Apparently, the Belarus railway workers aren't too keen with the war in Ukraine and the use of their country as a staging ground. The railway connection between Belarus and Ukraine have suddenly fallen into disrepair and can no longer be used, for the moment, to reinforce and resupply Russian forces in northern Ukraine.
https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-russ.../31761964.html
He has been doing pretty fine so far. Had you been President of Ukraine, on day one of the invasion, not only would you have taken the offered ride out, you would have;
- sold off the next 5 generations as indentured servants to Russia, because ya know, lives important, gotta appease Russia
- given away all the rights to Ukraines natural resources to Russia
- handed over any part of the land Russia wanted
I'm sure Russia is absolutely salivating at the idea of Ukraine not sanctioning them afterwards.
Ukraine has no real control over the sanctions that's actually hurting Russia here, and neither is Ukraine the ones Russia needs to get to go along with that for lifting of them.
There seems to be reports that Belorussian citizens and railway workers are sabotaging their own railway services to impede Russian logistics. *chuckle*
https://belsat.eu/en/news/02-03-2022...nother-attack/
https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-russ.../31761964.html
https://spring96.org/be/news/107024 (You need to run this through google translate- At least 8 "rail guerrillas" detained since the beginning of the war: what is known about "rail war" in Belarus)
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
Cowardice is it's own thing entirely. It's entirely possible for two parties to do diplomacy, with one party being spineless coward, and the other one not.
It's also possible for outside observers sitting in complete safety to exhibit spades of cowardice, while the ones in warzone may not. Isn't that pretty interesting?
So no, I've basically equated spineless cowards as cowards, that's all.
A background briefing with a senior U.S. defense official about the Russian war on Ukraine just concluded. It’s Day 27 since the Russian invasion.
- Fighting in and around the southern port city of Mariupol remains fierce, as Russia tries to claim a first strategic victory after weeks of fighting. It now includes naval shelling launched from the Sea of Azov, the senior defense official said.
- Near the southern city of Mykolaiv, there are now signs that the Russians are repositioning themselves outside the city to the south after facing fierce resistance from Ukrainians, senior U.S. defense official says.
- As reported elsewhere, there is a Ukrainian effort afoot to retake terrain they had lost to Russia. Pentagon isn’t commenting on specific locations, but senior defense official says “we’re starting to see indications” that Ukraine is “now able and willing to take back territory.”
- Still little clarity on Russian casualty numbers, after an unexpected report from a Russian tabloid yesterday said that more than 9,000 Russian soldiers had been killed. Russia has since blamed that report on a hack.
- The Pentagon is “aware of that incident,” but can’t say whether the report was a hack, a protest or someone “making a statement.”
- U.S. estimates of Russian combat deaths are still nebulous. “Even our best estimates are just that, and we have low confidence in them.”
- Continued discussion about Russia reinforcing its military in Ukraine. If it does so, the senior defense official says, “the most likely scenario would be that they would draw them from outside of Russia.” That said, other options are available for Russian reinforcements. “I can’t rule out that they wouldn’t pull out reinforcements from in Russia, too,” senior U.S. defense official says.
- President Biden raised yesterday concerns about Russia potentially using chem/bio weapons. The senior defense official says they still have no signs that anything is imminent, but Russian officials “continue to talk about this.”
- Some fidelity on Russian naval action. There are about 21 Russian ships in the Black Sea, senior defense official says. That includes 12 surface combatants and nine tank landing ships.
- Russian forces are still roughly in the same positions outside Kyiv: 15 km northwest of the city center, and 30 km east. “We just have not seen a lot of movement on their part.”
- Senior U.S. defense official says that its deconfliction line with Russia for this conflict is tested every day “and the Russians are picking up.” Calls that a “good thing.”
- Senior U.S. defense officials compares current U.S.-Russia deconfliction line for Ukraine war with a similar line set up years ago for operations in Syria that still exists. It has narrow goals, he implies. “It’s a deconfliction line. It’s not a complaint line.”
- Continued morale issues among Russian soldiers seen, senior defense official says.
- In addition to food and fuel shortages, the Pentagon now observes frostbite as an issue.
Not planning for a long conflict. Missing out on rotation of forward forces.
The above independent page has a wierd layout on mobile at least.Russian troops ‘suffering from frostbite as deployed without* proper cold-weather gear'
Pentagon reporter Caitlin Doornbos, who contributes to the US-based Stars and Stripes news outlet, tweets comments from a US official, who has claimed Russian troops are “suffering from frostbite in some cases because they were not deployed with proper cold-weather gear”.
It's pretty well established that US intelligence has been more or less on point throughout the past weeks, and I'm very willing to believe this.
How the fuck did Russia, of all places, get this wrong?!
*Their headline has a clear typo of 'with', which should be without
I'll do you one better: why is Gamora? Why are Russian tanks getting stuck in spring-thaw mud while the troops are getting frostbite? It takes a special kind of leadership to get both sides of the weather wrong at the same time.
From Business Insider:
If a friend or family member visits from the middle/south US way up here in (checks local sources) 38F weather and doesn't bring their jacket, they'll likely feel foolish and complain, but they'll be okay. Whoops. If they come for a week to go hiking, skiing or fishing without winter clothes, even in March, eventually they'll be outside below freezing. That's no longer "whoops" and balls-deep into "what was I thinking?" We've seen plenty of reports that Putin thought it'd be over weeks ago, this is just more of that.Russian forces are getting frostbite while fighting in Ukraine because they don't have adequate cold-weather gear, a senior US defense official said.
The official told reporters during a Tuesday Pentagon briefing that the frostbite problem had forced some Russian troops to the sidelines during the war.
"They're struggling on many fronts," the official said, according to the Task and Purpose reporter Haley Britzky.
It's the latest setback Russian forces have faced in their invasion of Ukraine, which began February 24.
A US defense official told reporters at a Monday background briefing that Russian forces were experiencing issues with morale within its ranks because they did not expect such a fierce resistance from Ukraine.
Many Russian troops also had no idea what orders they'd be forced to take in Ukraine, the official said. Russian forces were also having communication and logistical problems in Ukraine, the official said.
Russia's ongoing advance on Ukraine has appeared to be largely stalled across multiple fronts as it struggles to achieve significant military objectives.
It's the same temperature here as Kyiv, incidentally.
There's been credible reporting that Putin really thought that he would just waltz in Ukraine like he did in Crimea and simply have cities roll over for him.
Wether that's due to bad intel from yes-men or actual delusions is up for debate, but the results are the same. Russia did not go into Ukraine with "prolonged conflict against a resistant population" as a possible outcome.
Many in Putin's inner circle consists of a bunch of his buddies from the FSB and his time in the KGB, the BBC had a good article about who those people are earlier this month.
It's likely they were feeding him less than factual information about Ukraine cause they're afraid of him, if they weren't just as deluded as him to begin with.