with more Patriot and SAMP-T systems on the way let us hope that changes.
I know only What I Read and Analyze With Public Domaine Sources..Many..Much ike Our Intels Do…But..This Event Was a High Level./.High Participatl Even..I Dont remember anything similar.From The “empire”..
Issue…Were All success hits…Heat And IR..Missles ??
Were The Ones Going To HIGH PRIORITY Targets..tracked and Shot Down First..and letting the Civialian targets Get Hit By Most..
If So..Why..And Where is The TRUTH…????
Regards…Jim
It’s reported in Reuters today that Kharkiv buildings were all hit with N Korean made Short Range Ballistic Missles SRBM
Jim
It Appears to be Multiple launches of The KN-23 From Inside Russia..
.Range 430 miles
jim
I Found a Published online Story in NEWSWEEK tonite Dated Jan 5,2024…
Header…”Was Putin’s Top General Gerasimov Killed In Crimea Attack.? What We Know…
That Would Be Putin’s Chief of General Staff..Valery Gerasimov…Ukrain Air Forces Claims a Successful Attack..
jim
jim,
This is very likely an off the wall rumor that gained life through the wonders of social media.