Sanctions against Russia

[willedoo]

35 minutes ago, kgwilson said:

Why Russia has created all of the beach fortifications in Crimea seems to display a complete failure to understand how to defend the place.

I recon it's all for show to make the civilians believe they're safe. A political diversion to suck the plebs into supporting putin the master strategist. It's a joke. 

[Old Koreelah]

No recent talk of the canal from Ukraine, which is Crimea’s water lifeline.

[willedoo]

2 hours ago, Old Koreelah said:

No recent talk of the canal from Ukraine, which is Crimea’s water lifeline.

Some time after the annexation of Crimea in 2014, Ukraine blocked the canal with a dam across it. It was a long way from the catchment dam on the river, close to the Crimean border. Early in the war when the Russians occupied that land they reopened the canal and the water flowed again to Crimea.

 

The catchment dam at the source is on the Russian occupied left bank of the Dnipro River at Nova Kakhovka. As soon as the Ukrainians cross the river and take the town they'll be able to shut the water off at it's source. Google maps haven't updated the satellite image since pre war, so in this screen grab you can see the wet canal north of the Crimean border and the blocking dam the Ukrainians built. Before the war Crimea was relying on piped water from Russia and water restrictions to get by.

 

[willedoo]

Or maybe the Ukrainians won't shut the water off. Probably no point unless there was to be a long siege of Crimea. It also supplies water to the Ukrainian towns north of Crimea.

[willedoo]

Here's the catchment dam at Nova Kakhovka on the Dnipro River.

 

[willedoo]

The Ukrainians had an accident with a Leopard 2 tank at the training ground in Poland. It looks like they've had a head on collision with one tank mounting the other and hitting the turret.

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

OUch! That's gotta hurt.

[willedoo]

Here's a map of Crimea showing the three land access points from the Ukrainian mainland. A problem with getting sizeable land forces across the Syvash is that a lot of it is too shallow for conventional boats but too deep and muddy to wade across. The Russians built a pontoon bridge across it to take trucks and artillery over when they re-took Crimea from the Germans in 1944.

 

The second map shows Russian fortifications and trench systems just south of the Crimean border.

 

Edited April 20, 2023 by willedoo

[willedoo]

This is a Russian MTLB amphibious armoured fighting vehicle with old track chains welded on as added armour. Not a bad idea and there's a lot of scrap Russian tracks available these days.

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

Something a little light-hearted inthe tragedy of this war: https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-hackers-used-russia-drone-money-for-sex-toys-2023-4?r=US&IR=T

 

[willedoo]

I was reading that in the last six months, 300,000 artillery shells and one million ammunition rounds have been shipped from Iran to Russia via Russian cargo ships operating in the Caspian sea. I'd never really thought about the Caspian Sea transport link between the two countries before. It makes sense that the heavy freight would go via ship and land transport. My guess is that lighter freight like drones would be shipped by air freight.

[Old Koreelah]

6 hours ago, willedoo said:

I'd never really thought about the Caspian Sea transport link between the two countries before….

During WWII the Caspian Sea route was vital to the Soviets resisting Hitler.

After they invaded Iran, the Allies delivered 8 million tonnes of supplies through the Persian Corridor, much of it carried across Iran on hundreds of thousands of Studebaker trucks, before being loaded onto ships crossing the Caspian.

 

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

 

We hoped Russia was so isolated they’d run out of ammo, but now Ukraine has more suffering ahead. Due to America’s treatment of Iran, they’re supplying lots of weapons and ammo to America’s enemy.

 

[facthunter]

TRUMP will fix that. He's gunna NUKE them off the face of the earth WHEN HE gets back in. I guess that will be after he gets EVEN with all those who wouldn't bend the rules to keep him there last time. Oh , I almost forgot. He's gunna stop WW3 the first day , even before He's sworn in.  Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

Amen to that!

 

May as well pray - will achieve the same

[facthunter]

It's hard to be in any way optimistic..  Nev

[nomadpete]

23 hours ago, facthunter said:

He's gunna stop WW3 the first day , even before He's sworn in

At least he was offering to address the problem. I don't see too many other politicians claiming they will address the problem of imminent global war.

 

(Duck for cover, awaiting replies)

[Jerry_Atrick]

I'll donate you my kevlar jacket :-)

[willedoo]

31 minutes ago, nomadpete said:

At least he was offering to address the problem. I don't see too many other politicians claiming they will address the problem of imminent global war.

 

(Duck for cover, awaiting replies)

I get the feeling Trump is only offering to address Russia's problem.

[willedoo]

There's a lot of campaigns popping up lately to encourage and educate people to boycott western products that profit from sales in Russia. Beefeater Gin is one that's had a bit of attention lately, along with many others. Some corporations that initially ceased supplies to Russia are returning to the market. French companies seem to be the worst offenders. Trading blood for cash.

 

[willedoo]

Here's a photo of Maryinka, a town that has been totally destroyed. Once home to 10,000 people, there's now not one intact building left. Second photo is an outdated google maps street view of Maryinka dated 2011, back when the 1991 Ukrainian border was still intact.

 

Edited April 26, 2023 by willedoo

[willedoo]

South Africa has backtracked on their plan to cease to be a signatory to the International Criminal Court ahead of a possible visit by putin in August for the BRICS meeting. They are saying now they will remain a signatory. Technically, as a signatory, they would be obliged to arrest putin as a wanted war criminal when he entered South Africa. Probably either putin won't go to the meeting, or South Africa will refuse to arrest him if he does. They have strong links with Russia going back to the ruling ANC's history with the former Soviet Union.

[nomadpete]

I'm getting impatient. Probably not as impatient as some.

 

The longer we wait for the spring counter offensive, the bigger it is likely to be.

 

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

 

[willedoo]

1 hour ago, nomadpete said:

I'm getting impatient. Probably not as impatient as some.

 

The longer we wait for the spring counter offensive, the bigger it is likely to be.

 

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

 

You would think something would start happening before the end of next month. It will probably depend on all the gear and crews being ready, but there's signs of it all starting to come together fairly quickly now. They're playing a smart game; let's hope they get it right. I don't know whether they'll only get one bite of the cherry, but regardless, they'll need a good measure of success to keep western support at a peak.

 

Russia is showing signs of preparing to go on the defensive, but I hope the reduced Russian shelling rate lately is a result of shortages, and not holding back supplies to counter the expected Ukrainian push. Maybe it's a bit of both. It's hard to figure out Gerasimov, Russia's current war chief. How he reacts to a Ukrainian counter offensive will show how versatile he is. All before him have been one trick ponies; time will tell whether he's any different. The last leader, the Uncle Fester look-alike, achieved one thing in that he got all those trench systems in place which will make it hard for the Ukrainians. His other achievement was to squander most of Russia's missile stocks for almost no gain.

 

When Ukraine starts a counter offensive, it's hard to see Russia having the capability to also go on the offensive and try to outflank the Ukrainians. Russia carrying out a fighting retreat is more believable. Hopefully Ukraine has plenty of long range HIMARS munitions saved up, and plenty of those guided bomb kits the U.S. has been sending them. We won't know until we see it, but I suspect Ukraine has a few tricks up it's sleeve that have been kept under wraps. It will be interesting to see how many of those drone suicide boats they've managed to build. They could crack Sevastopol harbour if they had a big enough swarm of them.

[kgwilson]

While the counter attack is imminent but no-one other than the Ukrainians know when or where, there have been a few thing happening as a precursor. Ukraine has crossed the Dneiper in the Kherson region and a long line of Russian defensive trench systems appears abandoned. Russian supply depots in different towns seem to get attacked every few days by Ukrainian artillery or missiles probably due information received from local partisans & marine drones have attacked Russian Navy ships in Sevastopol again.

 

Now Xi Jinping has been on the phone to Zelenskyy apparently for 2 hours to try to get a peace deal under way. Zelenskyy is saying positive things about the call while proclaiming it can only occur once Russia retreats behind its borders as he has always said & China has now publicly stated that it supports preservation of the original national boundaries. Things are beginning to get very interesting.

[Jerry_Atrick]

There is scant detail on the conversation [that I could find], and there is little on real offer by the Chinese (at least, publicly). There are editorials that seem tot hink this is a tactic for China to strengthen its ties to Europe as the US relationship has deterioriated.

 

Personally, I would not trust anything that came from Xi Jingpins's mouth anymore than Trump, Putin, or any other senior pollie. But, in the conext

 

But what was interesting is this:

8 hours ago, kgwilson said:

China has now publicly stated that it supports preservation of the original national boundaries

I read this as more of its intentions with Taiwan than anything to do with Ukraine. After all, he has already strengthened ties with Russia and blamed NATO for proviking the war.