ok what the fuck is happening in ukraine

a little nuclear warhead, as a treat

apologies for derail, but I have co-worker who brought up the Putin stopping bioweapons angle during a staff meeting. He didn't mention the Fauci/convoy element, but those are definitely other wacked out things he likes to harp upon, so now I'm rolling my eyes at the fact that it is all part of one grand theory.

during a staff meeting

wtf

well, he doesn't seem particularly rational these days

― Andy the Grasshopper, Friday, March 4, 2022 2:11 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

no but if he launches nukes he's risking turning all of Russia into dust. if he fires into a NATO country it's practically a certainty. I understand how Putin is making people very very nervous right now but crazy, irrational people don't just jump off bridges thinking they could sprout wings and fly

one thing to remember when putin talks about “soviet union” or “russian empire” is that these are dog whistles for different parts of population

Territorial advance/roll-back to xpost'97 borders could be "justified" as means to rolling back, discrediting NATO/ imperialist, pesky liberal democracy, in glorious alliance with China and other post-democratic underdogs, according to that document accidentally released(?) and pasted upthread.

xxxp

I KNOW

and this is not an isolated incident by any means, I have been plagued with shitty political conversations during staff meetings for years

But yeah dog whistles for different parts of population too.

of course having said that I do get pretty worried about some dumb misstep escalating things to the brink, say Russian soldiers indiscriminately firing upon something they shouldn't or a sitting US Senator openly calling for Putin to be murdered

xp How do these things come up in staff meetings? A time set aside for comments on news of the day?

he doesn't seem particularly rational these days

Even North Korea has managed to evade destruction for decades.

Firing on the biggest reactor in Europe, even with post-Chernobyl design, is quite a precedent, no matter what else happens or doesn't, in the short run.

xxp

more or less. this most recent one was like "I'm sure everyone is aware of the situation in Ukraine, pretty scary stuff"

coworker: "well I heard that the US is building bioweapons in Ukraine and Putin is trying to root them out, but of course you wouldn't hear about that on mainstream news. Verrrrrrry interesting."

FFS

you reported this coworker to Homeland Security, I take it

FaceBook, Twitter and Youtube all blocked in .ru...winning

this is like 90% of our staff here in Texas, messed up conspiracy theories are practically a requirement

I'm fucking all your moms. But you won't hear that on the mainstream news. Ipso facto.

how did Dr Fauci become this evil mastermind, he seems like a mild-manned grandfather

exactly

that's what he wants you to think

Ahhhh, now I seeee... hmmmm....

Reports of a significant armor engagement in a suburb of Kyiv, …between Russian forces. Friendly fire restulted in the loss of 9 tanks and 4 infantry fighting vehicles. pic.twitter.com/lS0ysDVagk

— Alexander S. Vindman (@AVindman) March 4, 2022

Translation:

"Just in the Kiev region, near Severinovka, the Russian occupation forces came into battle with ... the Russian occupation forces. As a result, thanks to "friendly fire", 9 tanks and 4 armored personnel carriers were destroyed...

Accordingly, it saved us 13 Јavelin."

Savage.

— Evergreen Intel (@vcdgf555) March 4, 2022

Related, from the Guardian:

Russia’s ruthless treatment of its own soldiers, while concealable at a small scale, has now brought about operational repercussions. Having not told its troops that they were about to go to war, its army has been left unprepared, logistically and psychologically. Morale is low, limiting the combat power of Russian forces. With too little time to plan, Russian logistics and communications are in disarray, slowing its pace of advance. This gives the Ukrainians crucial time to prepare their defences and organise a protracted resistance.

From some woman's IG story:

- almost all non-state media in Russia are closed/blocked
- all flights to Europe are cancelled
- spreading "fakes about the war" and protesting faces up to 15-20 years in jail
- $1 = 105 rub; 1 Euro = 117 rub with average salary of 32000 rub
- international money transfer is almost impossible
- Europe stopped issuing visas for Russians, some countries cancel already existing visas
- Apple, H&M, Nike, Airbnb, Ikea, Paypal, Intel, Dell, BMW, Audi, Ford, Boeing, DHL...left Russian market
- movies too
- Nordstrom 2 closed
- after Russia left Council of Europe Russian politics got quite excited about returning the death penalty
so basically all Russians are captured in hell. no media, no voice, only death/jail threat. poverty and lack of resources is just a question of time. and of course no nice cars, clothes or food.
my family can neither earn or send me money for studies. and hell knows when I am gonna see them again. unless I lose my Swiss visa - if so, I am going back home with no chance of returning.

today I've been trying to track down online texts by Nicolai Leskov and keep running into website errors and I'm like "wtf? oh, .ru"

been meaning to post about it.. echo of moscow and dozhd were forced to close

any still independent sources referring to what is happening as "war" accompany it by a footnote along the lines of "roskomnadzor insists what is happening is a 'special military operation'". the majority of news also have a footnote "reported by such and such which is considered a foreign agent" (basically anybody who doesn't push the official propaganda is included in the list of "foreign agents")

and among all the insanity this bit still stood out: there was a bill introduced in duma to draft participants of anti war protests to military and send them to donbass. but apparently it won't happen because according to peskov "military duty is an honour and not a punishment"

And then they played Frampton

Ooh baby I love your war

i want you to Uskoreniye

More Russia than Ukraine, but:

So... am I seeing this correctly?

Basically Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul gave the pensions of all Kentucky teachers to Russia and now none of those teachers will have retirement money?

'cause it kinda looks like that. https://t.co/hP1hte5Qzg

— Chris Vickery (@VickerySec) March 4, 2022

Sold them off last month. https://t.co/U5wdKzTckL

— Dale Rutz (@DaleRutz) March 4, 2022

That’s fucking insane.

So it's not actually 'completely false' than, right?

I think I saw that it (thankfully) amounted to a relatively small amount of the total fund.

...also how would US Senators control the Kentucy Teachers Retirement System?

(citation needed, also can US posters please stop spamming up this thread with random thoughts and musings kthxbye)

No Josh is right. The KY TRS has $28 billion in assets under management. $13m is less than 0.05% of the fund. And it looks like they sold it.
https://trs.ky.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/20210827-Investment-returns.pdf

Moreover, as US senators, McConnell and Paul have zero to do with state teachers, let alone a state teachers retirement fund.

Moreover, those investments were almost certainly chosen by some fund manager, state govt doesn’t get involved in picking investments.

ty for actual content, appreciated

Actually TBC it’s not like 100% impossible that there’s some corrupt connection between McConnell and a Sberbank investment by a Kentucky fund, but you’d need a lot more info and certainly the pension fund is not bankrupted or seriously harmed atm. Also it doesn’t look to me like it was actually the second largest shareholder or anything close to it, not sure where Twitter is getting that.

And pension funds invest in all kinds of stocks all around the world so it’s not inherently weird to me that they had that investment.

my old job's pension was .33% in russia and now i will never be able to retire

excerpt:

Update 11 – IAEA Director General Statement on Situation in Ukraine

...The safety systems of the plant’s six reactors had not been affected and there has been no release of radioactive material.

Radiation monitoring systems at the site are fully functional.

However, the operator has reported that the situation remains very challenging and therefore it has not yet been possible to access the whole site to assess that all safety systems are fully functional.

Of the plant’s reactor units, Unit 1 is shut down for maintenance, Units 2 and 3 have undergone a controlled shut down, Unit 4 is operating at 60 percent power and Units 5 and 6 are being held “in reserve” in low power mode.

Two people were reported injured.

The IAEA Incident and Emergency Centre (IEC) has been put in full response mode due to the events at Zaporizhzhia NPP, Director General Grossi said. The IEC will be manned around the clock to continuously receive, assess and disseminate information about developments. (w more resources linked from this page)https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/update-11-iaea-director-general-statement-on-situation-in-ukraine

Okay, I was wondering this same thing... from BBC:

Q: Why doesn't the Ukrainian air force attack the long Russian convoy?

Everyone is baffled as to why Ukraine has not done more to attack the Russian convoy as it is a sitting duck for drone and airstrikes.

There are several possible explanations, Ukraine may be running out of armed drones and its small, outnumbered air force may be wary of being shot down by Russian air defence batteries.

Ben Barry from the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) suggests the Ukrainians may well be safeguarding what resources they do have in readiness to counter-attack when the Russians get closer to Kyiv...

They should just do a drive-by Molotov.

They may be stuck in mud, but I’ve reached my limit on sharing Twitter links.

thank you all for answering my no-fly question earlier. makes sense now. i was overthinking it.

and i probably should've worded "would trigger nuclear war" a little differently.

Unless Eazy, I share away. Not a fan of all the memey stuff in the thread but I posted another one by the guy earlier, he knows his stuff, and...this could be why the air force isn't bothering

Lady's and Gentlemen, boys & girls, it is time saddle up for another installment of the "Mud and Truck Maintenance in Ukraine" feed.

And this one will be a doozy, because we are talking about Russian truck refueling in the 64km column north of Kyiv. 🧵

1/ pic.twitter.com/akTbOuo4tI

— Trent Telenko (@TrentTelenko) March 4, 2022

Not unrelated

it’s amusing watching everyone who never served learning in real time just HOW MUCH of a soldier’s time is spent on maintenance. I bet I spent 40 hours in the motor pool for every hour my m1a1 was in actual maneuvers. Probably more.

— John Cole (@Johngcole) March 5, 2022

We're all blind here, one of these people on Twitter has decent eyesight but how would we know?

But this aligns with what I posted earlier about the Russian army being based around artillery.

It's time for a reality check.

Everyone RTing these threads needs to look at an updated map of the conflict.

What they'll find is that the bulk of the Ukrainian military has been *encircled* in the East of the country. pic.twitter.com/SgSltxISU8

— Clint Ehrlich (@ClintEhrlich) March 5, 2022

idk, maybe don't post Russian propaganda by Fox News pundits, because everyone knows where their eyes are.