Ukraine

[Uwe]

There is so much fake news / pictures /videos it makes me vomit.

Yep. At this point it's impossible to know what's really going on there. Western media would like us to believe that the Russian invasion is stalled and failing. Russian media would paint it as they're being gentle and only going after military targets while doing their best to avoid hurting civilians or damaging the infrastructure.

The only thing I'm reasonably confident about is that Kiev is still standing and hasn't taken any real damage. This is clear from a number of web-cam live-streams. Yet we know from experience that Russia could make Kiev look like Grozny did 25 years ago if they were so inclined.

-Uwe-

 

[vreihen]

This is why I get much of my Ukraine/Russia war news from Al Jazeera.....

 

[DV52]

Your friend, he have big cajonies

@Crasher: Not surprisingly - I have no idea!!

But, one of my most important life lessons is something I call the "inverse Cahonas equation"; it defines the relationship between brain size and testicle size!!

Now- back to the topic of Ukraine

Don

 

[RGH0]

Yep. At this point it's impossible to know what's really going on there. Western media would like us to believe that the Russian invasion is stalled and failing. Russian media would paint it as they're being gentle and only going after military targets while doing their best to avoid hurting civilians or damaging the infrastructure.

The only thing I'm reasonably confident about is that Kiev is still standing and hasn't taken any real damage. This is clear from a number of web-cam live-streams. Yet we know from experience that Russia could make Kiev look like Grozny did 25 years ago if they were so inclined.

-Uwe-

The good thing about biased media reporting when you get it from both sides is that after you discard the junk that is blatantly false, you can usually find the truth somewhere in between in the rest of the information

 

[DV52]

The good thing about biased media reporting when you get it from both sides is that after you discard the junk that is blatantly false, you can usually find the truth somewhere in between in the rest of the information

RGHO: I can't agree; anyone who tries to find any truth from either battling side during a time of war is bound to fail!! It's the first causality and it's a fatal casualty!!

Don

 

[morris39]

RGHO: I can't agree; anyone who tries to find any truth from either battling side during a time of war is bound to fail!! It's the first causality and it's a fatal casualty!!

Don

Propaganda is an old tool used by the belligerent (ancient word but still good) governments to convince their population to act against its best interest, that the enemy deserves death and is not human. So success is not finding truth but burying it.
Ironically the enemies (Russian) propaganda is being criticized for lacking truth.

 

[NZDubNurd]

Well the price of the Super unleaded 99RON octane unleaded I use is now £1.70 a litre which is approx $2.25 so in US gallon terms that is approx $8.50 per gallon… and it will only get worse, much worse; I can see it doubling in the coming months… I think the great reset button has been pressed.

That's what I have to pay here in NZ for 95 RON... and "someone" just bought a 97 Land Rover Discovery V8i auto today...

 

[RGH0]

RGHO: I can't agree; anyone who tries to find any truth from either battling side during a time of war is bound to fail!! It's the first causality and it's a fatal casualty!!

Don

Don

The propaganda from opposing sides defines the extreme limits of what is vaguely creditable. The truth does not comes from either side but is reliably somewhere in between the extremes they will claim. Finding where the truth lies is the challenge but it is not impossible to get into the general area of truth with a little thought and analysis.

cheers
Rohan

 

[vreihen]

The good thing about biased media reporting when you get it from both sides is that after you discard the junk that is blatantly false, you can usually find the truth somewhere in between in the rest of the information

Al Jazeera reported that Shane Warne passed away. He was apparently the Australian cricket equivalent of American football/gridiron quarterback Tom Brady. How bad can they be as a news source?????

 

[JMR]

So..like i ve said before , i like to be able to read all kinds of news sites , be it american , european , russian or whatever. Truth to be told i 've never felt that the news on RT were misleading or doing pro russian propaganda . But hey..whatever..Now , since 2 days ago this site is not working anymore based on censorship ? Why ? Am i suppose to read only one sided news ? All of a sudden my connection is not secure anymore. I don t buy it..but it is what it is. Misinformation , fake news on all sides..pictures , professional quips..shitload of crap. Everybody seems to have amnesia about lots and lots of bad political moves and declarations going back many years. I think that all parties involved should sit down and agree to disagree and stop this . People are dying needlesly on whims of politicians and disagreements. And not one leader has a cool head about it. I much fear that this will escalate even further and worse than it is already.
https://flic.kr/p/2n7eDoF

 

[Bruce]

I much fear that this will escalate even further and worse than it is already.

On this, you and I agree. I am waiting for China's play. While the world is watching Russia, the Chinese are flexing their muscles towards Taiwan.

Didn't we go down such roads before in world history? Aren't there similarities to the run up to both world wars?

Yes, I fear there is more to come besides high prices for fuel.

 

[Crasher]

Russia invading Ukraine was child's play, China invading Taiwan has 110m miles of open sea to cover and Taiwan's navy and Air force is strong, the Chinese would be decimated. Putin is a dead man walking, if he stops his own people will kill him so he will keep going until he is dead.

 

[jyoung8607]

On this, you and I agree. I am waiting for China's play. While the world is watching Russia, the Chinese are flexing their muscles towards Taiwan.

I'm not sure they're planning to capitalize on the situation at this very moment, but given the situational parallels, they are absolutely taking notes. Taiwan was never going to be easy to take by force, but the geopolitical calculation just massively shifted as well.

Didn't we go down such roads before in world history? Aren't there similarities to the run up to both world wars?

Yep. große Lüge (the big lie), Lebensraum, everything. The fight against evil will never end, but there are good people in the world willing to fight for what's right, and by and large they step up when it's truly needed.

I don't know what's complicated about looking at a map, looking at hundreds of videos of bombed out cities in Ukraine, looking at hundreds of videos of protesters in Russia getting arrested, or reading Russia's new law making it illegal to call the war a war. But it turns out to be complicated for some. It's very simple for me.

I remember learning about WW2 in school and wondering how the actual fuck humanity got to a point where millions of Jews were put into ovens and gas chambers. It's still horrifying, but let's just say it's no longer a mystery. Holocaust deniers had one excuse going for them, they weren't drowning in live high definition video. Those people still exist, but in 2022 that excuse is revoked.

Yes, I fear there is more to come besides high prices for fuel.

This is a legitimate fear.

There is no version of this where Putin wins. He could roll up all of Ukraine tomorrow (which won't happen, since it turns out Ukranians are pretty badass) and his reward would be occupation of a hellscape with a rifle behind every blade of grass while enduring redoubled sanctions with no end in sight, with a formerly feared military that got absolutely clowned in front of the entire planet, with a population waiting in breadlines none too happy with him.

I can't even think of a face-saving exit strategy. The closest thing I've heard talked about was maybe recognizing/legitimizing the Crimea part of the invasion in exchange for GTFO and STFU about joining NATO and/or EU. But if I'm Ukraine, I'm not sure if I even take that; time is on their side. Every day that passes, the Western world pours more supplies and materiel and intelligence support into Ukraine, the Russian supply and materiel situation deteriorates further, and the Russian economy tanks further. Every day the line is held is a strategic victory, and damn if they don't seem to be holding the line.

So yeah, we're currently determining the magnitude of Putin's loss, and whether he flips over the table when he walks away. And flipping over the table could be very, very bad.

 

[vreihen]

I think that I'm going to apply for a trademark on "Z" ... as the new mark of the beast.....

Looks like I was prophetic back on page #1.....

https://www.thedailybeast.com/vladimir-putins-world-war-z-has-created-a-new-swastika

...Now, the “Z” has become akin to a new “swastika” or symbol of hatred and is showing up everywhere supporters of Russia’s uninvited invasion of Ukraine can be found...

 

[jyoung8607]

So..like i ve said before , i like to be able to read all kinds of news sites , be it american , european , russian or whatever. Truth to be told i 've never felt that the news on RT were misleading or doing pro russian propaganda . But hey..whatever..Now , since 2 days ago this site is not working anymore based on censorship ? Why ? Am i suppose to read only one sided news ? All of a sudden my connection is not secure anymore.

You'd have to dip into Advanced to see what that's about, what certificate the site attempted to present. Various Russian sites have been getting DDoSd from various sources (not state actors, or at least not all state actors) and have been shifting stuff around trying to compensate, including running their site through various front-end CDNs. I would take that as technical difficulties instead of censorship unless the presented CA looks like an attempt at MITM by someone like Vodaphone or something else local to Romania.

 

[DV52]

Western media would like us to believe that the Russian invasion is stalled and failing.

@Uwe: I find the stark contrast between Putin's and Zelenskyy's approach to the media absolutely fascinating!! In many ways, it's the most revealing aspect of what separates the two leaders.

This is perhaps no more telling than how the 2 x leaders structure their news conferences:

• Putin: always immaculately groomed, dressed in a tailored business suit and sitting erect behind a big desk. Very traditional. Very regal/presidential/autocratic and clearly designed to send a strong message about his position of absolute power (and as a consequence, Putin's separation from the great unwashed proletariat).
• Zelenskyy: not particularly well groomed, always in combat fatigues and invariably framed in a door-way, or other impromptu venue with his troops!!

I know that Zelenskyy was a comedian in his early years and probably has a better understanding of 21st century media - but I'm surprised that Putin's media advisors are still using old fashion props for news conferences.

Interesting stuff (to me, at least)

Don

 

[RGH0]

Win , lose or draw in the Ukraine.... Putins dreams of a new Russian empire are cactus. At best he comes out of this as a new vassal state of the Chinese empire. An interesting new era has begun

He did not want NATO on his borders now he has guaranteed that is what he will have.

He wanted to control energy exports to Europe and he will now have total control of those exports that will soon amount to.... ZERO

The only good thing out of all of this is that Australian ( and Canadian) exports which are the same commodities that Russia and Ukraine used to export to Europe just got in greater demand so Australia's terms of trade just took a big jump as trade around the world rebalances due to the unfortunate suffering of others.

 

[Uwe]

Since Zelenskyy was a comedian before he was a politician, let's get another comedian's take on how this all came to be:

-Uwe-

 

[RGH0]

Yes of course Nato caused the current war.....they "appeased" him and wanted cheap gas from the dictator Putin for the last 2 decades and demonstrated to him that he could salami slice them slowly to death in exchange

Doh ... It was not hard to predict the the rest of Ukraine were the upcoming next salami slices.

The hard question is what should Nato, the USA and EU have done in the last 20 years and the referenced video does not address that. It is impossible to answer that question in reality and most possible answers just lead ultimately to the same war or similar war at the same or similar time, as that is where Putin was going all along

The real question is has Putin gone to far, as all dictators ultimately do ??

Putin has been deliberately vague about what his aims in the Ukraine are, as that allows him to claim that what ever he achieves was his aim and save face in Russia.

However after whatever he achieves, their will be Nato on his border, be it in a divided Ukraine or at the Polish border and the remaining non Nato states on his border will join Nato before he can invade them. If he draws the border to far West he will also have a lot of very unhappy Ukrainians at his back unless he withdraws to the very East that was already held by ethnic Russians as most of the Ukranians have already left those areas

Whatever the outcome the democratic West will also proceed to separate itself economically and commercially from Russia and Russia will become almost totally dependent on China for sale of its commodities in exchange for their ( stolen ?) technologies. They will be a vassal state just as North Korea is now.

Once last comment - you see how western morality is used by Putin against the West. All these "experts" freely expressing their views can do that in the democratic west and potentially reduce the democratic wests desire to fight in response to an invasion and we allow it (despite all the government conspiracies ) In Russia you get arrested and beaten up and face 15 years jail for expressing any opinion at odds with Putin that may reduce the Russians desire to invade

 

[vreihen]

Yesterday, Let's Go Brandon stopped the US import of Russian gas and oil.

Overnight, Brandon put a stop to Poland's plan to give/lend a bunch of their old MIg-29 fighters to Ukraine, and backfill the Polish air force with US-made jets. The stumbling block was apparently handing the jets over to Ukraine pilots at a US airbase in Germany. I don't know if pushing them by hand over the border into Ukraine would be an option.

The best one is that the Russian Ministry of Propaganda has claimed that Russian forces have destroyed a chemical/biological weapons factory in Ukraine, that was funded by the US military. This claim is so laughable that some mainstream media might not even give it air time.....