US Foreign Policy 3.0: We're The Mets of International Diplomacy

[Kepler]

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

All around the world, the same BS. The rich urbanites never send their sons to die in shitty wars, that's what the poor rurals are for.

[MichVandal]

All around the world, the same BS. The rich urbanites never send their sons to die in shitty wars, that's what the poor rurals are for.

Right, look at Viet Nam. For sure not something Americans should crow about.

[Jimjamesak]

All around the world, the same BS. The rich urbanites never send their sons to die in shitty wars, that's what the poor rurals are for.

Unless you're royalty, then it's expected that your kids go (see Elizabeth II, Prince Andrew, and Prince Harry).

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

And of course, as always, a prime opportunity for Russia to do a little ethnic cleansing via conscription of minority-majority oblasts.

[Handyman]

"Why don't presidents fight the wars why do they always send the poor?!"
-system of a down

[Kepler]

All around the world, the same BS. The rich urbanites never send their sons to die in shitty wars, that's what the poor rurals are for.

Although to be fair the poor rurals are usually the gun humping bigots, so...

[Kepler]

Day 208.

• Russian President Vladimir Putin appears to be increasingly relying on irregular, poorly trained ad-hoc volunteer and proxy units rather than attempting to rebuild damaged or destroyed conventional Russian ground forces units.
• Ukrainian forces continue to consolidate positions on the east bank of the Oskil River in Kharkiv Oblast despite Russian efforts to contain them.
• Russian forces in western Kherson Oblast may be attempting to fall back to more defensible positions in a controlled withdrawal to avoid the chaotic retreat that characterized the collapse of Russian defenses in Kharkiv earlier in September.
• Russian forces suffered devastating losses of manpower and equipment in their fight for eastern Ukraine and especially during the Ukrainian Kharkiv counter-offensive. Multiple Russian armored and mechanized units have likely been effectively destroyed according to assessments released on September 18.

Also, shades of Hitler delusion:

A prominent Russian milblogger also claimed that the Russian command issued a “no retreat” order last week for all units serving in Donbas, requiring that Russian forces operating on the axis hold their positions regardless of the unfolding situation in front of them.[12]This order would be noteworthy in two ways if the report is accurate. First, Donetsk Oblast is the only area in Ukraine in which Russian forces are still attempting offensive operations. There have been sporadic reports of limited Ukrainian counterattacks, but no evidence that Ukraine is preparing a large-scale counteroffensive operation in this area.[13] The order suggests that the Russian military may fear a Ukrainian counteroffensive into the teeth of their last offensive efforts, however. Second, it shows deep mistrust of the combat capabilities of the units receiving the order in contrast with the apparently higher confidence Russian commanders have in the units in western Kherson Oblast, where sensible efforts to conduct a controlled withdrawal appear to prevail.

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

The Ukraine War has made Freerepublic a fun follow again. Freepers are torn between a handful of Putinistas who post Kremlin propaganda and call everyone else fascists and sheep, and the majority of MAGAts who don't trust Putin but are tired of America playing the world's police.

[Kepler]

I am sure Freep also has the SVR infiltration of all social media.

[Kepler]

1. Wagner Group goes through Russian prisons and recruits rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ***-kickers, ****-kickers and Methodists.

2. Prisoners are shipped to Ukrainian front, given weapons, and sent to the front line.

3. Prisoners kill their commanders and surrender to the UA en masse.

[Handyman]

Basic game theory. They will be treated better as a POW in Ukraine than they will be in a Russian Jail.

In other news Ukraine is claiming they hacked Wagner Group's web site and have all the info on the people involved.

[aparch]

1. Wagner Group goes through Russian prisons and recruits rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ***-kickers, ****-kickers and Methodists.

2. Prisoners are shipped to Ukrainian front, given weapons, and sent to the front line.

3. Prisoners kill their commanders and surrender to the UA en masse.

[rufus]

1. Wagner Group goes through Russian prisons and recruits rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ***-kickers, ****-kickers and Methodists.

2. Prisoners are shipped to Ukrainian front, given weapons, and sent to the front line.

3. Prisoners kill their commanders and surrender to the UA en masse.

That is frickin' brilliant.

[Kepler]

Oh man the Kremlin North (Moscow) is even more of a sh-t show than the Kremlin South (Mar-A-Lago) right now:

Urgent discussion on September 19 among Russia’s proxies of the need for Russia to immediately annex Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts (much of the latter of which is not under Russian control) suggests that Ukraine’s ongoing northern counter-offensive is panicking proxy forces and some Kremlin decision-makers. The legislatures of Russia’s proxies in occupied Ukraine, the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DNR and LNR), each called on their leadership to “immediately” hold a referendum on recognizing the DNR and LNR as Russian subjects.[1] Russian propagandist and RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan spoke glowingly of the call, referring to it as the “Crimean scenario.” She wrote that by recognizing occupied Ukrainian land as Russian territory, Russia could more easily threaten NATO with retaliatory strikes for Ukrainian counterattacks, “untying Russia’s hands in all respects.”[2]

This approach is incoherent. Russian forces do not control all of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. Annexing the claimed territories of the DNR and LNR would, therefore, have Russia annex oblasts that would be by Kremlin definition partially ”occupied” by legitimate Ukrainian authorities and advancing Ukrainian forces. Ukrainian strikes into Russian-annexed Crimea clearly demonstrate that Ukrainian attacks on Russia’s illegally annexed territory do not automatically trigger Russian retaliation against NATO, as Simonyan would have her readers believe. Partial annexation at this stage would also place the Kremlin in the strange position of demanding that Ukrainian forces unoccupy “Russian” territory, and the humiliating position of being unable to enforce that demand. It remains very unclear that Russian President Vladimir Putin would be willing to place himself in such a bind for the dubious benefit of making it easier to threaten NATO or Ukraine with escalation he remains highly unlikely to conduct at this stage.

Russian leadership may be running out of ways to try to stop Ukrainian forces as they advance across the Oskil River and closer to Luhansk Oblast. The Kremlin may believe that partial annexation could drive recruitment of additional forces, both from within Russia and from within newly annexed Ukrainian territory. Russian forces are desperately attempting to mobilize additional forces from all potential sources to backfill their heavily degraded and demoralized units but have proven unable to generate significant combat power, as ISW has repeatedly written.[3]

This latest annexation discussion also omits other parts of Russian-occupied southern Ukraine in which the Kremlin was previously planning sham annexation referenda. A willingness to abandon the promise to bring all the occupied areas into Russia at the same time would be a significant retreat for Putin to make in the eyes of the hardline pro-war groups he appears to be courting. It remains to be seen if he is willing to compromise himself internally in such a fashion. The Kremlin’s proxies in Donbas regularly outpace Kremlin messaging, on the other hand, and may have done so again as they scramble to retain their occupied territory in the face of Ukraine’s successful and ongoing counter-offensive.