Ukraine reacts to fears of Russian invasion as troops build up at the border

[EnterpriseSovereign]

GHETTO EDIT: Looks like the ship has actually sunk!

[Elfdart]

The Azov regiment is not what it was 8 years ago. It started out as a unit mainly composed of neonazis, but after the fighting in Donbass, was folded into the Ukranian military and now has a much more varied membership.

Besides, when the aggressor of an unjustified war has publicly put out a document where they lay out plans for the genocide of an entire nation of over 40 million people and has been seen putting it into practice, pearl clutching about the political leanings of a single regiment on the side targeted for genocide and casting doubt on helping the victims sounds to me like being complicit with the aggressors.

You wouldn't by any chance have the extraordinary evidence needed to back up either of these extraordinary bullshit claims, would you?

Four days later...

Elfdart, since you've decided to turn into a full Russian shill who is parroting the Kremlin propaganda line to the hilt, I have five, sincerely heartfelt words for you: Go die in a fire.

That's all the response you're going to get.

So you make an absurd bullshit claim, can't back it up, and all you can muster is incoherent verbal abuse? Did Ralin hack your account?

[Edi]

You dodubled down on the Russian propaganda when it was pointed out, so the only response you are entitled to is a hearty fuck you, you shitlicking goat-molester.

I've cut off family for being Russian shills and the only reason my uncle doesn't have a severely broken nose and missing teeth is I'd lose my job if I did something like that. So for you to think your shilling for Russia is going to get you anything other than a torrent of gratuitous abuse merits the question: How much grandeur did you put in your delusions this morning?

The Wikipedia page for the Azov battalion says that 10-20% of its members have neo--nazi views, and the unit started out as approximately 900 people and numbered around 2500 people at the start of Putin's invasion. The regiment also has Jewish soldiers. Combine that with the Twitter thread I posted on Ukrainian far right, and you're free to point out where anything I said was materially wrong, asshole.

[Broomstick]

Russia now admits the ship has sunk.

Coincidentally, that was just about exactly 110 years after the Titanic went down.

Less cheerfully, Russia is now enraged that the Ukrainians have dared to fight back and are calling to bomb Kyiv. I wonder that they fuck they think they've been doing the past 50 days?

Putin's Russia seems intent on escalating this even if no one else does.

[Lord Revan]

Russia now admits the ship has sunk.

Coincidentally, that was just about exactly 110 years after the Titanic went down.

Less cheerfully, Russia is now enraged that the Ukrainians have dared to fight back and are calling to bomb Kyiv. I wonder that they fuck they think they've been doing the past 50 days?

Putin's Russia seems intent on escalating this even if no one else does.

Well I'm pretty sure the Kremlin has known that Ukrainians have been fighting back, but they've done it now in way that's much harder for the Russian government to pretend isn't happening. Dead soldiers simple enough they're on "holiday", sunk warship not so easy.

There also might be the symbolic value of sinking a ship named Moskva (Moscow in Russia) that has also ticked of the Russian Government.

[wautd]

GHETTO EDIT: Looks like the ship has actually sunk!

Appearantly, Russian state media is being hysterically mad right now, demanding revenge (although, officially, it sunk by a "fire") and that it was a "direct attack against their territory"* or "that the motherland was attacked"*

*without a hint of irony

edit: Broomstick beat me to it

[Ralin]

and all you can muster is incoherent verbal abuse?

Yeah, it is. If by incoherent verbal abuse you mean telling you to get fucked and otherwise refusing to engage because you've proven you're a dishonest little ghoul who no amount of evidence or arguments will affect. That's the best anyone here can muster because the site owner has made it clear he won't let them ban you no matter how much you troll or how many rules you break.

Does it make you feel big to know that everyone has to just tiptoe around when you shit on the floor because you're Daddy's special boy?

[Gandalf]

The Wikipedia page for the Azov battalion says that 10-20% of its members have neo--nazi views, and the unit started out as approximately 900 people and numbered around 2500 people at the start of Putin's invasion. The regiment also has Jewish soldiers. Combine that with the Twitter thread I posted on Ukrainian far right, and you're free to point out where anything I said was materially wrong, asshole.

The Wikipedia page says that 10-20% of its supporters had Nazi or Nazi-adjacent views back in 2015, the membership was at 2500 in 2017, and that at the start of March 2022 they were at about 900. It's probably not the best source for what the Nazi composition of the Azov Batallion is like now.

[GuppyShark]

GHETTO EDIT: Looks like the ship has actually sunk!

Appearantly, Russian state media is being hysterically mad right now, demanding revenge (although, officially, it sunk by a "fire") and that it was a "direct attack against their territory"* or "that the motherland was attacked"*

*without a hint of irony

edit: Broomstick beat me to it

That's not ideal. That puts nuclear escalation back on the table.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

GHETTO EDIT: Looks like the ship has actually sunk!

Appearantly, Russian state media is being hysterically mad right now, demanding revenge (although, officially, it sunk by a "fire") and that it was a "direct attack against their territory"* or "that the motherland was attacked"*

*without a hint of irony

edit: Broomstick beat me to it

That's not ideal. That puts nuclear escalation back on the table.

Only if Ukraine later makes a play for retaking Crimea

[LadyTevar]

and all you can muster is incoherent verbal abuse?

Yeah, it is. If by incoherent verbal abuse you mean telling you to get fucked and otherwise refusing to engage because you've proven you're a dishonest little ghoul who no amount of evidence or arguments will affect. That's the best anyone here can muster because the site owner has made it clear he won't let them ban you no matter how much you troll or how many rules you break.

Does it make you feel big to know that everyone has to just tiptoe around when you shit on the floor because you're Daddy's special boy?

ENOUGH!
I WILL TEMP BAN BOTH YOUR ASSES IF YOU DON'T WALK AWAY RIGHT NOW

AND NO, ELFDART IS NOT PROTECTED, AND NEITHER ARE YOU, RALIN. GIVE ME ONE MORE REASON AND I WILL PROVE IT.

I DO NOT WANT TO SEE A POST BY EITHER OF YOU IN THIS THREAD FOR A WEEK.

[Broomstick]

GHETTO EDIT: Looks like the ship has actually sunk!

Appearantly, Russian state media is being hysterically mad right now, demanding revenge (although, officially, it sunk by a "fire") and that it was a "direct attack against their territory"* or "that the motherland was attacked"*

*without a hint of irony

edit: Broomstick beat me to it

That's not ideal. That puts nuclear escalation back on the table.

Nuclear escalation has ALWAYS been on the table.

Make no mistake, Russia is the side that has been steadily upping the ante on this shitshow.

Although last I heard the "chemical attack" in Mariupol might have been tear gas. Which, by the way, is still illegal/against treaty to use in warfare, but I doubt anyone on our side will want to go nuclear over something the local police have and can use, not to mention in many US states it's legal for civilians to purchase for self-defense purposes. And also to repel bears. However, it's still not certain what, exactly, is happening in Mariupol.

[Solauren]

The other question with the chemical attack is - how do we know that it wasn't a leak of some kind from the drone? I've heard of drone models using chemical engines, and the same with missiles they can launch.

All you need it one that uses something noxious to take damage, fly over people and suddenly it looks like a chemical attack.

Not saying Russia couldn't or wouldn't use chemical warfare, it just seems strange to have done it in that particular incident.

[Broomstick]

Bottom line, we can't be sure what, exactly, did or did not happen in the alleged chemical attack.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Russia claims to have carried out strike on Kyiv missile plant following Moskva warship sinking.
In other words, locking the stable door after the horse has bolted.

The strike on a missile plant in Kyiv is an escalation after the flagship of Putin's black sea fleet suffered damage, reports Peter Smith

Russia claims it has carried out a missile strike on a factory which produces military equipment on the outskirts of Kyiv, as it pledged to ramp up missile attacks on the Ukrainian capital after admitting the flagship of its Black Sea fleet has sunk.

It is thought a workshop and an administrative building at the Vizar plant, which lies near Kyiv's international Zhuliany airport, were seriously damaged.

It is believed the factory produces the same Neptune missiles which Ukraine alleges it used to sink the Moskva.

The threat of intensified attacks on Kyiv came after Russian authorities accused Ukraine of launching airstrikes on residential buildings in Bryansk, a region that borders Ukraine, and wounding seven people. Authorities in another border region of Russia also reported Ukrainian shelling Thursday. These claims could not be independently verified.

Life in Kyiv has been gradually returning to some normalcy after Russia failed to capture the capital and withdrew its troops in northern Ukraine to focus on a concentrated assault in the country’s east. A renewed bombardment could return the city’s residents to sheltering in subway stations and the steady wail of air raid sirens.

Amid the threat of renewed attacks on Kyiv, the regional police chief said the bodies of 900 civilians have been discovered in the region following Russia's withdrawal.

Andriy Nebytov, the head of Kyiv’s regional police force, said on Friday that the bodies had been abandoned in the streets or given temporary burials. He cited police data indicating that 95% of the casualties had died from sniper fire and gunshot wounds.

Ukrainian officials have not confirmed striking targets in Russia, and the reports by Russian authorities could not be independently verified. However, Ukrainian officials claimed their forces struck a key Russian warship with missiles on Thursday. If true, the claim would represent an important victory.

The guided-missile cruiser Moskva, named for the Russian capital, sank while being towed to port after suffering heavy damage under circumstances that remained in dispute.

The Russian Defence Ministry claimed the Moskva missile-guided cruiser sank in a storm on Thursday after being gutted by fire, and that the fire caused ammunition to detonate and blow up. Russia said all 500 crew members were evacuated.

Maksym Marchenko, the Ukrainian governor of the region around the Black Sea port of Odesa, said Ukrainian forces struck the cruiser with two missiles and caused "serious damage", a claim the US has backed.

Anton Gerashchenko, an advisor for Ukraine's Ministry of Internal Affairs, said the ship's captain died "during the explosion and fire on board".

Neither set of claims has been independently verified, but it is thought the ship has sunk.

The Moskva had the capacity to carry 16 long-range cruise missiles, and its removal reduces Russia’s firepower in the Black Sea. The warship’s loss in an invasion already widely seen as a historic blunder also was a symbolic defeat for Moscow as its troops regroup for an offensive in eastern Ukraine after retreating from much of the north.

The UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) said the Moskva’s loss would likely force Moscow to change the way its naval forces operate in the Black Sea. In a social media post on Friday, the MoD said the ship, which returned to operational service last year after a major refit, “served a key role as both a command vessel and air defence node.”

As Global Security Editor Rohit Kachroo notes, the Pentagon has said that four or five other Russian warships have now backed away from the Ukraine coastline- possibly as a consequence of the sinking of the cruiser.

The Moskva is the same ship Ukrainians defending Snake Island, off the south coast, told to go "f*** yourself" after Russians demanded they surrender.

Officials said the soldiers - who made headlines around the world - had been killed moments after their defiant message.

But the group was actually taken prisoner, said Ukrainian officials, who were later released from captivity as part of a prisoner exchange with Russian forces.

The Moskva cruiser is the second major Russian ship known to have suffered serious damage since Moscow invaded Ukraine, after tank carrier Orsk was hit and set on fire in the Sea of Azov in late March.

If Ukraine hit the Moskva with missiles, the cruiser likely represents the largest warship to be sunk in combat since the 1982 Falklands War, which saw a similar-sized cruiser called the ARA General Belgrano torpedoed by a British submarine, killing over 300 sailors on board.

In a late night television address, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukrainians should be proud of having survived 50 days under attack from Russia when Moscow "gave us a maximum of five".

The 44-year-old called it “an achievement of millions of Ukrainians, of everyone who on February 24 made the most important decision of their life – to fight".

Mr Zelenskyy gave an extensive and almost poetic listing of the many ways in which Ukrainians have helped to fend off the Russian troops, including “those who showed that Russian warships can sail away, even if it’s to the bottom” of the sea, his only reference to the Moskva.

Mariupol mayor says 20,000 civilians dead as second mass grave exhumed in Bucha
News about the flagship overshadowed Russian claims of advances in the southern port city of Mariupol, where Moscow’s forces have been battling the Ukrainians since the early days of the invasion in some of the heaviest fighting of the war — at a horrific cost to civilians.

Dwindling numbers of Ukrainian defenders in Mariupol are holding out against a siege that has trapped well over 100,000 civilians in desperate need of food, water and heating.

The UN has said people are being "starved to death" in the city.

Mariupol’s mayor has claimed 21,000 civilians have died in the city.

The port's capture is critical for Russia because it would allow its forces in the south, which came up through the annexed Crimean Peninsula, to fully link up with troops in the Donbas region, Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland and the target of the looming offensive.

Moscow-backed separatists have been battling Ukraine in the region since 2014, the same year Russia seized Crimea. Russia has recognized the independence of the rebel regions in the Donbas.

[Batman]

Does that mean Russia 'admits' the Ukraine sunk the ship?

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Depending who you ask, either it's being called "underwater evasive manoeuvres" or a "special underwater operation"

[bilateralrope]

Russia claims to have carried out strike on Kyiv missile plant following Moskva warship sinking.
In other words, locking the stable door after the horse has bolted.

A missile factory sounds like something you'd want to hit early in a war. So I'm wondering why Russia didn't hit it sooner. Did they not think it was a threat ?

Or have they been trying to hit it for most of the war and only succeeded now ?

[GuppyShark]

Maybe intended to capture it, not destroy it.

[Solauren]

Russia is starting to hit military targets because they were expecting the Ukraine to fold like a cheap house of cards, and they wanted to pick up as much hardware and other assets as they could (i.e factories).

Now that Russia is cluing in that the Ukraine is not a house of cards (and in fact, it's looking more like Russia is the house of cards), they're starting to actually try to damage the infrastructure they were hoping to capture.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Which will only get them so far with the ever-increasing amounts of military hardware and other supplies coming in from the West.
Is Russia changing its tactics as it claims to focus on the east of Ukraine?

As Russia’s war on Ukraine passes 50 days, its initial plan to storm the capital Kyiv has been stopped in its tracks but a new front may be about to open.

We’re led to believe Moscow is redeploying troops down to the south-east and the critical region of the Donbas.

Russia will for the first time have a central military commander on the ground – but does this show a shift in tactics? And, if so, why? And how will this unfold?

Former British army brigadier Ben Barry speaks to Correspondent Rachel Younger about what this could all mean?

Biden has taken this into account and is sending more artillery they can use.

[Beowulf]

The other question with the chemical attack is - how do we know that it wasn't a leak of some kind from the drone? I've heard of drone models using chemical engines, and the same with missiles they can launch.

All you need it one that uses something noxious to take damage, fly over people and suddenly it looks like a chemical attack.

Not saying Russia couldn't or wouldn't use chemical warfare, it just seems strange to have done it in that particular incident.

Usually they aren't that noxious of fuels, and the volume of air that stuff disperses in makes it unlikely to get to the required concentration from something that's flying.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Putin's humiliating double loss - two more top commanders killed as Ukraine war rages.

Colonel Ivan Grishin, the commander of Russia's 49th Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade, is reported to have been the latest high-ranking officer to have been killed in a massive blow to Moscow. He is said to have been killed in the Russian border town of Smolensk on Saturday, according to numerous reports circulating on social media. A post on VK, the Russian online social media and social networking service based in St Petersburg, appeared to confirm the killing of Grishin.

It read: "The commander of the 49th anti-aircraft missile brigade stationed in Smolensk was killed.

"According to initial information, this happened yesterday 16.04.2022.

"On the territory of Ukraine, while performing military duty, the commander of the 49th anti-aircraft missile brigade, a tactical air defence unit of the Ground Forces of the Russian Federation stationed in Smolensk, Colonel Grishin Ivan Ivanovich died!

"Knew him personally - honest, responsive and very strong in spirit man, a real colonel, a good family man."

Major General Vladimir Frolov, deputy commander of the 8th Combined Arms Army, had become the eighth Russian general to be killed in battle.

He was laid to rest with full military honours in St Petersburg on Saturday.

The city's governor Alexander Beglov, a close ally of Putin, said he sacrificed his life so that children, women and the elderly in Donbas would not hear bombs exploding again".

In a gushing eulogy at the general's funeral, he said he was from a military family and "died the death of the brave in battle against Ukrainian nationalists".

Frolov was "a true patriot, a brave and courageous man" who "honestly and to the end fulfilled his military and human duty".

The number of high ranking officers killed in battle during the war in Ukraine destroys claims from Putin that his "special military operation" is going according to plan.

Last month, in another blow to the Russian President, Lieutenant-General Andrei Mordvichev, commander of the 8th Combined Arms Army, who was killed in battle at Chornobaivka, near the southern city of Kherson.

That followed the deaths of Major General Andrei Kolesnikov of the 29th Combined Arms Army and Vitaly Gerasimov.

In early March, Major General Andrei Sukhovetsky was reportedly shot dead by a sniper at the battle for Hostomel Airfield about 30 miles outside Kyiv.

General Magomed Tushaev died when his Chechen special forces column, including a huge 56 tanks, was taken out by Ukrainian forces near Hostomel.

In the besieged city of Mariupol, Major-General Oleg Mityaev and Lieutenant General Yakov Rezantsev also died in battle.

Russia is already known to have lost eight generals since beginning its war of Ukraine nearly two months ago - a conflict that is said to have cost the lives of 20,000 troops.

This latest blow to Putin comes with footage emerging of Russia's flagship Moskva warship engulfed in flames and sinking in the Black Sea after it was struck by Ukrainian missile.

Smoke is seen billowing out of the vessel as it was being towed away by a tug boat.

Ukraine quickly claimed Russian First Rank Captain Anton Kuprin had died after the Moskva was fatally hit by Ukrainian Neptune missiles.

Anton Gerashenko, adviser to the Kyiv interior ministry, said he "died during an explosion and fire on board the former flagship of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation".

Russia claimed the crew was evacuated but there is mounting speculation of reported deaths among the battleship.

Moscow has not gone public about the possible death of Kuprin, but has also not announced the deaths of many prominent military personnel since the war in Ukraine began nearly two months ago.

[Solauren]

The Cynic in me is convinced this would be a very easy way for Putin to remove military officers without it being obvious that it was a purge...
Not saying that was hit intent from the start, but at this point he might figure 'well, if they get killed, good riddance, and if they don't, they've proven their loyalty..."

[Lord Revan]

The Cynic in me is convinced this would be a very easy way for Putin to remove military officers without it being obvious that it was a purge...
Not saying that was hit intent from the start, but at this point he might figure 'well, if they get killed, good riddance, and if they don't, they've proven their loyalty..."

There's of course the issue that the Ukrainians aren't really gonna co-operate with any purges Putin has planned and if are aware of those would more likely target the loyal officers to cripple the Russian war effort.