ok what the fuck is happening in ukraine

Yes, including half of them believing in a conspiracy theory that Russia killed the President in 2010.

― Scampo di tutti i Scampi (ShariVari), Saturday, February 26, 2022 8:01 PM (six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Yeah, this is wild. There's a memorial to the victims of the crash at Smolensk in a Polish cemetery in rural Pennsylvania, and the whole story was told to me as perfect truth! It was quite surprising, a couple of years later, to be listening to a podcast that unpacked the conditions leading up to the crash and the likely explanation, and debunked the "Russia shot down our government" thing.

http://en.psfcu.com/News__Press_Releases_630.html?article_id=1027

russia/rest of europe seem to be closing airspace to each other’s commercial flights

This picture, my God. https://t.co/8m2EDk8cBb pic.twitter.com/YW8dZ2fI04

— Emily Ramshaw (@eramshaw) February 26, 2022

can anyone answer me why Chechens are in there fighting for Putin?! I realize they are part of Russia, but they've had, what, two major rebellions? are they part of the russian military proper and just have no choice?

Fighting and dying:

Magomed Tushayev, one of Ramzan Kadyrov’s top warlords, has been killed in action in Hostomel.
🇺🇦Ukraine’s elite Alpha Group is reportedly fighting Chechens in the airfield. pic.twitter.com/bPHgBPK8sL

— Illia Ponomarenko (@IAPonomarenko) February 26, 2022

Head of Chechen Republic seems like a real sweetheart:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramzan_Kadyrov

Chechnya is run as a fiefdom of the Kadyrov family. In return for backing Russia, they’ve been pretty much left to do what they want. The Chechen branches of the Russian army are more or less Ramzan Kadyrov’s personal militia and he’s a close ally of Putin.

There are probably still some Chechens fighting on the other side too,

In another new twist on modern warfare, there’s a bunch of deepfakes convincing enough to fool a couple of gullible journalists circulating of Kadyrov saying the Ukrainian resistance is much stronger than he expected and he regrets getting involved.

thanks Shari.

The irony of all these scenes of citizens arming up, beauty queens with AKs, grandmas making Molotovs, action-movie caliber quotes (“I don’t need a ride, I need ammunition”)…It’s the fantasy scenario of a certain slice of American society—the slice most likely to be pro Putin.

— Michael Schaffer (@michaelschaffer) February 26, 2022

Britain can be embarrassing:

Kevin Foster on Twitter: "@LukePollard @pritipatel Hi Luke, As you will be well aware there are a number of routes, not least our seasonal worker scheme you will recall from your Shadow DEFRA days, which Ukrainians can qualify for, alongside the family route for those with relatives here." / Twitter

Hi Luke, As you will be well aware there are a number of routes, not least our seasonal worker scheme you will recall from your Shadow DEFRA days, which Ukrainians can qualify for, alongside the family route for those with relatives here.

— Kevin Foster (@kevin_j_foster) February 26, 2022

Second, we will paralyse the assets of Russia’s central bank.
 
This will freeze its transactions.
 
And it will make it impossible for the Central Bank to liquidate its assets. pic.twitter.com/8H9eWkNCW9

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) February 26, 2022

Not sure if the US will do the same, but potentially huge.

US is as well,.

damn

seems like they have announced they will do it but are not actually doing it yet.

my wife said there was a statement from China earlier today as well, in support? has that been posted?

in support of cutting russia off from SWIFT?

to the extent that I know anything about anything, none of this looks very good for Putin in the long term. The entire world has turned their back on him. He has fewer supporters than Assad.

The only China statement I've seen was a classic say nothing PR move - we respect Ukraine's territorial sovereignty but we get Russia's security concerns, everyone should chill out.

Ok I’m starting to come around to thinking maybe he lost it after all, if the China thing is really true.

But let’s see if that actually pans out

i would be inclined to think the increasing isolation is something putin not only welcomes but perhaps planned for
partially because it allows him to continue using the “everybody against us” angle locally
and if anything it would be the internal unrest he would be more worried about

and it gives him an excuse to contribute to this isolation precisely to exercise more local control
wouldn’t be surprised if russia will be introducing state level firewall a la china soon

xps to akm: no just in support of "territorial sovereignty" but imo even saying that is distancing and on purpose

Michael Kidman posted a video purportedly showing thermobaric weaponry being deployed today

Now, I only learned what thermobaric weaponry was itt this week but fucking yikes; anyone know if this is confirmed?

KOFMAN not Kidman

classic mou tactics and imo only a matter of time before putin allows ukraine to hold on to the nukes for 72% of the time and try to do the damage on the counter

love u darragh but I cannot parse that post at all

guessing it's a footie thing

lad's feeling chuffed; his club now has a positive goal differential

my bad, i should've posted a tweet that conveyed the depth of my feeling on the situation

(yes it was a footy thing)

I've seen several reports of thermobaric weapons, but I can't say with 100% certainty. But it seems very plausible to me (a dumb american.)

not trying to poop on you, ian ian ian, but that is not very helpful

I’m not going to pretend I understand a whole lot but this seems to be going really poorly for Putin? Everything is falling apart not even a week into this

Could any Russian speaker give me information about this? It is purported to be a resource for parents of russian soldiers, with videos confirming captured soldiers.
https://200rf.com

this seems to be going really poorly for Putin? Everything is falling apart not even a week into this

maybe? he leads a much larger country that can threaten ukraine on three sides. does it really matter if it takes an extra week?

he's definitely losing the public relations/internet battle, tho

What mookie said only I’m not sure they care much about the PR battle.

oh i think it's pretty important that europe sees the sunflower seeds lady and the snake island stuff!

i mean is there a more popular person in the world than zelinskiy right now?

i think it matters if it takes another week depending on how well the Ukrainian military can disrupt the Russian supply lines; recent twitter post i saw, for example, claims that to the east of Kiev, the Ukranians blew up a tanker of fuel intended for advancing tanks. if the russians can't keep their armies moving, or fed, or supplied w fresh water, i think that the time factor becomes super important.

xp
no, he is the most popular.

I guess the time factor matters in terms of giving allies time to decide to help more and the time to actually do so.

Saw a post that basically said Russia, of all countries, should know the logistical headaches of an eastern land war in winter.

The Zelinskyy thing is wild. Dude was literally a comedian playing the President on TV and now he’s the President for real during a fucking war.

Probably ought to be careful about assumptions of how the war is going (particularly based on twitter posts, particularly after things like the Ghost of Kyiv were shown to be false). It took us a month to capture Baghdad, the idea that Putin expected few casualties or a three day ground war is a huge assumption.

If it was a movie plot it would feel hackneyed.

Xp

Also agree with milo, very much want to be hopeful but still feel pretty apprehensive and grim rn.

I think the “pr” battle does matter a lot tho. Putin has gotten away with a lot over the last decade and has suffered what I’d consider light consequences. And what it seems like now is that a lot of nations that would prefer to turn a blind eye are standing up to him. I doubt he expected Germany to agree to a swift ban or for Kazakhstan to refuse to send troops (or maybe he did factor for this, I dunno).
But probably what he fears most is looking weak in front of his people. And that’s where the pr fight can really hurt him.

PR battle does matter but there's a wide gulf between "surprisingly resistant" and "turning the invaders back". hoping like hell for the Ukraine but there's probably a lot of ugliness ahead.

mostly I'm just reading what's being posted so keep it coming please (very helpful)

I get the horrible feeling that things going poorly for Putin translates into Putin flattening Kyiv with tens of thousands of civilian deaths. There is no way Putin is not going to take Kyiv, even if it means Berlin-level destruction

things going badly for putin sure but they've got way more bodies/weaponry at their disposal to throw at whatever this is and the ability to make adjustments

not trying to doomsay but it's only been a couple of days
minute to minute twitter updates can be misleading as to where things are headed
doesnt give you the scope of the whole thing which is kind of what is needed