Russia's War Against Ukraine

[Jarhead0331]

Ukrainian pilots arrive in Poland to pick up EU provided fighters.

Sounds like: 28 MiG-29s from Poland, and 12 from Slovakia

Apparently the Ukrainians thought they would get 16 Mig 29s and 14 Su 25s from Bulgaria, but it sounds like the Bulgarian Prime Minister quashed the donation.

Hopefully the Poles will throw in some goodies on the pylons before turning them over.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukrainian-pilots-arrive-in-poland-to-pick-up-donated-fighter-jets/ar-AAUraGd?ocid=msedgntp

Yesterday Russia increased its attacks on airfields, particularly those in western Ukraine, most likely in an effort to deprive Ukraine of bases of operation for EU supplied aircraft. It will be interesting to see how long these planes can survive and how much of a difference they can make. The noose is definitely tightening.

[JasonPratt]

Okay, I finally found something about the thermobaric bomb drop claim, this morning.

USA Today says the claim partly came from Amnesty International. USA Today says they said it was used on (more likely fell off course near) a preschool in north Ukraine where students were sheltering inside.

Jen Psaki said the White House didn't have confirmation yet, but if true this would be potentially a war crime.

The USA Today article (linked here via MSN https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/russia-has-been-accused-of-using-vacuum-bombs-in-ukraine-what-are-those/ar-AAUsS0G?ocid=entnewsntp) says that Amnesty International accused Russia of using at least one thermobaric bomb.

However the linked Amnesty International article (https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/02/russian-military-commits-indiscriminate-attacks-during-the-invasion-of-ukraine/) does not say this specifically, although it could be implied as possible from analysis of an impact crater from a strike that caused a lot of fire damage. I rather doubt a thermobaric weapon would leave an impact crater per se, since that seems to run against its mode of operation, but others here may have better information. (Maybe the point was that a lot of burn damage was caused by something with a relatively small non-explosive impact crater? I would think thermobaric weapons would be pretty easily identified from the damage pattern alone!)

Note that the Amnesty article linked from USA Today refers to damage caused on February 24th.

I suspect the Amnesty article has been updated to remove claims of thermobaric weapons. There are no articles at Amnesty right now mentioning that term at all, and any reference to "vacuum" is to some other topic and dates no earlier than last May.

Anyway, the specific reference to thermobaric/vacuum weapons was not from Amnesty.org (or not anymore), but from Oksana Markarova, Ukraine's ambassador to the United States, who (per the USA Today article) told reporters after meeting with members of the U.S. Congress on Monday that Russia had used a thermobaric weapon.

"They used the vacuum bomb today," Markarova said after a meeting with lawmakers. "...The devastation that Russia is trying to inflict on Ukraine is large."

This could be Ukrainian propaganda, however.

[Uberhaus]

https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/russia-flight-ban-canada/index.html

Canada, the EU and UK have closed their airspace to Russian aircraft.  Hopefully, domestic political pressure can be brought on the US administration to do the same and cause further economic problems to Russia.

[JasonPratt]

The AN-225 is apparently a casualty, too:

http://www.cnn.com/travel/article/antonov-an-225-largest-plane-destroyed-ukraine-scli-intl

[Uberhaus]

NATO should open its airspace to pursued Ukrainian aircraft at least temporarily.  The Russians will not like having their own tactic used against them.  if Putin responds with a tantrum and detonates a nuclear weapon remotely in a show of 'power', the West can then provide airbases, Western aircraft and ordinance for a long war. If these are attacked, it will be Article 5.

This is brinkmanship but the West needs to finally respond in the same manner.  This will boil down to a battle of the will of Putin and an ever shrinking support base and the democratically minded in the Free World.  Pundits state of Putin that he acts as a chess grand master; however I will quote a real grand master on Putin.  "He thinks he is playing chess but he is playing poker."  And clearly with his opening moves another quote from the past from the same grand master:  "Putin thinks he is playing chess, he is playing checkers."

These are extreme measures but we are all in an extreme situation and right now the Ukrainians are dying as our proxies.  Putin will be rageful that the West has provided the weapons that stopped his initial attacks, and he will be rageful that the Ukrainian Air Force has been reconstituted and probably trained by NATO, so providing further aid will just be more of the same. 

[Jarhead0331]

^Disagree.

NATO opening its airspace to Ukrainian aircraft actively engaged in combat with Russia would be madness and totally unjustifiable under the circumstances in my view. It is as if you are suggesting that NATO should purposefully goad Russia into a situation that would require an invocation of Article 5. The purpose of Article 5 is for it to be used as a shield, not as a sword, as you are suggesting. You are trying to weaponize a purely defensive provision of an alliance to which Ukraine is not even a member.

I don't concern myself with all the tough talk and characterizations of Putin. I concern myself only with facts and consequences. Based upon both, the EU, NATO and other civilized nations can and should respond, but twisting our military defense commitments in order to use them to escalate or trigger a larger war is an outrageous suggestion and I am glad that thus far, it does not seem that those in leadership roles are seeing this situation through such an aggressive and unlawful lens.

[al_infierno]

Yeah, intentionally escalating the conflict seems like A Very Bad Idea ™

[MengJiao]

At least a BBC expert has stated that there is no movement in Russian strategic readiness.

  Right.  US Intell also reportedly sees no particular change in Russian nuke postures, but who knows, maybe they just relax some restrictions on their go codes or something, to
vritually quote Slim Pickens AKA Major Kong in Doctor Strangelove:

Major Kong!!! "Nukular combat toe-to-toe with the Rooskies."

  Where the hell's Major Kong?

"Economic wars quite often turn into real ones," former Russian President Medvedev says
From CNN's Vasco Cotovio in Moscow and Xiaofei Xu in Paris

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has lashed out against remarks by French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, who earlier said that France was waging an economic war against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.

"Watch your tongue, gentlemen," Medvedev, who is the current deputy Chairman of Russia's Security Council tweeted on Tuesday. "Don't forget that in human history, economic wars quite often turned into real ones."
Earlier on Monday, Le Maire said in an interview with French broadcaster FranceInfo that his country and the EU would "launch total economic and financial war against Russia."

I thought there was a real war going on already?  (You have to wonder how to parce "real"...I guess real war for the Russians is nuking France for cutting them out of the banking system.
But if you blow up the banking system along with everything else...is that helpful?  Is that constructive?  Maybe not.
   )

  Russian state news accidentally publishes article saying Russia has defeated Ukraine and restored its 'historical borders'
ydzhanova@businessinsider.com (Yelena Dzhanova,Abbie Shull) - Yesterday 1:17 PM

  Well, that is odd.  The misssus and I (as Mr. Collins, it would seem, she as Charlotte nee Lucas) looking on with some disapprobation, had a kind of Jane Austen moment  -- I said "Such perspicacity!"
She demurred, "Mister Collins!  Ukraine is not totally occupied yet!"

[Pete Dero]

About the planes in the area registered in Bermuda I found this : Russian airlines pay high tariffs on aircraft imported from the USA and Europe, but Russian regulations allow airlines to avoid those taxes if the aircraft are registered outside of Russia.
For this reason Aeroflot, S7 and Promeda register the Boeing and Airbus airplanes they operate in Bermuda.

[al_infierno]

Russian authorities started a website compiling the names, faces, and social media links of "traitors" who speak out against the war.  Even so far as including people who simply say "this is terrible."  Disgusting.

[MengJiao]

Russian authorities started a website compiling the names, faces, and social media links of "traitors" who speak out against the war.  Even so far as including people who simply say "this is terrible."  Disgusting.

  As a different Mr. Collins, I went to propose to Miss Eliza Bennett. She said, "But Mr. Collins, your name and at least one of your faces and some of your other indescretions, is on a website
of traitors.  They will kill you intimately or worse if I learn to spell."
   "Not as intimately as I will eat that ham."
   "Mr. Collins!" she cried, "you won't be so quick to say that when you are dead."
   "No doubt," I answered bravely, "still you have to wonder: why a website?"
 

[JasonPratt]

^ That was pretty good.  8)

[MengJiao]

^ That was pretty good.  8)

  Thank you.  I feel Jane Austen offers a sort of moral perspective on at least the verbal weirdness of the Russian onslaught.

[GDS_Starfury]

good article

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/02/28/world-war-iii-already-there-00012340

[Uberhaus]

^Disagree.

NATO opening its airspace to Ukrainian aircraft actively engaged in combat with Russia would be madness and totally unjustifiable under the circumstances in my view. It is as if you are suggesting that NATO should purposefully goad Russia into a situation that would require an invocation of Article 5. The purpose of Article 5 is for it to be used as a shield, not as a sword, as you are suggesting. You are trying to weaponize a purely defensive provision of an alliance to which Ukraine is not even a member.

I don't concern myself with all the tough talk and characterizations of Putin. I concern myself only with facts and consequences. Based upon both, the EU, NATO and other civilized nations can and should respond, but twisting our military defense commitments in order to use them to escalate or trigger a larger war is an outrageous suggestion and I am glad that thus far, it does not seem that those in leadership roles are seeing this situation through such an aggressive and unlawful lens.

I defer to your legal knowledge and expertise.