Ukrainian forces are “shifting to offensive actions” in some areas, the country’s Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Malyar has said. On Monday evening she said Ukraine’s troops had made gains of up to one mile (1.6km) in several directions around Bakhmut.
Ukrainian military sources told the BBC that a series of small scale armoured offensive operations are under way.
They did not say whether this was the start of Ukraine’s long awaited full scale counter-offensive.
Earlier, Russia’s defence ministry said it thwarted a major Ukrainian attack in Donetsk.
A Moscow-backed militia leader and Russian military bloggers admitted that Ukrainian forces had achieved a breakthrough in at least one point in south-western Donetsk. Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said on Monday that Ukrainian forces had retaken part of the settlement of Berkhivka, north of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine
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No.we are not worried about Putin using nukes,I doubt Russian nukes work after all these years of corruption and incompetence. Besides,the US would not respond with nukes, we’d use our conventional forces,and just a very small part of our airforce to brutally punish them.
Russia is constantly bending completely over, that is all they know, they can’t defend their one border. Russia will dissolve.
Russians are not motivated, we are not fighting in Ukraine, we had very poor allies in Afghanistan and are extremely worried about collateral damage.
We have donated only $40 billion in weapons and Russia teeters on the edge of extinction.
Bellingcat can be a low rent sock puppet state actor and Putin can be a neighbor invading dictator (hello Georgia). You don’t have to pick between them you can hate them both for different reasons.
What is “Lesco Brandon” IP number? Is he from Russia and pretending with false western name. I find it odd that 1 commentator would defend Russia so much and post so many posts under 1 topic.
Evidence points in direction on russian atrocities. They are attacking independent nation. Russia was exporting communism and doing damage 100+ years ago. Communism was a useful pretext for russian imperialism. Soviets from Moscow ordered starving of Ukrainians and so millions of them died. People did not have any food, because every food was taken from them. Some of them resorted to cannibalism to survive longer. If they resisted, they were shot. That is what came out of Moscow. Lies and murder. Communism caused more deaths that nazism. What comes from Russia is no good and we can see that again and again. I can understand Ukrainians, that they don’t want to be Moscow’s puppet after all that happened and what Russians do to people.
It is far more common to have regular internet trolls than dedicated state agents.
I’ve studied nuclear war for close to two decades. I do not believe for a second that Putin will use nuclear weapons under any probable foreseeable circumstance in the near future including the loss of Crimea and full defeat of the Russian Army in the field in Ukraine.
Further, Russian nuclear release procedures are very similar to those in the U.S. (they were developed independently and later shared with each other as both were very concerned with nuclear security and accidental launches). Even if Putin gave the order it would not be followed. Use of nuclear weapons would mean the end of the Russian people.
Also, stop regurgitating Russian propaganda points re peace. Nobody believes that. Nobody believes Russian promises. So long as Ru occupies Ukrainian land there will be war.
Interesting convergence of interests on these boards. I started studying nuclear weapons and warfare – and for a few years did some training on naval tactics in those situations in the early 1980s.
The only data point we have (US vs Japan) for nuclear warfare is that it is an acceptable option for a nuclear power at war with a non-nuclear power. I subscribe to the theory that that is the case because it is a risk free escalation in that circumstance.
A common mistake (which I do not accuse you of) is using Rational Actor Theory when predicting the future actions of autocrats such as Putin, or of actors in non-Western social and belief systems (i.e. Iran and China). Putin’s decision is most likely to be based on his personal risk benefit analysis, rather than on his analysis of Russia’s risk benefit on using nukes.
I can certainly see plausible scenarios where Russia uses tactical nukes to contain Ukrainian forces. But I do not make predictions, because I do not have any insight into the what Putin and his generals think the West would do in response.
Russia built 2 to 3 defense lines in the south, breakthrough one weak point in first line is only a petty success. Don’t take Prigozhin’s words about Bakhmut seriously. Wagner strategy is constantly offensive and never go back one step and Russia army strategy is building defense lines and ready to trade space for more valuable things.
It’s not a question of “falling for propaganda;” it’s a question of understanding that Russia has no business invading a sovereign country. Whether the USA has done the same before is irrelevant. Russia has already shown that it cannot be trusted regarding keeping their mitts off Ukraine in 2014: when they randomly decided they wanted another piece in 2022 everyone who shares a land border with Russia became rightly concerned.
The US economy is 15 times bigger than Russia. The US had 5 times the GDP of Japan in WW2. Add in UK, Poland and some other active NATO allies and Russia is outmatched 20 to 1. After Russia has taken 20% of Ukraine, they have stalled out. The equipment from the US and allies have stopped Russia. Yes, the US lied and broke agreements. The US under Bill Clinton said they would not expand NATO. They did. They also said that they would protect Ukraine if Ukraine gave up the nukes left over from the Soviet era.
The US has been at war for 2 out of 3 years since WW2. Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq etc… and now this indirect proxy war. Of course it is not the US per se, but the military industrial complex and the pliant and eager politicians. China military tech is mostly copies of Russian gear. The China plane engines are worse. The china electronics are better. The US crushes China in an actual shooting war. The US war machine is eager to fight China. China has only fought in Korea and a Vietnam border war since WW2. China’s military is a bunch of spoiled only child, military rookies. The stealth planes that Russia has and China copied have not done anything.
The US military war machine has many problems but it is way better than China and Russia.
Russians and Chinese lie ,the US lied when we said we’d support Ukraine,neither UK nor US defended Ukraine,to our eternal shame.
Brial,don’t you own SpaceX ? Are you not happy Starlink is making money from Ukraine military contracts?
The Vietnamese killed more Chinese in a week than the US lost in 10 years, the Chinese did anything but fight, they died.
Everyone thought Russia would take over Ukraine quickly,surely with a vastly greater airforce and army and navy they would win quickly.
It is a testament to Ukraine intelligence and bravery and Russian corruption and incompetence.
Putin is an exceptionally bad war leader and Zelensky is an all time great war leader.
Your analogies are mostly correct. The reason for the Japan US conflict was oil, and the full US embargo of that vital resource. Russia has plenty of energy, and resources, which the Islands of Japan did not have.
Sanction Russian oil and gas? Well then they have excess capacity and one can ramp up production of nitrogen and metals extraction. Lots of raw materials for the military. Throw in clandestine semi conductor trade from China and a steady stream of missiles/drones become available (they have very old generation chip making equipment, good enough for some military applications). They are going to a war time manufacture footing.
I totally agree it will be a war of attrition between the US and Russia. US Escalation at sea or space (SpaceX is such a military disruptor!) would eventually win, but Russia has nukes to dissuade that course of action. Their goal is to shell Ukraine back to the stone age or for them to yield. Not very nice of Putin, and if I were Ukrainian I would never surrender.
Imo The US will need to pull out some unknown (to us) tech ace or trump card. The problem with that is they are most likely saving it to use on China and do not want to waste them on Russia.
Unfortunately it looks like Ukraine will be sacrificed by an utterly cruel ruler.
NATO is a defensive alliance, always has been. It would be a complete non-issue for Russia if NATO expanded right up to their border, except for the fact that Russia wants to be able to invade its neighbors.
Sure, for public consumption Russia will claim to believe NATO is an aggressor. What else are they going to say? But they know the truth.
Putin wants to put the USSR back together, and Eastern European countries that escaped from the USSR joining NATO is an obstacle to that, That’s all that’s going on here.
I don’t know what is the bigger joke:
Russia reforming the USSR
NATO doing *anything* proactively
Ukraine joining NATO while in a shooting war with Russia
I do not have to believe the stated reasons or the analysis of events. But I can get confirmation and reporting of facts. There is confirmed reporting of military combat. Reports of advances and land being taken get confirmed or disproven in days or months. I make myself more resistant to propaganda by having a memory and seeking out facts and confirmation. This process is independent of Elon Musk. Factually, I can see what Elon Musk and his teams have done. This does not mean I just believe. I can give the benefit of the doubt.
There are sources of actual images of destroyed hardware. There is tracking of the front and battlefield reports.
https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/
I am reporting on an attack that Ukraine is making with intelligence support from the US and the UK. I am reporting on them using equipment (tanks, missiles, artillery etc…) provided by the US and allies. The US is encouraging the war and the US likely blew up the Russian pipeline. The US determines if they order Ukraine to negotiate for peace or they do not.
Russia and Putin should bend the knee. Yes, the US has manipulated this. They backed Russia into a corner. The US is callibrating a war of attrition and we will see if the extra gear was enough to break the Russian lines. Russia should accept because they will lose. It is a matter of how much money goes to US military contractors before Russia is broken.
About $196 billion of support up to about Feb 2023. About $10-25 billion per month.
https://www.ifw-kiel.de/fileadmin/Dateiverwaltung/IfW-Publications/-ifw/Kiel_Working_Paper/2022/KWP_2218_Which_countries_help_Ukraine_and_how_/KWP_2218_Trebesch_et_al_Ukraine_Support_Tracker.pdf
China will never let Russia economy collapse because Russia actions is supporting its geopolitical goal. Helping Russia is easy, just buying cheap natural resources and selling goods to Russia while getting profit from that. The West and Ukr cannot win if Russia economy not collapse. Russia have good weapons, warrior cultural and genes, winter on its side, and its warrior fighting better everyday.
Your perception of Chinese motives is disproven by recent actions: they canceled the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline and instead signed a deal for natural gas and a pipeline from Turkmenistan. Seeing Russia collapse is in China’s interests as it would allow China to reverse the Amur Annexation and reclaim Outer Manchuria with very little effort. China would rather be the sole center of an alternative power pole than have to share that role in any capacity with Russia. People who think otherwise are desperately naive.
China-Russia trade was 190 billion$ in 2022, up 34.3% from 2012. In Q1 2023, it’s 53.8 billion$, up 38.7% from Q1 2022 while world trade is stagnating. Power of Siberia 2 was not canceled, it’s postponed before 2022 event (2015) because China want to diversify its gas sources and prefer to buy from “less powerful” nations. After 2022 event, negotiation was resumed and Russia announced “progress”. China need Russia because the West is still stronger them for now.
There are no nations less powerful than Russia.
The $196 billion is really a misnomer. Most of the aid has been in the form of weapons transfers. Most of those weapons have been quite old and near the end of their useful lives. The majority of the HARMs and Stingers sent to Ukraine were produced in the mid 1990s are were due for disposal in the next couple of years yet the DOD has valued them at full replacement cost for appropriations purposes. No actual cash is transferred in such appropriations: the equipment was paid for decades ago, it’s just an accounting entry against the DOD’s inventory.
Yes, Ukraine receives obsolete NATO weapons that are far superior to the best Russia can design. Obsolete Patriot missiles shot down 6 of 6 Russian hypersonic cruise missiles. Imagine how good our latest greatest anti missile technology. None of Russian nuclear weapons would be effective in a nuclear war. Moscow would become Bachmut II.
True,but we do send cash to support the Ukraine government, but 1.5 billion a month is nothing to us.
We have also spent money supporting the Baltics and Poland Romania,and Czechs. Europeans are simply too weak to support themselves.
You have a poorly working brain if you believe we blew up the pipeline, tell me you’re joking. Glad to see the pentagon paid Elon for Starlink for military purposes in Ukraine.
Most of that money went to US citizens, or for civilians, or for other countries, military support idd $40 billion, we need to send ATACMS, F-16’s,and encourage destruction of Russian oil depots, rail roads, barracks, and airfields.
Yes
The news reported on the ‘government propaganda’ channels is matching what the pro-Russian bloggers are saying. Or are they biased too?
Here you go.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/05/ukraine-counter-attack-looks-imminent-as-troops-search-for-russian-weaknesses
If anything, the biased commie liberal western media is parroting what the Russian bloggers are saying, which is that the Ukrainians are attacking and advancing. The only discordant note in all the voices is the Russian press releases.
Russia did blow up the pipeline. They have shut off other pipelines carrying gas to Europe as well. That was a great strategy, how could Europe survive the Winter?