Is Ukraine about to have a war?

[Geriaviator]

Originally Posted by meleagertoo

Who's identified those things as "sea-mines"?
I'm no expert on sea-mines but they're barely big enough to sink a harbour tug - they're not much bigger than footballs!
If they were mnies the the det-cord must be as thick as a man's arm.
I don't believe it.
Far far too much unquestioning reliance given to twatter on this thread imho.

Agreed ... but follow the link and subsequent quote states: "We don't know who is spreading these rumors but to make it clear: The big explosion (30 APR /01 MAY, in Kyselivka, Mykolaiv Oblast) is 250 KM's away from the ditch with 'strange containers' (08 SEP, Kopani, Zaporizhzhia Oblast) It is not the same incident!"

[Wokkafans]

Originally Posted by Geriaviator

Agreed ... but follow the link and subsequent quote states: "We don't know who is spreading these rumors but to make it clear: The big explosion (30 APR /01 MAY, in Kyselivka, Mykolaiv Oblast) is 250 KM's away from the ditch with 'strange containers' (08 SEP, Kopani, Zaporizhzhia Oblast) It is not the same incident!"

Reportedly a fertilizer factory/storage facility explosion.

Meanwhile:

https://twitter.com/visegrad24/statu...Sn3JXK_o5ZoaZg

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/poland-i...pons-1.1828211

Twitter

[DaveReidUK]

Originally Posted by rattman

Plus the USS Gerald Ford is there atm

AFAIK, Ford is currently undertaking an "extended training cruise" in the Atlantic. It doesn't sound like it will be participating in combat operations any time soon.

[Big Pistons Forever]

Originally Posted by DaveReidUK

AFAIK, Ford is currently undertaking an "extended training cruise" in the Atlantic. It doesn't sound like it will be participating in combat operations any time soon.

The boys and girls aboard may be getting some on the job training sooner than expected…….

[ORAC]

https://twitter.com/militarylandnet/...babfDs3LzVRAxA

Russian soldiers voluntarily surrendered with their BMP-2 somewhere in Kherson Oblast.

[ORAC]

https://twitter.com/chriso_wiki/stat...babfDs3LzVRAxA

When COVID meets mobilisation:

Newly mobilised Russian soldiers attached to the 2nd Guards Motor Rifle Division have contracted COVID-19 en masse and are now locked in a train for quarantine, without medical care or ventilation.

Translation follows…

[ORAC]

OPEC Cuts oil production…..

https://twitter.com/ap/status/157767...babfDs3LzVRAxA

The OPEC+ alliance of oil-exporting countries has decided to sharply cut production to support sagging oil prices. The move could deal the struggling global economy another blow and raise politically sensitive pump prices for U.S. drivers.

https://twitter.com/mcfaul/status/15...babfDs3LzVRAxA

OPEC's decision today to cut oil supplies directly and immediately assists Putin's war effort. They were not compelled to do so. They choose to do so. Don't ever forget it.

[ORAC]

https://twitter.com/trenttelenko/sta...babfDs3LzVRAxA

The Russo-ukrainian War is a railway logistics war, so people need to bookmark this map from @xaliu5👇

The denial of the Snihurivka railway hub to the Russians cuts Kherson city proper from rail logistics through Nova Kokhovka & strands engines & rolling stock between Snihurivka and either Nova Kokhovka or Kherson city proper.

[ORAC]

I’ve said previously mobilisation was as much as conscripting all those who might join rebellions on the periphery - perhaps it now far the more important consideration as Ujraine is seen as being lost…

https://twitter.com/chriso_wiki/stat...XawS-qfq2Nks7g

The independent Russian media outlet Verstka ("Layout") reports that the Kremlin has secretly ordered Russian regions to mobilise several times more men than publicly announced. Regions are said to have been categorised according to their "protest potential".

[ORAC]

https://twitter.com/wartranslated/st...XawS-qfq2Nks7g

Russian mobiks, location unspecified, recording an address to the public, saying they were abandoned, they are all sick, they were given weapons which are not registered anywhere, they have to buy their food, and there are mentally unstable people among them.

[fdr]

Originally Posted by ORAC

OPEC Cuts oil production…..



The OPEC+ alliance of oil-exporting countries has decided to sharply cut production to support sagging oil prices. The move could deal the struggling global economy another blow and raise politically sensitive pump prices for U.S. drivers.



OPEC's decision today to cut oil supplies directly and immediately assists Putin's war effort. They were not compelled to do so. They choose to do so. Don't ever forget it.

OPEC seems to continue the time honored squandering of resources that we have grown to expect. Revenue from finite reserves have made for wonderful palaces, edifices, and lots of decadence in the form of exotic cars, planes, yachts, watches etc, all based on finite resources that are being replaced as technology can provide more sustainable alternatives. Our favorite global leading producers have established economies that rely on ever increasing base pricing to cover the economic needs while production costs quietly increase as reserves reduce. OPEC's former cash cows are needing cash injection to keep their masses kept in the manner they have grown to expect. Some structural adjustments coming along at some point in the future. In lots of areas, those adjustments will have a "fundamental" flavor.

Cutting production continues to favor US and Canadian and other producing countries as they are given opportunities to increase margin and volumes. The elevation of cost softens global activity, which reduces demand in part for discretionary consumption, which doesn't help the short term OPEC revenue status, and promotes alternative supply and substitution.

When OPEC acts, it has a history of zagging when zigging is helpful to their interests.

Use of revenue towards nation building and diversification rather than multi jet shopping trips to Harrods might be a good option. Its a spectrum, some have done better than others, and some have more unemployed population pressure with diminishing future prospects which is a bad mix. Fixable? not without a change of heart of management.

[Wokkafans]

Originally Posted by ORAC

Intense footage of Ukrainian troops moving on Humvees under heavy Russian fire somewhere in #Kherson Oblast - and at least one HMMWV can be seen destroyed.

Bumpy ride: https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/xwihzm/ukrainian_hmmwvs_during_an_assault_reportedly_in/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/xwmt1c/another_video_of_ukrainian_hmmwvs_during_an/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

[ORAC]

First the protests, then the wars….

https://twitter.com/gerashchenko_en/...XawS-qfq2Nks7g

Something is brewing in Dagestan, Russia.

https://twitter.com/jvoc_kemptown/st...XawS-qfq2Nks7g

[fdr]

Originally Posted by ORAC

Russian mobiks, location unspecified, recording an address to the public, saying they were abandoned, they are all sick, they were given weapons which are not registered anywhere, they have to buy their food, and there are mentally unstable people among them.

1917 Redux

This spoiler is from Revolutionary History Vol 8 No. 2; which while sympathetic to Trotsky and Leninist teachings does tell historical events...
"History might not repeat but it rhymes..."
(beating & abusing your own population works only so long)

Spoiler

 

 

1917

According to an old officer from the expeditionary corps, towards January 1917, ‘the majority of the Russian soldiers in France were already voicing their belief that they had all been “sold off” to the French in exchange for ammunition, and they had no sympathy whatsoever for their “masters and buyers”’. After several months spent at the front, where they had endured the cruelty of their officers – corporal punishment, reintroduced in the Russian army in 1914, was used against these two Russian brigades – the ‘obedience’ and ‘loyalty’ of these men was shattered with the announcement of the fall of the autocracy, news which had been deliberately delayed for a fortnight inside the camp. The soldiers then elected committees, expelled certain officers, and decided that the spring offensive would be their last action. In the bloody massacre of 16 April, counting all the dead and wounded, the Russians lost close to 6,000 men. All the while, they never ceased to demand their repatriation.

On 1 May, according to the Russian calendar, the troops booed their commanders and displayed red flags on which they wrote, both in French and in Russian, ‘Liberté’, ‘Egalité’ and ‘Fraternité’. For its part, the Provisional Government continued to urge the soldiers to follow their orders and continue to fight for France, until the final victory.

Rémi Adam 1917: The Revolt of the Russian Soldiers in France

https://www.marxists.org/history/eto.../no2/adam.html



[tdracer]

Originally Posted by ORAC

OPEC Cuts oil production…..

The OPEC+ alliance of oil-exporting countries has decided to sharply cut production to support sagging oil prices. The move could deal the struggling global economy another blow and raise politically sensitive pump prices for U.S. drivers.

OPEC's decision today to cut oil supplies directly and immediately assists Putin's war effort. They were not compelled to do so. They choose to do so. Don't ever forget it.

Maybe it was a bad idea for the current POTUS to repeatedly condemn the OPEC governments - call them pariahs - and throw up roadblocks to increasing US oil production.

I would have loved have to heard the OPEC leaders behind the scenes reactions to Biden's recent trip to the Middle East to beg them to increase production...

[ORAC]

The USA is self-sufficient and unaffected by OPEC price changes. The customers OPEC should fear looking elsewhere is Europe.

[tdracer]

Originally Posted by ORAC

The USA is self-sufficient and unaffected by OPEC price changes. The customers OPEC should fear looking elsewhere is Europe.

Oil is fungible, it goes to the people willing to pay the most for it. In fact, some oil that Biden released from the Strategic Oil Reserve was shipped out-of-country, allegedly because there is some aspect of the law that requires it be sold to the highest bidder.
So, the US is unlikely to face shortages but we will face price increases.

BTW, USA was self-sufficient when Trump was still POTUS. Biden fixed that - we're about a million barrels a day in the red now days (although most of it doesn't come from OPEC).

[Economics101]

Originally Posted by ORAC

The USA is self-sufficient and unaffected by OPEC price changes. The customers OPEC should fear looking elsewhere is Europe.

Not quite: if the US is a net exporter of oil and oil products, it will gain from OPEC decisions which increase prices. While this direct effect may be small (US net oil exports are small relative to GDP), there are indirect effects: OPEC decisions may lead to recessions in oil-importing countries, who may be significant buyers of US exports

[fdr]

Originally Posted by ORAC

I’ve said previously mobilisation was as much as conscripting all those who might join rebellions on the periphery - perhaps it now far the more important consideration as Ujraine is seen as being lost…



The independent Russian media outlet Verstka ("Layout") reports that the Kremlin has secretly ordered Russian regions to mobilise several times more men than publicly announced. Regions are said to have been categorised according to their "protest potential".

comment on Russian quartermaster status:

• Recruits: 4 A1 medical, General Purpose, single use,disposable;
• Uniforms: 2, GP size, warm weather ( it doesnt get cold in Russia...);
• Boots: 1, pair for the use of, standard size;
• Hats, Furry: 2; tropical issue
• Hats, ball cap: 1, ballistic protective, light duty;
• T-Shirt, striped, Blue/white: 1. blood stains removed;
• Socks: 3 pair;
• Sandals: 3 pair, non Govt Supplied Materiel;
• Cigarettes: 1, communal use;
• Side arm: 0
• Squad Weapon: 0
• AK-12: 0
• Body armor: 0
• Ammunition: 0
• Targets, steel: 1
• Targets, live, for Ukrainian force practice: 4

"Mav, you have the number of that truck-driving school we saw on TV? Truck Master, I think it is. I might need that".

[Low average]

Originally Posted by tdracer

Maybe it was a bad idea for the current POTUS to repeatedly condemn the OPEC governments - call them pariahs - and throw up roadblocks to increasing US oil production.

I would have loved have to heard the OPEC leaders behind the scenes reactions to Biden's recent trip to the Middle East to beg them to increase production...

The Cartel (also known as OPEC) does include Pariahs, and we deal with them until they eventually turn on us - as proven by Russia.

One day, a list will be made of the Nations who stood silent while Ukranians were being slaughtered on their own soil. I hope that justice finds them eventually.