Youtube comments of Sean Cidy (@seancidy6008).

  1. Does Ukraine think posting this kind of stuff reflects well on their armed forces?
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  2. Being in the jungle is less dangerous than being in the jungle with a serial killer. These girls had been on the beach in previous days and Kremers especially was doubtless a little sunburnt and skin-sensitised, How could they go off a jungle path wearing very short pants exposing their legs, and bare arms too?; they would instantly be scratched by undergrowth and have been forced to step back on the path. Even in the Darién National Park of Panama, nothing like this has ever happened. The jungle does not preferentially disappear hot young women.
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  3. I don't think Western 'Special Forces' would be adjusted to Ukrainian conditions. The casualty rate in combat would be extremely high IMO.
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  4. By now the Russian losses must be regarded as a feature not a bug.
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  5. The best actors are not convincing in action films.
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  6. 1.That area has around the trail has parts like that with overhead foilage blocking out the light, but you can walk out of them because this is not the Brazilian jungle that goes on forever or even the Darien Gap. There are people and cattle around and you cannot keep cattle in a jungle. 2 If it was Froon and Kremers alone and lost taking the night photos, both of them were alive and well in the jungle for six nights already without using the camera at all; yet on in the early hours of the 8th April a full week after they went missing they suddenly decided to use the camera at night. By the way, the Panamanian authorities said the night photos were by Froon and show Kremers had died. It had been raining and It takes a month to starve to death. So even if Kremers had died, Froon's only immediate problem was she was lost and in that scenario the phone details must be accepted as proving she (or possibly Kremers) was still alive on the 11th. The searchers, many with previous experience of finding lost tourists in the area were aided by Panamanian special forces in combing though all areas they the girls could have reached, That very intensive search had began on the 6th of April and consisted of sweeps with yelling and using both loud calls and lights at night. It simply is not credible that either Kremers and Froon were able to turn a phone on and off and put it neatly in their backpack yet yet missed this dragnet moving through the area where they were, which must have come close to them while audible for miles away. If they had been lost they would want to be found. Finally the Panamanian government did not say the jungle killed them, according to them it was a cable bridge and that is not in the jungle, it is on the trail.
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  7. I once read that comedians have the highest testosterone levels. He was never an upstanding young man. more a debonair sex bandit of the 'get them laughing and you're halfway there' school. but he was super high status including appearing in Hollywood movies, and being good looking enough to marry Katy Perry, and women like men who have a proven ability to get lots of women especially highly desirable women (Sexy Son Hypothesis). Nothing succeeds like success but all good things came to an end and one day they looked at the latest photo of Brand and realised he was not gorgeous and funny and universally popular but an old man sententiously moralising, so their attitude to having slept with him back in his glory days changed.
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  8. I think he knew he was taking risks. The men in that family enjoyed doing risky things.
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  9. Ukraine says the KIA ratio is at least 7 to 1 in their favour.
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  10. No matter how well trained, experienced, young and fit, you cannot outrun artillery.
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  11. For decades Britain has been taking from the defence budget to pay for social spending without raising taxes.
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  12. Prigozin's troops are SBG (Slave Battalion Groups) of the undead, they can be destroyed but they cannot be killed because their lives ended years ago.
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  13. No I think the reason for the women with two husbands in Tibet (and parts of mountainous India) is the land is too poor for a single husband to work a family farm effectively. And in Tibet the husbands of the single woman are usually brothers.
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  14. Freedom is not free money.
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  15. I think the German girl realised she had nothing to lose because they could hardly have been planning let to her go and make a complaint against them; would get them 15 years (as it did). They were drunk and that is why it had a happy ending. In Kris and Lianne's case the perpetrators had carefully thought out what they needed to do to get away with it, which was not all that much as Panama has no army or police just a combined entity, and as the old saying goes ' Jack of all trades master of none'. The known facts(who found the remains) leave zero doubt about the identity of the vile perpetrators of this despicable double homicide.
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  16. Actually, there was an article in the Guardian in which a Russian (I think he was actually Armenian or something like that) said in 2014 he was recruited to fight in Donbass and the at the initial meeting in a public place the guy straight up told his prospective volunteers they they were heading to certain death (some of them left but some stayed). Fatalistic people, the Russians.
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  17. Professor Hutton makes an excellent case that she did not get a fair trial.
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  18. A sneak all out nuclear attack by a superpower on another superpower would start with a single very high altitude thermonuclear detonation to blind early warning radar. Hence the convention that a country launching ICBMs or rockets that could be mistaken for such must give prior notification to others.
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  19. Sorry but this is 'Putin is in desperate trouble' stuff is endless here and becoming not worth watching. The channel needs much more balance and a bit of realism.
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  20. Economists seem to secretly believe that GDP growth is wholly dependent on the number of people added to the population.
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  21. "Russian didn’t strike countries who provided weapons to attack Russia territory". Those countries are part of a nuclear armed alliance. Ukraine is not.
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  22. I think it is already clear that America is not giving Ukraine what it needs to go linear offensive. Ukraine is being supplied for mounting a static battle of attrition. The US objective is a slow but sure writing down of Russian conventional capacity. Russia is actually quite happy to go slow.
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  23. Do they want him in his grave? They are exposing him to far too much danger. Each video shows him in risker situations than the last one.
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  24. No one outside Kyiv and the Kremlin knows what the casualties are; that is very sensitive information on both sides.
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  25. That sounds like a call for enforcing conformity. Like the Dems did.
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  26. The point is half of the parents know their baby died in that unit and Letby was not responsible
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  27.  @Qųăñ-_-ßøı-_-420  It makes the Russians look like underdogs, which they are not
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  28. Kearney is talking about side issues. The fundamental problem fo rUkraine is Russia is an artillery centred land power with vast amounts of howitzers and ammunition that is now standing on the defensive behind fortifications, instead of over extending in foolhardy advances . The real aim of taking back Crimea is to make Ukraine safe by causing Russia to break apart. The Kremlin will prevent that by any means necessary.
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  29. The Kurds have been saying that for 50 years.
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  30. I get it was clickbait, but after her taking her own life this makes me not want to click on this site ever again
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  31. There are a lot of them.
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  32. All the the training and equipment in the world will not alter the fact that this is not 1941, when the offence held a decisive advantage--for a time. There have since been eight decades of developing arms and tactics to stop combined arms offensives. There is now zero reason to expect trying the traditional breaching and exploitation by maneuver warfare elements against an opponent all set up and waiting with a full suits of modern countermeasures can result in anything but a snail's pace with huge casualties at best. And that goes for any army trying it; those operations simply do not work any more.
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  33. Can't outrun artillery even if you are an Olympic champion athlete.
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  34. Salmond admitted on oath that he had been touching females who worked in the official residence in an inappropriate way. And he only got a 'Not Proven' on one of the sexual assault charges.
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  35.  @neoscylax  Of course she was convicted, why else would the professer be speaking out about the expert testimony at trial including a false probability estimate on cherry picked excess deaths. The interviewer thought the professor was making some abstruse academic point, but it goes to the heart of whether Letby received a fair trial.
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  36. Russia is right next to Ukraine . America is not. So Ukraine is not a good place for any geopolitical ploy like Jack Lifton is suggesting.
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  37. Russia is backward in technology and its society, but they are also 'my country right or wrong' patriotic in a way that people in the West used to be.
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  38.  @nursejessie8149  Did you hear about the German woman who got lost on a trail in Panama in 2017? An official Panamanian search team found her, then they abducted her and held her captive for days so they could have their way with her. Please Google it. Also that guide the Dutch girl supposedly went without after he convinced them to go on the trail has a farm in the middle of the jungle area where the girls disappeared. He had a review by a tourist as a danger to lone north European women. Those who go to Panama ought to know what they are getting into. If it is normal to let naïve girls go into danger, then I'm glad to be thought strange.
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  39. In 1994 Mearsheimer published an article in which he opined that Ukraine would need their own nuclear deterrent to Russia. You can judge for yourself how 'pro Russian' his' nonsense' analyses was
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  40. ​ @anderstorger3211  Denmark has the most economically equal population of any country in the world America's population is extremely unequal. The political polarisation is something to do with these facts IMO.
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  41. Nope, no one would ever have heard of it if the roles were reversed. It is a story catering to prurient interests.
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  42. If Russia considers Ukraine in the Western camp as an existential threat, they would attack it no matter how strong it was and how on earth can Ukraine ever be stronger than Russia? Anyway a pause might let Russia Ukraine re arm would certainly let Ukraine re arm even more as all the West 's industrial and economic power would be building Ukraine up.
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  43. He will agree but not right now.
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  44. Probably those Ukrainian troops were mainly Russian speakers. Kiev uses them as cannon fodder. The mainly Ukrainian speaking units are kept back
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  45. The Russians have a lot of artillery and military engineering resources. The Ukrainian have relatively little artillery, and are sorely lacking in both combat engineers for the infantry and heavy mine clearing equipment for the front of armored spearhead columns. After the debacle of Kharkov, Russia started creating multi layered defensive lines of fortification, and the recent Ukrainian probes as yet did not get into the first line of these defenses that Russia has been given several months to construct. Ukraine . Ukraine ignored advice to follow up the Kharkov success as soon as possible. The acted like they had all the time in the world; obviously banking on it being as effortless as Kharkov again no matter how long the Russians were given to prepare. Big mistake.
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  46. Yes, but they are and there are a lot of them
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  47. I think that interviewer was expecting it to be couched in generalities, and the Professor was very specific.
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  48.  @rmdomainer9042  The Ukrainian general staff who authorized the cross border raids (one of which came within striking distance of a thermonuclear repository) must be very pleased with the Russian reaction. They will be indubitably be getting a congratulatory phone call from Zelensky requesting more of the same, eh?
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  49.  @abdell75roussos  Sunburnt? Both the bras looked as if they had been taken off that first day and never put back on again. Eleven days to die and on the last day someone is still strong enough to put the phones in the backpack and securely fasten it. There are a lot of little things like that, and while each one if taken individually admits of an innocent explanation, when you take them as a whole the totality of what we know is pointing away from natural causes. If you wish an expert ask F, he is the great authority on the area where they were lost for 11days and apparently struck deaf and dumb by the sun so that the rescue parties calling constantly for them were unable to make contact.
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  50. He is not 8 years old in any meaningful respect, very deceptive to talk about mental age like that.
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  51. So much commentary about Putin's internal mental state. Wild speculation ad nauseum,
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  52. Yes, but its not like there were not deaths at that unit in the same time frame that couldn't be down to Letby. A full half of the excess deaths could not have been Letby so were due to the unit being sub standard. But that invalidated the statistical probability calculation of no murders having taken place that the jury heard
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  53. He is pressing his luck.
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  54. The interviewer obviously did not understand the direct relevance of what the professor was complaining about to the safety of Letby's conviction.
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  55. They're short of effective weapons, trained soldiers and intelligent generals, but Russia seems to have inexhaustible grit.
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  56.  @steveblundell7766  She was not the only appalling medical professional there, as half of the excess deaths were nothing to do with her.
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  57. Ukrainian anticipation of the reaction to their raids is not discussed. It almost seems like he is saying Ukraine does not need plans, because can rely on Russia to react in a way counterproductive to the interests of the Russian army.
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  58.  @abdell75roussos  I am redheaded, and once severely burnt myself with a UV lamp. How I cursed myself. But I was not debilitated. What you suggest is far from impossible, yet if one comes down on the side of 'no foul play' there are lot more anomalies stacking up than a double homicide. Yes Kris had red hair, but she was also a noticeably attractive young woman. That would make no difference to the jungle, but to sexual predators it certainly would.
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  59. On the 1st April 2014 after 2pm, by which time they had turned around to go back and were retracing their steps, someone attacked and subdued Kris Kremers and Lisanne Froon. Their phones were taken off them. About two hours later one attempted emergency call was made from each of their phones, 12 minutes apart. Had that been Kris and Lisanne, they'd each have made multiple attempts one after the other. So it was almost certainly one man who knew there was no phone reception in the area, and was using each of their phones in turn. Or, or him untying the hands standing over each girl in turn as they tried to made the calls. What is strange is this entailed him already having formulated a long term plan to later leave the phones to be found. He then switched both phones off for 13 hours (inconceivable that Kremers and Froon would have made one failed-to-connect call each to the emergency number, then both given up and switched off). Next morning he switched the phones on, and again made--or more likely had the girls make--attempts to connect to the emergency number. There was only one call by Kremer's but repeated calls by Froon's phone,. On the third try by Froon's phone that morning, to his surprise and no doubt dismay, Froon's phone did connect to a network. There were no more attempt to call the emergency number with Froon's phone, and Froon's phone was left on all night, which ran the battery down. Next morning (3rd April), Kremers's phone made an attempt to call the emergency number that was the last one by either of the phones. Just think about that for a second; it had power and was having the correct pins entered for another 48 hours, yet there was no attempt to call the emergency or any other number by Kremers's phone*. I doubt that either girl was alive after midday of the 5th. That would explain why no PINS for Kremers's phone starting that afternoon. There was the photo on the 8th of Kremer's hair, but that could have been faked on her corpse. The activity without PINS on Kremer's phone until the 11th April was part of a charade being staged by the perpetrator. *Kremers's phone did not need PINs for an emergency call , nether did Froon's. No mystery.
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  60. Lucy Letby's defence failed to challenge the evidence properly. The chart was terrible statistics as any statistician could have explained to the jury if the defence had called one.
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  61. If you've ever got lost in the woods and you are reading this, you know how difficult it is to die of getting lost. "In life it's not which path you choose, it's whose path you cross". (Wolf Creek 2).
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  62. Many a true word spoken in jest.
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  63. Russian military strategy can be summed up in two words: Mass effect. And it is not positional it is attritional. As a French mathematician showed many centuries ago, attrition favors the larger force. Maneuver warfare ceased to work in Ukraine in the 1940s and as the Russian supreme military commander said recently, concentrations of armoured vehicles are detected almost immediately.
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  64.  @steveblundell7766  The point is that the other excess deaths were just that, and the big difference seems to have been the deaths when Letby was duty were regarded as in a special category but it was completely unclear what criterion the prosecution baby death expert had for putting them in a different category from those excluded from his consideration apparently because Letby could not been responsible. But the deaths Letby could not have been responsible for were actually evidence highly relevant to whether there were any murders at all or just a unit having a lot of excess deaths (it was in fact found to be giving substandard care).
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  65.  @le_rayon_vert  It is difficult to believe that the prosecution and doctors who testified against her did not understand the significance of the other half of the excess deaths.
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  66. Not a fan of Sharron Davies previously from reading what newspapers reported about her. But listening to her make her case hear. I am struck by how astoundingly brave, articulate and intelligent she is. And _prepared_.
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  67. The US obviously does not want Russia to be trounced in Ukrane.
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  68.  @abdell75roussos  A possibility. Not the most plausible one though.
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  69.  @abdell75roussos  You see nothing odd in those two women not hearing the search parties that were traversing the area yelling, because they may have both been "incapacitated" even though one of the women had the energy to switch on and off the phones each day and finally put the phones in the backpack and securely close it on their eleventh day missing, or women in the scratchy jungle with creepy crawlies ECT would take off their bras and leave them in the backpack. I agree there is a simpler explanation than a gang; I think it was F & son and no one else. They know the area like the back of their hand and eph knew hours beforehand from a snapchat communication asking if he was available (he said he was not that day) to guide them that Kris and Lisanne were going a hike by themselves. And days before he had unsuccessfully tried to interest them in an overnight stay at his ranch which is reached by going down the very same trail the girls disappeared on! It is misogynic to think this could have been an accident. They needed a guy with them, but the danger was not the jungle.
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  70. Lincoln side had a numerical advantage in manpower over the South as great as Russia's over Ukraine. The North merely had to bring that advantage to fully bear, which took time.
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  71. An act of vengeance. Within 24 hours his Texan model me too memoir writing ex is turned into a villain.
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  72. The Wagner guy says it is being mounted as a battle of attrition, not for territory. You're assuming that Ukraine is defending and Russia suffering the bulk of the casualties while trying and failing to take territory, but is that credible in view of how long this has been going on?
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  73.  @callumaan No surprise they are slow to get even their brutish mass effect act together, It took them 4 years to get back what the Germans took in 4 months.
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  74. So the fighting to take Bakhmut has stopped now that Wagner is no longer a worry?
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  75. Lets be real, the Russians KIA in Bakhmut were convicts often lifers who had a few weeks training. Ukraine lost much more valuable troops. Ukraine tried to stop Wagner taking Bakhmut, but couldn't. There hasn't been a Ukrainian victory since November.
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  76. He is going to be imprisoned
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  77.  @TorianTammas  There are people who keep cattle there and you cannot do that in a jungle; it's forest and with scratchy undergrowth off the trail. They had bare arms and shorts, Kris was wearing virtual Daisy Dukes! Do you know that one of the searchers months later found one boot from each girl within 48 hours. The same person found the first remains of Kris and the first remains of Lissane, and these remained the largest pieces of their remains ever found. Can you guess who it was that made all the finds?
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  78.  @coleengoodell7523  There are people who did it wrong and reloaded their shotgun despite massive wounds to their head then finished themselves off. Never use a long gun or anything under a .38. And use a mirror to get the angle right. Otherwise you will be risking ending up blind or a vegetable
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  79. That's not a 15 year old boy, its a young man. Victim indeed!
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  80. We don't know what the ratio of attrition is but Russia mounting a another Bakhmut type operation suggest that they are willing to accept whatever that ratio is because there are a lot of casualties in this stalemate, which is purely positional. As it would reduce consumption of human resources and arms if running low on them, I surmise that Russia is not running out of men, missiles, or shells in the foreseeable future. America seems to be happy with Russia obtaining a limited victory
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  81. I would really like someone to explain to me how the Russians are going to be made to stop fighting.
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  82. That is how you live to become a combat veteran of the kind of fighting going on in Ukraine.
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  83. Ukrainian soldiers decided after interminable combat against Prigozhin's legion of the damned and artillery barrages of obsessive intensity that they had done their share.
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  84. Wagner's boss is on a video telling his prospective Gulag recruits they would be employed storming well defended positions and if surviving six months they'd be free. They are an expendable echelon used as specialised shock troops in the front wave, and taking them out of combat for training them up to be all round soldiers is not going to happen. Nor are they going to be allowed to while away the time in dug outs all winter.
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  85. "The situation is now so dire that Russia’s generals are pulling 70-year-old Cold War relics out of storage to plug the gaps" Yeah, never throw tanks away, you never know when they ight come in handy. And those relics are worth less than the weapons used to blow them up.
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  86. Simply put, combatants must clearly distinguish themselves from non-combatants by wearing an identifying uniform. Obviously they will attempt to use cover and concealment , It is not clear at what point bombing a building from afar is legitimate when there is no battle raging. You cannot demolish an noncombatant occupied apartment block just because an enemy combatant might be hiding in it, certainly not before the battle has started; It has to be proportional.
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  87. Immigration seems to be the Treasury's preferred solution. Pumps up the housing market too.
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  88. The key military reason for being defeated in Vietnam was America didn't declare national mobilisation and call out the reserves to smother the enemy with numbers. And the key reason for not taking the aforementioned steps was the US fear of China intervening as it had in Korea.
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  89. He understands the American people.
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  90. Russia would be insane (from its point of veiw) to end the war now.
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  91. This war has been fought by old guys on both sides to an unprecedented extent.
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  92. Not readiness, actually fighting, and not for a long time. Forever. I never understand how people can think that Russia would consider recognising any borders of Ukraine, even if they were highly favourable to Russia. If Ukraine ceased to be at war or in a dispute over the borders of its territory, then Ukraine would become eligible to join Nato. Russia cannot afford peace, so they will keep the war going.
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  93. Look up the 'Sexy Son Hypothesis'.
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  94. Washington has not given Ukraine the most effective weapons'. Why do you think that is? My bet is fear of Ukraine enjoying catastrophic success against Russia.
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  95. Rather be Donald Trump or Ron Jeremy. Tough decision!
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  96. Why no mention of the Russian energy supply and the Ukraine war?
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  97. This downplays the killing of Germans' girlfriends', both impromptu and by resistance groups of anyone denounced (even anonymously). My grandfather saw three young French women shot in a Normandy village square (with a British tommy gun) during a public Liberation celebration almost immediately after the Germans left.
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  98.  @artsy38  Well they went down the other side onto the Serpent trail, which is not usually travelled by unguided tourists. They did try to get the guide who had earlier tried to interest KK and LS in a trip down that very same Serpent trail, but he was busy. He was busy during the earliest searches for them too, judging by him being absent from the first week or so. But months later when the search started to encroach beyond Alto Romero when he got started mister eph (for it was he) was almost incredibly successful at finding KK and LS boots and remains.
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  99. It must be remembered that the Wagner convicts are there to die.
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  100.  @coleengoodell7523  Well I did read about a teacher of the blind who knew several who tried to put an end to themselves with a firearm and only ended up blinding themselves and he said they then became quite well adjusted people. Then again, there are some diseases one might prefer not to let run their course.
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  101. If that judge had tried to jail Trump he would have been stopped; that is why the judge announced beforehand he wouldn't.
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  102. And the biggest country in Nato was an enemy of the thirties while Russia was an ally.
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  103. Yes but it just shows how victory in Ukraine is an absolute priority for Putin.
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  104.  @marktrotter8971  Agreed
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  105. I respect General Hodges and his military analysis has been second to none so far, but I think he is becoming irresponsible in discounting non conventional responses by Russia if its command and control breaks down. The Russian generals might well request permission to use nuclear weapons in that case. It is official Nato doctrine to go theatre thermonuclear when losing conventionally; why would Russian generals behave differently that Gen Hodges would have as a Nato commander?
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  106. Yevgeny Prigozhin was coked out of his skull in Bakhmut. The president of Belarus said as much.
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  107.  @huzcer  Grande is tone deaf to cover this now.
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  108. Prog had zero military expertise, so what could he have brought to Wagner? A commander has to be soldierly: stoically accepting deaths, yet with a upbeat attitude that will communicate itself to the troops. Prog overdramatised difficulties. I suspect he was on drugs, and when one suspects that one is rarely wrong.
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  109. But at the end of the day Soviet equipment could be incorporated into Russia adaptations on the battlefield.
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  110. Dr Grande's worst ever video. These were two physically fit intelligent adults. Perhaps a chance in a million this was any kind of dual misadventure while lost. Start from the the most obvious thing: that they were a couple of strikingly attractive young women in an isolated area without phone reception, who would have been defenceless, and thus a tempting target for predatory men. The propinquity of what was left of their bodies, bones being fragmented into shards (especially), and one set of remains showing signs of being chemically stripped of flesh makes it ludicrous to think the most plausible explanation is accidents and exhaustion. The sinister night photograph of the back of Kremers’ head shows blood; they were being forced by their captors to walk into a more secluded area, the flash was for light. I strongly suspect they were followed from the town, realized it and tried to call for help but got captured and beaten, then forced deep into the jungle possibly to some shack. The bodies were pulverised and disposed of later. Sadly, when police are confronted with an unsolvable crime they have a powerful motive to write it off as probably not due to foul play. I'm old and over the decades have seen it repeatedly. For example the Babes in the Wood murders (Epping Forest), and the Disappearance of Natalee Holloway, and the case of Julie Ward.
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  111. Depends, If a woman is a ten she is looking for money. If she is plain, she will seek men who have looks, which is what she lacks.
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  112. What Anders seems to be saying is the logistics determine the strategy
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  113. Sorry doc, but the professional guides were experts not her, they knew exactly how dangerous it was to keep going. They had a duty of care that ought to have overborne all other considerations. And there were a lot of disputes about exactly who did what in the disaster.
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  114.  @kiheiarima6164  Most Americans who voted disagree with you.
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  115.  @MrMooremelody  Are you serious? The woman who saw them before they set off on the 1stwas stuck by how short their pants were and the skin of their their bare arms and legs, these girls could not have gone off of the trail without being scratched to bits and forced to retreat. Crossing monkey bridge requires putting you arm against steel cables and the bridges they are supposed to have fallen of are on trails. let stick with clothing. Both bras an Kremers's shorts were found. Panamanian authorities say Kremers after removing her denim shorts, so she would be falling in the river with no pants or bra,. Froom died without a bra too. . There is a photograph of the back of Kremers's head in the early hours a full ; week after she went missing in which she is holding her head upright or her corpse is being made being held to look that way This photo was taken by a criminal or Froom. If it was taken by Froom she would have no motive to make Kremers look alive and holding her own head up, and how could Froom do that anyway while she she was busy taking the photograph? Moreover, if it was Froon taking the photo, her hands were remarkable steady. Amway, both were both were alive and well and capable of screaming for help days into a very intensive search of a the area by people who knew it well. If Froom and Kremers didn't answer the calls of Panamanian search & rescues teams and Special Forces soldiers combing though even the most remote and impenetrable parts of the area it could only be because someone was holding them captive and prevented from call. Women lost in the jungle do not strip off to cross a bridge. Their underwear was never found. I strongly object to your offensive imprecations against Lisanne and Kris. You are suggesting they were beyond incredibly stupid AFTER the situation became deadly dangerous. And they could not save themselves in a week. But go ahead and insult them all you want. I can imagine what they would make of your character and intelligence.
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  116.  @stevemorse108  Grande is superbly informative about psychology, and usually very good at true crime. But I disliked his conclusion on this one. I think if he had looked at it like he was considering the purchase of a second car (ie trusting his own judgement) he would have not have bought the no foul play scenario.
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  117.  @scorpiontail2561  The simply inescapable fact is the guide F did it, probably helped by his sons. and has got away with it. He has a reputation with North European women clients, and is blacklisted in Boquete for that reason. He was listed as the prime suspect on the Panamanian police files because he had guilty knowledge.
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  118. There is a video of her kissing Macron when he was 15.
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  119.  @steveblundell7766  There were about 30 excess deaths beyond what was expected in that unit , and the ones she could have killed were only half the excess deaths but treated as if they were the only ones in the probability estimate that was instrumental in convicting her. That was improper.
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  120.  @JudeLind 1) Salmond admitted on oath that while he was in a position of high authority and prestige he was cuddling female employees of the government he headed without obtaining those women's consent. 2) Scotland has a third verdict called Not Proven.
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  121. I remember reading that after D Day half the losses in NW Europe were caused by Nebewerfers (rocket mortars).
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  122. My dad was in the TA Parachute regiment and says they used to put a handkerchief half in the fellow in front's pack as they were waiting to jump and just before they went would point out his chute was not right.
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  123.  @le_rayon_vert  Because of an unusual spike in deaths at the unit its procedures were looked and a report severely criticised the doctors in the unit and all but accusing them of accidently causing the deaths by being lazy and careless. After that report those same doctors went to the police and blamed the spike in deaths on Letby deliberately killing babies. So I am afraid there is a powerful self interested motive for those four doctors to have accused Letby.
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  124. Russia is a military autocracy, The longer the war goes on and the more help Ukraine gets from the West the more formidable the Russian military becomes as it adjusts to the level of opposition.
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  125. A lot of these 'backpackers' have led very sheltered lives.
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  126. You can see from the amount of body armour he is wearing that he now understands it is only a matter of time before his vehicle gets hit on the journey to these locations.
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  127.  @elizabethkelly2987  The Panamanian government did not want the deathes of Kris and Lisanne to be a case in which perpetrators who abduct, rape and murder Dutch kirls were roaming their tourist attraction areas. There is a lot of rationalization going on in what is said officially but I suspect that any cop worth his salt privately suspects the night photos to be part of a criminal deception.
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  128. War is a matter of will and logistics according to General Hodges. The Russians have plenty of both. Objectively, of course the cost is too high, but the Russians can wreck Ukraine if they are willing to pay the price, which they apparently are.
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  129. Taiwan does not currently assert itself to be a formal separate country sovereign apart from China. If Taiwan declares independence it will be invaded. and the Taiwanese know this because China has openly said it would instantly invade Taiwan if it said it was now a sovereign state.
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  130. Like they deterred him from attacking Ukraine? You have to care about Ukraine more than he does.
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  131. ​ @CreamIceMs  Well I am sure they were where they were unable to be heard but why? What you suggest as resolving an anomaly is reasonable, yet in this case there are myriads; when each factoid is examined individually one can see no overall pattern of a malevolent intelligence at work and the fact that these were two striking young women seems irrelevant , yet the evidence must be assessed in its totality rather than arbitrarily hinging on one point. When one proceeds in such a manner the marginal unlikelihoods accumulate into an Everest. Incidentally, It is not jungle, because you cannot keep cattle in a jungle and there are trails, work shacks and scattered dwellings for the herders (including a shack the book co authored by the Panamanian investigating magistrate in the case says the girls spent time in), you cannot keep cows in a jungle. Volunteer and then paramilitary emergency search parties were in that area yelling for days while the phones were being switched on and offin the latter part of a period of a full eleven days. And the those searching were professional guides so experts, and Panamanians trained in how to look for lost people in real jungle like the Darien Gap national park. I think it reasonable to assume their local knowledge, training, and experience enabled them to understand how far sound would travel and to go close enough to rivers to be within earshot. Except in a thunderstorm; now the night photo of a full week after they disappeared and that shows Kris's hair was taken in the early hours during a thunderstorm. Why do you think that photo, the only evidence of either KK and LF during the 11 days, was taken when no one was going to be out and about; it feels clandestine, eh?
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  132. Ukraine was most certainly not given any security "guarantees" in the nuclear negotiations as the former ambassador asserts. The US insisted that the text of the Budapest Memorandum explicitly stated Ukraine had been given security "assurances" and NOT security guarantees.
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  133.  @ayo8323  Anders does have areas in which he is the go to guy, but he cannot be an authority on everything.
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  134. You have to use everything you have at a trial. Her lawyer did not mount a proper professional defence with expert witnesses at her trial; so now she cannot use any of this stuff that was available then in an appeal.
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  135. If you must, never use a .22
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  136. How far would we be prepared to go in a war on our borders?
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  137. Drones. China has huge manufacturing complexes, and could produce an overwhelming number of drones.
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  138. Fail fast and fail cheap in general, while pouring resources into any hint of success is the Russian way according to Kofman.
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  139. Hodges is confident that when it comes down right to it Putin will fold without seriously considering his nuclear options. But the man in the Kremlin gets a vote, so it is irresponsible of Hodges to give the impression he knows what Putin's reaction to losing might be. Fortunately, Washington is not looking to find out.
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  140.  @Serbinator_Dominator  General Hodges was correct that Russia would fail in their initial SMO. He understands military science, but he does not appreciate Putin's decisiveness. Hodges thinks if he is trounced Putin will ultimately cut his losses in Ukraine, but the people in Washington know better.
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  141. Britain has been raiding the defence budget to pay for social spending without raising taxes for multiple decades.
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  142. The US never expected or wanted Ukraine to succeed with the offensive, that would be too risky because Russia might panic and escalate to a level that will involve the US directly. No, the true objective of US assistance to Ukraine is by giving enough keep it in the game no matter what Russia does conventionally, the Kremlin will ultimately tire of continuing futile attempts to knock Ukraine out of the war, and ask for terms to cease hostilities.
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  143. Quisling said it was logical on a range of grounds that the Dnieper be the border between the West and Russia. It now seems in many ways he was a visionary. The Russian losses now are numerically as bad as during initial assault on Kiev, although consist of mainly convict volunteers, not the professional cadre, so they are replaceable, and even expendable. Ukraine failed to follow up successes with all available forces on a single axis of advance, as a result Russia fortified then figured out sacrificial reconnaissance in force tactics and drew on prisons for abundant low quality manpower to implement it. Industrial scale production of arms including some pretty useful ones such as the FAB bombs and drones enable them to advance inexorably. All indications are that Russia is not quitting whatever the West does. Russia is most unlikely to back down over Ukraine.
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  144.  @duncansmith7576  Nah, Russia lacks the technology to even properly exploit its own oil and shale reserves. The massive investment required to develop a lithium mining industry is completely beyond Russia
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  145.  @arctech6169  Maybe he is an ironic hipster from the heart of urbane darkness.
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  146. Prigozhin is a clever businessman with a huge dog in the fight, rather thanbeing an an independent news source on it so he is quite capable of constructing a narrative of Ukraine winning in Bakhmut to keep Kiev sending troops there. For all we know he has all the ex cons and ammunition he can use.
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  147. I think there is an escalating stalemate, meaning the rate of death and destruction is inexorably climbing on both sides, but there is no end in sight. Ukraine has not even drafted men under 25 yet and they have huge stock of Western weapons (they use the $30,000 dollar British NLAW half a dozen at a time as an unaimed barrage weapon).
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  148. Trump made no secret of his policy on Ukraine and he won, so that is that for Zelensky.
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  149. Women are mischievous . I would not be too sure they are not kidding you.
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  150. A lot of info I was not aware of even though I try to keep up with this stuff.
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  151.  @nursejessie8149 Panama was successful at keeping it quiet; she escaped after a few days, but the abductors could hardly have planned to let her go. They are not the even the first Dutch girls to die on the trail, there was a supposed suicide before. More sinisterly, a backpacking British man in his twenties vanished from that same town in 2009. On the actual tourist trail up to the summit there are sometimes robberies. The girls didn't know any of that I am sure. The weather that day was excellent, and even on the rougher trail past the summit it is not through jungle at all its at most forest with settlements and cattle with people using paths. There are hikers shacks too. In the rainy season it is rough country with lots of mud but when they the girl were on it isn't could be covered quickly and isn't dangerous at all, at least in respect of the terrain and rivers. The reward offered is a king's ransom in Panama and they were supposed to be alive making calls for 11 days in this inhabited area with no one seeing or hearing them calling for help. A huge search was mounted over that area that over lapped with the calls from the girls phones. When the search hotted up ten weeks later and began to look for culprits, pulverized body parts and pristine belongings started appearing. Some close to a indigenous peoples village . Bones don't float.
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  152. ​ @scorpiontail2561  It is already solved, he just got away with it. He was the only one to say that the girls had gone behind the Pianista, and then he lied by saying that Eileen the young German woman who worked at the language school had told him. When she denied it, he said it was Eilleen's boss who told him . She denied it. The police listed him as suspect for that reason. He met the girls the day before they disappeared and offered them a multi day trip to the distant and village of Alto Romero with a stay at his lodge there. The trail they went missing on the afternoon of the next day while hiking by themselves is on the path to Alto Romero, and their backpack was found months later practically on the doorstep of one of his lodges there by an employee of his. he them found the first clothing and the first remains. He found one boot from each within 48 hours. He is almost certainly the one who suggested that the night photos (likely taken by him near Alto Romero) were taken at the cable bridge. There is guilty knowledge, untruths about how he came by that knowledge, and strong circumstantial evidence over months. No way in hell is he innocent of this double homicide, as anyone who has looked into it is already aware of.
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  153. Silly ending. Russia being driven back to its original 2013 borders was never expected by any serious analyst. The Russians are going to take further large parts of Ukraine, then there will be a deal.
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  154. You don't know what their life at home was like.
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  155. Some people though Ian Hislop was funny when he went on and on at Paula Yates on HIGNFY. I thought it was toe curling because she was too vulnerable. Truss is effectively not PM, because the decision to replace her has already been taken, so Starmer is not proving anything much, except he is as tone deaf as Hislop,
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  156. How is Ukraine winning? Invisibly according to Chapman.
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  157.  @squireson  When has he ever given the Russians credit for doing anything right? More than once (eg the Kremlin dome flagpole strike), he has said something cannot be a Russian false flag because the Russians are not competent enough to carry out such an operation. Or even focus the camera equipment to film it.
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  158. Quantity over quality. Quantity has a quality all of its own. This is how to fight a war of attrition.
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  159. If so it would work for the Army Tactical Missile System too, and Ukraine has not been even been given that yet.
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  160. "Pay them to come". If you have enough money she will pretend to come.
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  161. The ATACMS is not a weapon that Ukraine can use without the US terrain navigation system, and the targeting is 100% dependent on US intel and surveillance. The Ukrainians are told what the target is and given some coordinates to punch in but that is it. So the missiles are basically American strikes on Russians.
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  162. Ed, for goodness sake smarten yourself up a bit.
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  163. In 2008 it was announced by NATO that Ukraine and Georgia would become members of NATO; Georgia was instantly invaded and a fifth of Georgia is still occupied by Russia. Despite what happened to Georgia, Ukraine thought by deepening their NATO and EU links of they were going to deter Russia, instead they only provoked it. Hence 2014 and the loss of Crimea plus a hybrid war in Donbass. So with touching faith in the West's ability to intimidate Russia better than it had in 2008 and 2014, Ukraine intensified its EU an NATO links, and ended up in what they are in now
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  164. Not in Russia it isn't. Historically, democracy is not so much unknown as uncomprehended in Russia. As for whether the majority supports Putin, you are a naval expert. Zelensky has become more popular as a war leader; both boats rise in that tide. Putin felt secure enough to hold an election during a war.
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  165. An invasion can only really work if it comes as a surprise. The Russians wanted the invasion to come as a surprise and so they attacked with too small a force. You can have a big invasion or a surprise one. Not both. 'Further mobilised troops become inefficient'? Yes but its not about winning efficiently any more. For Russia a complete final 'true' victory is no longer attainable: a strategic success in getting to the Dnieper and them consolidating behind that formidable obstacle and incorporating East Ukraine into Russia is what is on the Kremlin's mind. They will have to be quick because the attrition of Ukrainian equipment at the current rate will mean that Ukraine will be entirely refitted with superior western arms by next year. At that point Russia will be faced with losing Donbass and even Crimea. which pace Binkvov will in my opinion face any conceivable occupant of the Kremlin with an unbearable humiliation.
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  166. I think he was a little wrong footed by how intelligently articulate Colonel Zhou Bo was. I have never heard a Chinese official who was that good at putting his country's case.
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  167. Yes the parity purchasing power or something like that has to be taken into account when you talk about the Russian economics.
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  168. The sending of low quality units into minefields is deliberate, a feature not a bug, and intended to clear those minefields one way or another.
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  169. I am sure people told them to think very carefully before joining Azov.
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  170. Europe needs to start worrying worry about getting economic growth to match China and the US's.
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  171. And conclude it was an accident?
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  172. Prigozhin is not capable of putting out false narratives?
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  173. Like Italy, Germany is a part of the West, and WW 1 & 2 were basically Western civil wars. You cannot talk as if the West was united in either.
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  174. No. The chief officer was the backstop; he left his post improperly, and on reaching the bridge failed to mention the door was still open to the captain.
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  175. Possibly it was in retaliation for the killing of grain logistics tycoon and militia funder Oleksiy Vadatursky, who was killed 3weeks ago in a targeted missile attack on his mansion, shortly after the Russians had agreed to let the shipping of grain resume.
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  176. Yes, but it is significant that CVR is posting about another novel ploy from the Russians. It used to be only the Ukrainians that he posted about coming up with this stuff. You can't stay top dog forever.
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  177. He is banned from most tourist businesses and hotels in that town. "In life it's not which path you take but whose path you cross'.
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  178. Taiwan does not claim to be independent of China, which has said if- Taiwan makes a unilateral declaration of independence then it will be invaded. So it is up to Taiwan what happens.
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  179.  @jasft9746  He is genuinely popular among Russians, and now he can announce some low cost territorial gains and boost morale. The cross border raids were never going to discredit him, and have backfired spectacularly.
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  180. Zaluzhny essentially halted the full on intensity of summer offensive after it became obvious it was not achieving results commensurate with the losses incurred. His replacement Syrsky is less worried about losses.
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  181. Doesn't he? Watch it to the end
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  182. What "this is all about" is getting Russia to stop attacking and enter negotiations. They won't do that if keeping what they have is presented as a concession (that would have to be paid for with a quid pro quo).
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  183.  @ScottishAtheist  The Professor says the most important evidence against her was not sound
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  184. It is not just Putin who thinks like that. The mindset of the average Russian is like that of an American or British man during ww1.
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  185.  @ScottMcMaster-er4xj  As late as the 1930s Britain was still grabbing new colonies for its world wide empire. An empire that was ruled by FORCE. Let me put it another way, Russia is backward, and that is reflected in their atavistic patriotism and support for Putin (he really is genuinely popular in Russia).
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  186. Ukraine for Russia is like Vietnam was for America: a country so far away that it could be withdrawn from without any great national security problems. Not.
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  187. But America is being asked to do the heavy lifting; in effect subsidise European social spending and a war that Ukraine has no intention of ending. And meet the challenge of China
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  188. Pretty much as one might have expected.
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  189. Blade runner anti drone unit.
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  190. Yes, but his conclusion as to what probably happened was way, way off. I am aghast.
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  191.  @nursejessie8149 The rucksack was never in the river, hence I don't consider what Dr Grande thought probable is even a viable hypotheses.
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  192.  @Darknesstaker  A very special expert on the case is guide F. He met the girls the day before they went missing and reported them missing the day after they went missing. He found their remains and clothing (relatively close to his ranch down the trail they went missing on) , I could go on. The most recent book about the case is by Nina von Rönne who rented a home on F's ranch for several months in 2015. She says he can be very charming but there there is a frightening side to him.
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  193. It may have been illegal and brutal but it was not unprovoked. Russia warned they would not stand for Ukraine getting close to the American led anti Russian military alliance known as Nato, and the top US diplomat in Moscow (now head of the CIA) told the White House that Russia was serious. The US and Ukraine knowingly provoked a response from the Kremlin, which set out to show that Russia was not a country that could be treated like that.
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  194. Or so egotistical that he though his oratory was enough, and didn't need to call experts for the defence.
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  195. According multiple people but especially 'F', you cannot go off the trail Lissane and Kris went on and get lost in the jungle because you literally cannot go off the trail where it is through the jungle. Where the trail is through jungle, that jungle forms impenetrable walls to the trail. Beyond that part you can go off the trail, but there the trail is through patches of forests with paths to cleared pasture land with people cattle herding, going on errands and working their farms. What 'F' says is the danger is to go too far down the trail and forget the time. I don't think anyone with a mental age of over ten years could fail to understand that if you walk too far from civilisation and find yourselves in an unknown area after nightfall, you stop moving, wait for dawn, and then retrace your steps.
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  196. She was too feminine for the job, you can see that by the way she dressed. He reportedly was more than a friend to her, its an open secret he was with multiple other top tory women. He ought to have told her that the tax cut would not fly, yet fantastic as it seems, he does not seem to have realised it.
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  197. English english of the South East received pronunciation variety is what is being given here (Scotland is a country). If I remember rightly Daniel Webster altered the spelling of words so that Americans could have its own language,. When tribes spit in Papua New Guinea something similar with words happens.
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  198. The worst is yet to come. And it will last longer than anyone thinks too.
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  199. It's only the convicts who are being killed, and it seems they are being used to locate Ukrainian artillery when it fires on Wagner's constant reconnaissance in force. Wager has 20,000 convicts, the planners of Wagner operation just get more convict to replave the ones dying, The bombardments after Wagner operation are greater thAT THE ONES THAT WERE TO SUPPORT THE OP. These ops always take place in daylight, all the better for Russian drones to see the Ukrainian artillery's firing. And sorry, but it is working for Russia be it ever so ugly.
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  200. What we needed to know. Thanks. There is a girl who stayed at the place and got the fee shots; she said while before this mass poisonings she thought she had a hangover although she couldn't see at all for a couple of days.
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  201.  @chetpomeroy1399  There are a lot of Russians though.
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  202. Russia is most unlikely to use them because nukes are for those losing conventionally.
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  203. The Bank was made independent. And they think they are cleverer than anyone else.
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  204. Russia might fold in Crimea (ie withdraw from there) but that is a very different thing from Russia folding everywhere in Ukraine and stopping the war. There is no way to get Russia to throw their hands up and quit. None.
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  205. 'F' found Kris's boot on the 18th June. Two days before he had been present when Lissane's boot was found very close to where the backpack had been previously found! All this on the doorstep of his farm! Are we expected to believe strangers were repeatedly going to this isolated village where F is an important man to frame him by leaving things near his property he might have received the $30,000 reward for finding? It is possible, but hardly likely.
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  206.  @MilitaryHistoryNotVisualized  It was in actually more that half according to an encyclopedia of artillery, it did say 'by some estimates' though. I have also read that the Allied Air Forces top brass (fighter bombers I suppose) came up with all sorts of excuses about why they could not go after the Nebelwerfers in response to army generals demands that much more be done about them. The real reason was the Nebelwerfers were cleverly sited and very well protected making it an extremely dangerous assignment for the fly boys. I have heard a British veteran of Ukraine talk about various types of bombardments and he particularly hated being under fire from the Vasilek automatic 82 mm gun-mortar.
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  207. He is constrained, he cannot be positive about anything Russia is doing. Not that he wants to say the Russians are managing anything well, but he couldn't anyway.
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  208. Denizens of area around the trailhead urged the girls to not go further by themselves; because of them being two rather naïve pretty foreign females who might be targeted when isolated from help. It was that and not because of concern about them being unable to cope with the terrain, as while the trail is through jungle and fairly challenging, it is intended for people of much older ages that these young women and less fit than they to walk for fun,; there is a definite path with a clear end at the summit, which they reached and took selfies at. A few hours later both of their phones called the emergency number. But then their phones WERE TURNED OFF AND LEFT OFF FOR 14 HOURS. That is clear cut evidence of someone else having control of their phones within hours of them reaching the summit. Next day a couple of French tourists were told by local people it was not advisable to go on the trail because screams had been heard in the jungle the night before. Nary a hint anywhere of this case being death by misadventure. Beginning with their phones being turned off for the best part of a day after an single emergency call each, and ending with the obviously deliberate scattering over a improbably large area of manipulated remains (one bone from each girl found on the SAME sandbar, virtually the whole skeletons fragmented by no known natural process, no trace of either head, a shoe floating upriver and a backpack appearing several weeks later in pristine condition without a trace of ever being in river or humid jungle) amounts to conclusive circumstantial proof of a vile double homicide for reasons better left unmentioned. Grande has made himself ridiculous in the eyes of all people with a modicum of common sense.
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  209.  @kirkpatrick7475  His job was to look after Britain Armed Forced so they were ready for any eventuality; he presided of=ver thenm being run down. The low growth in the UK has meant that the defence budget has been cut to pay for inexorable increases of social spending without increasing taxes. Britain has pitiful Armed Forces, and the stocks of weapons being given to Ukraine will never be replaced.
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  210.  @ansubchaudry2348  Bonobos are not very dangerous like chimps. Bonoboa are more human and and less dangerous than chimps. It is a case of adaptation to different environments.
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  211.  @Planetside223  Or they ceased being disciplined by trainers when sent to a shelter.
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  212.  @nozhki-busha  Putin is far less worried than he ought to be it seems. Hitting his home city might wake him up. At end of day, Russia has the population to win, and it's begining to draw on it. Although it would be a pyrrhic victory for Russia, Ukraine would be the greater loser.
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  213.  @garethamery3167  It is very clear to me, as it was intended to be, which war Anders is talking about, and which platform. It just so happens that Denmark was instrumental in getting newly independent Ukraine involved in peacekeeping and other military missions all across the globe, and Denmark did that in order to speed Ukraine's path to Nato membership.
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  214.  @MultipleUselessness  The sheriff were telling him that by bouncing him off that wall (even though there were cameras). Speaking without being spoken to is breaking the rules and they'll stop you.
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  215. No one could stand up to that kind of interview. Shapps made a big mistake going on that program.
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  216.  @TorianTammas  For an elderly debilitated person or a troubled person not very interested in surviving , or a couple of mentally limited deaf and dumb ones , I could believe eleven days (we know from the phone logs that is how long they were being switched on and off) lost in that area. But these were two young women at their physical and mental peak with a thirst for life and search parties were calling for them all over the place for days towards the end of the eleven days. Were they struck dumb by the 'jungle' (actually cloud forest with grazing and herding paths though it).
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  217.  @TorianTammas  "They were on a trail in short shorts so they left it to go into a scratchy forest and then stayed put as people were calling for them for days? . The phones were being used for eleven days, and for several of those day there were search parties of experts combing the area where their clothing and backpacks were found. The searchers were also yelling; are we supposed to believe Kris and Lisanne were both struck deaf and dumb? There are people on the herding trails through the forest all over that area in daytime, and the reward was a life changing amount of money for a rural Panamanian. There are innocent answers for any one point but when you take the anomalies as a whole it simply does not have the flavour of an accident. I doubt it was a double suicide.
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  218. Distracting.
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  219. Hippy commune. He wasn't abducted if he was with his mother, whatever a judge says.
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  220. You cannot say the a situation is desperate for someone if they view it with equanimity. Russia has sufficient artillery and there are more Russians at the front all the time. Their losses are high but a lot of the Russians currently being KIA are not the professional soldier cadre or even reservists but totally expendable convicts. The average age of Ukrainian soldiers in well into the 40, and there are lots of young men in Kiev who are not being called up for political reasons; is Ukraine really doing everything it can? Sadly neither side is in a desperate situation. I do not see how Ukraine is being 'let down' because help given to Ukraine has to come from money for British hospitals ETC,. Moreover it is far from clear that any amount of extra help from the West will enable Ukraine to end the war to their satisfaction because Russia can and surely would adjust by amping up their own effort. If it's left up to Kiev (they get supplies no questions asked) the war will grind on endlessly in the hope of Russia suffering a political nervous breakdown.
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  221. Reports of serious indiscipline by the Australians against civilians at the end were kept secret.
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  222. Ukraine can't double down with ATACMS, they can't do anything even with the ones they already have without American help, different with each target.
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  223. You cannot 'cede' what you do not control. Ukraine has 80% of what it had before it tried to join NATO (despite all the warnings), and Ukraine put itselfin that position. The domino theory has a proven ability to produce catastrophic misjudgments. Whatever its values, , there are certain risks that a country will take only if it believes they are an existential necessity. Suggesting a deal that involves Russia handing back territory that it already controls would be accepted by the Kremlin is a literary fairy story. The suggestion that Russia could be overwhelmed conventionally in Ukraine with without any well founded fear the Russian commanders would successfully request the use of theatre thermonuclear weapons to rescue the situation is strictly an armchair opinion. Thousands of Western volunteers who have actually been to the front have decided to leave Ukraine. They know what is coming.
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  224. Anders seems to genuinely believe Ukraine will win this way Not 'can' in theory but actually will. What makes him think so?
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  225.  @j.y.3604  The strange thing is this was a guy who literally had it all from the day he was born. Money contacts and looks that had women throwing themselves at him (and finding out he was superficial). Maybe just bored by not having to strive for things . RFK JR managed to get a worm in his brain, something that meant he had ate raw pork despite the known dangers. There was something in the father and uncle that made them careless, even JFK's war exploits were along those lines but it is difficult to forgive junior's lack of concern for those he took down with him.
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  226.  @eirikrsland1399  Sadly, they need a man around not another girl because men will fight and other men understand that. Naivety runs in the Kremers family, she had been to South America before with her parents. I have read (apropos the 'hired gun' theory of pair bonding) that women tourists in some counties often end up in relationships with a local man, simply to be able to get some peace. That said, you don't have to go to other countries, and there are cases (eg 1991 Austin yogurt shop) where stuff happened that I am certain would not have been attempted if a man had been present.
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  227. They started at 10.45 am and took 3 hours up to the peak, then kept going and went down the other side on a rougher continuation of the trail for an hour. It is known where the last daytime photo (Kremers on a boulder in a small stream) was taken and that it was taken at 2pm. They had been taking photos of all points of interest, but not far along from the location of picture 508 is a photogenic little waterfall, yet there is no photo of it. The lack of any more photos would be explained by them turning around to go back at 2pm. Such a decision would be very plausible because by that point the girls been already been walking for 4 hours, 3 of them uphill. Going back they they'd already have photos of everything on the route. The photos cannot lie, unlike the phone activity. Calls from their phones may have been by the perp, and made to deceive investigators, but as you say something bad was underway when both girls' cell phones tried to connect to the emergency number 2.5 hours after the 2pm photo. If they had not turned around and started back at 2pm and instead went on one hour it would mean they'd be accepting a five hour walk back. I just cannot see them choosing what, if they had eventually returned safe, would have amounted to a 10 hours walk (half of that up inclines). However, let us assume they wanted for some reason to keep on, and did not not turn around and go back, but instead kept walking in the same direction; no matter how hard they pressed on, they simply could not have reached the cable bridge over the Serpent river ravine in 2.5 hours from where they were at 2pm. So, whatever the apparent attempted emergency number calls after 4.30 pm were for, and whoever was using the girls cellphones to make them, those calls had nothing to do with an accident crossing the river cable bridge. Moreover, and this is a very telling point I think, the cable bridge over the Serpent river ravine is on the trail. So even if they went off the trail they must have got back on it to get to the cable bridge, and even if they were confused about what way they were going they knew they certainly must have know they had not crossed the cable bridge before and so to cross it was go further away from Boquete as it was getting dark. They had researched the trail on the internet before going so knew crossing the cable bridge would not be a quicker route to civilization than than turning around and going back down the trail. Crossing the cable bridge was going into part of trail they had never been on in order to hike though the night. The emergency calls, whoever made them, time the fateful events as being underway by 4.30pm . Yet no more calls were made for another 14 hours and the phones were switched off during that time.
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  228.  @rooster1012  They don't show you the many who tried to help medvac a comrade and got successfully targeted by another drone and then someone tried to help them, and so on.
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  229. The most likely explanation for Bakhmut is both sides have decided to go toe to toe irrespective of the consequences.
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  230. The contrarians notwithstanding, everything inescapably points to a double homicide. After the initial fruitless search the Panamanian attorney general announced the official conclusion of the authorities was girls had fallen in the river and been swept out to sea. THEN, as if by magic, the possessions and remains appear downstream from the Serpent river monkey bridge. The killer must take us for imbeciles to think that we would find girls lost in a foreign jungle/ forest trying to call the emergency number ONCE each then giving up trying for 13 hours credible. The next day they supposedly tried to call the emergency number three times them gave up by midday and never tried to phone the emergency number ever again! In the normal circumstances girls that age are never off of their phones and here they are lost in the jungle and desperate to get out, and they are trying to call the emergency services less than they call family and friends on an average day at home in Holland? And to top all they completely give up trying to call the emergency number after 48hours although their phones are active for several days afterwards? Arnold Donaldson has it right. Criminals preying on undefended young women, and trying to cover their tracks is an ineluctable conclusion.
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  231.  @happyjonn9242  The defence failed to do a lot of obvious things to counter the prosecution case. Not saying she would or should have been acquited but the evidence agains is not as strong as the jury could have been forgiven for thinking.
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  232. The centre of gravity of Russia's attack is flitting unpredictably along the front. Meanwhile Ukraine's best equipped mobile units are ensconced in the forests of Kursk.
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  233. She really is an Oakshott though, being related to the late political philosopher Michael Oakeshott, who was not left wing even in the 1930s. So maybe it's a bit hereditary.
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  234.  @tomellingham8627  Find a medical statistician or any statistician that will defend the statistical evidence used to convict her. They were banned from talking about it before but now everyone qualified in the field says the main evidence against Lucy Letby was misleading the jury as to the probability of her being innocent.
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  235. Israeli military intel makes mistakes, and they and the Israeli pilots being worked 24/7 to find targets and hit them at the moment. The Palestinians make mistakes too of course. Whoever launched the weapon that did it, there was no deliberate intent to hit a hospital I suspect. Totally innocent civilians die in wars, and this is a formally declared war now. it is difficult to believe Israel would deliberately use a weapon powerful enough to kill hundreds on the hospital and cause such a predictably huge loss of life. And yes the explosion in the car park is totally unable to have killed hundreds. On the other hand all twenty odd hospitals in north Gaza have been told to leave by Israel and this particular hospital was hit by Israel a few days ago. So the Palestinians are exaggerating and fibbing a bi, but what choice do they have? Conclusion: information war is being levied. As for Egypt not letting the Palestinians enter Egypt en mass, that would be colluding with Israel in expulsions because there is no way to know it they would be allowed to return.
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  236. If polyandry is bad then polygyny is good?; yes for the woman's DNA it is because she gets a high quality male's DNA in her sons.
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  237. The StormZ units are sent out to draw fire, thereby enabling enemy positions (especially artillery's) to be located.
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  238. In WW2 the German army overperformed massively, and that was the problem. The Russian army is far worse than anyone expected. So Europe can quite easily defend itself; they just don't want to spend the money.
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  239. Yes.
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  240. We need something that ensures the security of the UK. The security of Ukraine is an incident not an end.
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  241.  @stevenmoore3480  I don't think we can be confident either way yet. She may be guilty but the evidence was very much more shaky that one might be forgiving for thinking.
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  242.  @rogerbois1128  He is a good general. But when he calls for the US to give Ukraine the wherewithal to defeat Russia in Ukraine, he fails to understand that Putin' would react and that reaction is not something the US could control
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  243. Sun bleaching is irregular because of shade and angles ; Kris Kremers's pelvis had been soaked in lye to the extent the marrow was denatured, and it was uniformly greenish not blanched from UV light with mottling. Kris and Lisanne went on the hike on the 1 April 2014, they unsuccessfully called an emergency number before 5pm that day. Get it into your noggin that this trail has nowhere they could have got lost or fallen into a ravine reachable by 5pm, and by then they'd have been hours into retracing their steps for an 8 hour hike. One one of their phones was switched on the 11th April 2014, and switched off with 22% power remaining. So by the accident hypothesis at least one of the girls was alive in the forest for ten days. The initial couple of days search could have missed them as it was not thorough, but starting on the 6th, a huge police and rescue team with knowledge of the area search began to comb ALL the forest where they were later supposed to have been by the accident conjecturers. So for five days a sweep though the lightly wooded areas (which would include the river banks by locals helping police and with a substantial reward by the standards of the country) missed her, and she didn't hear the helicopters didn't scream which would carry a long way (young women can scream very loud). Then for five days at least one of them was alive and managed to avoid a dragnet search of even the deepest forest. Sorry to use the word 'avoid' but I think you have to remember these girls were not fugitives. The bones had not been pecked bitten or otherwise marked by animals, or abraded as in a river bed. A piece of Kremers's pelvis and a part of of Froon's ribs were found together beside a river but even it they died together upstream in a fall into the river, the odds are long of these pieces washing up on the same sandbank. A section of Froon's skin found 72 days later was rolled into a ball and seemed not to have even begun to decompose. These remains were found in the area around the hamlet of Alto Romero. The rucksack was very close to Alto Romero indeed and very few people think it showed signs of being having got there by floating on the river. Kremers's shorts were only a few kilometers away. It's abundantly clear, to me at least, that Alto Romero has at least one very calculating psychopath living in it. He thinks he is so clever with his fake emergency calls and leaving the phone to be found and pulverizing the bodies to blame it on the river. But really, he made a bad mistake not just disappearing everything, because all the improbabilities add up to a cast iron case for the deaths of Kremers and Froom being no accident. In a small community like Alto Romero, person(s) of that character would have acquired a bad reputation. I dare say sooner or later t his neighbours or his criminal associates will get tired of having him around to commit another crime get caught, so they'll deal with him in their own fashion. Kris and Lisanne, may you rest in peace.
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  244.  @Soupertrouper  Thirty years ago Mearsheimer told Ukraine they would need their own nuclear weapons to deter Russia bullying.
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  245. Trump is negotiating in the way Walter Cronkite suggested had to be done in Vietnam: "not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could." The Domino Theory nuts notwithstanding.
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  246.  @pittuk6500  There are a lot less men on these demos than the media are portraying, they could not even find one to speak on camera.
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  247. Russia is going to try and finish this in 2022. I expect a sudden massive escalation if they don't
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  248. Bakhmut was an extremely long battle with different stages in which the focus and methods altered, at least on the Russian side, so it is not amenable to a single encompassing narrative. We are not talking about Hostomel airport
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  249. Are they even trying to 'breakthrough' and presumably seize lots of territory quickly to the 'maximum extent possible? We tend to assume they are trying that, but they seem to be going too slow, considering a reportedly large force being held in reserve . That the mobilized troops are all gone seems dubious. . I think Macgregor's suggestion that Russia wants to keep Ukraine in an artillery logistics battle of attrition may be more along the right lines. A massive taking of territory in a successful Russian offensive might produce a big American response, maybe even a direct one. Russia is trying to make the war boring.
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  250. Total bluff by Ukraine. Russia was chastened and now is grimly determined; they have the people to figure out technical answers to anything the US gives Ukraine. There is no long hanging fruit left ("thinly held Russian lines"), the drunken incompetent Russian generals and colonels have been dismissed and command and control are less concentrated and easily located; there are defenses in depth artillery and supply are dispersed and out of range of HIMARSand double the number of troops manning a much shorter line. It is by no means obvious that successful combined arms mobile offensives under current conditions are possible for either Ukraine or Russia. Kursk is the model of a successful Russian battle. Any major Ukrainian attack will run into Kursk2.
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  251. @Di nada The more fool the Russians for believing in Minsk
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  252. If Bakhmut really was unimportant, then Combat Veteran Reacts would say it was important
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  253.  @Paroxystyphel  I think Russians are very, very, good at reverse engineering and their logistics are slow but effective when they come on stream in earnest.
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  254. The US's reactions seem calibrated more to keep Russia from panicking that help Ukraine to win in a meaningful sense.
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  255. The military aid to Ukraine accelerated massively after 2020 when Ukraine was granted further special status; Ukraine had been referred to by Nato officials as a Nato ‘partner’ for some time before they joined NATO’s ‘enhanced opportunity partner interoperability program”. They were de facto a part of Nato yet without any chapter 5 protection against being identified as such by the Russians, who had said that state of affairs was unacceptable. Zelinsky presumably was told that Ukraine being given weapons by Nato to fight a civil war against ethnic Russians backed by Russia was not placing Nato under any obligation to defend Ukraine from Russia, which had already annexed Crimea, and might do the same to the Ukraine. He does not seem to have fully processed that information.
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  256. To make you think what you are thinking.
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  257. Hamas are irregulars and irregulars commit atrocities through a lack of discipline. The Palestinians have lost every hand so they have the choice of desperate measures or meek submission to their fate. They played into their enemies' hands but Israel was already holding all the cards, so what was lost, really? Who was hounding the Jewish lady off of the Scottish mommy site? Not ethnic Scots I guarantee you. The Middle East conflict has nothing to do with Britain which has no influence with major players anyway. Note I said conflict not problem. As Connor Cruise O'Brian said conflicts don't have solutions. they have outcomes.
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  258. How? Are they going to go through a gas pipe and pop up on the coast?
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  259.  @balaclavabob001 The Chindit raids were followed by, and may well have been caused by, the Japanese trying the same trick, just as staff officers warned Wavell it might. Ukrainian Special Forces command orchestrating the Belgorod incursions, especially the last one that got uncomfortably close to a non conventional depot, ought to have predicted there would be a response. Anders seems to be saying this, like everything they do, has predictably gone wrong for Russia and Ukraine could (and will continue to be able to) count on that always happening.
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  260. If European countries are not willing to spend 5% on their own defence then why should US taxpayers foot that bill? Free ride is over.
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  261. Hunt is Truss's Norman Tebbit. Like a polecat.
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  262.  @dancerinmaya6813  He turned the questions around.
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  263. What is the meaning of calling Putin a gangster when he leads a sovereign state that by definition acknowledges no higher authority? If it is intended to mean he rules by fear then I am afraid Mr Sheridan is misinformed: Putin is genuinely popular in Russia.
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  264. Heavy artillery especially '3D' targeting as pioneered by the British in WW1 in what wins wars. The Allies failed with tanks. Blitzkrieg was a myth, (Mosier). WW1 saw the emergence of Stormtroop tactics. The Wagner assaults are super slow stormtroop tactics with the addition of ruthless use of expendable reconnaissance in force by convict units.
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  265.  @UNIVERSAL-UR  Russia did, proving that they are crap in offense. Their grit in defence cannot be denied.
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  266. There has never been a case of two people disappearing like that in a forest . And the first occurrence happened to be of two beautiful young girls. And the guide who offered them an overnight stay in his lodge near the remote village of Alto Romero, which they declined, ten weeks later can't set foot outside his Alto Romero lodge's door without tripping over Kris and Lisanne's remains, for which he tried to claim the $30,00 reward. If you believe that is not evidence of a double homicide, then I have some raffle tickets to sell you.
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  267. Ukraine renounced nuclear weapons and got paid. Russia was one of those issuing assurances to Ukraine so they could have been under no illusions about the value of the assurances from any of the others, and it was explicitly stated in the Budapest memorandum that Ukraine had not been given a security guarantee by America.
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  268. The Russian private who pushed a Lt. Colonel got 7 years in a penal camp. As for a culminating point, there have been multiple ones already and the Russians just remuster their forces and try again
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  269.  @timothymcbride9484  They are within striking distance, and forcing good units to be diverted there. Nice return on the Belregod raids, not.
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  270. Which country?
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  271. And Epstein's Island!
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  272. Going by the undersized army he went into Ukraine with, Putin seems to have originally assumed Kiev would ask for terms once the invasion reached the capital rather than fight it out. Putin is desperate to end the war, but only the terms he stipulates. I cannot see Putin withdrawing without what he could present as a victory, because it would be tantamount to admitting the war was a huge mistake in the first place and loosen his grip on power. It is too late for Putin, he must go on until the bitter end to (sort of) win or lose it all.
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  273.  @sinisterkitty8411  Trump seems to give a good deal but them bilks you and walks away laughing. That is how he succeeded in business. Putin would be a fool to trust any concessions he gets in an Ukraine agreement are solid or permanent.
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  274. The most level headed military man who has commented on this war. Still, I think Western experts inveterately underestimate how far Putin is willing to go in regards to Ukraine.
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  275. Ukrainians desperate to evade the draft. AKA conscientious objectors on luxurious German welfare.
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  276. "What Russia lacks more than anything else is soldiers, and it cannot afford lose people at the rate it has since the beginning of the war." So we are told but then we were told they could not afford to start the war, yet they proceeded to do just that. Russia has no other invasions in hand apart from the one of Ukraine so I suspect Russia is not going to worry about losing troops. In fact, soldiers are the one thing that the Ukrainians are not going to be given by the West, so wring down Ukrainian manpower is a viable strategy for Russia even if the Russians have to accept an unfavorable kill ratio.
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  277. Mearsheimer says Trump winning won't make any difference.
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  278. Is GDP growth not about innovation and productive capacity but just about how many immigrants are added to the population? Economists sometime seem to secretly believe that,
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  279.  @apollonia-ava  Have you seen that hostel owner? Understand why he'd put extra in the drinks of women who'd be coming back there to sleep it off?
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  280. I thought that originally, but it depends how far they went. If they went much beyond their last photo ( the nighttime photos can hardly have been by either of them) and got into the cow pasture, then they could have wandered off the trail, because there the trail is very poorly marked. Whenever killed them has to have an unrivalled knowledge of the area and confidence in their ability to know where to take them. Men who herd cattle in the area would fit that bill. If Lisanne and Froom were in the cow pasture and wandering about for even a short time , they would be highly visible and obviously not part of a larger group so undefended by men. That would make them an easy 'mark'. What is it they say about avoiding muggings?; 'look as if you know exactly where you are going'. Kremers was so striking she might have had trouble anyway.
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  281. Not much doubt about that.
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  282.  @michaelguzman7367  He has long had an insalubrious reputation. Reputable tourist businesses in Boquete wanted nothing to do with him before Kris and Lisanne set foot in Panama. When you put that with his being in communication with KK and LS the morning of their fatal hike and him being incredibly successful in finding their remains (though he could not find them when they were alive), it is difficult to avoid a certain conclusion.
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  283. Probably more than in WW1, cecause trenches are less of a defence that ever
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  284.  @julianbrelsford  What the Russian are mainly doing all along the line now is a scaled up version of what Ukraine was doing in Bakhmut, according to Anders, eh?
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  285.  @knoll9812  I would question whether the extra vehicles amounted to a relative advantage. The iron was hot, they failed to strike as the Western advisers urged them to. The minefields and integrated artillery are far more dense now, so the delay availed them naught
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  286. It is intended to alarm Washington, like the oil infrastructure strikes. Ukraine is putting pressure on America; the tail wagging the dog.
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  287. Emma Ashford gently points out that Russian collapse is has to be assumed by anyone who thinks Ukraine could win. As she says such a collapse would require Ukrainian offensives and the West is not going to do that. She further says that the effectiveness of Ukrainian defence will be the key to denying Russia total victory.
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  288. Prolly a set up, meaning they recruited him already intending to inform on him. They give the cops a few hapless bodies now and again and go about their real smuggling business, Everyone's happy, even content creators.
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  289. Denmark was the original Nato member trying to smooth Ukraine's way into Nato. The Danes live well in their generous welfare state as a defence freerider. Free ride is over. The Russians greatly overestimate Britain, being in the EU has deindustrialised the UK, just as the leading British industrialist of the time said it would.
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  290.  @nursejessie8149  I do not envy those in your care, I thought nurses needed common sense. The trail ends at the cable "bridge", which is a scary tightrope with 2 hand ropes and they would never have willingly crossed it even if there were not warning signs advising against proceeding into the jungle. The remains were found in an area that is across two large rivers so them crossing large rivers new to them would mean they'd know they were going away from the way back to the town: an impossibility. The taxi driver who took them there was found drowned in a pool though only in his 30s was surely in on it, (similar to Julie Ward). The clean and dry rucksack was placed there soon after an intensive search dragnet of the area assisted by the Dutch had begun, and was intended to get rid of the investigation. The calls made on the phone were done at the same time each day by someone with a watch, which they didn't have with them. Their underwear was not found. The remains were not the work of animals, skin had been rolled into a ball.
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  291.  @MrMooremelody  The night time photos on the 8th, a week after they went missing, show a cliff edge, and the back of Kremers's head with FRESH blood on Kermers's temple. Who was holding the camera so steady on those photos, which are like a storyboard sequence? The author of the fiction? Kremers's looks would have made her the main target of a crime, so I think she was alive longer. Maybe not till the 8th though. Codes for the cell phones are something the girls would have told any perpetrator(s) willingly, not realizing the purpose was to manufacture a 'lost and injured' narrative and get away with their homicide. Remember that all the phone information is, like the night time photos, highly suspect because it is data that in in our through being been gift wrapped and delivered rather that discovered. It cannot be separated from what is quite possibly a cunning stratagem by a an unidentified perp to mislead everyone about what happened. It's all fruit of the poison tree
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  292.  @stevemorse108  Dr Grande is maybe being tangential, and because he is worried about being sued. I would be in his position. If Amanda was guilty she would have had the key to her friend Meredith's door rather than having totry and kick it in. Yes, I know a lot about that case. I think Amanda had a few guys in Italy, but that is not all that unusual for young women of her generation. Lisanne was shy, Kris would have been a perfect friend for her in Holland. Panama is not Holland though. Like Knox, Kris and Lissanne's beauty were their downfall. The Nina Burleigh book was called The Fatal Gift of Beauty, and correctly said she was innocent as the Italian Supreme court definitive ruled. One of the few precedents for the exoneration was the reversal of former Italian PM Andreotti murder conviction , which was also a Perugia prosecution.
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  293. The German air force failed to destroy or even target in a determined way the mole in Dunkirk harbour that the bulk of the Expeditionary Force embarked from. This was because Germans failed to understand its importance. In the Battle of Britain, the Germans failed to comprehend the importance of the radar masts which were very vulnerable. The Germans had a unit of fighters with 1000lb bombs trained for precision strikes. They also had drop tanks that would have enabled them reach many of the masts and destroy the whole system. Most of the pilot losses During the Battle of Britain were lost on attacks of the invasion barges in the Channel ports. I agree that the Hitler was mainly concerned with conquering Russia and for that he needed to fool Stalin that Britain was Germany's priority. I'd go so far as to say the Battle of Britain was largely a deception operation. People forget that after Hallifax declined the premiership, effective choosing Churchill to lead the country, Chamberlain still had the allegiance of most Tory MPs and in Cabinet under Churchill, Chamberlain was extremely bellicose toward Germany.
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  294. Does everything have to be about limitless Western support for Ukraine or the lack of it?
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  295. People die accidently and otherwise in that town all the time. If all the murder victims were to stand up they'd have a hell of a population problem! Seriously, Boquete is not the laid back place the Western holidaymakers think it is. The locals and expatriates who are making money from tourism are in cahoots with the magistrates keep all that stuff quiet, which is why a few sad commenters here may actually believe the Panamanian authorities are objective assessor of the facts about Lisanne and Kris.
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  296. Dr Grande says an unknown person of interest is unlikely to be so "irregular" as to leave evidence consistent with foul play where it is bound to be found, and so there was no guilty intentionality at work. However, the trajectory of events established by the contents of the backpack was that the girls had gone down the rough and isolated part of the trail on the other side of the peak. That was a watershed in the investigation because it had not been thought likely, and having become known it moved the focus of inquiries much further away from the very many people living on the Boquete side of the the trail up to the summit that divides the two trails. Where the backpack was found is just outside the search area several kilometers down river from a dangerous monkey bridge on the trail that the girls could have reached and fallen into the river from had they gone on (another four hours!) . The remains of the girls were strewn around a bank of the aforementioned river near an Indian village. Dr Grande's conclusion is valid in relation to the Indians; yes, but though the possessions and remains finds made foul play more likely in in the minds of some observers, it did not in Panamanian officialdom's, who were the ones most important for the perpetrator to convince. In any case, it had the effect of moving the inquiries and search further away from those residing along the trail on the Boquete side. Most of the people who knew the girls were on the trail were those saw them as they walked past back yards on the initial three hour hike from the entrance to the trail up to the summit. In the Central Park Five case it emerged that, far from just being unlucky in running into a gang as originally assumed, the jogger-who was unusually attractive- had been spotted in a crowded part of the park and followed to an isolated area. The same thing happening with the striking Kremers is plausible. What probably happened was the girls turned around to come back after the photo at the little stream( they'd been walking for four hours) and quickly ran into the person(s) following them. One point that Dr Grande might consider is that if faked by a perpetrator the cellphone activity from the 1st April to 11th of April was begun almost immediately and continued with in the expectation that the phone would be kept for some time then left to be found and support an accidental interpretation. To me that would have been very quick thinking , or the result of a pre-existing plan. The night photos of the 8th April also indicate someone putting on record in a camera intended to be later left to be found, a narrative of girls lost in the wilderness and badly injured. Yet knowing to make it work he'd be keeping the camera and cell phone for another two months despite them being extremely incriminating; it would take a very confident methodical man. One could say it did not work, but this fellow if he exists is a Panamanian who knows all he has to worry about is the Panamanian authorities. And he used the contents of the backpack to gave them an illustrated timestamped narrative that satisfied them of not one but two foreign girls losing their way, having serious accidents, and fiddling with their cellphone in a relatively small area for 11 days without being seen or heard by a search and rescues team with abundant local knowledge that was combing every inch of it. This is quite a scenario to make people accept, yet he has done it. If such a culprit/screenwriter exists, who is he? My best guess would be someone who lives on a farm along the Boquete side of the trail, not over the summit. Maybe with his brothers.
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  297.  @rangelvictor5759  Have you been in a hospital lately? Being kind to Ukraine costs money that is needed to take care of our own people. Lets not pretend it doesn't.
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  298.  @evaluateanalysis7974  In Uk, the other day I was in the hospital and my Dad was in a bed under the unit reception desk. We in Britain have democratic elections, and if Ukraine does not want to stop fighting until it gets all its territory back then why don't they put that to a referendum of the Ukrainian people, eh?
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  299. General Hodges would not openly say what he really thinks the Ukrainian army is going to do. This is a ploy to keep Russia from striking while the iron is hot. Ukraine heeds time to regroup.
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  300. Today, he would be concerned with China's threat to American primacy.
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  301. Nixon did not look like an actor playing a great man. Kennedy did.
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  302. Hitler was culpable under the legal/forensic concept of responsibility. But what choice did Hitler have, given his objectives could not be achieved any other way and he felt compelled to attain them?
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  303. It is bad enough people averring he was the killer just because he said (and later denied), he met them Monday, the first the day before they went missing; was the one to report them missing on Wednesday the third; the one who somehow knew they had gone behind the Pianista (those who he said had told them said they hadn't and didn't know it themselves); the one who first suggested the night photos were taken at the cable bridge; the one to find the first remains--near one of his properties he'd offered the girls a stay at withal, but now we have someone saying that the night photo was an accidental exposure rather than a creative found footage fiction. People can be so cruel.
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  304. There are vast supplies of every type of arms and ammunition stockpiled in Israel by the US and earmarked for any conflict in the area. Washington is worried that China might see it as opportune to move of Taiwan if the US was engaged, directly or indirectly, in the Middle East in addition to the Ukraine commitment.
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  305. There are a lot of those Russians though.
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  306. When the US had a 200 to 1 ICBM advantage against Russia
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  307. 4:48 The aid to Ukraine is not increasing the likelihood of Russia and America coming into direct conflict, but actually decreasing it? Well, we ought to give Ukraine unlimited aid then!
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  308. No evidence was found for several weeks. The Panamanian Attorney general announced that Kremers and Froon had been swept out to sea in a river. Then after the Panamanian authorities ruled out foul play, (this was ten weeks after they disappeared) all sorts of evidence starts appearing. masses of fragmented, but nor abraded bones from the corpse of Froom, but only two much larger bones from Kremers, one of them a relatively huge piece of her pelvis. A cheap backpack that did not look like it had enough water damage or mold to have been in a rainy jungle for month, let alone in a river, and inside the non-waterproof backpack electronics in perfect working order. That is some value for money backpack! So all these items of very variable buoyancy, size and and weight were found in different places? Nope, all were found kilometers downstream from the monkey bridge over the Serpent river (fairly consistent with the river accident hypothesis) and on one one little stretch of the Serpent river that is almost on the doorstep of the farm belonging to guide F, who was searching hard for the girls with his unrivalled local knowledge. There was an intelligence at work in the backpack and remains appearing when they did and where they did. One that did not want to reveal itself, but overthought it.
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  309. Allow me to elucidate. Someone like that with pre existing 'form' has little to lose and was as a result willing to stick his neck out like a giraffe, and got in on the ground floor . So he is by now a nationalist figure by default. No matter what they really think, people with an education and position in society are not going to risk it
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  310. I like Tim Cross a lot but this is his worst interview by far. Putin would face 4:1 on the ground and much more in the air were he to attack a NATO country. It's clouded thinking to see a path from anything short of a compete defeat of Putin's SMO plus taking back Crimea to an attack on NATO.
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  311. I would not be so quick to assume any confessions would have been 'false'. There are hundreds of thousands of ethnic Russian Ukrainian refugees in Russia since 2015, and if you had went there talked to them in person you would discover that they all have horror stories, many about Azov. Anyone who joined a outfit like Azov knows (or ought to have) they are probably not going to enjoy a long and happy retirement with veteran's benefits. They did not get advanced American weapons, because of their unsavory reputation, which partly explains how they came to be captured. Anyway, what the Ukrainians are saying is that the Russians actually fired the missile, so who knows whether the Ukrainians are ruthless enough to deliberately do what they appear to be fibbing about?
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  312.  AndyWoohoo666  If Ukraine had them now it would use them. 'Nuff said.
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  313. ​ @Ian-yf1rl  I would have to question his minders' common sense given the dangers of movement to and especially back from a frontline location now.
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  314. The unions at that plant must share part of the blame. Repeated industrial action threats in 2013, refusal to discuss any reduction in pay and conditions and an actual strike that the them PM Cameron was complaining about in Parliament
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  315. Its's not just Trump dude. Washington clearly does not want to really defeat Russia in Ukraine.
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  316. 'Greased up penguin' is funny. Try and come up with more like that
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  317. The nuclear option is weak?
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  318. ​ @JudeLind  The presumption of innocence' is a shield not a sword; not for using to hide behind while making wild allegations against other people.
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  319.  @ragingtoastnextgen1458  Are you Tommy Sheridan?; he is loving all this. Like Sheridan who also was an accomplished pubic speaker let loose in court to successful deny everything, Salmond's victories will prove to be pyrrhic ones.
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  320.  @ciarandoyle4349  Russia built trenches and laid mines opposite Kharkiv. That was planning for a defensive contingency. The Ukrainians seem to have not dug in, and so lacked proper trenches, which explains why they had to fall back .
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  321.  @nozhki-busha  Is the Ukrainian defence line protecting Kharkiv so ideally placed and well fortified that they are sending good units as reinforcement to mediocre ones already on that line? Is Kharkiv, previously an area safe from enemy artillery and a useful supply hub for that reason, now in danger of being exposed to Russian fires because the defence line, such as it is, was built just right?
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  322. "The idea that a Russian victory is inevitable is prolonging the war". The Russians think that they'll win eventually; I am not sure that has anything to do with what opinion in the West is. You can tell them they won't win but unless they believe you, the war will not end even if they are pushed back inside their own borders, where with more infrastructure they can continue fighting and firing missiles. So what is Ukraine's plan for ending the war? You cannot be a winner unless you are the one that decides the war is over.
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  323. If I remember rightly, quite late in the video the Mail's guy did differentiate between Wagner's trained soldiers and their raw convicts. He said the convicts (being expendable) were sent first to draw fire, thereby enabling pinpointing of Ukrainian strongpoints for artillery strikes, presumably by recce drones. Actual Wagner troops moved forward afterward. It is surely unlikely that the convicts who had about a month of training mainly devoted to acclimatizing them to being outside 24/7, could be considered useful as replacements for a casualty in a squad of seasoned combat infantry. Many jobs in a squad a s rather specialised I understand this is part 1 of a reaction video but what the Mail says later about the way the convicts were utilized makes sense.
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  324. The Ukrainian separatist area units have the heaviest losses yet they are still heavy engaged in the fighting--not disbanded or even resting and refitting. It's kinda silly to think that the formations of Russia proper are not capable of fighting on at this intensity for another 1000 days.
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  325. While I like your take on the war and how it is going for Ukraine relative to Russia, you are wrong about what a country like Russia might consider an existential threat. Let us put how the war is actually going for Russia to one side. Now, assuming a hypothetical looming defeat for Russia, might their reaction be to think they are obliged to accept ( hypothetical remember) that they are a third rate country?; because that is what being defeated without daring to clearly threaten to use and then if ignored actually use some of the smallest types in their enormously expensive collection of various nuclear weapons against the conventionally armed medium sized country of Ukraine would amount to for Russia. To be clear Russia in this scenario would not be able to get Ukraine to surrender the land currently unoccupied by Russia; no, the most that would happen I think is Ukraine has to be satisfied with it being a somewhat smaller county. You have convinced me that Ukraine has serious problems but also has powerful weapons from foreign friends, strategic space, and potential mobilisation of getting on for a million men. Ukraine is losing men, but gaining territory. So if Zelensky is ruthless enough it is perhaps not out of the question that Ukraine ignoring nuclear threats and with a reequipped army might force Russia back to the 2014 borders.
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  326. Its a negotiating tactic; Trump is shaking things up. Zelensky got used to being the tail wagging the dog.
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  327. In the real world Russia acted as his theory would predict. Mearsheimer wanted Ukraine to be a nonaligned state with nuclear weapons . Instead Ukraine renounced nuclear weapons, then got an official Nato announcement that Ukraine would join Nato.
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  328. The Russians did not retreat, the Russians have not retreated for a well over a year.
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  329. Long term it is in China's interest . Russia is never going to ally with the US against China in the future after this, and without Russia, China can not be contained. China will probably end up brokering an agreement and its prestige will be immense.
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  330. Not loss of faith in politics, but loss of faith in technocracy, whereby certain issues are removed from discussion, case closed, and people have to like it or lump it. So the things they are most concerned about are supposedly no longer up for political discussion according to the mainstream parties, but we still have to listen to what business (ie specialists in making maximum profits for their shareholders) say is necessary. Is it any wonder that those parties are fading among the masses who are not shareholders? Valerie Höhne almost seems to be saying that white countries are racist until whites are a minority, presumably because white people are fundamentally racist so only a country which accepts they are or soon to be an immigration nation with a nonwhite majority is not racist.
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  331. Strangely. one girl's family thought it was an accident, and some Dutch journalists too. Living in a very well ordered and high trust society like the Netherlands is no preparation for understanding the the realities of Panama. A few years ago a German woman got lost in Panama and was found and ABDUCTED by members of the search and rescue team and assaulted for days until she escaped . In 2009 a twentysomething male British backpacker disappeared in the same Panamanian town the girls were staying in. Moreover, people have been robbed on the trail, but the Panamanians keep all that very quiet and I strongly suspect the girls didn't know enough to understand how much of a chance they were taking. The were warned but didn't comprehend the danger being alluded to was criminal violence. In my opinion, Grande was inappropriately snippy about the girls, as if he thinks Panama is the victim here. Quite the opposite, I have read a bit more; the standard tourist trail up to the summit is has residences backing onto it. It is possible to accidently keep going after the summit and be on a trail that you would walk for days before reaching a town, However the girls knew exactly where they were because they turned and photographed the town several kilometers away below them from the summit before continuing on down the other side on a trail that is NOT jungle but at most forest because there are people living in the area and they drive their cattle (you cannot keep cattle in a jungle) along the trails. They had been told they had to turn and come back from the summit but kept going probably because it was a sunny day and exceptionally easy going being very dry they went on for a couple of hours and reached a stream that has been identified from photos. In In the rainy season it is exhausting country with lots of mud but when they the girls were on it the going was underfoot was easy and the rivers were not in spate. The cable bridge was not necessary to cross the river, it could be forded. The reward offered is a king's ransom in Panama and they were supposed to be alive making calls for 11 days in this inhabited area with no one seeing or hearing them calling for help. A huge search by people that know the area well and have found lost backpackers there before overlapped with the calls from the girls phones. The calls were at a certain time each day and once when connected the connection was immediately broken, When the search got mote intense up ten weeks later and began , pulverized body parts and pristine belongings started appearing. The backpack was found close to an indigenous peoples village. Both girls' bras were inside. As for the bones and fragments of bones that supposedly floated down the Serpent river and ended up on one small sandbank, those were clearly never in the water: bones don't float.
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  332.  @4TheRecord  Eh? I agree with what CVR says in the video about what happened. Ukraine was duped into doing what it cannot admit, so is telling porky pies about it.
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  333. Ms Shalan was very effective. Ans she gave some thought provoking background on the Israeli attitude to hospitals. Nevertheless it is difficult to believe Israel would deliberately use such a powerful weapon on the hospital and cause such a predictably huge loss of life
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  334. Owen Matthews is a great reporter who cares, very trenchant and impartial.
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  335. Unlike Vietnam for the US , Ukraine is right there for Russia; the Russians genuinely don't think they can quit without being instantly destroyed. Russia was an opponent best avoided for Ukraine, but they are in it now.
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  336. China is focused on economic growth, not military supremacy, For now.
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  337. Why would Russia end the war? The only concession that they have offered is that what is left of Ukraine can join the EU.
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  338. Denmark has had a lot to say about Ukraine. Time the Danes got some reality therapy.
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  339. Pure US propaganda.
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  340. But the wolf did come.'
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  341. Because it looks as if you are not taking yourself seriously, and if you don't how are you going to convince others to? Please make a start by 'adjusting your dress before leaving'.  @TheJollyHeretic 
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  342. Allow me to suggest, if I may, that not taking onesself too seriously still allows you to always be serious about being your very best.  @TheJollyHeretic 
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  343. Russia rotated its military commander as a matter of course and to stop them getting to big for their boots.
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  344.  @HKim0072  A formal announcement by Taiwan that it is a sovereign state independent of China has not been made.
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  345.  @Chuang26  Taiwan wishes to but dares not say it is independent then. One can draw conclusions about what consequences the Taiwanese leadership think would follow from such an announcement. As they don't 'need' an invasion. they won't make the announcement
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  346. Hop to it soldier.
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  347.  @14ОБрСпНГРУ  Where Kris and Lissane met a grislily fate is cloud forest not jungle. There are cattle herding paths through it; you cannot keep cattle in a jungle.
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  348.  @nicholasconder4703  Their offensives so far have been through infiltration and exploitation by highly mobile wheeled vehicles against weakly held parts of the line. There are far more (maybe soon double) the number of defenders per kilometer of line, and fortifications across key roads in depth. The previous offensives are not going to be a guide to what will happen now. There will be an artillery war and possibly longer range missiles given to Ukraine if it begins to lose, but I don't expect either side will find it easy to make headway.
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  349. Ukraine was hardly formulating its strategy with the idea of causing Wagner to mutiny, otherwise they would have been ready, waiting and able to take instant advantage of it.
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  350.  @antimatters6283  Almost three years and hundreds of thousands of casualties later RUSSIA is doubling down and it seems to me the considerations Mearsheimer has been talking about for decades explain why. How does Anders explain what Russia is doing?
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  351. Good, but too much of a Russia versus Ukraine zero sum game analysis. Russia losing is not a win for Ukraine, it is a win for America that Ukraine is paying the price for. The Ukrainians may well be paying to much of a price for the land on the western side of the Dnieper. I suspect the Ukrainian military professionals wanted to wait until the Russians attack from that bridgehead towards Odessa, because so far Russia fights badly when mounting a swift offensive. Some people are saying the Russians deliberately give ground all the better to defend with artillery when under pressure.
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  352. Galeotti must be desperate to be on with this clueless wally. Galeotti hurts his credibility by addressing such silly suggestions as the ones raised here. The absolute responsibility for all this is on Putin's shoulders. 'You betcha!' is what he would respond. Yet would any Russian (or US or Chinese leader) act differently?
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  353. Anything along the lines of a your proposed explanation of an accidental or at least no foul play death is plausible for one person because some individuals are troubled or easily confused. At first blush, two dying together that way over eleven days in a sparsely populated but inhabited area with herders by day, and their phones (sans last messages) and fragments of a few of their bones being found all in the same five mile stretch of forest is barely credible for young fit women with a thirst for life. It is certainly possible, but on first principles I would say misadventure is far from the least unlikely way they met their deaths. There was one attempted emergency call from each phone at just before 5pm on the day of the hike, then there was a 14 hour gap between the original attempted emergency call, one from from each phone, and the next phone activity, which was one failed emergency call from each phone the following morning. Crucially, the phones were both switched off one hour after the first emergency call attempt (one from each phone twelve minutes apart). Are we supposed to believe that after the failed emergency call neither made any immediate retry and instead decided to be early to bed in a strange jungle, and so in order to get a good nights sleep (and not be bothered by people calling them?) switched their phones off and left them off for a whole 13 hours? The photos on the 8th were taken in the dead of night during a rainstorm. It stinks of clandestine activity being done when no one was up and about in the area to observe the movements. There had been no activity on any phone since the 6th and there was none until the 11th, so a 48 hour gap either side of the night photos. Nary an attempted call after the third day, so 5 days before the night photos the attempted call had completely stopped, but and one phone was switched on the 11th (after the aforementioned four day gap when both were switched off. To think the devices were in the hands of lost girls, one would have to believe the girls were behaving like fugitives for some reason. Why did the local expert they hired, who earned his living because tourists paid him to be on their hikes, not give KK and LS a warning not to go on one alone especially that one w, which he is the great expert on The girls could hardly have got cautioned to not go down the Serpent trail alone because they had hired him for accompanying them on the trip the next day. The found out they were at a loose end that moring and Eileen in the snapchat exchange of messages that morning asked if he was available,; she was not given (to pass on) such a don't go a hike without me warning for KK and LS, although that morning our friend knew they were probably going a hike alone, and he had told them about the Serpent trail at least indirectly while offering them through Eileen a stay at his lodge down it. It is a fact that he told journalists he had met Kris and Lisanne at the school and in town. Later he denied he ever had met them. That is very reminiscent of Van Der Sloot and his mutually inconsistent accounts. Were Kris and Lisanne foolhardy? Yes a bit, they met some rough nut guys and may even have been swimming topless with them on the 30th. Though their trusted professional had inexplicably omitted to say don't, going down an isolated trail (he had told them about) was contrary to common sense and the natural fearfulness that young women have for good reason. For reasons of state, Panama preferred the obvious killer should escape justice thinking it would soon be forgotten. Nope.
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  354.  @someguy7222  Ashamed and regretful interviewees are depressing to watch.
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  355.  @jesan733  As far as the cost of the arms yes agreed, but other economic consequences are less obvious, such as what currency Russia gets paid in for its energy sold to China. Dollars are no good to Russia now. That means they are increasingly less useful to China. America was closer to both Russia and China than they were to each other during the Cold War. The background is that production of the West was two to three times its share of world population for a century starting about 1880, but that is now well on the way to reversing.
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  356. Britain and France were making plans to attack Russia in the Russo Finnish war even though Britain and France were officially at war with Germany. It was the Nazi Soviet pact that caused Britain to declare war on Germany judging by the fact that the guarantee of Poland's independence was before the Pact was made public, but when they found out about the Pact Britain guaranteed Poland's _ territory_ and that was what made war inevitable. Chamberlain had no problem with Germany going East and maybe even succeeding and conquering some Soviet land, or it was at least acceptable. Germany and Soviet Russia being allies was unacceptable, because that meant Hitler was about to go West (first).
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  357. Comparisons between Russia and countries like Germany, France and Britain are inconclusive. But more important than the absolute size of their collective economies is that Western Europe has massive and inexorably increasing social spending. It is unrealistic to think it politically feasible for European countries make very substantial increases to their defence budgets. Nato countries are already objectively strong enough to deter Russia, which in three years of war has been unable to capture a city that is 19 miles from the Russian border, and this in a part of the world where Russia has huge advantages in ethnic and geographical propinquity. Absent an outbreak of mass insanity in the Kremlin, they will not even toy with the idea of invading a Nato country. Europe needs to invest in projects for economic growth, not raise taxes for futile military consumption.
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  358.  @concinnity9676  She calls out uber geeky scientists who want to build ever more massive colliders. They don't like her.
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  359. That is actually far more believable than the the narrative that the Panamanian authorities have espoused about their deathtrap bridge that girls take their pants off to cross, and fordable rivers that dissolve marrow like a lye bath and function like a wood chipper A murder-suicide would not explain the peculiar condition of the remains and all the bones but one floating rib being from the lower half of the bodies of Froon and Kremers, plus items with totally different weight size and buoyancy ending up on the same few yards of sand bank, where the main suspect and his employees 'found' them, and tried to claim the $30,000 reward . It was after the backpack finders were denied a reward that the fragmented leg bones of Froom and the pelvis fragment and bit of floating rib were found, by the chief suspect of all people. Small world!
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  360. Zaluzhny publicly said there was a stalemate and he needed half a million more men to be mobilsed. Zenensky is only willing to call up less than half that number. The West cannot give Ukraine troops. Reading between the lines, Bell thinks Ukraine is not going to be able to win back anything at all not matter how much help they get with weapons and money.
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  361.  @Thomas-yw9eo  Nobody that knew firearms and had access to a variety of them would use a .22 LR. especially a rifle
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  362. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery., and most of this genre came from Fraser's success in his latter years. The man was sent to Broadmoor and got the Mad nickname for a reason. Fraser says in his book that he had an extremely serious head injury as a child. He outlived all his contemporaries.
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  363. The job is attractive for the status that goes with it. The higher ranks make good money and get excellent pensions
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  364. From examination of their inner ear and skeletons , they could not easily lift their arms above shoulder level, (so no overarm throwing) run or jump . They were likely ambush predators.
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  365.  @zeni104  Nato is not going to directly fight Russia over anything Russia does to Ukraine. It just isn't.
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  366.  @Fraukie_H  Normal killers get caught, these ones (or their families who were drawn into it after the fact) were crafty enough to prepare a cover story story with the calls just in case, but the calls were at exactly the same time each day and had wrong pins. They girls were already dead, that is why the photos stop showing them. The evidence of the remains, pulverising of bone and skin rolled into a ball is the work of someone not something. Also the perfect condition rucksack that had not been in the river and was found just after a very close search had began with help from the Dutch and special dogs. The bras are inside and shorts are miles away, but the underpants' were not found at all. My bet is impulsive young men committing an outrage and then asking for help, and the authorites not wanting to admit tourists are at risk in their town. I think the people who were accessories after the fact and the actual perps were not sure what to do; maybe the plan was to store the rucksack with the phones an plant it in in a better way, but the search somehow alarmed the conspiracy and to have incriminating evidence stored became too dangerous so it was clumsily dumped. Quite possibly whoever had the stuff was not a perp but merely an accessory after the fact. Or maybe the remains being found immediately was necessary to stop a search that was making them nervous. The timing suggests the evidence was left to close the matter as accidental death and halt the investigation. But that was a mistake on the perps' part because they made some mistakes and anyone who looks at it in a hardheaded way definitely know this was a double homicide. mot any kind of misadventure. They didn't willingly leave the trail, because it ends at the so called "bridge" and there are warning signs it is inadvisable to proceed unless equipped for the jungle. Furthermore, a Dutchman with mountaineering experience said the cable tightrope (one rope is all there is for your feet) "bridge" with a 70 foot drop was frightening to him, and the girls would never have been on it in the first place to fall off (what the Panamanians say happened). There were multiple townspeople involved in setting them up and others drawn into the cover up I expect and one day it will come back to haunt them. The taxi driver who drove them to the begining of the trail has since drowned supposedly after having a heart attack, he was in his early thirties.
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  367.  @MrHaighahatta  Their next of kin are getting what are by Russian standard enormous benefits and payments.
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  368. I suspect it was standard depravity and cunning. There is a photo of the girls at the summit where the tourist orientated trail ends at 1pm, and beyond that is a barely there trail through obviously dangerous and slow to cross terrain: super scary slippery precipitous and with animal skulls displayed on branches. Adventurous young European men have said a few hundred yards into that rudimentary trail (having ignored the signs telling walkers not to proceed any farther) they became alarmed and turned back. One of the girls had asthma and they'd hardly have been planning on moving at night so had to start back it was a 6 hour round trip and at real altitude. They'd never have gone on past the warnings let alone used the cable tightrope to cross the river they were hypothesized to have fallen into. These were not hard core trekkers, but a couple of nice young girls wearing a minimum of clothing who wanted to work with children and had a day to spend. Dutch TV went to the area and the locals who know the trail best insisted that the last photos of the girls show them coming back down the trail, which is what one would expect. Fascinatingly, someone whose been there mentioned the tourist trail has shacks visible from it it every few hundred yards along.. What probably happened is they were dragged of the track and abducted by backwoods degenerates when they were coming back down. Maybe after they were seen, possibly harassed, going up. Their phones were turned off for 14 hours from that day. There were screams heard in the jungle that night because the next day a French couple was told this by a friendly local who dissuaded them from going in the jungle for that reason. The locals around the begining of the trail had tried to stop the girls going on even the tourist orientated trail by themselves. The backpack was found soon after what for Panama was huge money rewards were being offered.
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  369. Enabling Russia to fight a battle on home ground with shorter and more secure lines of communication; what a brilliant idea!
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  370. The US army thinks the Ukrainians have wasted the artillery they were given by assuming there was always going to be an inexhaustible supply. The Ukrainians leveled Bahkmut with artillery just as much as the Russians did.
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  371. The trouble with liberalism in international affairs is its not about societies overagainst one another and resorting to hard power; liberalism is about an individual's legally enforceable claims (rights) within a cooperating society. The US led because they paid the piper. American taxpayers were footing the bill for generations in Europe and it's now beyond what is feasible. Gangsters hide behind the presumption of innocence, operate against their fellow citizens abiding by the law, deny their acts, lead bullies out for themselves, and believe in nothing beyond themselves. Putin leads a powerful nation state with a monopoly of force in its territory that asserts itself openly and has men willing to die for it. Ditto Trump. In regards to his personal position, Putin was better off in ever way not invading Ukraine; he genuinely believes Ukraine getting closer to the West is a threat to Russia. For decades Britain has been taking from the defence budget to pay for social spending without raising taxes. Where does the money for endless support for Ukraine (have a long wait for Russia to collapse) come from? Europe is an economic dead zone. No country in the world is completely independent. West did our best for Ukraine but we have welfare state. Europe needs to start worrying worry about getting economic growth to match China and the US's. The US can't pay for the West's defence against an alliance of Russia and China. You add that billion people to Russia's resources and it's Goodnight Vienna. The US's alliance relationship turned into one of dependency. Trump was sent back to the White House, he is giving the Nato countries some realty therapy. As for Ukraine, it never received a guarantee of military aid, still less open ended military aid and imperceptible direct intel and targeting help that progressively pushed Russia closer to China. They are also ungrateful: Ukraine is hitting Russia's oil infrastructure and pushing up the global price of energy, which drives inflation. Russia and China may be each be weakening what taken in isolation but they are coalescing into an alliance, one in which they complement the others strengths. America has dependent 'allies' who place emphasis on their ethereal soft power contribution because they simply lack the economies to contribute anything else. Anything real.
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  372. I take a different view. Kris and Lissane have been established to be victims of a double homicide. The name and face of the man who did it is well known. Kris's parents met him, but Panama chose to go with its national interest and ignore his vile crime, so their attorney general ruled the deaths were an accident. Then there was a reward offered and the location of the finds of Lissane's and Kris's possessions and remains, and the identity of who made the finds, identified the culprit and proves the case against him beyond reasonable doubt. The only mystery remaining is why anyone continues to call it a mystery.
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  373.  @justusgoedhart5255  The Netherlands is a high trust society.(Humankind: A Hopeful History came out of there). Not all its folk are saints of course but they think their society is the normal human condition whereas it is actually at an extreme. In the Holloway case in Aruba, I am sure many in the Netherlands thought Van Der Sloot's story about her having gone to swim with sharks was plausible, until he was convicted in the death of another young woman in Peru. In the case of Julie Ward in Kenya, she was supposed to have gone off the main road to cross an extremely difficult terrain where she became stuck and was, according to a country trying to protect its tourism industry, got eaten by lions. Unfortunately for them her father happened to be a British multi millionaire and got the official verdict of accidental reversed. There was a trial at which the game reserve ware wardens prosecuted for murder were revealed to had persuaded people to give them an alibi by falsifying records. The semi official guide found guilty over the two French women in Argentina also persuaded others to make false entries to the records to provide an alibi. You will be told during the relevant time our person of interest was at the doctors; don't you believe it.
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  374.  @justusgoedhart5255  Being open minded is important but as with most things, there comes a point where it becomes counter productive. Abductive inference (forgive the pun): "process that goes from observations to explanations within a more general context or theoretical framework".
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  375. Iranians are not Arabs, and that is the divide..
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  376. Space Ice is starting to enjoy Seagal's movies.
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  377. It is all very well having these strategic objectives for Europe, but American taxpayers are not willing to foot the bill for them any more.
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  378. The EU did not give the key concessions that Cameron had to get concerning Poles claiming for their families in Poland ETC. The EU Continentals are the ones who had a failure of comprehension. To the British is was very clear.
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  379. Hard won booty like that gets kept.
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  380. The bras being off was probably intended by the killers as an indication the girls had gone swimming.
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  381.  @capndallas4918  The hostages with western connections West are more valuable because the Israeli public seems to support going ahead with an invasion regardless of what happens to the hostages. Also, she is photogenic.
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  382. A security guarantee from America for Ukraine would mean that Kyiv had been handed the power to start WW3. Their motivation for bringing Russia into direct conflict with America is all too obvious; they are not going to be given the power to do it.
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  383. Russia did win a victory in Bakhmut they took it, and Prigozhini complained ceaselessly that Wagner were starved of artillery taking Bakhmut. So the type of fighting in Bakhmut suited Wagner in a way that it would not have done elsewhere. Surovikin designed the Bakhmut operation, maybe he thought it was a good use of a traditional Russian use of convicts that had been made available for some time (ie they were not an innovation or recruited for Bakhmut specifically). Philips O'Brian is more of a naval and airpower expert, and I don't think the Russian artillery advantage being big enough to win in in a set piece like Bakhmut and fight elsewhere is obvious to him. I think it is quite telling that Wagner Group is gone yet Ukraine is still trying very hard to take Bakhmut . The city would seem to have a special military value to both sides beyond tying up enemy forces or attritiing them. Wagner were unlike the Russian army in fighting as light infantry rather than as part of an artillery centric force using bombardment for everything.
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  384. A business person's expertise is in making as large a profit as possible.
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  385.  @MetalsirenIXI  Seagal's Akido is more like Jiu Jitsu, and in he movies, the early ones at least, there is is hyperviolence. Not just many scenes of dental devastation but also eyes being taken out. I don't think Vandenberg would want any part of Seagal in a real fight.
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  386. Congrats to Denmark for them pushing Nato enlargement in the Baltic, it has made us all significantly safer, and now pays off big time by allowing savings on Danish defence spending.
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  387. The smiles were an hour before the last photo; the smiles by way of a celebration at the top of the touristy ascending trail, because they'd reached to the top, and very much ahead of schedule, which made them ebullient. Their mood could would stay at that level? I agree their remains were clearly tampered with, and that rules out an accidental death for either of them.
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  388. You mean Ukraine ignoring Mearsheimer's advice?
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  389. If they only have 6 then it is difficult to use them properly because no one will have previous experience with them m and train to utilize them to their limits or disengage when the tactical situation warrants is hard if the instructors lack experience. CVR is very good on how combat experience is invaluable.
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  390. 3:55 that is why Tren, which does not aromatise to oestrogen is the steroid of choice.
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  391. IF the girls were not abducted on the 1st April, but simply become lost, the photographs taken in the early hours of the 8th of April must have been taken by Froon, who would have no reason to fake Kremers being alive. Therefore, in the non abduction scenario, both Froon and Kremers must have been alive on the 8th. Yet there was no attempt to call the emergency number on their phones after the 3rd. FIVE DAYS BOTH OF THEM ALIVE AND NOT CALLING THE EMERGENCY NUMBER. For the lost theory to be true either Krmers or Froon must have been alive on the 11th. Yet even the most heavily forested places they possibly might have been were went into and searched closely by the local rescue team with a great deal of local knowledge assisted by Panamanian Special Forces (trained by the US green berets) begining on the 6th. The search teams were yelling and all the girls had to do is scream back and they would have both been found in those 48hours because they were both alive as late as the 8th according to the 'lost theory',. At night there were lights. The 'they got lost ' school of thought need to remember that in their preferred scenario these young women (not deaf mutes) WANTED to be found. At least one of them was still alive on the 11th according to the phone data which the 'losters' must accept. Yet she was not found, did not hear the shouts or seen or the lights. We have to bear in mind this person was certainly not hiding from the search in the losters' scenarios, so none of their conjectures actually 'fly' as a real world event. As for the backpack being found with money and constituting evidence that a killer would not have left, the phone data prov if there was a killer was preparing a 'lost' narrative from the first day with fake calls to emergency services. So in an abduction scenario, a perpetrator had from the morning of the day after they were kidnapped (at the latest) formulated a plan to kill them both and get away with it by creating an confirmation of the 'lost scenario on the phones, and much later leaving them to be found. Someone who could think up such a scheme would understand leaving the money in the backpack would be a good idea. Before the backpack or any other trace of the girls was found, the Panamanian government though its attorney general had announced that Froon and Kremers's bodies had been in a river and swept out to sea. Whoever abducted them had intended from the very begining to eventually leave the phones to be found. Once Panamanian law ruled the double disappearance involved no crime, the perpetrators thought they were safe. Moreover, there had been a new and very high reward of $30,000 offered and the leaving the backpack must have seemed a low risk way of claiming it. Especially if it could be planted downstream from the monkey bridge over the Serpent river. The person who found the backpack is am Indian woman but has connections to one of the main suspects, who lives nearby on a farm. Moreover, it was none other than this same this 'person of interest' male who discovered some of the subsequent remains of Kremers and Froon, which were found after there was there was a refusal to pay any of the reward for finding the backpack. This happened ten weeks after Froom and Kremers went missing, and by that time everywhere along the trail and out in every direction from it had been searched very thoroughly; it was hardly possible to put the backpack there and say these things had been missed. Moreover it would have been risky to move in that area with incriminating items while there was to much search activity and people wanting to claim the reward being alert to anything suspicious, especially from our person of interest who was associated with the case in the media, The search had began to verge on but had not yet taken in the person of interest's home area, which happened to be downriver from the cable bridge over the ravine ; so it was was not exculpatory for the backpack and remains to be found near his farm at all. He didn't have much choice but to leave the backpack virtually on the dorstep of hais farm if he wanted to plant it downstream from the monkey bridge in an area he felt secure moving around in and where he has connections which could be used as proxies to claim the reward. The fake emergency calls deception and leaving the phones for a post hoc record of the girls getting getting lost and attempting to contact emergency services was quite a ingenious stratagem. Almost too clever, unless the person had some occupational link in his everyday life to the possibility of tourists getting lost that bought such an ploy to victimize tourists and pass it of as a them perishing in a accident to his mind readily. The emergency calls ploy (and the initial abduction) also required him having confidence in his knowledge of where on the trail the phones of tourists would not connect. Kremers and Froon lost the ability to make calls at 1.39pm, and the last photo was 2.15pm. Pretty precise. Our person of interest guides tourist along this trail. He has also began denying that he ever met Kremers and Froon, though that contradicts his earlier account.
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  392.  @andyross1429  There is a motivation for the doctors to do that.
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  393.  @gregorymalchuk272  Defeat in war explains the Russian and Chinese communist revolutions. Ditto the French revolution. And that of an Austrian better left unmentioned. whose men were shot down by the police when he tried a putsch.
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  394. He is not very good at putting himself in the shoes of Russians.
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  395. A good theory explains multiple observations. You have a theory for each observation.
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  396. Biden listened to those of a similar mind to Lucas and the results speak for themselves. The thing is that Putin has just made a speech on Russian TV as good as publicly announcing that he will retaliate against any more ATACMS strikes on Russia with, so he says, American participation, then Russia will make equivalent missile strikes on American military bases in Europe. It's barely possible for Putin to back down from such a high profile assertion of resolve. Lucas seems to think because the missiles will not have nuclear warheads just high explosive ones, this would be no big deal but he must be the only one who thinks that.
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  397. If this had been an Old Baily trial the defence would have been on the ball and the prosecution would have anticipated the uproar that a conviction on this evidence would cause even if it was not properly challenged with defence expert witnesses including statisticians, medical diagnostic experts and psychiatrists (unlikely at an Old Bailly trial).. Fantastic as it seems Letby may have been the only one doing her job in a professional way, the doctors were not, the police were not and their baby death expert was not. Moral, north of Watford is a different world.
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  398. From what I have read those Indians just want to be left in peace with their traditional community life. They might be a deadly dangerous group if they thought someone was a threat to their families, but collectively they are careful to avoid trouble.
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  399. He is never safe there.
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  400. Prigozhin in Ukraine went the way of Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now, except Kurtz was not coked out of his skull. Lukashenko's account of the conversation with Prigozhin before he ended the mutiny makes it clear, to me at least, he was high. And so were Prigozhin minions (Wagnerian commanders). The excons who died in their tens of thousands in Bakhmut were moveing as iff in molasses wile under shellfire, so likely given drugs be fore going 'over the top', in much the same way as in the WW1 British army a tot of super alcoholic Navy rum was issued
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  401. No, but that is the copium your subscriber base will click on most readily.
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  402.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416 He talks about how many Ukrainians soldiers have been killed, and how great the trained reserves of Russian manpower are. Those things favour Russia, but only if it goes all out to win and the US continues holding back the longer range missiles for HIMARS. What the US's objectives are is the main determinant of what happens. So far they are being cautious about what they give Ukraine, but so far Russia has not been drawing on its full potential strength. I think the American objective is to thoroughly discourage the Kremlin by demonstrating that only the most Pyrrhic of victories for them is possible, while at the same time never quite enabling Ukraine to sweep the Russian forces away. By my way of thinking Macgregor is about as good a guide to what happens as General Ben Hodges. Macgregor does not take into account how effective new US arms could be for Ukraine, and Hodges does not seem to understand why the US will not want Russia to be so hammered with ATACMS it might panic
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  403.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  If Ukraine drives the Russians back, they will accept they have lost fair and square? Hmmm, people who thought like that would not have invaded in the first place.
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  404. They assumed he would anticipate failure and not do it. US strategists have did too good a job, but catastrophically failed to anticipate the reaction to it. Perhaps forgetting the other guy gets a vote, and if he is desperate he may take a foredoomed option.
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  405.  @sunnydisinfectant  I suspect it is more of a retaliation for the killing of grain logistics tycoon and militia funder Oleksiy Vadatursky, who was killed 3weeks ago in a targeted missile attack on his mansion, shortly after the Russians had agreed to let the shipping of grain resume.
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  406. The British supported the US's strong urging that Ukraine join ASAP. Most counties were willing to go along with that . The only real objection was by Merkel. Ukraine did not give up and there was increasing military cooperation with Nato, which anually reiterated the official NATO conference statement of 2008 that Ukraine would join Nato at some point in the future Was Putin supposed to wait until Ukraine was admitted to NATO and then invade?  @justmy-profilename 
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  407.  @PrivateEyeYiYi  The Israeli army has not has not started the battle yet so we are not talking about the Israeli army calling in artillery or airstrikes on buildings they are taking fire from. Judging by the sheer number of buildings being destroyed in Gaza before the battle has started, once ground combat starts Gaza City will be slowly but surely leveled in urbanised fighting. We shall see for how long the world will continue to consider such a way of doing things 'reasonable'.
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  408. Why do you think that is?
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  409. Alcohol.
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  410.  @andrewparry7528  Not while being closely watched/ filmed by superior officers. and the boots were not new. They were probably chosen for being young. Parades are very important in Russian military culture, and only the best troops are allowed to be seen on them in new uniforms, hence the spotless pieces of kit. You are right that these are not soldiers in the front line, probably even in Ukraine; a high proportion of soldiers duties in a modern army are not combat. . I'd bet they are from the PR unit of the Russian army tasked with making the film..
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  411. Their ineptitude in getting into a war being exceeded only by their stubbornness in levying it should not surprise; 'tis in the Russian character, and not just when they are fighting on our side.
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  412.  @Dokumentarfilme  Scotland, I saw a documentary years ago on Russia tToday about am American schoolteacher who was living and working in provincial Russia while doing archival research into the Soviet era. It was very enlightening.
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  413. Beer is considered a soft drink in Russia.
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  414. Only in retrospect (if you dump her).
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  415. America could give Ukraine the wherewithal to push the Russians back (100 HIMARS and limitless rockets), the US apparently thinks pushing the Russians back is too risky. Because in the final analysis Russia has options that America doesn't want to Russia to start seriously considering. Isn't it rather contradictory to say Putin is not going to be overthrown, but a new leadership might reverse his policies. If not overthrown he will choose his successor. The Russian masses would have to be educated up to the necessity of accepting their country had been defeated by a medium sized country using conventional weapons. Even with new leadership, that process would take many years, because there is no Russian DeGaulle awaiting the call with his already existing prestige for abandoning a region; new leadership would consider remaining in power their first priority and a withdrawal from Ukraine would be politically risky. Even were Russia to withdraw, it is so distrusted now that its relationship with the West would not be significantly repaired anyway, and other energy supplies having been found the gas sales would not restart . The only incentive to the Kremlin would be to halt the deaths of Russian soldiers. Yet those deaths are being presented as being patriotic: for something . A withdrawal would make it look like what by then will be tens of thousand of deaths were for nothing
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  416. So Russians are totally different to Ukrainians?
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  417.  @ThisHandleWasTheOnly1Available  Yes and their surviving relatives get all sorts of benefits on top of a pension.
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  418. The loser does not get to say when the war is over.
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  419. Until its not.
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  420.  @marinka424  I would not go so far as to say there was no case to answer, but it was far from open and shut.
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  421. Yes, but Ukraine is paying a terrible price to do it.
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  422. Ukraine attacks across the border causing the Kharkiv limited offensive worked out well for Ukraine? Hmmm.
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  423. Ukraine has had six cities destroyed. Any it takes back will be in ruins. That's the big picture.
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  424. The company that owns Grangemouth was willing to invest 300 million for new shale oil refinery facilities and a port to handle the shale oils from the US; the workforce would have to accept a reduction in their pay and conditions including pensions. They voted and were split, so many are not that bothered about losing their jobs at all. There was a strike in 2013 that was only ended by an announcement the plant would be closed down.
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  425. The Russian generals are going to quit the army. Or tell Putin to escalate.
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  426. Alcoholism is very common among Koreans. They are naturally stoic too. She is very Korean in every way. A white woman would be in tears.
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  427. Four doctors in the unit were severely criticised for bad practice in a report commissioned because of the unusual rise in baby deaths on the unit and it was only then after they were as good as called lazy and careless that they went to the police and accused Letby.
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  428. I wonder if they realise how much trouble they are in.
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  429. Russia let Ukraine go but when it did that it did that clearly never dreamt that Ukraine would actually try to join Nato. Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons because it thought that Russia would not dare invade Ukraine. They were both wrong.
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  430. The fake emergency calls did not connect, so the phone had to be found for the authorities to know about them. That is why the electronics (phone ) were kept until weeks later then left . The perps or someone they turned to for help were pretty cunning, and had a plan in making the calls over several days to later leave the phone to be found. Having money in the backpack when it was found was really clever of the perpetrators, or those helping with the cover up.
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  431. A bubble called Russia.
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  432. Be aware that the Panamanians said they fell off of a bridge, and the bridge was on the trail.
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  433. Much more of this and he could go to the opposite extreme and start saying that Ukraine will eventually win a conventional conflict.
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  434.  @seanbinkley7363  He can tell Putin there is no way to win with conventional arms now.
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  435.  @HanithSVK  Being so imaginative, Gerasimov might over dramatize and tell Putin if he is determined to avoid losing to Ukraine then he is out of conventional warfare options, and ought to consider non conventional weapon use. Actually, that might be objectively true: Russia may in fact already be losing. Do they want to lose to Ukraine and become a defeated joke country, or take action to close to war down by any means necessary?
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  436. Sabine seems to have changed her mind since about what Einstein was talking about in the 'spooky action at a distance' comment? And whether that 2022 Nobel was all that deserved.
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  437.  @UNIVERSAL-UR  Neither side in Ukraine is going to quit. Or get anywhere.
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  438. So for years Western youngsters have been dying there at the rate of one a fortnight.
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  439. There is a search and rescue team for the area and they have always found the missing tourists before. Moreover, Panamaia doed not have police or army, they have a paramilitary security, with elite squads trained by US Special Forces. The most elite units in the Panamanian special unit were assisting the search and rescue and they combed through the entire area shouting and using lights too. The photos indicated Kremers and Froom were alive on the 8th. Unless this was some kind of suicide pact between them, neither were ever lost the jungle. They were abducted and hidden by someone who thinks he is clever, but fools foolish people only. He is not kidding anyone else.
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  440. The wedge between the US and its European freeloaders allies long preexisted the Ukraine conflict, it is that the Europeans just won't spend the % of GDP on their own defence they agree to do. Even Britain has been steadily raiding the defence budget to avoid raising taxes and Germany is now suffering deindustiralisation, but it really is a bit much to say Europe with its industial and economic power cannot support two wars, one of them completely indirect, so it would have to prioritize one, Indeed, were Russia to attack Nato counties in order to choke off the supply of weapons to Ukraine , it would only be logical for the West to give Ukraine a deluge of weapons in order to make the Russians see that their plan was not working.
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  441. Zstorm units are repelled by elite Ukrainian units, thereby pinpointing the non expendable Ukrainian assets for Russian artillery. The Russian tactics are merciless, but they work, going by the fact that they are inexorably advancing.
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  442. Has Petraeus a track record of being correct about what Putin's future moves will be?
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  443. So what? 99.9% of the time nothing drastic is going to happen to you doing stuff like that. They were the 0.1% who ran into a one in a million psycho, and nothing can protect people living their life from that.
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  444. Trump is a 6'3'' alpha male who heads the world's most powerful state.
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  445. Ha, Russian high tech. Don't make me laugh.
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  446. The standard Western tactic in modern war is pin with fire and concentrate for maneuver against an enemy weak spot to break through to an objective. The first Russian offensive maneuver in years has no serious territorial intent and yey opening up a new front line. I think they are trying to use active defence to engage the entire Ukrainian army along an immense front line, and soak up any new Ukrainian troops that are being drafted.
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  447. I don't believe the Ukrainians are going to launch a huge offensive. They are talking about it doing it soon and even where it will be, which they would not be doing if the plan was for real.
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  448. I am sure Ukraine is right about its security requirements; it is far from obvious why Ukraine's agenda ought to be aligned with Nato's by Nato moving toward the Ukrainian position. Amping up the aid for Ukraine might make Russia back down, but it might not. Security guarantees for Ukraine at this point would be a step into the unknown because the issues have not been worked for decades in the way that the West overagaint Soviet confrontation along the Iron Curtain was. I would point out that the thinkers on both sides seemed to believe nuclear weapons were a deterrent to nuclear war, but Nato and the Warsaw Pact did not act as if they thought having nuclear weapons were a deterrent to conventional invasion and occupation.
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  449. No Dr Grande, no-one, either the family they were staying with or any employees of the language school, noticed the girls were missing until the guide did the next morning. The school intern, a pretty German girl who had sometime on Tuesday phoned the guide to book him to take her, Kris and Lisanne to his strawberry farm, met the guide at 8am for the booked trip, then went to Kris and Lisanne's lodgings, where the German girl and guide were given the key to the girls' room and looked around at about 9am. Before going to the police station? Nope, the guide and school employee just went on the trip to the strawberry farm. It was when they got back that evening that they went to the police station to report Kris and L:issane missing at 7pm. The school employee is certainly innocent, she is an Amanda Knox type; merely a little slow on the uptake in an extraordinary situation. We must each draw our own conclusion about the other personage.
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  450. @Back2 Nature Then so was Kris Kremers. I know a vast amount about Amanda in Perugia; if she was guilty she would have had the key to Meredith's room, so she could have retrieved the lamp without trying to break the door down. The man convicted of killing Ms Kercher (Rudy Guede) had met Meredith, who knew him as an acquaintance of her boyfriend. What probably happened is Guede simply knocked on the door when Meredith was alone in the house and she opened the door to him and was forced back inside and murdered. Guede was the one who faked a burglary, even though he was a burglar of sorts. Intentional or not, it was a huge red herring and confused almost everyone for years just like the backpack contents. Meredith's keys were never found, neither were Kris and Lissane's. Basically, Guede killed Meredith all by himself, and the guide killed Kris and Lisanne, quite possibly by himself.
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  451. They were likely captured as infants and kept as pets.
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  452. It takes two to tango and Ukraine has no nuclear weapons, so it would be necessary for America to start a tit for a tat that was not on any Nato country. They have said they would not do that.. America is not going to put Russia in the position of choosing between Crimea or nuking the Ukrainian army, so Ukraine will never be given the wherewithal to take Crimea. The US strategy is for Russia to get fed up and quit. To help discourage Russia everyone is being dragooned into saying that Ukraine will roll back Russia very soon now. Not going to happen, not because America does not have stuff like ATACMS that could be fatal to the Russian bases in Crimea but because the US does not want to panic the Kremlin into drastic measures of a theatre thermonuclear device or three.
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  453. 8:15 Migration also stops wages from rising for jobs that (unlike manufacturing) cannot be outsourced abroad such as construction, services, and caring for the elderly. So it hinders improvements in productivity, this supply of relatively cheap labour. Hmmm.
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  454. Why do attractive young women like this chose *ssholes who abuse them?
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  455. Dr Grande's verdict coincided with what the Panamanian authorities had announced before there was any evidence discovered. Panama had a tourist business reason for the fell in a river theory, and then a confirmation bias for slandering t Ms Kremers and Ms Froom. It is a slander because only someone of subnormal survival instincts or actually suicidal could be plausibly thought to get lost for eleven days (one phone was being switched on and off for that time, we know this because 9 weeks later both phones were found inside the backpack) in an area that size with local people searching and not be able to just shout and get help. It is very sad that the 'objective' viewpoint is in accordance with the contempt the murderer(s) had for Lissane Froom and Kris Kremers.
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  456.  @BjornSeverinLarsen  Ukraine could hardly have predicted that
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  457.  @frankshailes3205  Russia is standing on defence now, and that and the fortifications they have been given time to construct completely reverses all the advantages Ukraine one held. Russian artillery is carefully concealed and sited to cover their own minefields, so low quality Ukrainian troops are sent towards the Russian line for the artillery to fire on them, thereby enabling HIMARS pinpoint destruction of the Russian artillery along with its crew. This is phase one, which is currently ongoing. Phase two will be identifying the Russian artillery supply hubs and hitting them. Phase three will be breaking through the lines of the Russians (who cannot fight without artillery) and cutting off Crimea and retaking it. The final phase will be complete when as a result of the military humiliation, Putin falls and Russia completely breaks up, which will make Ukraine safe for ever more. Bringing about the disintegration of Russia as a country by conquering Crimea is the only way Ukraine will be ever be safe. That is the plan anyway.
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  458.  @rimanahbvee  Roosevelt second term the political establishment had to accept the will of the people For Trump, it’s not about Ukraine it is about Europe. Having won his second election Trump is able to move ahead with his most controversial policies: make Europe pay for its own defence and stop giving them privileged access to the American market. Only then can the US meet the challenge of China.
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  459. Russia is a land power, it's Naval spending has been a compete waste of money and probably explains a big part of why the Russian army consistently underperforms, except in the South in the initial stages when Naval Infantry played such a prominent role in the Russian victory in the South. Turkey is in Nato and has planes and pilots capable of using the US nukes stored on Turkish airbases. Of course Russia does nor want trouble with Turkey, which sees itself as a mediator. Ukraine is not going to run out of money because it is backed by the West.
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  460. Would you prefer Russia concentrated on making drones rather than bots?
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  461. Exactly.
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  462. Starmer is too downbeat. While he hasn't been so fortunate as to come to government in a Britain with massive slack in the economy enabling headlong growth, and he lacks Blair's youth and dolphin like perma smile physog, him saying Labour have inherited a skint Britain is putting off potential foreign investors.
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  463.  @kevlarcardhouse252  You are wrong about Mr Kremers, he thinks there was foul play, and he also thinks the guide is not telling the truth about Kris and Lissane having arranged a guided walk of the Pianista trail on the day after they went on it themselves. These were well brought up young women who would have stuck to an agreement. Furthermore the guide originally gave a detailed and vivid account of having met Kremers and Froon the day before they went missing; now he says he never met them. I don't see how anyone can make a mistake like that
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  464. If you are not self aggrandizing in print after the fact, then it is hardly likely you ever had the strong confident personality required for having conquered in actuality (see Caesar and Napoleon's memoirs). Guderian knew Russia very well from his time in the secret military college there during the Weimar Soviet collaboration, and his assessment of Soviet forces to be faced in Barbarossa was accurate . He was in a beautiful modesty contest judged by bookish aesthetes? Nooo, he spearheaded an enterprise in which temerity and a decisive lack of self doubt were as essential as the tactics and strategy. He WAS the right man for crossing the Meuse and then the drive to the coast of France, and no one can say he wasn't the ideal general for taking Moscow. The biggest strike against Guderian (like all German generals he was getting secret payments and he asked for a huge estate in addition in latter stages of the war) is that he did not stand firm in the face of Hitler's diversion of the drive on Moscow but altered his position after an interview with the Fuhrer. Von Bock was outraged.
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  465. Four years later things suddenly changed as German soldiers became convinced that victory was impossible and decided they were not willing to continue fighting an a lost cause. Troops advancing get a a tremendous morale boost that makes them valiant in attack.
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  466. It is true what Fraser said, Foreman was wrong to do that .
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  467. Growth in Britain has been progressively lowering since 1945. The spending on health and welfare had been increasing at the same time. To keep the proportion of national income consumed by the state from climbing any, the defence budget has been cut to the bone. Truss tried to reverse the aforementioned long term trends, and look what happened to her!
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  468. He had to extricate the US from disastrous overreach in Vietnam and act on long term goals. I don't think anyone could have managed those things better.
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  469. Why not an economy of force operation rather than a such a rigid defence complete with counter attacks. Russian convict casualties were a feature not a bug.
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  470.  @queenivy8600  Why do female deer want to mate with a stag that has large antlers?; small feet and hands are part of men's' search image.
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  471.  @queenivy8600  By our DNA. Likely because it is related to fertility. Women like large hands and forearms on men.
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  472.  @nigelhaywood9753  If I had to bet on either the guide they spoke to to day before and who had unsuccessfully offered them a multi day guided hike to and overnight stay at his ranch at Alto Romero which is where their bones were found, by him ten weeks later having killed them , OR any other combination of lost and foul play ones , I would unhesitatingly chose to bet on him being the culprit. Moreover it is far from being a balance of probability decision; I would give very long odds against him being innocent of having murdered them.
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  473.  @Peanut_taco_muffin  Panamanian pathologists' reported Lisanne had shin splints, so she covered a lot of miles (although it could have been in circles or out and back in a different direction each time (like spokes from a wagon wheel hub) returing to where Kris lay injured because Lisanne did not want to leave her except for a limited amounts of time . Being fit for walking means Lisanne's voice was strong. I think a lost scenario works if we assume Lisanne was not using her physical capabilities properly. Kris being over confident and becoming debilitated in a fall then and Lisanne getting neurotic under the stress and not going for help in a determined way can work as a realistic scenario for me. Alto Romero being under ten miles from Boquete and having scores of people living, working and travelling between it and the overlook each day is troublung because it makes Lisanne's actions seem farcical, if not tantamount to suicide. Dr Grande does not canvass such a possibility and he has some experience in these matters; he say this seems to have been an accident, but with the important caveat that there is no really satisfactory explanation. Its not Seven Degrees of Kevin Bacon type links I am talking about no one denies the guide was hired by them on the morning of the hike and he then he found scattered pieces of what was left of them after they went some way down the trail to his ranch. Small world! If he had told them to on no account go hiking without a guide none of this would happened. But he clearly did not because a couple of hours later they did just that and on a trail he may well have discussed with them. By his own account he went as far as the entrance to the paddocks on the 3rd looking for them; that was on the correct trail out of many possible ones. Lucky guess would be a possible explanation. but when asked by the police why he had said publicly the girls had went hiking behind the Pianista he said Eileen had told him; she said this was not true and she hadn't known it anyway. Now is such a deliberate untruth about how he seemed to know so much about where the two missing girls had gone several weeks before the backpack was found and the camera revealed it was the Serpent trail, really not suspicious? He was listed as a suspect in the police file you know. There were people who said Van Der Sloot was innocent of the killing of Natalee Holloway, (and some still do), but that case showed circumstantial evidence can be the best evidence of all.
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  474. Zelensky was complaining that Ukraine is not going to be allowed into NATO while the Ukraine-RusFed war is going on obviously. But that would mean Britain and other countries would be obliged to fight alongside Ukraine against Russia. What NATO countries have been willing to do is give arms. Ukraine ask for one type of weapon, and when they get it they instantly start lobbying for something else now they are demanding things such as advanced fighters that are capable of hitting inside Russia proper, which Britain ect would have not control over once the Ukrainians get their hands on them. The Ukrainians have been given many things already, almost all come from limited stocks in each country and in a great many cases there are no production lines actively replenishing the stocks (starting them up and running them open endedly would be a commitment to something that could be incredibly expensive, because free stuff that will be replaced is going to be use profligately. Storm Shadow killed a the highest ranking general to yet die in Ukraine the other day. So Ukraine should not complain about its treatment in any respect.
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  475. A potential future rival for the leadership of the country. Too young and charismatic for Zelensky to be comfortable with him.
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  476. Also ants. Except that Lisanme's leg bones had undecomposed flesh on them, which indicated a cool grave in the cloud forest.
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  477. I don't think it is at all random, It is an illustrated story with a logical narrative. The jungle at night, a cliff edge, and Kris Kremers looking like she is hurt. Lissanne Froom was supposed to be taking these photos after seven days lost, with a rock steady hand, instead of giving her friend first aid.
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  478. I like how Sabine chose a dress with a virtual reality warrior camouflage pattern for this brutal realism video.
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  479. Putin might do it through a miscalculation, everyone has seen how he, his advisors, and those executing his orders make a lot of mistakes, so why think they suddenly become competent with ICBMs? Cannot have it both ways,
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  480. The reason they did not react is they knew it was Ukraine not Russia all along.
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  481. ​ @TheUrbanmeister  Compared to volunteering for the front, its not difficult to say clever and funny things,.
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  482. Keeping the Russian occupation of Crimea tenable was the likely reason for the 2022 invasion (an objectively excessive reaction by Putin). As attempts to make Crimea untenable have had disastrous consequences for Ukraine already, one wonders why anyone would think it wise to double down on the policy. Cleary they have convinced themselves that in all probability Putin's proven tendency to overdramatize the danger Russia is in will not be activated by a "degradation" strategy. Hmmm.
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  483. That is the way the real world works. Everyone tries to pretend they don't care but everyone cares. Russia does and so do we.
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  484. 1:56 Fanfaronade from Ukraine about their perma imminent mighty offensive may be a ploy intended to get the Russians dedicating resources to digging in, thereby obviating any major Russian attack. Ukraine is going to throw its laboriously accumulated, superbly equipped, and trained crack brigades into a very predictable drive South against what is by now a deeply echeloned Russian defence a la Kursk(2)?
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  485. Half a thousand days ago I might have agreed with you.
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  486. Panamanian girls would not have been presumed 'lost', there would have been something done, whether legally or some other way. The perpetrators chose wisely.
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  487. That is what Biden did too. It's the US presidents job.
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  488. The West have zero experience of maneuver warfare against a near peer with intact anti aircraft systems and its own airforce. Western theories have been exposed as worthless. So far in Ukraine whichever side is on the defence has the advantage. Maybe an insurmountable one. If the West gives Ukraine the military wherewithal to slowly but surely wear down the Russian army, then the Russians are going to quickly realise that they can't win by conventional means. Maybe they will just lose interest and withdraw. But that seems very unlikely. as all indications are their objectives in Ukraine matters too much to the Kremlin. Ukraine is heading for 'catastrophic success' that will usher in a new era where use of nuclear weapons will be seen to have a real military purpose
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  489. Many of Russia's top commanders have been killed, and Russia conquering all Ukraine seems to be an unattainable objective now, especially given the defensive advantage conferred by the so called transparent battlefield. It would be surprising if Russia set even as a lower order objective of was trying to get men killed for an uncertain psychological or propaganda impact rather than strengthening the Russian position. Surely the more plausible explanation is the Russian commanders are being pressured to supply results and the Kremlin has a higher tolerance for the cost of those results the Russian army is actually able to achieve. In other words Russia sees neutralising Ukraine as an asset of of the anti Russian Washington alliance as essential.
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  490. The reason Russia had different goals was not because of the USSR being communist, but simply because Russia and America were different countries. Realism would predict that the internal political system makes no difference to how states act.
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  491. Pro tip, if you act ready to and prepare to fight defensively on the basis that you won't actually have to fight because the threat wil be deterred, that may be interpreted from another country's standpoint as preparations to attack them and provoke rather than deter them.
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  492. Punching out an old man is not incredible I suppose, but her jumping between skyscrapers like a Marvel hero was just too much. It was slapdash. All the same, film is a director's medium, so it is not fair to blame Waller Bridge whois an actress that looks the part and could have been convincing with a better story (she only contributed a little suggestion or two) . The director and the Butterworth brothers are the main ones responsible for the ill judged aspects of the film.
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  493. Ukraine can only win if Washington really want Russia to clear cut lose and Washington doesn't because a rapprochement with Russia will be needed to deal with a future China , which will be a megapower. Russia is not going to give up and Ukraine will not be able to make them for the aforementioned reason' So it will go on interminably.
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  494.  @SL-ze6su  They don't call it the Lost Waterfall for nothing, Kris and Lisanne would not have tried to find it without a ...GUIDE.
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  495. Prison preserves a sucker.
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  496. If the new Russian tactics were working the Ukrainians would tell us? Dubious.
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  497. Halford Mackinder was irrational? Zbigniew Brzezinski was irrational? They thought control of Ukraine was vital.
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  498.  @worldpeace1822  No, the US has VAST stocks of Abrams tanks and every other sort of thing Ukraine wants. An order of magnitude more that Ukraine has been given would be no problem if Washington really wanted to defeat Russia in Ukraine. But it doesn't..
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  499. Reasonable from their point of view. It had been quite clear what their point of view was since 2014.
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  500. So they were in the jungle for six nights and on the seventh decided to start using the camera flash?
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  501.  @OliveJuice  I will never understand why so many people think it is being over emotional to think foul play is plausible, but their most convoluted conjectures in support of misadventure stem from their super coolness..
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  502.  @OliveJuice  Not denying you are super cool then?
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  503. Well, no. Girls who were strangers to such conditions getting disorientated and making foolish decisions is very plausible, and so is stumbling around exhausted and in low light conditions falling off a cliff into a ravine with a river at the bottom of it. Kris and Lisanne were less worldly-wise than most twenty year old women, which is really saying something. I agree one of the girls being alive and not being found for day after day while locals were wandering along the paths able to hear screams and search teams were combing the area that is only tens of kilometers across is far from credible. Itmeans the girls were not simply lost. There was in Panamanian terms a huge reward for them. However, the culprits overthought it with the fake calls leaving the backpack and remains so likely are not too bright. The mechanically pulverized condition of the defleshed, although not abraded as they would be by a river bed, bones seems conclusive, especially when taken with the fact that bone does not float. The perpetrators are local yokels, and I am sure I know where they are from. As for blaming the girls, it is not entirely unfair because the girls had been told by the woman of the family they were living with that on reaching the summit they must come back the way they came. Panamanians living around the begining of the trail tried to dissuade the girls from going by themselves on even the touristy part to the summit that borders on properties. I think the way the striking Kremers was dressed worried them. The problem was the girls did not get explicitly told the reason for concerns was they might be assaulted by criminal men. It was an exceptionally good day and dry underfoot, one was artistic and wanted photographs of wilder places and the other was quite athletic, so the combination of their personalities and the favourable conditions led to them not only venturing over the summit on to the rougher path, but going much further down it than anyone would have predicted, or the average couple of European girls might have though wise. Relevant to the idea of them twisting their ankle is they both had excellent boots on. They went for two hours to the little stream where the last photos' were taken. Given that they had then been walking for four hours from the trailhead and would have the same time to get back there by 7 pm at the earliest, the most obvious reason for no more photos is because they turned to go back and were retracing their steps over where they already had taken photos at. An hour later both their phones called the emergency number within ten minutes and those were the last calls made on their phones that were was actually by them I suspect. The most likely scenario for them being alarmed enough to call as an emergency yet having over ten minutes to do so is they passed someone on the trail who then altered direction and began stalking them. There is a photo of Kremer a week afterwards ( 8 April) Yet they cannot possibly have been alive then because they could shout for help and be heard, unless they were being held prisoner. One of the girls' phone was being used on the 11th. I have never thought there was the slightest mystery about it; the perpetrators being most likely men from Alto Romero where the backpack was left very close to the village indeed, and Kremers shorts later appeared only a few kilometer away. The body parts were almost entirely beween the two locations. and close to Alto Romero No one not from the area could make repeated trips there. Also it shows a lack of sophistication about the fuss and forensic examination that that guide would likely not be stupid enough for. I don't think he had anything to do with it. When Dutch TV wentto Alto Romero it was apparent the residents were trying to confuse the issue so I'll bet the people there have a good idea who did it. The Panamanians' motives in covering it (and several similar incidents) up is all too clear. Why people are still choosing to go there of all places for a carefree holiday is an enigma to me though.
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  504. "Possible" simply means it would not have violated the laws of physics. For what actually happened the most likely scenario ought to be concentrated on. Arnold Donaldson is very good on this first principle being neglected by 'losters'. Jaime Costa, who knows the area and walked the trail has pointed out that the trail has too many people on it for an abduction to be likely. I now think Lissane and Kris being duped into leaving the trail on the pretext of being led to a photogenic waterfall is more plausible. No one was given an interrogation appropriate to it being identified as a double murder case, for the simple reason that this the Panamanian authorities could call it what ever they wanted, and they did not want it to be a murder. Many in Boquete were somewhat resentful about a level of resources being given to looking for disappeared women tourist froms the Netherlandsm which was far beyond what would have been used for a couple of equivalent age women from Boquete. But on the other hand extra judicial retribution would be more likely for Panamanian women; our person of interest wouldn't dare continue hanging around in the town if two Panamanian families there suspected him of being responsible for killing their daughters. I don't think 'suspect' is a strong enough term for him actually; the finds of possessions and remains seem highly suggestive of him, especially that two days after Froon's boot was found it was F who found Kremers's boot. No one talks about Kremers's boot though (apart to note that she died without shorts, boots or a bra on),
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  505.  @mariaf.6601  Poles not only dislike Russia, they have abrogated their agreement to renounce claims against Germany for WW2; Poland is in the process of demanding trillions from Germany. Poland wants to be the 51st state and pursue independent initiatives that increasingly seem like trouble making.
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  506.  @dutchroll I was simply objecting to CVR's' unspoken assumption that Ukrainian soldiers in Russian custody could not make genuine confessions of rape ang murder of ethnic Russians noncombatants. If you watch and listen CVR is tacitly accepting that Ukraine committed this attack, he is just suggesting they were tricked into it . But Ukraine is fibbing about this, which is a decision they have freely chosen to take.
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  507.  @jascu4251  Agree, but 'hard times make hard people' and Ukraine is fibbing about it.
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  508.  @ABR04D  I really question how interested the Russians are in keeping him alive. The exfiltration pursuit by a drone looks like Ukrainian had a drone set up and waiting for him to leave. His team are too high profile and has too many members for surviving under current conditions.
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  509. ​ @malikatamaeva3811  He has become infected by fatalism. He has been reporting on the fighting for ten years. He was never in all those years so close to exploding ordinance. It was a drone meant for him; that intro with his speaking to the camera right out side the bunker at the begining was surely spotted. . As they told him, if that drone happened to have a thermobaric warhead he would have been seriously injured. And then his vehicle was being specially hunted by another drone.
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  510. Precisely correct.
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  511.  @vlad1889  "Ukraine is winning because none of the Russian objectives had been accomplished". That sounds more like a stalemate deleterious to both Ukraine and Russia.
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  512. He called it right.
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  513. 5:55 'Not the sort of 5 , 6 kilometer distances that one would expect from mechanized warfare'. Before the invasion there was a universal expectation that mechanized dashes by either/ any side that managed to concentrate sufficient large formations would be very effective, especially when allied to drones for reconnaissance and artillery spotting. But in practice it has not worked for the Russians despite repeated attempts. What has proven to be crucial is artillery ammunition supply/ transport. We know this because both sides in Bakhmut are complaining that of bottlenecks in the supply of shells. Now a mechanized advance that goes forward 5 of 6 kilometers a day will outrun its logistical train's ability to supply the self propelled guns for the mass effect bombardments necessary, but the defending enemy supply dumps will be getting closer to the point of contact so they will have improved logistics.
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  514. But he is not asking and might not accept the offer; supposing he loses the battles and the all the annexed land, but refuses to give Ukraine peace?
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  515.  @Pnaraasi94  Mearsheimer has an explanation why almost three years and hundreds of thousands of casualties later, Russia is going for broke in Ukraine. Not clear that Anders can explain that.
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  516. Tom Sizemore was the ultimate supporting actor.
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  517. Russia is definitely the underdog, and it has 20% non ethnoRussians in a relatively impoverished population that is one sixth that of Nato and a quarter of America's. Russia's total population is comparable in number to Java's and Russia's economy is only twice the size of Taiwan's. Zelensky has openly said that Russia will split up under the stress of war, and all that will be left is Muscovy.
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  518. Drones are not going to take you prisoner though. So forget about any Russians coming into the open and trying to surrender. According to Ukraine ratio is 7 to 10 Russians for every Ukrainian. Putin is only claiming 5:1 in Russia's favour. Incidentally, drones can't take POWs so they are going to stop Russians from trying to surrender because they will know what happens when they come out into the open.
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  519.  @johnadam2885  Nothing that Westerners talk about has much affect on the Russian perception of the war.
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  520.  @jonlittle5032  They have a hermeneutic value if nicely done.. But your is hardly apposite. How Russia sees the war is probably a mirror image of how Ukraine and the West sees things. I very much doubt that Russia is self aware enough to have the ultratoughminded realist viewpoint that Anders is attributing to it.
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  521.  @jonlittle5032  Capone's successor Big Tuna Accardo never spent a single night in prison in his life. Anyway, the international system is not one where there is a cop to call on a sitting regieme in country such as Russia. And knowing if they lose power they are going to be hauled off to prison is the very best of incentives for Putin and company to follow through on their aggressive war to the bitter end rather than ever be convinced to relinquish power. They have nothing to gain by backing down. As Kris Kristopherson put it ''Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose'. The ICC is not achieving anything, unless their aim is to appear to be relevant.
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  522. is outer Manchuria more important to Russian that Ukraine? Not now I think.
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  523. Compared to Obam
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  524. Ukraine may have missed that a federalised Donbass though the Steimeier modification of Minsk would have been no real concession to Russia because the European members of Nato veto would have prevented it so the unrealism was one both sides from the begining. The Russians can destroy the Ukrainians' weapons and the West will replace them with better ones. Ukraine's fighting manpower is the thing the Russians would be better concentrating on attriting, and they seem to be doing that. Despite the fanfaronaded reiteration of Ukraine (and Georgia) joining Nato being made every year since 2008 by Nato, Ukraine joining Nato was a dead letter after the invasion of Georgia, so Russia's fears were not very rational. Yet that does not mean they were not genuine. While Zelensky was in Paris in 2019 negotiating for peace through a modified Minsk agreement that would have obviated any need for Russia to stay in a special autonomous status Donbass (because Donbass although a part of Ukraine could have constitutionally prevented it joining Nato). it was made clear to him if he signed then he would be overthrown by 2014 style mass demos. Currently, Zelensky would not be able to agree to any settlement that did not entail the return of Crimea (dubious the majority in Crimea want this), which many in the West are encouraging Ukraine to insist on as a rock bottom demand; it does not seem to me at least merely an initial negotiating position. I think there is an unspoken agreement in the West to not say anything that can be interpreted as encouraging to Russia. Nevertheless, General Milley said Russia and Ukraine have taken 100,000 casualties each. Ukrainians between 16 and 60 who have been forbidden from leaving the country constitute a reserve army of manpower and yet is Russia substantially different apart from having three times the population. Men not machinery are the best target for Russia, and overall commander Surovikin seems to approve or he would have terminated the Bakhmut operation which the Wagner boss says is an attrition one. Now if the West actual gives Ukraine troops, Russia can forget about even emerging with a draw, but it seems most unlikely those things will happen.
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  525. If she told the truth on the stand about her internal mental state at this the time of this interview about her latest movie and how she tamed Puff's playboy ways, then she is one hell of an actress
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  526. He said peace was in China's interests
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  527. Diddy is done, but he enjoyed his life ten times over. And super rich druggies are not going to last into their 60s.
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  528. Russia is standing on the defensive a la Kursk. Drone cannot reconnoiter defenses and that is why Ukraine is having problems.
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  529. True but such Russians are not the stuff front line combat soldiers are made of. And them going abroad makes Putin more secure domestically.
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  530.  @AndrewBlucher  In war subpar human resources are sometimes just the ticket. Both sides are progressing by using low quality troops in small groups to draw fire so that the artillery gf the enemy can be pinpointed by drones and destroyed. The Russians invented those tactic and used the Zconvicts as cannon fodder to draw fires. but Ukraine is having to use troops who are ordinary men for such high attrition roles. Both Ukraine and Russia are going to pay very dearly in demographic consequences for this war.
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  531.  @Nickbaldeagle02  Thousands of Western volunteers have left Ukraine.
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  532. While General Hodges has been prescient from the start and is an undoubted expert in conventional war, lets keep it real and admit that an open ended absolute commitment to 'continue supporting Ukraine' being extended to insisting they get back Crimea (something that he and others of his school of thought never originally mentioned), is rather covert switching onto a fast track to very scary escalation. If things go so well for Ukraine that they are on the point of getting back Crimea, the Kremlin might accept defeat as Gen Hodges encourages us to think. But they might not. And the assumption seems to be that if Russia withdrew from Crimea the war would end. Yet if Russia stops fighting, refuses to formally end the war, and feverishly replenishes its armed forces what is Ukraine going to do, invade Russia?
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  533.  @HamzaStallion  It was certainly an important factor. The jury were misled by an improper presentation of what the data meant in probability terms.
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  534.  @FB-cx4sp The Dr is good on psychology, I was expecting that kind of analysis. One would think as a man Grande must have an understanding of the relevance of these being peak physical condition female humans, not old and unhealthy, and therefor giving men certain ideas. Kris was particularly striking, with unusual coloring and dressed in a way that drew attention to her figure, like would be appropriate for getting attention at a holiday resort let alone an isolated forest. She was said to be artistic and out going. That said, you can disappear going to the beach in Panama as American Catherine Johannet did in 2019. Possessions, pulverized bone and rolled up pieces of skin were scattered in various direction in the area around the village of Alto Romero. The backpack was found beside a rice field quite close to that village just as the searching was reaching a crescendo and moving towards the village. If I was forced to say who I think it was likely someone from Alto Romero or a farm around there that did it. On the other hand, someone was quite cunning with the fake emergency calls (though all were made during at times suggesting a midday break from work), but the 14 hours of both phones being switched off immediately after the first and probably genuine emergency calls suggest to me that the cover up calls-entailing long term planning- maybe were after both were dead, devised by someone different to whoever committed such an impulsive crime,--possibly a father or older brother of the perp(s). My bet would be they were targets of opportunity having passed a local(s)who realised they were totally isolated and abducted them off the trail. Possibly they were not alive for more than hours, although they could have been most easily moved (at night to avoid witnesses) to a nearby farm where the chemicals and machinery to dispose of the corpses that was clearly used would be present. I think that farm may be very close indeed to the little stream where their last photo was taken
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  535.  @leninstreet  The Russian have made their first decent territorial gain in years. Of course they are going to reenforce it. Lapon knows the area is open country suitable for offensives from having to retreat back through it in 2022. And most people think the offensive was prompted by the Ukrainian cross border raids, which have proved to be counter productive from Kiev's standpoint. So whose side are the most incompetent generals on?
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  536.  @AthelstanEngland  Partly because Wallace made no objection the UK defence budget is has been raided so much that it is close to rock bottom. You cannot give open ended in those circustances.
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  537.  @Vale0x3  Bruce Lee's primary attack was jabs to the eyes.
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  538. Putin may have suffered from being over-treated. Nassim Taleb says that having a personal doctor has shortened the lives of many rich and powerful men.
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  539.  @harmless6813  First of all, Russia has no way of knowing what the intentions of other countries are or might become. Secondly, losing conventionally to a medium sized country like Ukraine would show Russian army as unable to win conventionally and not just in Ukraine. It is of course possible Putin would accept such a debacle, but showing such a lack of nerve when playing for the very highest of stakes would hardly leave Russia's nuclear deterrent to a conventional invasion much credibility, would it; so what would the point of having either conventional or nuclear forces, or RusFed as a unitary state to pay for them? It would break up.
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  540.  @tokeherkild8038  We'll both go on living and in a year we shall be able to agree on what happened in 2023.
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  541.  @4TheRecord  I agree it was a war crime, (as CVR says the captor power has a duty to keep POWs somewhere safe and certainly not use that to draw fire), but I just don't think it was as stupid a war crime are you make out.
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  542.  @4TheRecord  Vast number of comments about the Froon Kremers case, well known as a Putin priority is it. eh?
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  543. Ukraine will never give in, but Russia will? Hmmm.
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  544.  DOLLY PRANE  I am not sure what your point is as the French females killed after the Germans left were in a great many cases were killed for simply going out with Germans, and the Germans were doing the killing so they ought to have been the objects of revenge attacks. If you want to talk in general about Frenchwomen who were killed in WW2 many if not most most were killed by Allied bombing and artillery.
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  545. They wear military uniforms but these press gangs appear to be late twenties; it's bastards like them who ought to be at the front. They are career cops I bet, very happy as heroes in their safe rear area job.
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  546. 100,000 Russians freezing to death? Much of the Russian army is from Siberia All the Western MSM are reflecting Ukrainian /US psychological warfare talking points.
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  547. An event is best characterized by how it ends. Ukraine started well ....
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  548. They don't want to say anything that might encourage Russia and make it think it has the West over a barrel. But the truth is they have not given Ukraine all they could have because Russia is both fragile and belligerent.
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  549. No, it's just two countries that are 'my country right or wrong' patriotic in a way that no one has been in the West for a hundred years.
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  550. Russia.
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  551.  @boink800  The targeting and intel is entirely British or American. Supposing Putin gets targeted or a nuclear power station or ICMM related site with Ukrainian drones/ missiles because Storm Shadow has destroyed the Russian radar and air defences. Ukraine has every incentive to get the West directly involved in fighting the Russians.
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  552. ​ @Suzanne1999 I take a different view, any such informant could just be the culprit trying to blame someone else by planting evidence. He already tried to frame the cable bridge by suggesting it as the location for the night photos. Circumstantial evidence is the best evidence. When you have one man working alone to do the whole thing himself, which is what I think happened, it is the only evidence (apart from a confession). This guy came up with so many red herrings finds and prescient suggestions that it was virtually a signed confession.
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  553.  @samsam828  Who is gong to attack Russia to save Ukraine?
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  554.  @Chevy64w  When it comes right down to it what country is going to fight Russia to save Ukraine?
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  555. You are talking about a lash up.
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  556. Maybe. There is something very steely about him as if there is an internal pressure. 'I can't just walk in carrying a camera' he says, but I wouldn't put anything past this guy.
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  557.  @HKim0072  A formal declaration would indeed be purely theoretical, were it not for the fact that China has repeatedly spelled out for decades that such an announcement would have immediate practical consequences of a unpleasant nature for Taiwan, which has not made the announcement, we must assume out of fear of the war levying consequences China has threatened. So until the unilateral declaration of independence by Taiwan is actually made, China will continue to exert a shadowy overlordship on Taiwan.
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  558. They don't seem very advanced in the weapons they used. No guided missiles. just ordinary rockets and cannon.
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  559. Sweeney is an expert on spirits
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  560. When Israel's supporters say 'jump', the commentariat say 'how high sir?' Jeremy Corbyn can explain why.
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  561.  @artnull13  It didn't seem to hurt him when he was dancing to the IRA's tune.
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  562.  @sebastianforbes1  Vietnam was a status thing for America. But at the end of the day they didn't care that much because it was on the other side of the world. Korea was ended by threatening to use the Bomb, which China did not have at the time of Korea. I don't think Russia has the option to pull out of Ukraine in the way that America withdrew from of Vietnam. Afghanistan was abandoned admittedly, but that was as a general conciliatory policy by Gorby, who is not remembered fondly by Russians. Putin is no Gorby and even if he was Ukraine is much too close, (Kharkiv is less than twenty miles from the borders of Russia proper) and too small for a superpower to admit it has been defeated by. Obama said it best Russia has escalatory dominance, because there is a point that Russia will and the US will not go beyond over Ukraine.
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  563. The West is supporting Ukraine because the West wants to/ thinks it has to . There is no obligation whatsoever.
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  564. I think Ukraine is playing into Putin's hands with these assassinations of Russian ideologue civilians like Dugina (Anders does not mention those), and drone attacks. The latest drone attacks are on residential buildings. Russians can feel patriotic in relation to attacks on Russia proper, so is getting Putin's population to support his contention that Ukraine is a threat to Russia a path to victory for Ukraine? I think it is the quickest way for Ukraine to lose. If Ukraine has drones to spare it ought to use them on the battlefield, where it has not had a victory since November. Saddam was not overthrown by domestic dissent or armed resistance from within Iraq as a result of missile attacks he failed to prevent. No, Saddam was overthrown by a massive invasion taking his capital. That is not going to happen to Russia. Judging by the recent costly advance against heavy opposition and increasing bombardments, Russian generals do not believe they are about to run out of soldiers or arms.
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  565. How long was she putting up with that again? Nine weeks? Nine months? It was nine YEARS. By 20 Cassie was a recording artist with minor hits and a successful model who'd bought her own Manhattan apartment. She was reportedly in a relationship with a influential producer from 19. From 21 to 22 she was in a regular relationship with Puffy then he started the weird stuff ... so she stayed another nine years.
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  566. Ukraine and Russia are something like near peers and they tend to go tit for tat case in point the assassination of Dugina was quite possibly in retaliation for the killing of agricultural logistics tycoon and militia funder Oleksiy Vadatursky, who was killed 3weeks ago in a targeted missile attack on his Mykolaiv home 40 km from Kherson, shortly after the Russians had agreed to let the shipping of grain resume. Ukraine ostensibly preparing in the South for a huge offensive operation would detract from establishing a defense line. The danger is the Ukrainian fanfaronade about a Southern offensive might give the Russians the idea to launch their own major attack from their west bank foothold in the South rather that having the troops pouring in to that vulnerable area just accumulating and in an untenable position. There is in fact currently a developing Russian advance towards Mykolaiv.
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  567. He is one of the best villains ever in a movie. You've got to give Seagal credit for letting William Forsythe's Ritche steal the scenes like he did.
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  568. Trump is making his position clear.
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  569. Well their bones and ended up outside the remote lodge they they did not want to vist. And one who offered them a trip to the lodge the day before they went missing, the finder of their bones, the lodge owner, the guide who reported them missing, and the only person who suggested looking behind the Pianista trail for them are all one and the same. Kris died without her shorts, boots or bra on. Animals would not have eaten their underwear or tops but no trace of these was found.
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  570. I have never thought the camera deletion oddities to be an argument for foul play. But I always thought it was an obvious double homicide. There is no recorded instance of two women disappearing by accident like that. And the first time there is such an occurrence we are supposed to believe it just happened to be two extremely attractive and young ones who took off their bras and put them in their backpack, but whose underwear and skulls were never found?
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  571.  @borisgraell  Night is dark in most places. They made one call each 12 minute apart while the sun was disappearing behind the mountain when seen from the down slope on the stream in photo 508, then, without any any retries at connecting for an EMERGENCY both the phones were powered off and stayed off for 14 hours. No attempted calls after the morning of the 3rd, and no phone activity of any kind on the 7th, 8th (when the night photos were taken), 9th and 10th. The last phone activity was on the 11th. Malevolent human beings are more easily underestimated and tricky than trees and nightfall.
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  572.  @abdell75roussos What girls would expose their sensitive breast skin to chafing scratches and biting insects in a jungle? I can think of a reason why they would both take them off, they were told to. Kris also took her denim shorts off because they were found with no trace of decomposition breakdown products on them. So they were kidnaped, ordered to strip, and you can all too easily guess the rest. After that they could hardly be left to go to the authorities and make a complaint. That area is sparsely inhabited but people live there and they are not deaf so screaming would have got Kris and Lisanne found long before the 11th day. The reward was a very substantial one for an ordinary Panamanian. The night photo of the back of Kris's head among completely random ones of a tree were taken in the early hours during a thunderstorm. It reeks of the clandestine. Too many anomalies for your hypothesis I am afraid. You are arguing the case about as well as it could be, yet I think this is far from obvious accidental deaths in which the victims just happened to be hot young women
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  573.  @markmike7933  That is a powerful argument but as with most controversies of this type seemingly great points are inconclusive as very pertinent counter-arguments exist. What to me seem two of the best grounds for thinking this was most likely a double homicide by the father and son guide team Kris Kremmers and Lisanne Froon had contacted on the morning of their hike to try and hire, thus allowing those men to surmise where KK and LF would be going, are the following. Firstly, it is not jungle but a forest with meadows, some human habitations and people with good hearing moving throughout it on herding trails except after nightfall. Secondl there was someone turning the phone on and off until the eleventh day, which is a long time to be lost is such an area if you are yelling for help and there is (in rural Panamanian terms) a life changing amount of money offered as a reward for finding you.
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  574.  @jonesmorales-tu6kq  I know this case, and i know they were hot young women,.
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  575. If this is the effect of a bad Russian plan then Ukrainians better hope Russia does not come up with a terrible one!
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  576. Ukraine knew all about the forming up of the Russian 50 thousand force near Belregod. What Kiev did not know was the lack of proper prepared positions for defence.
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  577. It's notes for his defence, I am amazed the prosecutors tried to use them as evidence.
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  578. The West was getting increasingly secure, until they announced Ukraine and Georgia would become members of NATO and Georgia was instantly invaded (Russia still occupies a fifth of Georgia). Despite what happened to Georgia, Ukraine thought they were going to deter Russia, instead they only provoked it.
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  579. Better still, don't go to South America and expect that you will not be a target. Apart from a foot in a shoe and the bleached pelvis, all the bones found were in fragments. Nothing on four legs can pulverize bones like that, and the remains being found together makes it certain it was a featherless biped that did it. Those who think otherwise could not find their own rear end. As for the guide, well I think it likely someone from the town set them up. They were too trusting of people.
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  580. Tourists don't use lye to dissolve animal carcasses, Panamanian farmers do.
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  581.  @AA-ch7yw  You don't think views and comments on YT are going to make any difference at all, do you? The war will be decided on the battlefield.
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  582. You are getting very far out on an 'objective' limb with certain issues. I'd cool it for a while, take a coffee break.
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  583. That Ukraine would do this suggests Ukraine is not in the slightest worried about a nuclear strike. They ought to be slightly worried, especially now.
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  584. I really cannot see the US army or airforce entering combat with the Russian army inside Ukraine. I agree that the American strategy is to proceed in 'boil a frog style', but with more and more effective arms supply, rather than joining in on the side of Ukraine. The Ukrainians can and will be given more and more devastatingly advanced firepower and real time targeting information the worse they are doing, and that is why Russia will be unable to get any momentum. In this war, Ukraine, Russia and America can all lose. China can't.
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  585. Are the majority of billionaires populist? That would seem counter intuitive as they are by definition an elite. Are most of the super rich even neutral? I would say most of them that do donate do so to socially progressive causes
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  586. Maybe dissolved in lye by now..
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  587. No country can be certain of another state's future intentions, but we can be pretty sure that Ukraine intends to get Crimea back, which is something that the West never envisioned back in February and no one was talking about then.
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  588. Yes, you don't deal with people the way Zelensky is doing with Trump.
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  589. ​ @freedomfighter22222  The US could have supported an indefinite effort in Vietnam economically, but that was academic because there was no end in sight and so what was the point. Nothing is ever spelled out about how Ukraine is going to actually win. Insofar as there is a Ukraine wins scenario, it seems to be an unspoken one that that the Russians are suddenly going to realise they are losing and quit, but why would Russia be constrained to that 'we have lost' reaction to losing instead of a more pugnacious response?
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  590. Wagner is a light infantry formation with an expendable component of irregulars, they are specially designed for advancing through heavily fortified and mined urban areas. Russia is currently standing on the defence, which requires regular units with heavt weapons and engineers. Moreover, Wagner in Belarus is necessitating a diversion of Ukraine's troops from the east and south.
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  591. It would be completely unable to defend itself against a handful of kamikaze drones costing 0.01 percent as much.
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  592. Kris and Lissane were wearing excellent boots, and they had plenty of time to get back before the 6.40pm sundown. At their last location known there is a photo taken at 2pm (they had started at 10.45am. It was a trail that is is impossible to go off of or not understand that you stop and go back the way you came so stop halfway through your time to nightfall. They were killed, and everyone who has a little common sense knows why, and who by.
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  593.  @craigcraigster5605  I wasn't aware that cell phones use much more power when they try to connect. However there really is nothing they could have fallen at that could have been reached by 4.39pm when the first emergency number calls were made 12 minutes apart. Only a single attempt each, 12 minutes apart, and then switching off for 14 hours seems highly suspicions for anyone let alone 20 and 21year old girls. That there were two best friends doing this seems really quite strange. This is not some troubled loner. Moreover the next day Lisanne's phone did connect while ringing the emergency number and the call was ended after two seconds. There was no second attempt immediately or ever again, and Lissannes phone was then LEFT ON ALL THAT NIGHT without being used. So that is three things with possible innocent explanations ...within the first 36 hours. I am sure the many other anomalies over the 11 days Kremers's phone was active (being turned on and off) such as it was not used for an emergency call after the 3rd day and turned off for the last time on the 11th day with 22% power remaining, have possible explanations not involving criminal activity. Possible does not mean likely though
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  594.  @keptins  But not by tourists any more.
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  595. This is crap, Diddy isn't in a cell at all in the high profile unit which is a open group dorm. like a barracks.
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  596. Ten percent of the Bradleys Ukraine was given destroyed in a single small probing operation. The combined arms mobile warfare method just does not work any more, for Russia or Ukraine
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  597. Ukraine has every reason to get the West in direct conflict with Russia.
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  598. Chips Rafferty the Aussie actor was beaten to a pulp when he was inveigled into' stepping outside' by a doorman in London. Zelensky is a comedic actor by profession.
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  599.  @nil7148  Reagan was head of the actors union, not a political novice. Putin navigated the Kremlin scene so as to not make enemies, so he had relevant life experiences. Zelensky is a guy who had a comedy show about a non politician that became president, and became president. He is not the only person to lead a country without much experience but he surely has had the least. Put it another way, no one has ever had such a meteoric rise to power as Zelensky; of course he was over confident prior to the invasion, he would not be human if he hadn't been.
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  600. Waving the pedestrians to cross could be very dangerous if they are focused on you and not a car coming fast in the opposite direction.
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  601. One can argue whether she ought to have been charged with manslaughter, I think that charge was considered excessive by the appellate court and the main reason the judges were looking to be punctilious. Anyway, she clearly was gesturing and speaking angrily. That someone does not have right of way according to the Highway Code is hardly a licence to demand they veer instantly into a busy road (with her back to oncoming traffic) and enforce that by not giving them room to pass while waving one's arms about, thereby giving every indication of being enragedly motivated to behave aggressively. I feel this business of proving beyond doubt mental states is a let out of jail free card played by judges minded to split hairs against common sense.
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  602. Farming chemicals and knowledge of how to butcher animals explains it all. The cunning use of the mobile for fake emergency calls (entailed a plan to later leave it to be found) implies more sophistication than tribal people.
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  603. Please tell me about the similar accidental deaths of two women together in the woods. You can't, because it is not something that happens. They each unsuccessfully tried to make an emergency call at 5pm on the day they went missing and failing to connect that one time, then ... switched the phones off for 14 hours. Ten days later on April the 11th, one of them tried to connect for the last time and then switched off the mobile ( with power remaining) and CAREFULLY PUT IT IN THE BACKPACK along with the other mobile, and the folded bras that they had been wearing. There must have been water to last 11 days but you can't starve to death in under a month, so what killed the girl who made that call? The backpack then found its way into the winding Serpent river and over nine weeks floated many kilometers down and came to rest on the same sandbar where Froom's rib and Kremers's pelvis were later found, just outside Alto Romero a village full of Indians who'd make good scapegoats if the accidents theory was rejected by the authorities
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  604. Jaime Costa who knows from walking it says the trail is too busy for an abduction and any locals would know that. This is one guy who tricked them into going off of the safety of the path. They trusted, and they died for it. I don't think they would have trusted a beefy YOUNG guy they had not met before, like the guide who said he saw them that day and admits to being near the overlook.
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  605. The Russian command are not trying for maneuver breakthroughs, or to close pincers on a caldron. No, they are 100% attritionist; moving at the speed artillery and its requisite ammunition can be moved forward.
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  606. There is no insurmountable political problem in mobilizing more troops by the Kremlin, and they could but it would get them nowhere. The real reason they haven't is they know it would bring a nullifying reaction from Washington. The Kremlin understands what is going on: it cannot start winning without Ukraine being given additional help to restore a stalemate. Hence the repeated announcement that giving Ukraine ATACMS is being considered every time Russia enjoys the slightest success. Ukraine is going all out, but Washington is not and neither is Moscow. Whereas Vietnam was lost by virtue of the lack of propinquity, and the corollary of an option to withdraw and not have the VC on the US border, the Russians cannot withdraw from the occupied territory an ocean between them and Ukraine. The Russian population would fear that. Actually, your average Russian is choosing to ignore the case for Ukraine being no threat is left alone and has identified Ukraine as an state that is backed by the West and part of an enemy assemblage that cannot be trusted. And RusFed may be an autocracy like the Soviet Union but unlike the USSR Russia is basically a nation state, and can benefit from ethically based patriotic feeling just as much as Ukraine can. Making Russians cease to believe in their country without burning out the they morale of Ukrainians will be a challenge for Ukraine. Both sides are going to be relying on front line soldiers who are aware they are replacements for more committed volunteers who got KIA. The norm of soldiers' patriotic motivations and willingness to invite death has surely altered for both sides. I don't think being a democracy makes much difference to things after 19 months, because the Ukrainian in uniform is no more free to swap it for his bed at home than a Russian soldier is. They are under a military discipline which is essentially the same in both armies. For example, conscientious objectors are being arrested and jailed in Ukraine.
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  607.  @DanWinterborn  Starmer has just said they all should be immediately identified; that's a call for the media to show every one of photos of their faces and get them sacked even if they were doing no more than standing about.
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  608. In the movies a guy that good looking would be totally competent at everything he tried.
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  609. Costa Rica is where the girls originally wanted to go. Panama is going to pay dearly for this affair in tourist business that chooses Costa Rica over the unsafe substitute.
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  610. The American observers said the Ukrainian offensive failed because they were not doing ground reconnaissance, Ukraine is trying to do everything with drones. The Ukrainians are in a Western mindset where the individuals' have a mindset of developing their particular potentialities. That not so great when what are needed are expendables.
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  611. Can't have it both ways; if Russia has as good as lost, then it is presented with either coming to terms and withdrawing/ fighting on to the bitter end of what would be the worst humiliation since the Ethiopians beat the colonial army of Italy, or issue a clear warning of battlefield nukes being detonated on the advancing Ukrainian armym and if Ukraine continues regardles, making good on the threat. Putin won't take his vague rhetoric so far being scoffed as bluff to be a dare, but the war has not got beyond the point of no hope fore him yet. If as seems likely he realises in before too long that he is in hopeless military quandary, then what we know of Putin suggests that for him the thermonuclear option (an open explicit threat then use when the redline is crossed) is the least bad one, inasmuch it is a way to end the war and keep what Russia currently has in status. It certainly would end the war because you cannot fight conventionally against even very small H bombs, and no one is going to get into a thermonuclear conflict because Putin balks at giving Ukraine only a qualified victory. China does not want to alienate the US, but China can't allow Russia to lose and be humiliated, because China is going to need Russia as a friend to deal with the US in future. So no. China will not isolate Russia. In a nutshell, Russia is not necessitated to decide against playing the nuclear non empty threat card at all by what China or anyone else's reaction might be . It depends on the Russian mindset. Do they think they are a third rate country?; because that is what being defeated without daring to use their enormously expensive nuclear weapons against the conventionally armed medium sized country of Ukraine would amount to for Russia. To be clear Russia will not be able to get Ukraine to surrender the currently unoccupied by Russia; no, the most that would happen I think is Ukraine has to be satisfied with it being a somewhat smaller county
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  612. The genes may be fine but in the womb the fetus is protected by the placenta, which is part of the mother and the mother's genes are responsible for. Placenta not keeping out infection is a big cause of developmental instability that the baby's genes are not necessarily responsible for. The most important nine months of one's life.
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  613. That was the Freemasons
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  614.  @wlyFwd2140  They don't talk about Russia here it is just Putin's emotional state as clickbait . Well it is a pro Ukraine channel (and there are Russian ones), but I like more balance so I will leave you to it.
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  615. There were prehistoric bird things with opposable thumbs. Astoundingly advanced.
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  616. Every border in the world reflects the balance of forces either side of it.
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  617. Being strong in Europe is begining to mean being relatively weak in Asia. And do we really was a Russio Chinese alliance?
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  618. Steampunk superpower.
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  619.  @jevinliu4658  Yes they were caught off guard because the Russian invasion force seemed insufficient and was assumed to be sabre rattling. Kllitchko the mayor of Kyiv said President Zelensky was not expecting an invasion and failed to prepare for it until the last weeks. Earlier preparations could have really hammered the Russians. This is why they preferred to not have ponderous preparations, and catch Zelensky with his pants down.
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  620.  @Cannon_Fodder_Russians  Exactly.
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  621. Where does the money come from ? Europe is an economic dead zone. No country in the world is completely independent. And we did our best for Ukraine but we have welfare states.
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  622.  @chrisgwynne1586  Agreed, and who found that evidence having so much connection to the victims and the reason they were on that remote trail unprotected is very telling. That the bogus emergency calls started a few hours after the last hike photo suggests that there was pre planning.
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  623.  @davidhoward437  This case's nighttime photos and phones data are a found footage fictional movie produced and directed by a psychopath.
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  624. There was no guarantee for Ukraine's security. The US specifically said so in the treaty.
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  625. The morale of Ukrainians can be affected by a relatively minor tactical defeat if it is taken as a sign the tide is turning. And morale has strategic implications.
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  626.  @kalinmir  Journalists understand the strategic importance of morale. Russia's has got a boost.
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  627. Sounds like a plan.
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  628. Channel 4 fellow thinks the West is not hypocritical but Russia is.
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  629. Ukraine is a smaller country and the West is not going to send them troops.
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  630. The way they don't realise they are spouting amateur medico statistical reasoning even when they are is rather alarming as to the training of the legal profession, and the their failure to learn from experience. 'Implicit statistics' debunker Professor Hutton is someone that is quite fascinating to listen to. You have to concentrate though.
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  631. The international order consists of sovereign states and Taiwan isn't one; it' is not an independent country; does not itself claim to be such. If Taiwan were to declare independence it would be invaded by China, and we know this because China has said so. After the shock of the Korean war, the US knows that China does not bluff. China did not have nuclear weapons at the time of the Korean intervention by China. A few years ago the US made veiled threats of thermonuclear weapons use against China if it attacked Taiwan. To the apparent surprise of American diplomats, China responded by pointed that it has the capacity to hit the continental US.
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  632. Of course they are going to seize on any opportunity that comes up without regard to whether it is 'not in the plan'.
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  633. He is a heterosexual man who has made some obtuse advances, but he has a couple of businesses, and so a pretty intelligent fellow; not such a fool as to plant the possessions and the remains so close to his coffee planation, and then find some of them them himself. In addition to being rather old for such a crime, his cash businesses were doubtless hard hit by the aftermath of the incident. I think it is possible but not very credible that he has any involvement. The perp is more cunning than that. I do blame him guide F for failing to tell Kris and Lissane , as he obviously did not, that the trail was unsafe for unaccompanied young foreign women tourists, and they needed a guide--not as someone to show them where to go, but as a local guy with a machete to be a protector. But if he had said that it is possible they would have decided against going at all, and he was trying to get them to hire him. As for his son, this is not a gang thing, they are young macho and get young girls hanging around them; would consider it beneath their code to commit such a crime. Also were a gang member involved, his friends would realize and someone would hear talk and inform for the ward . It is conceivable the backpack body parts were planted close to the guide's coffee plantation in order to frame him and his son though I suspect the Indians were also scapegoat's as a plan B for the accidents scenario being disbelieved.
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  634. The remains of Froon found relatively close to the guide's farm and mainly found by him were all from a leg.
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  635. I suppose it is true that malicious Russian mischief alarming the Western pubic could interfere with Washington/ Nato's effort to help Ukraine win the war, but as far I can see, Washington is not trying to end the war by helping Ukraine win the war. Superpower America has VAST stores of all kinds of useful armament not longer in service that it could give to Ukraine. Take Abrams tanks, they could easily give 300 but have only supplied 30. Washington wants Russia to get discouraged and give up with what it could claim as a sort of victory. The reason is that Ukraine really winning with American help make Russia see the US as an enemy forever more, and that cannot be allowed to happen because Russia will be needed in the future when China becomes a MEGAPOWER.
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  636. ​ @michaeljones3774  The prosecutor implied she could have been there for some. To answer your question, if the unit was so badly run there were excess deaths, that is an environment in which deliberately causing excess deaths would be easier to get away with.
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  637. Other counties would doubtless love Russia to renounce force in all circumstances. But it never did; although it is true that previous Russian leaders had warned that force would be used yet they did nothing. Putin turned out to not be Gandhi, but there was no reason to think he was. Ukraine and the US ignored warning after warning since 2008.
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  638. Patrick is going to have a heart attack running with that suit of armour.
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  639. No one has been consistently right about it. Moreover, Nielsen is employed by the Danish navy and in what he says is constrained to follow the country's official policy.
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  640.  @BellaMcMill  Anders has a point about 2022, but now two years later Russia's effort in Ukraine is almost total. I think there is more than some caprice of Putin driving it.
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  641. The trouble with CVR is like so many others, he sees Gorby and Yeltsin as the norm: Kremlin leadership who took decisions with an eye to Washington and did not dare do anything to antagonise it. Combat Veteran Reacts thinks the Russians bank on Western appeasement, weakness or fatigue when they make an aggressive move and would reevaluate their whole strategy if the West showed a hard driving implacability to defend Ukraine. The upspoken corollary is a belief Russia would back down from a resolute West. But backward as it is Russia is a distinctly separate civilisation. The West is much too strong for Russia and yet not everything Russia does is dependent on what the Kremlin thinks the attitude of the West is or might become. And to feel compelled to fight is not to believe one is going to win.
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  642. It is questionable if Russia can win the war given the increased support the US gives Ukraine any time Russia has any success, but why can't Putin can keep the war going so as to not have to explain how it was lost? So how does Ukraine win if it cannot end the war?
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  643. If the US did not see it will one day need Russia against China, then that would be truly baffling. All indications are that America does and will not try to crush Russia in Ukraine.
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  644. What choice does anyone have as to the country they are born in, or anything else that leads to them being either the victim or executioner?
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  645.  @retrocool  Assange was in London for the lifestyle. Down under will be like a living hell for him,
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  646. ""To cross the nuclear threshold, even with a small nuclear weapon, I think would turn even China against President Putin and Russia."" It depend how desperate Russian gets, but in any case China would be short sighted to leave Russia to be humbled because China would then have the prospect of facing America alone in any future crisis, such as over Taiwan. I think Russia is a long way from where they would seriously contemplate even threatening use of a battlefield nuclear weapon, however if it came to actual use in order to avoid Russia being humiliated, I think China would reluctantly accept it as necessary
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  647. It is a greenscreen, he is in a luxury Dubai penthouse..
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  648. Well if the path they walked (during a drought) was dangerous they were idiots and took more than a week to die. Otherwise they died in a matter of hours, due to thinking Panama was not a country where their homicides would be compared to silly cows that drown, and their killer could escape justice despite brazenly trying and claim a reward for 'finding' their bones and belongings.
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  649. Fun fact: the Gaza Strip is not a part of Israel. So this is Israel's internal business.
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  650. Identify it as what it was: a vile double murder. Don't disrespect Kris and Lisanne.
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  651. Anders seems to be saying either Ukraine is free to become a member/ de jure member of Nato (with aspiration to regain occupied territories Russia says are its) and member of the EU, whereby Ukraine as poorest country in the EU necessarily gets massive transfers of funds (for economic convergence), or it becomes a Russian puppet. No middle ground, or room for compromise. Where is all the money to build a new strong Ukrainian army and rebuild Ukraine AND bring it up to EU economic convergence level? Not from America, Trump has said the US ain't paying for s**t. Poland lost a lit of its territory and had a vast number of its people die in WW2, but it has experienced a resurgence. Ukraine will too, in time. Virtually no person, no country is completely free in the absolutely inviolable way Anders is holding up as the minimal acceptable level of independent sovereign democracy that Ukraine must be raised to ASAP by the West once the fighting stops. None of this is anyone's fault because no person is responsible for being born to the parents they are or for living in the circumstances of their life and times. Like people, some countries come into being more favourably ensconced than others. Ukraine is next to a large paranoid military autocracy and parts of Ukraine are heavily larded with Russians. Ukraine might still move to relatively quickly to be a prosperous secure country in Nato and the EU of course. But that would take an enormous transfer of wealth from Western taxpayers (including from the population of countries like Poland that are accustomed to being net recipients of EU funds).
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  652.  @zulubeatz1  Yes there is a Western nuclear deterrent to Russia using nuclear weapon on the West. There is no deterrent to those weapons being used on Ukraine.
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  653. There are a lot of people who deserve these EXTRA (ie above and beyond basic) benefits, but there really are a significant group who ought not be getting them to spend on self medicating with drink and drugs (as they do), who are giving the whole program a bad name. And these people can be very manipulative and intimidatory to their own doctors.
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  654. If you do volunteering and stick with it to show you WANT to work and are reliable, then you will get paid work,
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  655. ​ @karenrobertsdottir4101  One could argue that Twitter in its pre Musk heyday did too well fore outre single issue causes with one Tweeter's outrage being retweeted massively. Ezra Kien said Obame was able to keep those factions under control but his successors could not. Lind thinks Twitter's autodidacts are likely going to do similar damage to the right as the non profits did to the left.
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  656. China was built up as a counterweight to the USSR. With the fall of the Soviet Union, the attenuated Russian power then became the unspoken counterweight to a burgeoning China. However with its Ukraine policy, Washington has brilliantly wedged Russia away from considering China as a danger, and, through huge losses in the SMO, handed the Chinese a geostrategic coup by alienating Russia forever after from fighting on the side of America. Putin falling will not alter the new alignment.
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  657. Sometimes fighting back against a bully does not end well.
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  658. The have a big enough population to draw on that the question is why they used such a little hammer in the first place. A country the size of Ukraine needs a million strong invasion army. at least.
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  659.  @kevinkliegl9315 You are only giving one side of the story. Ukraine has logistic and equipment problems too. The essential point is that Russia is not quitting and drawing on its resources however slowly and blunderingly. The casualties are probably running about even now, and Russia can afford them better than Ukraine can.
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  660.  @terjeoseberg990  Ukrainian nationalism is not the only variety, if Russia is losing the population will not merely support but demand whatever level of mobilization seems needed, and another million is well within Russia's capabilities. Russian soldiers don't have a monopoly on demoralisation.
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  661.  @kevinkliegl9315  Well said.
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  662.  @olddogoddments675  Mearsheimer said thirty years ago that Ukraine was foolish to renounce the development of its own nuclear weapons because without them it would be bullied by Russia. So he understands how things are the real world. As Mearshiemer's theory has it, Russia is like every other state in the world inasmuch it wants to be as powerful as possible, because there is no telling what challenges it might face in the future. You say that Russia faces no meaningful threat from the West, but in all truth Russia has no was to determine what the West's inner intentions ar or might become in the future. Putin is not going to make the same mistake Ukraine did thirty years ago.
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  663.  @kevinkliegl9315  The initial invasion avoided fighting and emphasized headlong drives by columns of vehicles containing insufficient infantry along roads for huge distances ASAP. The current Russian offensive is slow, contains double the infantry , and accepts casualties to proceed methodically and accompanied by intensive engineering creating infrastructure, fortifying against counter attacks, and mine laying. There is also a lot more concealment and dispersal of supply dumps. The current Russian offensive is more ratchet than pendulum, and the gains will be quite likely permanent
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  664. Knee problems would be expected by his age especially for someone who was heavily into judo.
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  665. The presence of voracious insects cannot explain why they took their bras off, indeed it is a powerful reason to think they did not do so voluntarily. If it was an accidental death documented by the night photo of an injured Kris's head, which the guide was the first one to say was taken under the cable bridge, the body would be in the river for most of the ten weeks, and only ended up on land when the levels receded, so no insects for most of the time. It's surprisingly cold at elevation, and there was some flesh on the bones from Froon's corpse along with a hardly decomposed piece of skin from her shin. So what probably happened is her body was in a jungle grave at high elevation, and the killer returned to dig it up enough to take a leg. Kremers's corpse was probably very heavily doused in caustic soda (her boot was bleached) and the pelvis fragment dipped in lye again before being left (it was lacking any trace of the the super tough ligament that connects to the backbone) It must be borne in mind that this is not a horror film about army ants (or piranhas) but a real world event in which two young sexually attractive women who ventured one hour down a remote trail, and 20 minutes after they left cellphone reception stopped taking photos, then got transformed into a few bones..Dr Grande has done video on men who who killed women and tried to make it look like an accident. I dare say there are ones who got away with it. While it must be accepted that things might have happened as you suggest in the case of the pelvis fragment, it would be a long shot. For there to have been no foul play a long series of long shots would have had to converge. That is what is called "overfitting" . Much more plausible than a prolix series of remarkable things just happening, is that Kris And Lisanne were victims of a double homicide. Everyone talks about the chemical state of Kris's pelvis, which was found while the guide was present, but much more telling are the parallels and extreme propinquity of the remains. To be specific, the backpack was found by an employee of the guide very close to one of his properties. Then the guide found the first remains, Froon's foot, in her boot nearby. Two days later he found Kremers's boot. The guide was there at the finding of Kremers's pelvis, which was not all that far from the backpack and Froon's foot/boot (despite the presumably different buoyancy characteristics of these items). Neither Kris or Lisanne's underwear or tops were found. but both of their shorts were. One boot each, both bras, and a few bone fragments from each. It stinks of a murderer having selected items easy to carry from where Lisanne and Kris were covertly interred, and planted those remains and belongings to show both girls slipped into a river ravine. That $30,000 reward was an additional motivation. Criminals tend to operate out in a rough V shape pattern begining from their home. The finds are consistent with that method of operation.
    2
  666. Maneuver just does not work. There are too many mines for one thing. The only way is pushing disposable units (for Ukraine that is mainly formation of ethnic Russians to stupid to have fled Ukraine already) one after the other on the same axis of advance. That clears the mines one way or another.
    2
  667.  @Luke-pp2lw  No, he just thinks they are too big for Ukraine and says so.
    2
  668. Putting your job on the line and not being able to support your family even after you come out of prison?
    2
  669. Does anyone?; the 'solution' Anders is talking about is a nightmare for the US. It would tie America down in Europe, and lead to it facing off against Russia in a nuclear sense. Anders needs to take East Asia into account, but people in Denmark don't seem to worry about such things.
    2
  670. Does Putin think that Trump is going to get a fair trail in NYC? Putin imprisons his political opponents so what he is thinking seeing the Trump mugshot is that Trump will escape the Big House and be in the White House?
    2
  671. On the day they went missing, three men were seen running on the trail at the same time as frightened female screams and a crashing noise, according to what a Belgian was told by a local Indian on the 2nd, before the alarm had been raised.
    2
  672. Total bull. There are hardly any tank on tank battles in Ukraine now, The Challenger2 was disabled, abandoned and then destroyed with a Kornet infantry AT missile. And the turret was displaced and the commander's cupola blew completely off because the Challenger 2 lacks internal armoured doors to protect the main gun ammunition which exploded. Good in its day , on a 2023 battlefield Challenger 2 is a ponderous death trap.
    2
  673. Unfortunately Letby's lawyer used a legal strategy that was highly unusual (calling no expert witnesses for the defence), so the most important parts of the prosecution case were not stress tested in court. That does not mean she is innocent though.
    2
  674. He doesn't mention China. The Russians were supposed to have their large number of tactical nuclear weapons in order to defend against China.
    2
  675. This interview is going to hurt Philips's ability to get Minister on his program. He instantly interrupted Shipps because he was not giving yes or no answers.
    2
  676. She can hardly blame the director if she wants to work in the industry again, can she?
    2
  677. Or maybe they just prefer death to dishonor.
    2
  678. The Ukrainians are using relatively disposable units (often with many ethnic Russians) in sequential attacks along the same axis. The objective is to clear a path through minefields one way or another, and also to locate enemy artillery. The real strike for will not be committed until there is a good prospect of complete breakthrough--if there ever is.
    2
  679. Except that he does not pay US taxes.
    2
  680. Too much of Special Forces fanfaronade. Battle hardened tends to mean less naïvely obeying orders. The US and it European minions could not keep giving at the rate they were in July if they wanted a stalemate, which they do want. They stop Ukraine collapsing, but supplying the wherewithal to drive Russia back to the Feb 23 start point would be extremely risky. Russia is unlikely to accept it had to stay conventional in those circumstances, and Ukrainian concentrations for offensives would be a tempting target for a battlefield nuke.
    2
  681. 'No plan survives contact with the enemy'. Plans change
    2
  682. Two sides calling each calling other fascist. Both convinced they are right.
    2
  683. They died of thirst and a raging torrent river? Can't have it both ways. As for the backpack, that was a very stupid move or panic. There was a $30,000 reward by that time, which was 10 weeks later. That amount of money would transform a backwoods Panamanian and his entire family's life. Possessions, pulverized but not abraded bone and rolled up pieces of skin were scattered off in various directions in the area away from the (unmarked on maps) village of Alto Romero. The backpack was found beside a rice field really quite close to that village just as the searching was moving towards the village. Someone from Alto Romero or a farm around there got away with double homicide.
    2
  684.  @_nick_d  The last day photo is at a little stream , which has been identified as a couple of hours past the summit and down the rough trail, Kremers looks like someone happily posing for photos, which she was in fact doing. It was about 3pm. They had been walking for 4 hours by then. My bet is they turned around there, which had they got back (they didn't of course), would have been in total an 8 hour walk. I suspect you are right about one bottle being inadequate, but we don't know what water they actually took, just what was in the backpack when it tuned up . What we do know is both of them were wearing bras under their tops, yet when the backpack suddenly appeared several weeks later just outside the hamlet of Alto Romero, both those bras they went on the walk wearing were inside the backpack and neatly folded. I'm not a woman but surely those garments would be something a woman would take off when she was feeling secure , not lost in a strange forest. The backpack, fragmentary pulverised remains and Kremers shorts were mainly within a few kilometers of Alto Romero. We are talking about the kind of predatory animal that lives in a house.
    2
  685. LOL. Ukraine getting desperate?
    2
  686.  @darugdawg2453 The Ukrainians have qualified people for any SF missions that come up and they have relevant combat experience. Western SF operators have zero relevant combat experience by comparison. missions I remember how shocked I was hearing a Rhodesian SAS behind the lines exponent explain he left the regular air assault infantry because he did not want to die and the guys in the RLI understood they were going to be KIA. The Russians lead with profligate use of heavy firepower and the true elite Ukrainian units are in battles. In Ukraine the Western SF are just VIP bodyguards.
    2
  687.  @cdeford2  There were a lot of top level ex SF operators in Ukraine as contractors at the begining but they have all been replaced now. Ukrainians are better at fighting in Ukraine.
    2
  688. "If he survives". That is silly because Russia cannot be defeated unless its leadership thinks it is better off not escalating, and how can Putin be expected to accept a defeat that would be the end of him?
    2
  689. So call the cops.
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  690. Russia's help will be needed with China.
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  691. Russia's standing, or willingness to stand alone depends on what Russians think, not Westerners. @justmy-profilename 
    2
  692. Yes, your money will go a long way so hire the best. The guide who Lisanne and Kris arranged for the 2nd then went on the 1st without (or so he said) is not a "bonded" guide. Similarly the school that told them to come on a certain date to start their voluntary work, and when they arrived on the date stipulated to them in an email, told them they were a week early (probably deliberate overbooking IMO) were inexpensive but had a poor reputation. The reason they had a day to pass and went on such a long hike is because of sketchy people they were dealing with.
    2
  693.  @sliderdriver1  So civilian noncombatants (literally half of the population of Gaza are children) can be sentenced to death by an Israeli officer's intelligence assessment.
    2
  694. I am more worried about his drinking.
    2
  695. Maybe, but countries that lose wars also start new ones. Germany WW1 & 2 for example.
    2
  696.  @tureytayno3154  Trump is a lot smarter than Putin.
    2
  697. Not just the state if the remains it was who was incredibly successful in finding the remains.
    2
  698.  @IconTitan  He knows the trail they disappeared on better than anyone, and has a certain reputation . Eff was informed that they were unexpectedly at a loose end and going a hike that day so could he guide them . He said he was busy, but he could easily have guessed where they'd be going as he had apparently offered them a stay at his coffee ranch down the Serpent trail days earlier. When you ad the fact that he was absent from the earliest days of the search, and was the first to suggest (correctly) they had gone down the Serpent trail , and after an increased reward was offered and the search got close to his ranch was incredibly successful at fining the Kris and lissane's boot (one from each) and pieces of bone in thick undergrowth (although he could not find two big healthy girls in that area when they were alive and shouting for help for over a week) there is now reasonable doubt. I don't think he followed them he is more cunning than that. I believe he was waiting on the trail and with the help of his some dragged them off into the forest near the last daytime photo at that little stream crossing which is 20 minutes walk past cellphone reception.
    2
  699. The police is safe employment with a pension (and if you don't rock the boat you get bumped up a rank six months before retiring). The job of a cop is to provide for his family .
    2
  700. Russia is a superpower essentially equivalent to the US in thermonuclear ICBMs. That is why NATO are scared they may help Ukraine too much. Russia giving up is the US objective.
    2
  701. He is a naval guy and this is a Makinder war
    2
  702. But he seems to be familiar with how to load a mag.
    2
  703. The Ukraine's 'ingratitude' and ' I'm not Amazon' gaffe did for him. Low profile career that gave him no chance of building up tolerance for criticism. It was not just under his tenure that the Defence budget was raided for social spending without raising taxes, but he certainly did not rock the boat and the UK military is now no longer taken seriously by the US
    2
  704. The Times is coming out with Soviet style psychiatry (anyone who disagrees with us is psychotic) every single post now
    2
  705. The dangers of the jungle do not preferentially target hot young women.
    2
  706.  @mrbrumby3409  First use against a nuclear armed country in a conventional war is the Rubicon that has never been crossed. America cannot support Ukraine while it quietly builds and uses a nuclear weapon on Russia and then act all shocked. whatever Anders may imply. Especially mow it is already being openly discussed on YT for goodness sake. There is also the point that Ukraine would suffer unlimited devastation if it used a nuclear weapon on Russia, and the Ukrainians who issued and obeyed such on order would have to answer for what they had done to their own countryman. and their families.
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  707. The Russians were outnumbered in Donbass until recently. In my opinion that is another reason to doubt that 'territory at all costs' was at any time in the past the Russian strategy for the interminable Bakhmut fighting, because it would entail Russia has been accepting an unfavorable KIA ratio for months while lacking the local numerical superiority for a successful offensive.
    2
  708. Oh Jesus, is that living?
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  709. Nuking Ukrainian forces on a Ukrainian battlefield is not going to cause a conflict with Nato. So if Ukraine wins, Russia has a useable option. Long range strikes into Russia are not going to make it give up; what they will do is cause Russia to take it to another level. Ben Hodge's hand waving notwithstanding, Ukraine is not a member of Nato for very good reasons.
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  710. I disagree, they would have been better not going so far into the other side of the summit trail; if anything they took too much water. The backpack had both their sunglasses and both their bras, and one water bottle. Plus the mobile with the fake emergency calls (one of which was terminated as soon as it got though). The mobile was the whole point of leaving the backpack to be found. Quite possibly there was another bottle.
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  711. "A shorthand way of explaining it is that it tried to adapt philosophical thought to Darwin’s theory of evolution. So the way Darwin described the world and on the Origin of Species changed science, obviously, because he produced a different idea of what organisms are and how they relate to one another, and how they evolve and so on. But he also, as a consequence of that theory about how life emerges and how change happens, was a different idea of the universe. {...] Pragmatists thought that the purpose of minds is not to mirror a mind-independent reality that’d say the way things really are, even if we weren’t there to observe them, because that has no adaptive utility. The purpose of minds is to develop beliefs that will help us cope. And when circumstances change, and the same thing is true of any other organism when circumstances change, then the way we think, our beliefs, will change too. It doesn’t have to be set in stone, in other words",
    2
  712. Hodges and those advocating taking Crimea are really hoping that as a result of that Russia would come apart; he and those who think like him need to start being honest about their objective being Russia ceasing to exist.
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  713.  @migBdk  Emptying its junkpiles more like; that stuff would have been corroded into inoperability in a few years.
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  714. They made an emergency call and failing to connect that one time, switched the phones off for 14 hours. So cell phone battery life was more important than their own life.
    2
  715. A lot of excellent points from General Hodges, but he misunderstands the source of Putin's power, which is the common people, a quarter of who do not have an inside toilet. The oligarchs once held sway but no longer. Russia will win this like they always do in the end. The real miscalculation was by Zelinsky, who f****d with the wrong guy. China and India together are how many billions?
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  716. Zaluzhny has not had all that low total casualties but more importantly he has publicly said in the Western media that he does not now see any way to win or limit casualties apart from not attacking. Not a message Zelensky wasnt Ukrainians to hear. Last year Zaluzhny broke off the all out initial counter offensive which was more defuse than the US wanted anyway, Subsequently, he preserved his elite units at the cost of having the mediocre ones decimated as stationary sitting ducks. Now he wants more than double the men mobilisatied Zelensky has announced in order to provide provide more cannon fodder stationary targets at the front. And as he said in the Economist no amount of sacrifice will win back territory because the surveillance technology means neither side can get concentrate for an attack unnoticed
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  717. The cost of the war to the West is not much because Ukraine is being given barely enough to keep them in it. Peace with reconstruction of Ukraine and policing the demiliterised zone will be extortionate.
    2
  718. You are far right by definition if you complain of unnecessarily high immigration and bogus asylum seekers. In fact the international human rights conventions the UK long ago signed up to make no exception in anti racial discrimination rules for a country controlling its borders because such laws are necessarily discriminately by national origin. The legalist technocrats like Starmer don't like that the electorate have a bit of a say in immigration, sort of (for now). He wants to put it far beyond the reach of politics where judges will strike down any bill on deportation of illegal immigrant, asylum seeker or family reunification chain immigration or even plain old immigration restriction a future elected government might try to enact
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  719. You cannot cover much ground in the jungle, especially with bare arms and legs and no machete. Look at the videos of the search, the trail is through rough wooded terrain, in some parts; yes, but interspersed and surrounded with cow pasture and other agriculture. Lye and related substances have a great many purposes for farmers.
    2
  720. His Texan model ex Maya Henry was in the news writing books about him and yesterday suing him. So he took revenge. Top that Maya!
    2
  721. "They were saving all the battery life they could". As opposed to saving their own lives? "But by the time the friend was required to unlock it, her hands were probably shaking and her vision might be fading". Whoever took the 8th April night photographs that showed blood flowing from Kremers's temple had very steady hands. Too steady for it to be a weak and upset Froom.
    2
  722. Which is why a bit of one's pelvis and the others rib were found on the same sandbar.
    2
  723. Ukraine is using its best equipped, trained and most determined and rested brigades such as Azov around Bakhmut. Of course they are more than a match for the new Russian defence line. Whether that location is a good use of the limited number of elite units available to Kiev is questionable; i should think those formations would be reserved for a crucial stratagem. Furthermore, Wagner's convicts are totally disposable so what does it matter if they all get KIA, it is cheaper than keeping them in prison
    2
  724. There are a lot of them who have alcohol and drug habits, making them very motivated to get a grand a month, and more and more have learned from their subculture how to do it. The exponential increase is not coming from the genuine cases, it is from the word spreading among tosspots that there is free money for relatively little effort. Yes genuine deserving cases are going to be hurt , but whose fault is that?
    2
  725. The Russian don't need new ideas. Digging and stockpiling artillery's shells will work just fine. Ukraine is not going to take Russia by surprise. Kursk was the classic model for a successful Russian battle
    2
  726. Why would anyone believe any of this? Ukraine is getting desperate for a Hollywood ending but it is all completely useless in the real world. Stalin was a heavy smoker and drinker who lived into his 80's. The devil looks after his own!
    2
  727. I have my doubts about whether Putin's every move is done with the intention of trying to influence the West
    2
  728. If you complain about things happening on the watch of people with responsible jobs, they are not just going to circle the wagons, they will go on the offensive. A fractured arm suggests there was something beyond a normal kids scrap
    2
  729.  @HanithSVK  Yes but eventually there must come results and if CVR's analysis is correct, Gerasimov could say to Putin 'We are trying to beat Ukraine with conventional weapons but we cannot'. Agreed going nonconventional would be insane if first use is against any member of a nuclear armed alliance such as Nato ; against Ukraine it's begining to look like the only alternative to what the Kremlin would see as an unbearable defeat and relegation of Russia as a country that will ultimately back down and does not need to be taken seriously.
    2
  730. i like how 'they' refused to let huge Niño Valdés (supposedly 'too boring') fight for the title against Rocky. He was great, but willpower is as innate as size.
    2
  731. Wilson's cabinet was full of Oxbridge firsts.
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  732. Ukraine literally needed ten times more arms supply than the entire West gave.
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  733. 1:37: 10 I like how they go out their way to show this Asian woman is a smoker. In jail (not general population obviously) a guy called Gene Borillo who was in with him said Bankman was terrified and getting bullied/ extorted.
    2
  734.  @vladoparenzan3344  Calling out the reserves is something that could be done as in addition to a draft, and would be many millions
    2
  735.  @gardtexas603  They met their killer the day before, in a language school which recommended him as a guide.
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  736. The guy who tried to buy the Russian arctic fishing fleet for 1% of its value.
    2
  737. Whatever. It's just a fantasy.
    2
  738. What is the price of success ought to be the question when talking about conventionally defeating a thermonuclear power. One thing is for sure, America will not pay that price
    2
  739. Yes Putin murders his political opponents, but he is genuinely popular in Russia.
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  740. The night photos were eight days after the day of the hike and were rapid (minutes and seconds between photos) and random untill the back of Kris's head was shown whereupon the intervals suddenly became much longer and even hours, as if showing Kris's hair was the whole point. The sheer number of outré occurrences amounts to a compelling circumstantial case for a double homicide. Between the last day of the hike photo we have (photo 508 taken at 1:54 p.m very definitely on the trail). and the first supposed emergency call attempt (made at 4:39 p.m.) was two and a half hours. Barely possible they were walking along the trail for hours after they suddenly stopped taking photos but before they attempted to contact anyone at all, and when they did it was the emergency services? Starting at 4.39pm they made one attempted call from each one.s phone, then a totally inexplicable 14 hour gap their first night in the jungle. The location of 508 is about 20 mins walk outside phone reception in addition to being isolated, so it would be the perfect place for malevolent guides with knowledge of both the area and Kris and Lisanne's likely route to lie in wait and abduct them without witnesses.. They were dragged of the trail just after 2pm and the rest was the killer and his son fabricating a lost 'story that just does not stand up. Everyone knows who it was, but he Panamanian government wanted it to be an accident, so an accident is what their minions deemed it to have been.
    2
  741. Bremmer's advice about giving the Ukrainians what they need to drive the Russians back to their start line for this war sounds innocuous. But with the capability to push the Russians to prewar defacto border, the Ukrainians would surely not stop at that and try and drive the Russians out completely, quite possibly succeeding. It is not in the West's interests to have a humiliated Russia, yet the idea of ensuring Russia gains nothing would in practice entail it very likely loosing everything. I disagree that Russia's greatest asset is natural resources; in my opinion the strategic space of Russia is of incalculable value, especially to China. A Beijing to Moscow line or the Arctic passage from China to Europe has would transform the supply chain. |It is all very well talking about advanced democracy compared to but there are indications that China will falsify the belief that wealthy advanced democracies will always beat totalitarian states. Unless, we have an unspoken belief that Russia ought to be a democracy but the Chinese are wired different.
    2
  742.  @BengalCatChilli  But a long way from the guide F's ranch, very near where 6% of their bones were found together along with a backpack (items of dissimilar buoyancy one might think unlike to end up on the same stretch of bank at the same time ten weeks later). And this after the region had been searched by the rescue teams! It must seem like such a small world when you are turning a blind eye to the activities of a psychopath.
    2
  743.  @lunatigannie8860  People have been convicted on less evidence certainly
    2
  744.  @janeknight3434  There was a large spike in baby death and half were happening when she was not there. Anyone who worked as many hours as she did especially in the early hours would have been in the unit for the same number of baby deaths.
    2
  745.  @Truth4thetrue  Prigozhin's military empre was growing too big and the army was going to take it over. That, and Prigozhin ,being coked out of his skull, was why he revolted
    2
  746.  @dawsonweber99  She deferred to his judgementit wasn't too risky, she was an amateur, he was a professional who took her money , but that was not a licensee to take her into something that was far riskier than she realised. The best understanding of the potential dangers was his, that knowledge was what he was getting paid to use in making the final decision.
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  747. In 1933 Hitler gave an interview to the Daily Telegraph, which quoted him as saying that he intended to expand East, not West.
    2
  748. They are not just US supplied missiles the Ukrainians are pointing and firing they navigate in flight by using an American terrain recognition system, and the target's are likely selected from US intel and surveillance info. All the Ukrainians do is punch in some coordinates the US give them and press launch. Moreover the US approves the destruction of each target a missile is fired at. There attacks are really US attacks using Ukraine as a cats paw. If they go beyond Kursk as Ukraine is trying to get authorisation for, the Kremlin will have to do something.
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  749. Maneuver warfare's bold operational advances just do not work when the the opponent is omniscient due to US surveillance capabilities. Back to WW1 stormtroop style tactical snail's pace advances that do not count on surprise.
    2
  750.  @xavierg8985  Know one really know, but I THINK Russia has the advantage in attritional warfare. Ukrainian are going to have an open door to the west, where refugees form a diaspora that will lower the cost of emigrating West and their country had even worse demographic woes than Russia anyway.
    2
  751.  @cmanlovespancakes  Those Ukrainians trained by the British or American regular Army have complained that they had been taught small unit tactics suitable for counter insurgency rather than methods suitable for battles against a combined arms invader with an imprecise yet nonetheless overwhelming firepower advantage.
    2
  752.  @apollonia-ava  The woman who has coma forward to said she went blind in there the week before after getting shots is young. Free shots in a hostel offered to very attractive young women may well have got a guy to say ' if ithey are free I'll have some'.
    2
  753.  @PatrickCooperPhotography-nw1pp  No business owner in Laos would risk prison (virtual death sentence there) or ruin by putting that much methanol in a series of free shots for Westerners just to save money on something he didn't have to do. Joe Blogs is right, it was SA he had on his mind.
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  754. I don't think it is obvious that any defence experts think Ukraine can win without a truly massive donation of near state of the art US weapons, because Russia can amping up its own arms production quite a bit yet. Ukraine and its supporters do not want to let on about that and prefer to implicitly suggest that just a little more will work. What Johnson seems to be asking is the same questions as, at the inflection point of Vietnam, Clark Clifford asked the Joint Chiefs> "what is your plan for winning the war?". Ukraine's plan is to ask for better arms and guaranteed supply of as much of them as needed, whereupon they will decimate the Russian army in Ukraine I don't see the problem with Ukraine telling the US what they would do, were they to to be given everything on their wish list except their with list is so long it is thought better to not ask for it all in one go. The reason they are not given everything on the current explicit wish list is is the Pentagon don't want Ukraine to be given those things because the Pentagon think the war in Ukraine might get out of control and drive Russia to desperate measures were there to an open ended US supply of everything Ukraine needs to win.
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  755. If Ukraine are openly talking about an imminent attack or counter attack then it is just a disinformation ploy.
    2
  756. Nice of you to be so concerned for Russians.
    1
  757. Have the forces of Ukraine killed death?; it would seem so by the dearth of Ukrainian KIA mentioned. As well as being immortal are Ukrainians immune to nonfreezing cold injury AKA trenchfoot in their dugouts?
    1
  758. You have to be quite intelligent to disbelieve in free will though. And the intelligent, because they can better foresee the negative consequences to themselves of harming others, are oft times more moral in their behaviour. So I would be careful about who I tried to convince they had no free will. The average person's belief in free will does the heavy lifting to keep them out of trouble.
    1
  759. He has become addicted to the publicity and the penalties don't bother him. They will hit him with a terrorism offence next time,
    1
  760. In the first phase of the invasion the Russians had unrealistic shock and awe expectations resulting in them penetrating too deep too fast. There was a lack of proper discipline due to the unfeasible unsoldierly ethos of winning by simply swiftly advancing rather than fighting. Slow and sure suits their artillery focused army, and Supreme Commander Surovikin seems to have carte blanche to ignore political priorities and coordinate the solution to military sub objectives in order to integrate their solution so as to advance the attainment of the overall goal of ***** up Ukraine,
    1
  761.  @gurglejug627  Brexit hurt, the pandemic was a disaster and the inflation from the cutting off of cheap Russian energy didn't help (the UK's debt repayments are almost the same as the defence budget), however the worst hit and the preventable mistake was the post 2008 austerity under Cameron.
    1
  762. Okay so Russia can only quit or keep fighting, Eventually it has zero conventional combat power and if it then gets into a direct confrontation with the US will Russia be totally out of options? Putin is not exactly level headed, is he?
    1
  763.  @Nun195  Not the kind that is desirable
    1
  764.  @scottotterson3978  In global utility terms they often do, The business class so great benefits up for grabs
    1
  765. North Korea is a Chinese sockpuppet. The ICBM's of China have obviously been gifted to North Korea (the ICBM design is practically identical to China's). Every time the anti China Trump gets elected , North Korea suddenly gets bellicose. The way things are headed Russia is going to be a future megapower China's sidekick.
    1
  766. Sorry, who are you?
    1
  767. Anders is basically right that Ukraine has to be supported. But Ukraine's interests are not identical to NATOs. Ukraine has the very best of motives to try and get the West far more involved than it is already is or wants to be, We don't know how things actually are with the Russians' will versus their conventional capability. Anders seems to speak as if we can assume their will is relatively fragile and they'll quit long before the conflict threatens the continuation of the current system in Russia. We don't know that. If anything the Kremlin's will appears to be much stronger than their conventional military and economic power. How the Russian leadership would react to a build of of pressure is uncertain . There might be a tipping point where the suddenly flip from rhetoric and decide action as a specimen of what they can do has become necessary.
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  768. The Panamanians did not want to know, and said the girls had fell in a river and been swept out to sea. I agree that the perpetrator would have been much better off just leaving it at that and thus having a disappearance of the girls without any trace. But it must be remembered that whoever did it is not right in the head to do it in the first place., so he tried to guild the lily. The calls and cameras are definitely 'found footage' fakery. The killer is someone that thought (overthought actually) he could not afford to have it thought a double homicide, that means there is some connection. Such a possible person of interest is salient if one looks at who had a pr meeting with Kremers and Froon about being paid to guide them along the trail, and he also was very quick to raise the alarm. When you factor in that his very same person is the one who ten weeks later was almost incredibly successful at finding the remains of Froon and Kremers in heavy vegetation, yet relatively close to his ranch withal ..., It is pretty certain he killed them. He ought to be seven years into a life sentence, but we live in a world where there is quite a gap between what is and what ought to be.
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  769.  @kevlarcardhouse252  You are misunderstanding the extent to which police are free to open a politically embarrassing new criminal investigation in Panama, and what the purpose of the backpack was when it was planted. F's intent with the backpack was to access the reward that had just increased to a life changing amount . The backpack was found by F's employee, almost on the doorstep of one of 'F's tourist lodges in Alto Romero. F then found the very first remains, behind a nearby tree. More finds by F and search parties led by F followed. '"He's the last guy to see them alive—and then he's the one who finds their bones,” says fellow guide Tornblom. “Something about that just feels wrong to me."' Let me give you a counterfactual. Coming under all this suspicion from people who know the area, why would F not have worried the next thing would be the rest of the bodies and the heads of Froon and Kremenr being found in a shallow grave at the bottom of his garden. An innocent man would have to suspect someone was deliberately implicating him by planting evidence and the trap was closing on him. Anyone in the position an innocent F would have been in by mid June could and surely would have protested his innocence and publicly said he was being framed. But he did not do that. Why? Forget about all the convoluted and competing inferences about favoured factoids. F's failure to be alarmed at the finds of the remains inexorably making him look guilty, and to react by protesting he was being railroaded, is that one clear index we need.
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  770.  @kevlarcardhouse252  He was in the clear before the finds of backpack and remains, and after all the finds, which were made by his employees or him himself, he was still in the clear. On Monday, the day before they disappeared, F met and offered them a trip to his remote finca, which involved an overnight stay. Lisanne and Kris declined that, but agreed to hire him for the Pianista trail on Wednesday, but went themselves on Tuesday and went missing around the time they'd have been turning to come back (this was a three hour there and back hike on a well marked trail with no navigation required). Seventy two days later their bones end up around the unmarked village of Alto Romero. The backpack is found in the same area, virtually on the doorstep of F's ranch, the same one the girls had had declined a trip to. Small world!
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  771.  @nigelhaywood9753  Er, they were killed not just stolen from. How did he know where to find their remains that were found a little way from the backpack? A double homicide is not something that you trust anyone with evidence against you with, even a backpack. The night photos show that Kris was held prisoner for a week, that was likyl on a storage shack on F's ranch near Alto Romero (before being killed and the bones and possessions planted nearby for him to 'find ). He was listed as a suspect in police files bacause he had lied (said the language schoool women told his , whch they denied) about how he knew long before anyone else Kris and Lisanne had gone behind the Pianista; that was a deliberate decision on his part and removes any doubt about him being the perpetrator.
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  772. Turtle tanks? I think the composite armour of Abrams is difficult to weld or bolt stuff to. The armour on Russian tanks are easier to modify
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  773. When you here about a Ukrainian victory, and listen closely. what the person is really talking about is a Russian collapse due to domestic dissent.
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  774. Russia suffering high and continuing to mount losses yet doubling down on that unsustainable strategy is a way of pressuring Washington, because the US does not want Russia getting into a quandary that its nonconventional weapons might be the only way out of. Hodges thinks when it came down to it the Kremlin would not dare. Hmmm.
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  775. Russia took Bakhmut, that was not a psychological blow to Ukrainian morale and a huge boost to Russian confidence?
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  776. I don't think the evidence suggests Washington wants a total defeat of the Russian effort in Ukraine.
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  777. It was Neville Chamberlain that declared war on Germany
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  778. Deep down everyone thinks they are more sinned against than sinning. In 2013 the former head of the US National Endowment for Democracy Carl Gershman, , wrote: “Ukraine is the biggest prize" and if it could be pulled away from Russia and into the West, “Putin may find himself on the losing end not just in the near abroad but within Russia itself.” I think the Ukrainian were a trifle hasty in thinking that Putin was going to be scared to take military action. Even after 2014, they thought he could not be serious Anders seems to think that unless Putin agree to subject himself to whatever a Western MSM interviewer wants to subject him too, the West ought to ghost Putin, but he the leader of a poweful country that, whatever you may think, is not going anywhere. He is not in the dock of an international court being cross examined. Insulting attribution, weighted questions, interrupting answers ETC has no downside for the MSM interviewer. The Russians cannot be required to grant interview to those who think Russia owes explanations. 'He is leader of a huge aggressive state angry at what we are doing so lets ignore everything he has been consistently saying. Great thinking Anders.
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  779. America could defeat Russia in Ukraine, I don't think it wants Russia to win or be defeated . Russia is going to be needed to deal with a future megapower China.
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  780.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Russia is still going on about WW2. They are not going to forgive and forget a clear defeat in Ukraine. America is not seriously trying to help Russia win; the US could donate an order of magnitude more if it really wanted to.
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  781. ​ @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Russians are obsessed with a victory in WW2. They are hardly going to be able to just forget about a defeat in Ukraine largely down to America, eh?. And the Kremlin would become much ,much closer to China than Washington is comfortable with in the aftermath of a defeat in Ukraine. Washington has to let the Russians achieve a limited victory or draw. Really beating them in Ukraine is not an American objective.
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  782. Beardie just wants to talk about how bad Trump is because that gets views. When Kate tried to give a sold analysis (that Trump is likely trying to con Putin but will get tough with Russia if that does not work), beardie closes her down in mansplaining fashion.
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  783. A reasonable expectation based on the the last twelve months of the war is for the foreseeable future the Russians will fight stubbornly if not skillfully, and they are not intending to mount their own major offensive.
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  784. They (or rather the politicians in charge back then) renounced forever more Ukraine having nukes in return for money (much of it paid by Germany). Ukraine did get "assurances" but at the insistence of the US the agreement explicitly stated that there was no guarantees being given to Ukraine. This caveat was not 'small print it was made quite a thing of. The money was the sticking point the Ukrainians held out for more and signed when Germany provided it.
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  785. The Battle of Britain Polish pilots counts were all true. So many of them were Counts too.
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  786. The US will ceaselessly react to tip the balance in Ukraine's favour, but that will always produce a counter reaction from Russia. It is going to cancel out and not be decisive. Anyone who thinks that when Trump fails to win (how can he with his money and time tied up), V.Putin will quit the war in Ukraine is living in a fantasy world. So there is going to be no end to this until both sides accept that in a fair fight of good against evil the result will be a draw.
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  787. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tnm351D9wkE
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  788. Since Putin called out a portion of his reserves Ukraine has had zero breakthroughs, and the fortification in Russian held territory is unending and extensive The troops brought back from West of the river in Kherson are some of the best in the Russian army. The ones being used as the first wave in Bakhmut are an expendable Legion Of The Dammed. There may be as many as 600,000 Russian troops currently in position overagainst Ukraine. Russia is all about amassing an ever greater force https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8G6S6fQQ4I
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  789. Putin would be a fool to quit the war now when the Russian advance is gathering real momentum.
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  790. The was some close quarters city fighting in Lysychansk, but basically it was enveloped making the defenders' position untenable. Ditto Severodonetsk. Why expect Bakhmut to be where Russia stops doing what works. It is slow, but Bakhmut is a honeycomb of tunnels and concrete emplacements.
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  791. Ukraine can win a hundred battles, but the war will keep going on.
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  792. Ukraine has been regarded as a crucial key to world power since Halford Makinder in the nineteenth century, and Russia has such propinquity to it they cannot be made to stop fighting. If the West went all out to help Ukraine with supplies. the Russian military autocracy of Putin would get clobbered and might collapse, or might prefer to escalate to battlefield nuclear weapons use against the Ukrainian army.  @swankfiber5278 
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  793. Some of these locals loath Westerners. I would not be too sure this was an accident.
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  794. I am starting to wonder if his hosts want him to remain in one piece.
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  795. Israelis did not like him comparing Ukrainians to Jews in WW2.
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  796.  @SuezWSuezW  Israel is a jealous god. Meaning Ukraine can't get what Israel has by way of US support; there is not enough of it to go around. Ukraine wanted to become Poland, now it wants to be Israel. Which country next?
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  797.  @SuezWSuezW  They would not be talking about it, except to say they would not dream of building one if one if they were building one. Russia has them too so it would be a Mexican standoff in a nuclear sense. IMO Zelensky is trying a ploy to get the US to increase i the quantity and quality of its conventional support.
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  798. ​ @c0der1020  This is very explicit and public, Putin can't pretend to the Russian masses who watched his speech on TV that he didn't say if the ATACMS strikes continue inside Russia then American bases in Europe will be hit in retaliation, or he meant something different. The ball is in Biden's court, his team didn't expect anything like this but the Pentagon did, which is why they opposed it.
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  799. Indirectly. Her Budget led to the Bank Of England decided that thet had to crash the economy to get rid of her.
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  800. Only indirectly. The Bank Of England decided they had to crash the economy to get rid of her so they tanked the price of UK bonds by selling them. The Bof E sabotaged the economy and it was deliberate. Sounds like ' misconduct in a public office to me'.
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  801. Those who voted for Trump did so in order to have better lives, and so the US president does not want to bankroll Ukraine any more. The Nato countries likely could, at a pinch, supply Ukraine with the wherewithal to defeat Russia and give security to Ukraine; that is not the problem it's how how to pay for it without negatively impacting their own economies and investing for the future of their peoples. The money for social spending in Europe without raising taxes has been coming out of defence budgets for decades (especially in Britain). European countries suffering from chronic low growth have now been joined by Germany. Some supporters of Ukraine talk as if there there is an inexhaustible, eternal mountain of surplus money to draw on. Whatever happens Ukraine will be an ongoing drain on European finances
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  802. I don't think the value to each side was equal; the Russians thought they could not leave Ukraine in possession of Bakhmut as it would expose a weak part ofthe Russian held territory to attack, but Ukraine could have used a economy of force fighting retreat in the second stage of the battle because Russia could not continue advancing after taking Bakhmut.
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  803. This is your best and most thought provoking video so far.
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  804. Yeltsin hated the encroachment of Nato into Eastern Europe, clearly deluded by his heart disease, eh? BTW Yeltsin chose Putin, and that was a kind of retribution.
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  805. Do something America would surely would feel impelled to, yet it is not a combatant in the war, suddenly taking actual military action directly against Russia would be a bigger escalation than Putin using a theatre thermonuclear weapon In a war Russia is has been losing for many month and has already had by his own admission several thousands KIA in. In a situation where America is retaliating for a strike on Ukraine, Russia has already crossed the Rubicon, so it is barely plausible that after detonating one theatre thermonuclear weapon Russians are going to accept that their nuclear deterrent to conventional attack is an empty bluff and in fact worthless in relation to America. In a thermonuclear sense, China is as weak as a kitten compared to Russia, whose ICBM arsenal is essentially comparable to America's. You cannot successfully use fisticuffs on a man who is holding a loaded gun, especially if he is puny. He won't just take the pain. He will not.
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  806. Prisoners are very valuable and hard to come by, and so for purely practical reasons I don't think they would be gratuitously mistreated let alone killed. You are basically correct that it was a Russian set up (possibly one of dozens) intended to draw a HIMARS strike. But the objective was to make the Ukrainians scared to continue with the HIMARS attacks. As a deception solution to a technical problem, it is quite clever.
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  807. His downfall was failing to take the money off of the table.
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  808. Not necessarily but is our definition the final word on the matter?
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  809. Putin isn't stopping within 24 hours of the second term of Trump, but in 3 years Nato under Biden could not make Putin stop either. It all stems from the value Putin puts on keeping Ukraine out of any kind of Western alliance. And that is something only Russians can change.
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  810. The West seems to think it can weaken Russian soldiers' morale by echoing the Ukrainian sour grapes propaganda but the troops doing the attacks are Wagner who are better off in Bakhmut than the concrete coffin they were just released from. Bakhmut is the centre of gravity of the Ukrainians' defence in Donetsk and has been heavily fortified for eight years in accordance with its importance; it certainly seems to be being defended as if it is a focal point. Surely some Ukrainians are dying in the battle for Bakhmut too, and being three times larger Russia can wage a successful battle of attrition while sustaining an apparently unfavorable ratio of losses. Prighiznin the the head of Wagner says they are doing attrition in Bakhmut. Again, his assault infatry there are a Legion Of the Damned released from life sentences. and no one will miss them much in Russia. Stuff about Bakhmut being militarily worthless is quite possibly pure Ukrainian psychological warfare by fabricated fanfaronade, not a release of an actually accurate assessment because the truth will hurt Russian morale . A little bit more neutrality and less of an insult to our intelligence please
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  811. Maybe, but its not a zero sum game for the West, which wants stability. Russia genuinely believes what it is doing in Ukraine is an existential necessity, and if they become a poor country then that will affect all kinds of consideration in regards to deterring China. The West has let the Russians get the impression that they have to do what they are doing, more or less irrespective of the consequences.
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  812. It is a mistake to think it terms of breakthroughs in this war.
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  813. Logistics expert. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=du8IaRJWDsE
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  814. This is one of the people that thought the 2008 declaration that Ukraine would join Nato would deter Putin. Then they thought the arming of Ukraine (which started under Trump and massively accelerated under Biden) would deter Putin from invading. Now these same folk are telling us that Putin would not dare use nuclear weapons, and his subordinates would not let him anyway. That is very uncertain, because it depends on what situation he was in. With everything that Ukraine is being given, and the poor performance of Russian forces and consequent lack of morale, Putin's army on invasion may not merely be stopped in its tracks but driven back beyond its start point and into Russia proper. Given such a situation, Putin and the Russian leadership might well agree use of a nuclear weapon on the concentration of Ukrainian troops in Donbass was necessary. While Russia using a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine would not start bring nuclear retaliation, (because Ukraine is not a member of Nato)t that hardly a reason to be insouciant; it would be a step toward a nuclear war between the US and Russia, which has lost 20,000 killed and many others seriously wounded through having superior weapons used on it by Ukraine. Do not think that Russia would consider the death of tens of thousands Ukrainian soldiers concentrated in Donbass an unjustified act, given certain circumstances.
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  815. Angel is a looker but she is 6'3''.
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  816. But Ukraine is universally acknowledged to be an independent country and the US is not directly defending it. America does not recognize Taiwan as a a fully sovereign independent state, but it is more or less committed to sending the Nave and Marines to fight in Taiwan if the Chinese invade. It is pretty clear that America is worried about fighting Russia. That US policy is constrained by a Russian deterrent drives US strategist crazy.
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  817. He gets out more than you I suspect
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  818. 3:28 Yes Ukraine is FIGHTING which is their decision. By fighting on and as the impressive general said 'putting in in work' (ie kill Russians with US weapons) they do not get to decide whether we start fighting Russia,, that is our decision.
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  819. It is a fact that babies were dying in that unit at a very high rate but she could not have been responsible for half of them and conceivably may not have been responsible for any.
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  820. Asians (especially Chinese, Koreans) are distinctive for their small hands and feet and reduced difference between the sexes.
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  821.  @Robehh35  To get the best looking women you need to be rich.
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  822.  @Robehh35  Which happens to be the one thing that women do not openly say they like.
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  823.  @Robehh35  Hmm. Trump?
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  824. Well that is what her lawyer was supposed to try and answer, and he could have done but he failed to. There are things that are very difficult indeed to explain for a believer in Letby's complete innocence, especially the doctor who testified walked in on a baby with the breathing tube disconnected and the alarm for it not sounding and Letby standing there doing nothing and the baby was close to dying. He went to the unit managers with that; would he have dared to make up such an episode, it was really accusing her, the most experienced nurse on the unit despite her youth, of trying to kill a baby. That could not be good for his career unless they believed him and in fact they didn't .
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  825. Sorry, you are backhandedly allowing that the techy companies are massively profitable, and at 13:50 you are admitting it's supply and demand with doctors that is responsible for their salaries. It seems very logical to assume that just as he is loath to pay tax on his profits so has a HQ reporting profiits in a tax haven, Musk wants to keep the price he has to pay for tech workers from climbing by increasing the supply. So while the H1 b workers are not reducing tech wages, they are stopping them from rising as fast as they otherwise would be.
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  826. What about Zekensky going along with the attempt to impeach Trump, think he forget about that? Trump is the most powerful man in the world. You don't deal with people that way, you certainly don't deal with someone like Trump that way, you placate them. Zelensky's inexperience was showing.
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  827. The Russian are in no hury to fight through a huge city; they seem to have a strategy of as broad a front as possible, thereby forcing the Ukrainians to spread themselves too thin for keeping elite units out the line. It has all about the enemy army being ground down, nothing to do with territory.
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  828.  @hansb7020 The Russians tried a coupe de main in 2022. I think that they have changed tack.
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  829. Sanity is not being status conscious? We would still be living in caves.
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  830. Doubt any of the Labour leadership have ever been in a fight, to them anyone who has is a thug.
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  831. The are people without connections. The equivalent of the convict storm units.
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  832. Not by actually fighting Russia though.
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  833. The mafia is a secret society in which members are hunted by law enforcement. Putin is the leader of a proudly independent country who has his own police force and extremely powerful armed forces with nuclear arsenal essentially equivalent to the United States of America's. Ukraine thought it could just call 911 and Russia would run away like a thief/; what were they smoking? Russian prisons are tough and Navalny never looked healthy to me so sending him there after he returned was malevolent, but what on earth was Navalny trying to achieve by going back to Russia?
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  834. So if Trump fails to become president then Putin will end the war? Not a chance; put it out of your mind.
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  835. Hit the nail on the head Willy OAM; the Russian goal is to have all Ukraine's reserves drawn in, whereupon Ukraine will have lost the advantage conferred by defence.
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  836. ​ @MrMooremelody Well, they assumed they would not be murdered. So you will be in good company.
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  837.  @MrMooremelody  It was a sex crime and Kremers was, for want of a better word, sexier. Moreover, her long natural strawberry blonde hair and very pale skin gave her a rarity value in Panama. Also her clothing showed her assets off more:, she wore a bight patterned tight top and daisy dukes.. Froom was hardly plain, but she was six foot tall , and relatively speaking a beanpole. In the very similary case of Cassandre Bouvier and Houria Moummi in Argentina where two women from abroad were murdered while walking on a nature trial, only Bouvier was violated. By several different men.
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  838.  @Android3008 First principles: people surviving in the wild for 11 days no more that seven miles from a town without ever being found is less common that women being kidnapped and held for sexual purposes. Two women alone together dying in an accident is an order of magnitude less common that two women alone being murdered. To function in the world you ought not demand proof , that would be paralyzing. Just quietly assume they were murdered and move on. Lisanne's leg bones were determined though examination by pathologists to have exhibited shin splints. which means she was forced to cover a lot of ground: open ground. Who found the remains makes it obvious who killed them.
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  839.  @jamaaldavis6243  No one who had has actually physically been on that trail thinks Kris and Lisane could have got lost. Two women out by themselves both dying accidently is rarer that double murders of women by themselves. What we know from the Panamanian pathology report on the fragments of Lisanne's lower leg bones is that she was suffering from shin splints when she died: she hardly would have went on the hike with that condition, and so she covered a great distance over rough ground in a short period of time after going missing ( she also had a foot bone fracture associated with twisted ankle). None of that is speculation.
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  840. He has been right about the military side. On the prospects of thermonuclear weapon use against the Ukrainian army his analysis is shaky, but the situation is an unanticipated one completely different to the scenarios that have been studied for decades.
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  841.  @WhatAboutTheBee "The humiliating russian advance towards Bakmut. 100 meters in 4 months". They are currently surrounding it.
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  842. An opinion offered in your capacity as a former general in command of Nato forces
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  843. He'd use nukes to avoid losing, and he does not think he is losing. But he could not lose without it dawning on him at some point. So the red line is starting to have no serious possibility of wining, which is not where we are. The US is not going to get into a nuclear war over Ukraine. Russia cannot get into a nuclear war with Ukraine. Nuff said.
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  844.  @nobodyherepal3292  Nuclear weapons are a deterrent to nuclear was between two nuclear powers. Ukraine has no nukes.
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  845.  @nobodyherepal3292  Putin is not Gorby, nor has Afghanistan long been identified as a crucial pivot of global domination.
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  846. The Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba has openly stated today that 'Ukraine would be more cooperative in halting attacks on Russian refineries' if the US provided additional support. The attacks are a political ploy, a wedge (the threat of US voters having to pay more for gas) to pry more support out of Biden though threatening him with defeat in the upcoming election.
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  847. Well who did ruzzia guarantee Ukrainians' security against. Itself? That would be a promise it would be unreasonable for Russia to make of anyone to believe because no country can go beyond its own interests. You know who told Ukraine to keep its nuclear weapons don't you: Mearsheimer.
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  848. More realistic f most unarmed combat scenes where one guy takes out several using martial arts style moves. That said, if you want to kill someone in the Special Forces , you shoot them. This is not a fight scene, it's a cutlery scene, especially after he gets back in the bus, when if you look carefully those are not kicks, punches or hammerfist strikes, but an edged weapon plunging into the opponents. Probably only the 70s Yul Brynner movie The Ultimate Warrior has as many knifings as this.i
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  849.  @colbyharris1985  Being provoked (even walking on on your wife with another man) is not a legal defence and Russia acted illegally, but not unpredictably; there is the 'unwritten law' in respect to adultery and the international system has unwritten laws too'. The Code Of the Streets is if you are 'dissed' you must put a stop to that right away. Ukraine was being insolent. So they were an innocent victim in terms of explicit international law, yet they were certainly provoking Russia and understood they were doing so.
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  850. Got a feeling Coffezilla is not going to want to take credit for him getting life in prison. 'Ironically' or otherwise.
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  851. Like when he said twenty years ago that Ukraine ought to build its own nuclear deterrent.
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  852. Well the Russians seem to think it is worth it, and so how is Ukraine going to get Russia to stop fighting?
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  853. The other countries still in the EC are not doing all that much better than Britain. China and the US are growing, Europe is not.
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  854. Annoying the Bear: a method for national suicide.
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  855. As I recall the forensic in that case said in his long experience pregnant women never commit suicide, which was true as far as his experience went but in fact pregnant women committing suicide is far from unheard of . The expert witnesses and doctors testifying against Letby made similar statements about they had neve rseen babies having illnesses like they were dying of in that unit. They may have never seen such illnesses but that does not mean other doctors have not.
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  856. 12:21 Those are heavily ethnic Russian Ukrainian units soaking up the mines and drawing fire to locate defences. They are the equivalent of Wagner's convicts. For Ukraine the death of ethnic Russians is a feature not a bug.
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  857.  @bobmabel8543  One might think that any extreme difficulty in finding an expert was all the more reason to call the one expert that was willing ready and able to testify as a defence witness for Letby. But her barrister didn't. Truly catastrophic for the trial AND her appeals.
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  858. The US has not even begun to all out indirectly support Ukraine, so there is no problem continuing . And with his own political opponents in Siberian work camps, Putin understands the meaning of the Trump booking photograph: the US system is aiming to, ready willing and able to, ensure Trump is en route to the Big House rather than the White House.
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  859. Germany has a ruling class that is happy with importing cheap labor and the Single Currency as an export promotion program. They are desperate for resumption of cheap energy supply to German manufacturers. So you will get a deal but, Germany is going to continue heaping up its own funeral pyre per immigration.
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  860. General Kean is no lackey of the Russians. He is talking facts about Russian losses, and vulnerabilities, which Trump can easily exploit using Ukraine and giving more of America's immense military resources. Did you even listen to Gen. (ret) Jack Kean's trenchant analysis.
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  861. Politics is all about rhetoric, Trump's and his opponents'.
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  862. Why is an unending war in Ukraine paid for by Europe in Europe's interest's?
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  863. Yes there is a hotline for de-escalation by preventing Ukraine doing something Russia would have to retaliate to it Russia knows what Ukraine is planning. However, Ukraine has every incentive, the very best of incentives, to suddenly and without warning provoke Russia into direct conflict with America
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  864. There isn't going to be a rapprochement with China, so we hand China an alliance with Russia? That would be a disaster.
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  865. First of all, pushing Russia out of all Ukrainian territory would not end the war because there would be no way to stop it fighting along its land border with Ukraine, and every incentive for Russia to keep fighting the war in order for Ukraine to be ineligible to become a full member of NATO.
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  866. I think it is clear that Washington's policy all along has been to limit Russia's victory, not prevent it.
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  867.  @TyllerBoom  Yes, because that is how it is net negative for them
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  868. Hulking gun nut with two kids to pay for gets into fight because he's got two additional women pregnant at the same time. Tries to go gay then then provokes cops and shoots another three cops. Sounds to me like some people will go to any lengths to avoid paying child support.
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  869. There was an announcement by Nato that Ukraine would be joining Nato someday, and this was reiterated every year at the Nato conferences. Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014 and went into all out war against it in 2022 because Ukraine refused to give up the ambition of joining Nato.
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  870. There will eventually be a tacit peace once Ukraine's manpower becomes exhausted, and a ceasefire is possible but there will neve be any final official agreement in which Russia agrees to recognize even a truncated Ukraine's borders. It is going to be like the Korean war with the cause of it never resolved.  @islandwills2778 
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  871. He contradicts his earlier views: who doesn't? He has just reached a certain age where one stops living the sort of lies that are less tenable at that particular age. Priorities change with age and like an alarm going off one starts thinking differently including about the world after you are gone. You'll see.
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  872. 8:30 There is a reluctance to say Ukraine is winning. But we ought to be aware of how close to desperation Putin is.
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  873. And that was only until lunchtime when the Ukrainians ran out of ammunition. Ukrainian casualties are repetitive strain injury in their trigger finger. To be serious, Ukraine is a lot closer to Moscow that Hanoi was to Washington. Ukraine is not a good place for getting the Russians to tap out.
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  874. He bought the Russian Artic fishing fleet (worth a billion dollars) for $100 million. Those, such as Magnitsky, who agree to act for such personages, are acting according to justice?
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  875. He can double down and eventually lose really badly. America does not want Russia to be left burning with resentment once this is over. Washington is thinking a generation ahead, when China will be a megapower. So Putin can go all in conventionally in effect daring Washington to bring about a total humiliation of Russia that will mean long after Putin is gon the Russians will loath America..
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  876. The mindset that Russia ought to be schooled in liberalism, whereupon its civilisation an societal organisation must become different to what it has been for half a millennias no less unfeasible than any Russian idea of Nato being undermined and divided. Attrition strategies depend on what the opponent is willing to accept, and it is now apparent that whatever its deficiencies in military science, Russia has been widely underestimated in regards to its reserves of stubborn persistence, which may well be the crucial factor in the ultimate analysis. If battered to its knees Russia will issue a very unvague and unmistakably specific threat, and that is why the Ukrainian caprice that they can get back Ukraine is being backpedaled in the West.
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  877.  @robby3467  The West is not being told that Ukraine is not going to be satisfied with just defending and regaining what it held at the beginning of the invasion, which is what the Western population were originally told was the objective. No, Ukraine is now demanding Crimea back before any settlement, and many Western commentators are starting to agree with this position although it was undreamt of at the begining of the war.
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  878. True. But it's not a healthy way to think.
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  879. You have to assume other people have it in order to get the better of them. @dyschromatopsia 
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  880. As opposed to suddenly hitting the Russia heartland military infrastructure with a maelstrom of ATACMS strikes.
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  881. Zelensky looks unhealthy.
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  882. Attacking US satellites or Western infrastructure would be a far greater escalation than using nuclear weapons on the Ukrainian army. Russia and Ukraine are at war after all!
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  883. So that Xi can be left with no ally against America?
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  884.  @KD--sj8eo  Please read things thoroughly before commenting, and looking on Wikipedia might be an idea too. The Central Park Five were supposed to have run into the Jogger at random during their mugging rampage though the park. The Five were freed when Matias Reyes confessed he was acting alone when he saw the Jogger in a busy part of the park near the entrance; followed her to an isolated part of the park clubber her with a branch and dragged her off the path and into the trees. My point was the Central park Jogger was UNUSUALLY attractive so the odds were against perps 'hitting the jackpot' at random like that. Catherine Johannet the American woman who was murdered in 40 miles from Broquete in Panama in 2014, was also clubbed while walking a forest trail and them dragged off it. Kris Kremers was unusually attractive.While it IS possible she and Froom were not followed from the more inhabited Boquete side of the trail into the isolated over the peak/ continental divide section of the trail, and just ran onto some bad actor{s} when they went down the other side, I think the balance of probability is they were followed. Kremers was too striking for her being a random victim to be more probable than not. You cannot get off the narrow trail accidently or in order to avoid an attacker on the bit Kremers and Froom were on in the last photos, but a little way further on from the last photo is cow pasture where two victims would be much harder to control, so any stalker who knew the trail would have had to strike quite quickly. An important point is that Froon and Kremers were indisputably dressed for walking along a trail rather than leaving it and moving through undergrowth with bare arms and legs. It would have immediately been very uncomfortable for them and obvious they had to backtrack. So it they left the trail, yes, but it was surely against their will because they were abducted.
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  885.  @KD--sj8eo  I know the CP% were released because Matias Reyes confessed he was a lone attacker who spotted in a Jogger in a busy part of the park and followed her. DNA confirmed it. The Jogger was too damn good looking for a random victim. My point is , so was Kremers.
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  886. Ukraine is such a clever country ruining Russia. How I envy those who are governed by the masterminds of Kiev.
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  887. Extermination of a closely related human species by modern humans is not something people want to here in this day and age. He is saying back in the day Neanderthals gave as good as they got, which is obviously a fairy story.
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  888. Do you speak Russian? People who do say Putin went on TV and warned that if there were any more ATACMS strikes in Russia then it would reply in kind by attacking US bases in Europe because, so he said, the US is actively participating in each one of those strikes. So Putin is going to be able to back down from what he told every Russian? Of course he is not going to use nuclear weapons, but he is going to fire a missile at an American base. Or lose all credibility not just with the West, with his own people. A single very high altitude thermonuclear detonation can blind early warning radar, and would presage an all out sneak attack, So yes the Russians warned the US, but the US with all its intel thought Russia might hit the US Embassy for goodness sake! This is a misjudged video in my opinion. You ought not to pretend this is a nuclear threat by Putin, it's him publicly saying he is going to fire a conventional missile at a US base if the ATACMS strikes deep into Russia continue. This is the problem with game changers in war: the opponent knows it for what it is and says 'oh no you don't'.
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  889.  @plattenkreisel6686  Thousands of Western volunteers to fight for Ukraine have left the front line and returned home. Maybe they will offer to work on your house, and they will pay for materials and machines as well you comical column dodging freeloader.
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  890.  @Have_A_Nice_Day242  Life is not fair and Britain had a 20 mile moat, a relatively huge navy, the worlds most advanced air defences, and home advantage when fighting over the south east coast; so despite the appallingly swift defeat its army suffered it could and surely would have, at however smashed any German invasion. Moreover, the US was not going to let 'Airstrip !' fall because that would mean Germany becoming a continental power with in due course the Volga as its Mississippi and thus the World Island closed off to the US. In other words common people have common sense and would not have voted to end the war with even the Channel Islands in German hands. the great exploits of Ukraine's army have astounded the world and Zelensky has articulated the country's feeling with his rhetoric, but now the terms of the conflict are changing. I think the Russians need to be resisted and Ukraine supplied with lots of weapons, yet we ought to be realistic about what can be achieved.
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  891.  @samsungtap4183  Ukraine is not helpless, it can defend itself; just look at how long the defense lines of 2014-2015 have lasted.(the Russians are only just through them and just in a limited area). new defence lines would be a powerful deterrent.
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  892. Ukraine is mounting a diversion in Kursk to stop the Russians taking a break in Donbass where it suits Ukraine to have Russia attacking? Sorry, I don't follow you.
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  893. According to Anders, Putin was already loosing anyway and the unnecessary SMO was doomed along with his regime. Prigozhin's echoing of Western analysis gives him clout? I think he must be mad as is anyone who really believes the Russian army is going to quit this war. To work psychological warfare needs to be in tandem with battlefield success and Ukraine has had none since November.
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  894. You're posting that everywhere now you sad man. Doesn't make sense as they were dead within a couple of days maybe an hour.
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  895. Looking a little bit under the weather here Ian.
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  896. The thing is America will not give ATAMS or F16s , and without them there will be inadequate disruption of Russian command and control/supply hubs. Hence, Ukrainian offensives are unlikely to attain sufficiently favourable ratios of attrition to make such a campaign sustainable. That's probably a good thing for the world, because we don't know Russia would accept such a defeat. The US certainly is not looking to find out.
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  897.  @williamanderson8932  America could jam the Russian GPS signal and make their guided missiles inoperable but hasn't. My comment explains why.
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  898. Could they? What would all the sacrifice have been for?
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  899. Britain invented the tank. One hundred years later they drove a stake through its heart with the NLAW. The Ukrainian were like 'Brit tech weapon-blah'. then they tried it and became addicted because it stopped Kiev being overrun. Someone needs to do less reading and get some of that rarest and most invaluable of things: combat experience. With an NLAW (it will be safe and fun).
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  900. Russia is what it has always been: a military autocracy. You are not going to cause a political nervous breakdown of Russia by asking awkward questions about causalities as if it is a democracy.
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  901.  @batukhan1  As Sabine says, there are great advantages for benevolent cooperation, and consequences for harming others. That is what usually stops those malevolently inclined from acting on their desires. Were that not so animals would be not be amenable to discipline .
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  902. Nothing about Ukrainian casualties, but Russia casualties are only heavy or light relative to Ukrainian casualties.
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  903. Special forces are old but real war as is being fought in Ukraine is not about the that kind of thing, and some SF veterans went to Ukraine and realised they did not want to be in that type of danger without the glamour. Old geezers all right for sitting in a foxhole , but young men are more willing to bravely attack, and die. That and energy are needed for success in high tempo attack.
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  904. The main military mistake or miscalculation by Ukraine was in assuming the Russians would build what was for them the standard depth minefields even where they knew from the publicity the main attack would fall. Instead of what was anticipated, Ukrainian spearheads found themselves in minefields that seemed to go on for ever.
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  905. Fat produces estrone.
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  906. These people are are fair, there are some real horror stories I am sure. But as the lady said, there are evil bastards in every country.
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  907. Yes.
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  908. That is the summing up by the prosecution I believe.
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  909. Fuchs has a claim to be the individual he made the key conceptual break through and was respomible for many important practical calculations.
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  910. I started of thinking that but I am afraid what has come out in the last few days makes me think she may well be innocent; the prosecution case was not tested in court but experts are now tearing ever aspect of it to pieces. Not a single statistician is defending the chart. Her lawyer was extremely passive
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  911. It would be nice to do what he says, but in the real world it is not practicable and that is probably a good thing given that Russia's reaction might be more cobra than tortoise.
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  912. The endgame Dannant has in mind is not spelt out though. Are the Russians supposed to break and run for home from where they apologize and stop fighting? Russia is three times the size of Ukraine, has a nuclear backstop for any great advances by Ukraine and has not yet officially declared war on Ukraine. Since the Kremlim called out a relatively moderate portion of its reservists and doubled the troops available to be used in the Special Military Operation, Ukraine has ceased to make advances. I think there has to be a recognition that Russia can't be outmatched in Ukraine and the war is going to continue without an end in sight if Dannat's advice is followed.
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  913. Polygyny
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  914. But the US has managed to create a Chinese fear that through its defeat in Ukraine, Russia will be knocked out of the balance of power. Xi can't let that happen.
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  915. 7:00 There is no treaty, and no open ended commitment to give Ukraine help indefinitely . The UK are under no obligation whatsoever, and it is moral support really. America is the only one that counts. It seems to me that General Hodges has been saying the Russians are about to culminate for months.
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  916.  @travelwell6049  Compared to Thatcher, I think Truss is very gender conforming . And she has a higher opinion of male competence
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  917.  @SabineHossenfelder  There is that naughty word I commented it was inadvisable for you to use at all. I have heard it suggested it is filler (extra time to decide whether 'a' or 'an' ought to come next).
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  918. Immigration?
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  919. That the guy only lasted a total of two months from being conscripted indicated that the chance of dying is now much greater than it was. It is just like Lloyd George in WW1, out of fear that more troops will be used in wasteful counter offensives, the Government does not trust the army with extra soldiers. But they also want victories.
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  920.  @Zuluknob  For teachers with pupils it is surely a crime in France when the pupil is 15, age of consent in Britain is 18 for teachers to shag pupils . There is a video of Macron's now wife then English teacher publicly kissing him during a class when he was 15.
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  921. The US and its allies may be in a position to supply the Ukrainian armed forces the equipment and intel for clearing Russia out of Ukraine, but the unspoken assumption of Sonderland that Putin would be then be out of options and compelled to stop fighting is faulty; why wouldn't Putin use tactical nuclear weapons on the Ukrainian army rather than accept conventional defeat and agree to peace? Putin is already on the borders of several Nato countries and he is only a fraction of the way into Ukraine and cannot even defeat it. Freezing the current lines seems to make little difference. However, this all or nothing approach, whereby Russia must be totally humiliated or it will become totally victorious will is a recipe for disaster. The Russians don't see their invasion as a predatory attack and they will react stubbornly. The next world war might start like WW1 did if we think that the only danger of WW3 starting is not learn the lessons of WW2.
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  922. But if you don't like the price then you don't buy. For Russia the price is clearly worth it, and do not forget the first waves of assault troops in Bakhmut were expendable exGulag and probably being used to draw fire and locate the enemy. 'Reconnaissance in force' in the Russian army is very bloody; so Wagner may have been particularly effective at that because they are tactically naïve. Exploitation is for better trained troops who are reservists. Wagner will be sent in again for street fighting, and the the regular army will be used to occupy what is being taken. It will be slow but most of the Russian troubles so far came from going to fast with too few infantry.
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  923. Had a reputation in the British army for trigger happy pilots who would attack allied soldiers. They were sometimes not given the chance and shot at on sight and quite a few P47s must have brought down by non German AAA.
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  924. The ordinary Russian is being told that Russia is doing well in the war. Withdrawals would come as a tremendous shock to the Russian people and make them lose faith in the political leadership; there would be massive momentum for complete change in the Kremlin, were Russia to withdraw. Not merely because Putin has a totalitarian propaganda machine and compliant mass media, but because it is much easier for the Kremlin to portray the conflict as a war where the homeland is in danger from an assemblage of enemies, than eg the White House could during Vietnam when America was fighting on the other side of a ocean. The average Russian is not going to support Putin if he withdraws, and perhaps even more crucially, when he left his chosen successor would not survive due to being discredited by association, so before long so the whole system would be replaced. A withdrawal by Putin, or by any chosen successor if Putin dies or becomes too ill to discharge his duties, would be flushing his legacy down the toilet. He is better off fighting it out as best he can, and hope that Trump pulls off another upset and demands a ceasefire on the current lines. which is the absolute most that Trump could do for Russia. There is no possibility of Trump cutting Ukraine off and letting Russia win:: absolutely none. That would be a humiliation of the US, and Trump is very sensitive to such things; he still has not forgiven Iran for the hostage crisis. Trump has said he would tell Russia and Ukraine to both stop and use the threat of massively increased and massively decreased arms supplies to Ukraine as a wedge against the Kremlin and Kiev to end the war (presumably on the current lines), on much the same way Korea ended. However there is no indication that Putin is the sort of gambling man who might take such a risk. The Ukrainians will not stop fighting and demanding a complete withdrawal to cease fire and Biden has said he would not tell Ukraine to end the war before they are ready, so are we supposed to think it is in our own interests to open endedly finance a massive effort to give Ukraine an arms advantage great enough to not merely attrite but extirpate an entire Russian army? Because that s what it Gen Cross backhandedly admits it is going to take, Ukraine ought to be strongly supported to hold what it has; yes, but even if the entire West were to try to the utmost, getting the Russians to leave or pushing them out of easternmost Ukraine will be an extremely challenging objective given their propinquity. Conversely, if as they more west in Ukraine to Odessa etc Ukraine Russia's logistic and other military problems would increase by an order of magnitude. As for the Kremlin following up total victory in Ukraine (a very unlikely occurrence) by invadin Latvia; the Russian military re not going to demur if Putin ordered what would be for them a literally suicidal attack on NATO? With ll due respect, I think Gen Cross is overdramatizing the consequences of not going all in for an undetermined /indefinite indirect assist of Ukraine.
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  925. Almost like Andrew Neil wants the war in Ukraine to continue endlessly so Russia can't rest and refit its army. Meanwhile, welfare spending is cut to the bone.
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  926. So he has to trust us. You will have a long wait for that Ben.
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  927. The dog hung out with the many tourists who walked the Pianista which is five miles long and you turn at the end and walk back down it Therefore the dog would would not have went past the end of Pianista and down the other trail which would be strange to it. The dog returning was only odd because no one thought the girls were going to keep going straight on after the Pianista trail ended and descend an hour down a trail that only Indian inhabitants and serious hikers take. It would not be credible that a natural accident could happen to them on the Pianista, and it is much too inhabited for a serious crime of violence. The Pianista is what the girls told people they were going on. So the lack of action when the dog came back by itself was understandable. The information they got about the trail beyond the Pianista was partly from the internet that morning before they set out, but we know that they day before they disappeared F talked to them about it when he unsuccessfully tried to get them them to take a guided tour with overnight stay to his coffee plantation outside Alto Romero. The rough trail was the way that F would have taken them to his plantation, although it was 14 hours hike further along than they got according to the last photo, and the time they's have had had to return to Boquite before nightfall. Ten weeks later their backpack and then and 6% of their skeletons (which were apparently pulverised and treated with lime, turned up in around Alto Romero, found by people associated with F and him himself. It is a terrible injustice that F and his employees were not given the $30,000 reward
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  928. Incredibly costly to mount the suggested type of combined arms mobile warfare offensive against a prepared peer opponent nowadays. The Western trainers have not done it and no one knows if it can work against a Kursk style defensive array in depth. Are the Ukrainians going to engage in motorized suicide? I think not.
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  929. They are heavy infantry. Heavy duty soldiers who want to fight and like to take risks to prove themselves.. You can't teach that , it is dependent on the sort of person they are. All the light infantry skillsets in the world are no substitute.
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  930. Did America fear a Cuban invasion? No country can possibly invade the US, there never has been any danger of that.
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  931. Tough guy. The original RPG was issued with an asbestos goggled hood and gauntlets.
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  932. Massed tanks as key to breakthroughs and swift exploitation have been overrated. Individual tanks as a support to small units of infantry are coming to the fore. A tank shell goes at a mile a second; unlike artillery', grenade launchers or mortars you cannot hear it coming before it hits. And a tank can dart back behind trees, which interfere with AT missile targeting
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  933. America does not want to alienate Russia completely. Russia's help will be needed to cope with a mega power China will become. Ukraine being aided enough by the US to defeat Russia would leave the US on the outside with Russia forever, they would never forgive it. So there is a point Washington will not go beyond for Ukraine. One could almost say that Ukraine is doing a bit to well for Washington's liking.
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  934. Would Russia accept a conventional defeat in Ukraine they way they did in Afghanistan? We surely would need to know before we gave Ukraine the wherewithal to conventionally defeat Russia
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  935. Yes, all he had was a no show client (he says, there is no independent account of their interactions and he now denies he ever met them). He went into their room, but waited hours after that to inform the police. If you know the route to where the finds of the backpack and remains are it is 12 hours at least (some say much more) hiking from where Lissane and Kris's their last known location, but only an hours walk from his ranch. None of that is particular incriminating. However, that ten weeks later he was the one making the key finds of their remains in non obvious places is considered extremely suspicious by absolutely everyone. Especially as this was soon after a huge reward was offered, which it looked like he was trying to access. Had it been identified as a double homicide at the time after he found those remains he and his son would have been bounced around the police station until they confessed. It would have been less likely they would have ever left the remains to be found if there was a criminal investigation though. Now every one knows who did it but nothing can be done.
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  936.  @AAWT Did China give Russia permission to start this war? No, it almost certainly did not. If a nuclear WW3 starts between two of the big three superpowers, then the other one would be hit too. Not going to leave them to inherit the earth. Anyway, Ukraine does not have nuclear weapons so Russia can win win without using them. The most worrying thing for Washington would be if Russia started to seriously lose the war, which is why the US does not really want Russia to start losing.
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  937. I doubt that.
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  938. Mike was taking a chance that the man did not sustain a serious head injury. If that had happened (as it quite easily could have) the police attitude would have been more neutral along the lines of 'we didn't ask you to'. Not against the law but by posting it online he is seeming a bit too pleased with himself. Like he was taking pleasure in hurting someone instead of doing it reluctantly. And gloating afterwards. I think his reputation will suffer from him posting this. Which will not be without ultimate effect.
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  939. High ground to weight pressure, and ultimately just too heavy. So the Russians know the terrain Abrams can operate in. Once the Russians find out Abrams are in the area and if the unit is made up of Abrams only ad advancing then their path is obvious. then it is going to find the Russians all set up and waiting for them. Abramses need to be mixed in with other tanks in an offensive. In defence the Abrams is relatively difficult to conceal and get behind foliage cover. Crucially, the Russians soldier who gets an Abrams is paid a bounty on it.
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  940. Assange is just a typical guy who got high status and proceeded to fuck every women he could, which was a LOT. But he wasn't in relationships so was required to use condoms; not enough for him. He got too much random sex on that visit to Sweden; he was making enquiries about moving there permanently.
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  941.  @jurijeckel4938  He went straight to Thailand. Nuff said.
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  942. Did you die?
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  943. Retreating is a slippery slope, unless there are better fortifications to fall back to. Hastily dug trenches filling up with freezing water will be far more difficult to hold
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  944. The Russians invaded Ukraine under Obama and Biden presidencies. Trump is just here to clean up the mess, and he will--by any means necessary including military force. But first he will try to dupe Putin.
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  945. Nobody is above the law or the Constitution, but both rest on a much wider, if implicit, system that Trump being jailed will undermine and discredit.
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  946. Both Russia and Ukraine have made very bad mistakes in predicting the other's weakness. Slow learners
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  947. Putin's threat as I understand it was to hit a US base in Europe (probably Britain) with a NON nuclear (hypersonic kinetic tungsten) IRBM strike, if the ATACMS strikes deep into Russia proper continue. Is the reason this very explicit statement of his on TV is not being mentioned is fear he will carry the threat out if he is called out about it? This' Russia will be unstoppable in 2027' stuff is surely being said publicly by such a top Ukrainian military expert official as a ploy to make the Russians think time is on their side, and downplay the effectiveness of ATACMS strikes inside Russia. I don't see how Putin can possibly stand up to another two years of ATACMS strikes in Russia; these things are already offing his generals. They will have to move every missile repository, artillery ammunition hub, command /control bunker, and barracks back another 200 miles
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  948. What on earth is CVR talking about.? They were under observation by an enemy drone (that was what took this footage), which they spotted while they were all bunched up and wisely dispersed ASAP to avoid the enemy artillery's strike that was moments away. The immobilised tank and any beside it were goners.
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  949. ​ @steveblundell7766  Of deaths in excess of what would be predicted in the relevant time period it was only the half of the excess death that occurred when Lucy Letby was working the unit that were presented to the jury. The police investigation was of Lucy Letby from the begining and was initiated by four doctors after an official report had criticized them for bad practice and not preventing excess deaths in the unit. It was only then that they reported suspicions about her to the police. The police were investigating suspicion about HER not suspicious deaths in general. So they looked at deaths Letby was there for, but (and this is the crucial point) there was no effort to explain or estimate of how likely it was that an innocent nurse would have a death on her shift in that unit in that year, and how many an innocent nurse would be there for over a year on average, especially if she had the total number of hours Letby was there for. Nor was there any attempt to show the jury which doctors who were there for those deaths Letby was working during and the other half of the excess deaths. The other half of the excess deaths were not clearly distinguishable from the deaths Letby was convicted for, except that she was there. The chart showing she was there for those baby deaths and a number of collapses of babies was presented as if it was an unusual pattern, yet it has been demonstrated that the number of dead / collapsing babies on Letby's shift would on average be duplicated for any nurse who worked as many hours as she did, especially in the mornings when patients tend to die. She lived nearby and was called in at short notice for many shifts, which means the unit was short staffed and had been giving less attention to sick babies. Letby worked the maximum permitted number of extra hours for a full time nurse many weeks and some others did not even work full time. You have to control for these things to make a convincing statistical case, and the prosecution simply did not do that.
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  950. Fentanyl has always been from Wuhan China (yup, same place as Covid). The chemical components of fentanyl are still made in Wuhan. Lot of the rich Chinese in casinos especially in Canada are laundering that money.
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  951. And a snitch
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  952. How can we square 'great powers are not above the law' ethos' theory of the West, with the US vetoing all international institutions' legal action against Israel over their armed forces behavior in Gaza? Like Israel, Russia has gone, and likely will continue to go, further that anyone in the West expected. Clearly, Putin places a much higher value on Ukraine being kept out of the Western alliance/sphere of influence than Western analyses comprehend. The job for politicians is to steer their government's policy in their country's interests. Be they large or small, the interests of no two countries are completely Identical, and so the limitations on a country's sovereignty by a world order may be theoretically absolute, yet in practice it is is always contingent on whether it violates that particular country's interests in the leadership's view. What small countries want is defence on the cheap, paid for by American taxpayers. Until recently even the huge Germany has managed to stay on the defence freeloader bandwagon without anyone noticing. Denmark giving its entire stock of artillery shells to Ukraine shows the girly men Danes have no intention of fighting anyone,
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  953. Putin wants to transform the international order? Putin' leads an 'Upper Volta with nuclear weapons' state that after two years and getting on for 100,000 KIA cannot even take Kharkiv, which is less than 20 miles from the internationally recognized borders of the Russian Federation! Ukraine is very important to Russia, but notwithstanding Western rhetoric, for the rest of the globe Ukraine is not the hinge on which the world order turns. The full on war fought by Putin that is calling into question the continues existance of his regime is not fought all over the planet, it is entirely in Ukraine and really all about Ukraine having tried to move from one sphere of influence to another, under the far from sensible expectation that Russia would be deterred by Ukraine's links with the US. States are limited by their assessment of whether their interests are being well served by peace. If you want peace, then you ought to make sure you are not compromising an another country's security interests in your interests.
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  954. https://youtu.be/UIe9UsltpW4?t=1382 The NYT published this as an op ed. Klein and Lind discusses the old Woke Twitter and the new Twitt. In Lind's Dems agenda was driven by non profits, who are not about winning elections. Hence powerful single issue progressives in the Dems and the trans issue being pushed too far in tail wagging the dog style. Trump's people were reportedly stunned by how effective their trans issue ads were.
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  955. Russia is not good at propaganda. For several months Russian progress in Bakhmut has been so incremental, in territorial terns at least, that it has been barely discernible whether they were advancing at all. The info war is being so badly lost for Russia that it is very difficult to credit any successes by them, yet a battle of attrition has been going on nevertheless!
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  956. Superb overview.
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  957. Pace Col Mcgregor, the theory of escalation to theatre thermonuclear weapon use was entirely about a Nato-Russia confrontation. The possible paths to use are not at all well understood for the situation Ukraine is in outside NATO and defence pact with America yet in a war with Russia, one where Russia is not doing well. In other words, Russia could--in certain circumstances--see actual use of a theatre thermonuclear weapon as the least worst option in Ukraine.
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  958. Only a fool would say Russia will just do what it thinks is in its own interests irrespective of whether Russia comes to believe it is begining to lose . Once the loser becomes aware the tide has turned against him, he is willing to try risker strategies to rescue the situation. That is plain common sense. The ATACMs strikes into Russia proper are highly effective and Russia is going to start being outproduced in artillery in a years time; no one knows how the Kremlin might react to open ended US help to Ukraine in the context of Russia facing progressive military, geopolitical, and economic degradation. Anyway, the purpose of news is to let us know what is actually going on.
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  959. What an obese idiot. Trump is offering the carrot. The big stick comes later.
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  960.  @NadaYoTengo  Boquete had not an international reputation as place where foreigners could disappear without all that much fuss being made , but maybe it ought to have had given that Alex Humphery went missing there in 2009. And maybe those 'rescuers' had thought they could get away with disappearing the German lady (they could hardly have let her go) because of the verdict over Kris and Lissane.
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  961. At least they are having babies, unlike South Korea.
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  962. Mearsheimer would say that be they fascst or democratic arrangements of domestic politics do not matter much for a state's foreign policy . The attitude of Russia toward Ukraine has not changed in hundreds of years
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  963.  @Alan-cl2ix  America has plenty of most of those things, So the reason for withholding them is ulterior.
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  964. Police are mainly concerned with fattening their pensions, which considerably benefit from a bob's your uncle promotion very late in their career if they don't rock the boat. That is why the police commanders in Rotherham (and many places did nothing about pimps preying on underage girls for decades. And it paid off because none have been convicted of misconduct in a public office or even had their pensions sanctioned. The police who asre now entering the top ranks were on the streets turning a blind eye to the grooming at its height. The way they intimidate pro British protestors is saying they will get a criminal conviction. But many, many of the small membership of nationalist organisations already have criminal records. I don't think the protest are big enough that ordinary employed members of the working class are attending them yet; the demo's would be up in the tens of thousands were that the case. You can't expect ordinary fellows with jobs supporting a family to risk it.
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  965. Stoner was a lot heavier surely.
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  966.  @weronikazalewska2098  Didn't have to carry them very far I suspect.
    1
  967.  @zoiders  Hmm, needed more maintenance then? Must have been a reason.
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  968.  @Azrakul-t7i  Likely the reliability was a big selling point.
    1
  969. It's a reflection of how countries in East Europe and the Baltic have pushed moving NATO East. Before the was in the White House Bush the Younger's minions reportedly encouraged Saakashvili to take Georgia into a confrontation with Russia in order to embarrass sitting President Obama. It was wrongly thought that Putin had backed down once the US showed support for Georgia. As President, Biden tried to correct what was thought to be Trump's lack of support for Ukraine and ended up encouraging Zelensky to stand up to Putin. How is that working out for Ukraine? I would note that the Ukrainian army report leaked today says that Wagner tactics are the most effective of any Russian force and the regular Russian army is begining to adopt Wagner methods. Wagner does have combat experience, so it is perhaps not so much privatization as quick practical methods such are used in business being shown to be more effective than Russian military culture stuck in the Soviet mindset.
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  970.  @mariaf.6601 Joining Nato was not enough for Poland, they wanted to be cocooned within Nato with member countries on all borders. So Ukraine had to join. When was Denmark conquered by Russians? Denmark pushed very hard for Ukraine's military to be part of international peacekeeping missions, as a way of showing they were up to Nato standards
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  971.  @mariaf.6601  Anders is a serving member of the Danish Navy is he not? Clinton was clear that Ukraine was different, and Yeltsin predicted war if it tried to join Nato Germany was cocooned, then Poland wanted to be. Yeltin's war in Chechenia added to the poles urgency. As Yuval Noah Harari said that is how empires grow.. Whether Poland anticipates getting some territory from all this I do not know, but Russia's invasion is not a subgoal in aid of an ultimate objective of conquering Poland. I think Putin wanted to be cocooned too. He screwed up royally, but is not the only who acted against their country's security interests. Ukraine forgot that they are an incident not an end for the US. If you doubt that why is it that Ukraine is being denied the most effective (deep strike) weapons and unable to do mobile warfare as a result, is being dragged into a rolling battle of attrition with Prigozhin's tens of thousands of expendable prisoners released from a life sentence to go to their deaths by drawing fire in Bakhmut ECT?
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  972.  @mariaf.6601  Remembering that Yeltsin said that extreme Nato expansion would lead to war. I don't really know why Demark was so keen so early to get Ukraine into Western military structures either, but they were. They, and others especially Poland had agency in creating the current situation ; it was not just Ukraine and Russia and the US. It does not seem to have proved a very effective way of ensuring security, this attempt to get Ukraine into Nato. And there was already the example of Georgia which was invaded in 2008 mere months after it was announced it would join Nato
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  973.  @mariaf.6601  Whereupon the Poles (supported by Denmark!) started agitating for Ukraine to join Nato even though everyone from Clinton to Brzezinski thought that was taking things too far for Russia standing for it.
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  974.  @mariaf.6601  I think the attitude of the US to Ukraine being brought into Nato altered from Clinton (who was dead set against it) to Bush, and while Bush had his own reasons, the East European countries had agency too.
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  975. Yeltsin never anticipated when he let Ukraine leave with Crimea that Ukraine would try to join Nato, but I think his and other Russian's attitude to that was no surprise. And Putin began warning what he would do in 2008. So what was the point of trying to get Ukraine in Nato?
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  976. Volker sounds reasonable but he is talking as if Russia has no hard and fast objective in Ukraine and can just walk away. His solution would require America to escalate to a frightening level with no way of knowing what the Russian reaction might be. And Ukraine has not even drafted its young men yet.
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  977. I don't like Saplonsky's politics, but he is truly a great educator.
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  978. The defence were defeatist. They were not even willing to try.
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  979. Careericide post. He's done put a fork in him.
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  980. Scared to do recon on the ground.
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  981. Of his successor Eden launching the Suez debacle (invading then withdrawing under pressure in the terminal folly of the Empire), Winston Churchill said : “I would never have dared; and if I had dared, I would certainly never have dared stop". After Suez Britain ceased to be thought of as an Independent Great Power, even by British establishment insiders. Putin surely understands he made a profound miscalculation in launching the SMO, but that barely touches the nasty reality that Russia's credibility as a country willing to go (not merely conventionally) to the final extremity is in grave peril if it accepts anything Ukraine can accept as a win for them. An occupant of the Kremlin who withdrew would have to face questions about the cost in blood and treasure already sunk into the war: 'was all the sacrifice of our boys for nothing?'. Ukraine's leadership has a clear motive to inveigle America and the rest of the West into less and less indirect conflict with Russia. From Ukraine's point of view the worse they are doing, all the better to pressure the Americans to help with deep penetration strikes against key installations; I speak of targeting , which is certainly something Ukraine needs America to provide the coordinates for. Maybe Kiev has the idea that eventually they can provoke Russia into doing something silly by using Western weapons and intel for deep strikes on highly sensitive targets. However, at the end of the day no one is going to attack Russia whatever it does to Ukraine. The weapons supply to Ukraine ought to continue in a measured way to make the conflict pyrrhic for Russia, but Ukraine should be disabused of the idea that escalation would be in their interests. No more strikes on the Russian early warning ICBM radars please.
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  982. But Ukraine signed up to the international non proliferation convention and renounced them forever, so it would be in violation of its obligations were it to try and develop them.
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  983. Success in a fistfight against a man with a gun on him. What could go wrong?
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  984. You have to bring some to get some. In other words Ukraine was tying down its own units too and those troops needed resting and refitting after the battle ended. Also confidence building training because hiding un bunkers from mass effect artillery was not much of a preparation for swift mobile advances.
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  985.  @jascu4251  Personally, I suspect the Russians were infuriated by Zolkin Volodymyr hundreds of interviews with Russian prisoners in Ukraine, and Russia tricked Ukraine into killing their own men. On the other hand Ukraine is fibbing, and US surveillance capabilities would make moving that many POWs undetected into a warzone very difficult. Then again. this is gong to make the HIMARS strikes a risky option for Ukraine. Kind of subtle for Russians though.
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  986.  @dutchroll  Why would the Russians not prefer a deception operation to lure Ukraine into hitting the building as a stratagem to get them dead and get an end to the HIMARS strikes?.
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  987.  @dutchroll  They have to do something smart eventually
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  988. That's why he was sacked: he refused to come back from the conference. Hierarchy.
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  989.  AndyWoohoo666  Nato doctrine in the Cold War was LOL
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  990.  AndyWoohoo666  Ukraine giving up its nuclear weapons for 'assurances' , that was LOL.
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  991.  AndyWoohoo666  FAB bombs
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  992. Regime change is a dangerous objective against a nuclear armed power.
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  993. This idea that supporting Ukraine is a way to get Putin replaced is very naïve.
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  994. Russia does not need an excuse to escalate, it needs a rationale to. Risking it to rescue the situation would be such. In other words, you need to think you are losing to escalate. Whatever is actually happening in Ukraine, Putin does not escalate because he thinks he is winning and there is no reason to alter tack. Give him a reason with devastating strikes on the Russian army, and you will see him step up to the challenge; and then some. Or maybe Putin will just quit. The people in Washington are not looking to find out what Putin would do if he understood he was losing
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  995. @annmariedeignan2596 Jon Wayne's character in 'The Shootist": "You said I was as strong as an ox ". The doctor (played by James Stewart): Even an ox dies".
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  996.  @internetcensure5849  Well that is exactly what happened, because the drone strike is not an everyday occurrence--they had to report it.
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  997. Like the French army in WW1, Russia can be bad and still effective.
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  998. How could a leader be human without being concerned with his own self image? @jjhpor 
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  999. By stop sending them begging letters?
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  1000.  @anthonymorris2276  America could give Ukraine what it needs to actually push the Russians back inside Russia but it hasn't. Lloyd Austen spelled out the American aim, which is damage the Russian military's potential. But doing that will entail wrecking Ukraine, and tens of thousands more Ukrainian deaths Get it into your noggin that this is not a zero sum game in which if Russia loses then Ukraine wins.
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  1001.  @anthonymorris2276  A long slow Pyrrhic war against Ukraine would achieve Austens' stated aims for America better. If the US wanted to drive the Russian's out why was Ukraine not given a hundred HIMARS months ago? It seems most reasonable explanation for the US does not supplying what might have made the Russian army hastily retreating if American strategists do not want Russia quickly defeated, but rather drained and subject to a year or more of attrition.
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  1002.  @deang5622  Austen said he wanted to help Ukraine retain its sovereignty and defend its territory. and that he wanted Russia to be weakened by losses in men and equipment it could not replace. That would require a very long and bloody war fought inside Ukraine. One in which if Russia lost Ukraine' would be decimated.
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  1003.  @alainlefebvre9860  An artillery army such as the Russians have would create fire traps by small withdrawals to lure the Ukrainians in. The US Marine Corp officer writing under the penname of Marinus says the Russian army is slow but adaptable when the tactical situation warrants a little retreat, but the overall advance is so slow that the 'cauldrons' Russia creates are not recognized as such. It is not clear Russia is losing in any meaningful sense, yet
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  1004. Trump is quite right that the Europeans are in Nato in order to freeload on the American taxpayer. There is far more chance of Trump being in prison than in the White House.
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  1005. In the real world you can't always get rid of a bully. You can't!
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  1006. The implication of 'they came here to work' is they do low level to skilled jobs. But their children are not going to be happy with that. A son of a legal immigrant became prime minister. Another is already halfway to being PM. We are importing an overclass. Meanwhile the indigenous will be outcompeted for working men's jobs. All very meritocratic, but not very stable.
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  1007. We support the Ukrainians fir as long as they want and we get no say in when or if they negotiate. That is unsustainable.
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  1008. I think some of the Ukrainian generals thought the battle initially made sense but the returns on the investment of manpower rapidly diminished as Russian tactics evolved towards the use of ex con expendables to bear the brunt of Ukrainian firepower and mines.
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  1009.  @lancehilt7536  The announcing of Bakhmut to be such a symbol was a dangerous thing for morale especially if it was in fact lost after an appreciable loss of good troops KIA defending it. Surviving defenders would hardly be sharp in the skill set for combined arms attack of be psychologically ready for participating in a mobile offensive. Russian troops on the other hand must have gained in from their first victory in over a year, be it ever so hard fought.
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  1010. Think twice before you go back to Ukraine Paul.
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  1011. No. There cannot ever have been any incriminating photo on the camera, because if there was, that would mean there was a killer who had control of the phones and camera for ten weeks before he left them for the authorities to find (in the backpack). By that time there was a lot of resources being dedicated to the case from Holland, which is a technically advanced country. In that case you better believe that the killer looked very carefully at the photos on the camera to make sure there was nothing on it other than typical snaps of a hike. Deleting a photo using a computer and gambling that even world class experts would be unable to restore it would be a tremendous risk, and there was nothing to be gained. The camera was not necessary for reinforcing the 'lost' narrative or for claiming the reward; the perpetrator(s) would simply have left it out of the backpack if there was anything on it.
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  1012. Grinding progress As Eisenhower once said to JFK; 'It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop'. Grimly determined and they have at long last figured it out. Is it worth the cost?; the Russians seem to think so.
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  1013. If he thinks the US can decide what to do by deciding who is a criminal, Trump's SecDef doesn't understand what kind of world he is living in. Right at the begining of his term, Biden called Putin a "killer" and Putin knew he could not have good relations with the US. While a decoration for direct combat as infantry means a guy is personally impressive, I don't know about it being indicative of the kind of qualities needed to be a good SecDef.
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  1014. So according to you, we are supposed to be allegiant to the global and local but not the national. And how would people in Russia, or the inhabitants of any other country (such as Ukraine) be able to defend themselves if banding together in a nation state level common fate group was impermissible?
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  1015. The person you ask in the street with tell they do not want war and that is as true in Ukraine as it is in Russia, (or Crimea).The public in Ukraine is probably far more negatively affected than in Russia, and Maidan was an authentic expression of national feeling, not a desire to have an easy life at the cost of weakening the nation's position; in short there will be a long wait for Putin to be overthrown, just like Zelensky is here to stay for the duration. Russia and Ukraine both underestimated each other but now know the strength of their opponent. Diplomacy works best when backed by a correlation of forces. My expectation is that the apparent obduracy on both sides is merely the standard. reluctance before negations start to put anything on the table. When Russia and Ukraine start talking then there will be begin to be slight concessions made and trade offs can be seriously thought about in Kiev and the Kremlin. It seems to be taking an eternity for the compromising to start, but both Ukraine and Russia are proud countries. @katerynaspivak1  asit is in Russia
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  1016. Fine. Just don't think the West is going to supply Ukraine with anything to end it. @katerynaspivak1 
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  1017. Ukraine is not a member of Nato, and ultimately it is on its own. So it can talk or not talk as it pleases.  @katerynaspivak1 
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  1018. I think Ukraine ought to have taken Professor Mearsheimer's advice and not renounced nuclear weapons. And if you make comments suggesting Ukraine has a right to unlimited help from other countries, then you can count on a challenge.  @katerynaspivak1 
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  1019. Like it was ever pure or what might replace it would be.
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  1020. It is good that you learned your lesson from getting completely fooled by the Ukrainians' destruction of the NordStream pipeline (you clearly thought it was a Russian operation). Denmark was an early supporter of Ukraine joining NATO; Danes may comprehend Russian slapdash methods, but Russian anxieties are a closed book to Danes.
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  1021.  @antimatters6283  Which country's leaders ignored Mearsheimer, took money from the West and put it in their personal Swiss bank accounts to leave their country dependent on empty promises from Nato? Not Russia. If the Ukrainians had listened to Professor Mearsheimer there would not have been an invasion of Ukraine. It really is a bit much to BLAME him for a war he tried to prevent.
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  1022.  @williamrobin2638  I don't think that Mearsheimer failing to predict the decision of Putin as an individual to go ahead with the invasion he had prepared invalidates Mearshemer's theory about states.
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  1023.  @morongovalley940  Mearsheimer has not influenced Russian policy. Or US policy. He has tried to explain Russian actions in Ukraine and the Kremlins determination to not lose there as something other than a outbreak of mass insanity. Russia has came in handy for fighting Napoleon, the Kaiser and Hitler. In all likelihood they could be an ally against a future mega power China, as long as Russians don't see the West as the enemy that defeated them in Ukraine. Using Ukraine to indirectly inflict a total defeat on the Russian invasion and force their withdrawal would be great for Ukraine, but not so great for Europe in the final analysis. Europe is a fading backwater in the eyes of America you know; yet Europe is still a very valuable ally.
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  1024. "And yes, you do need free will to act responsibly and live a good life. It's well researched that people with certain trait/characteristic/behavior will be more successful as well as the opposite." But a truly free will would not be deciding for whatever option was likely to lead to ongoing success, which includes not suffering retribution for harming others. A free will would not come into play unless there was no possible personal costs for doing bad things to others in order to get scarce goods, or benefit in being peaceful. If the aim is to flourish, then clever and careful calculation must motivate being nice to others in almost every situation. For instance, one can say Putin was obtuse and wayward to think his foolhardy invasion of Ukraine would go well. But he surely did think about the benefits and weigh them against the risks, and those consideration, imperfect though they were, led to his decision. So only someone who does not care one way or the other about something can have free will in relation to it.
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  1025.  @nguyenvu8262  If you have an objective in mind you calculate which course of action will achieve it.
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  1026.  @nguyenvu8262  We calculate our action with an objective in mind, down here among the filth and worms on earth as mortals with instinctual desires and fears many if not mainly subliminal ones. No decision a human takes is explicated with all considerations going into it out in the open to be consciously cognated. There is always an unconscious standing order background imposing an objective, of reproductive success ultimately. We do not choose to these animal instincts. Nor do we choose our DNA, whether we are clever or possesses exceptional self control, the family were are born into, whether the people we whose paths we cross are good or bad to us, or if we have to work to earn a decent living. How can we be responsible for the decisions we take when the constraints inherent in our thought processes and worldly circumstances that are the ingredients of any decision are _not_of our choosing?
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  1027.  @nguyenvu8262  No, just that they are wired to try .
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  1028. If he can con Putin Trump will; if not there will have to be another way.
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  1029.  @everettputerbaugh3996  The professionals in Washington do not think Russia being thrashed in Ukraine would be a good thing for a future in which China becomes a mega power and the US needs Russia as an ally. Consider, Washington has huge stocks of weapons (eg hundreds of mothballed Abrams tanks) it has barely touched, If Washington wanted to it could give enough arms for Ukraine to trounce Russia. Washington does not want to .
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  1030. They were young and strong and best friends together they could have crawled home in 11 days.
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  1031.  @m0o0n0i0r  The Bank is not supposed to meddle in politics, but that is what they did to get Truss out asap.
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  1032.  @rockrowell6499 That is true, but to stick with your analogy, Gen Breedlove wants to repeatedly pummel the face of a man who is bad at fighting yet carries a gun. Breedlove believes such a man will decide to abide by the Queensbury rules and keep taking the punches until he collapses, admits defeat, and crawls away? Hmmm. Were someone to behave thus, while we might say the fellow was a good sport, we'd also think he was lacking in pride (the urge to maintain one's status).
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  1033. What Russia does is dependent on what the Russians think is the least bad option for them. Western politicians are under no obligation whatsoever to put Ukraine's interests first. It is not true that Ukraine's interests are identical to the West's.
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  1034. Their propaganda would be chronically clueless, if it were aimed at Westerners, but it isn't.
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  1035. Rhetoric yes. But Putin would be a fool to take it at face value.
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  1036. The guide who said Kris and Lisanne had booked him for the Wednesday for the same trail they disappeared on while walking on Tuesday, and then found their remains days hike away over four river crossings. and incredibly close to his own plantation?
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  1037. Storegga Slide. Doggerland was indisputably real. It had became a myth by the time of the ancient Greek
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  1038.  @rmdomainer9042  No reason to stop the border raids and cause the Russians to stop needing to enlarge the buffer zones right along the border then.
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  1039.  @MarcosElMalo2  Defence in depth is having to be used because the continuous concrete fortification line is lacking. Does Ukraine have a shortage of cement or troops?
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  1040.  @pseudonym745  The Rissians are so predictable Ukraine ought to have been able to predict the effect of Ukraine trying to join Nato on Russia. Russia's job was to prevent Russia from being invaded; Ukraines job was to keep Ukraine safe. The Kharkiv offensive WAS anticipated, it is just silly to think only Ukraine can have sucess in that open terrain.
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  1041.  @noahway13  Standard Soviet tactics a la Kursk.
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  1042. The sacked general used elite formations for counter attacks then quickly rotated them out so they didn't have to face the Russia artillery music . Ukraine's new supreme military commander is giving the precious reserve units a one way ticket. But it was Russia's strategy of taking towns was meaningful because it applied massive massive political pressure on Kiev that got the previous commander sacked.
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  1043. Yes humans are here so they were not the prey they were the predators . And the rapists.
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  1044. Already back in Holland. Anyway, someone they've flirted with is hardly going to commit such a crime. It was someone who couldn't get them any other way.
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  1045. No not just narrative it is a sound military principle to concentrate strength against weakness, and constantly probe for weakness. Fields have windbreaks so they are not devoid of cover. No one really knows what the attrition rate currently is, but the key is what Russia is willing to accept by way of attrition ratio, which we obviously have not reached yet because they are still advancing. Mearsheimer says Trump is not going to do anything for the Russians and will keep the Biden level of aid to Kiev so it can continue the war. That the Kremlin are continuing to mount costly offensives suggests they think Trump's win has changed nothing.
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  1046. Could outbuild them, the problem is, as with electric cars, China's are much cheaper and as good (maybe better) so there has to be tariffs. Biden put a 100% tariff on Chinese electric vehicles.
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  1047. Ukraine likely shook down the US for the halt, It is prolly fear that Ukraine will try to repeat the extortion the got Austen complaining about the attacks.
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  1048. I thought the Russians had run out of warm clothes, trained soldiers, artillery ammunition, and missiles? Why on earth would Ukraine publicly announce accurate information about their own or Russia's future dispositions? Ukraine HOPES Russia will make another try to take Kiev again, and so the Ukrainians are trying to give the Russians the idea to do so. The snail's pace operations in Bakhmus have the Ukrainians coming to where they can be most easily attrited because Russia has a shorter supply line long established, and I expect what Ukraine most dreads is the Russians continuing to fight slowly and methodically in the war's centre of gravity: Donbass.
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  1049. Wagner's low skill troops are not 'conscripts' they are volunteers. They had the choice to stay in prison.
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  1050. She was actually the most experienced nurse in the unit. Which is remarkable considering how young she was at that time.
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  1051.  @vitruvianbody7132  The unit lacked the proper specialized staff, it was under resourced and under administered, very badly run, Lazy carless doctors were likely responsible for a lot of the spike in baby deaths. Yet there are things that are difficult to explain if you are assuming Lucy Letby to be innocent of all charges; unless you think a doctor made up his walking in on her in the early hours just standing there as a baby was close to death in front of her, apparently after she disabled an alarm on the breathing tube and dislodged it..
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  1052. One very bad man was all would take, and I think it took. I don't think Panama wanted to know, which has not worked out too well for the reputation of their country as interest continues to grow on the internet.
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  1053. The Russians are not going to fall for that one again/
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  1054. Ness never met Capone, who was convicted because years before his lawyer had made admissions to the IRS about Capone's income during abortive negotiations about regularising his tax liabilities
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  1055. ​ @andresmartinezramos7513 Maybe you are right.. However that the Allied armies'' commanders were extremely frustrated about the air force fobbing them off about dealing with Nebelwerfers indicates to me that it was responsible for a lot more casualties than is often discussed.
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  1056.  @SuperMadman41  That was a long, long time ago. It would have been published in the late 80s.
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  1057.  @willd7596 Not aware the Germans had so much heavy artillery in NW Europe that losses to German artillery could not have been--in a great many cases---actually to Neberwerfers.
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  1058. Let say in early 2022 Ukraine was given any arms they wanted and permitted to hit inside Russia with them. A million Russian soldiers would have been killed and injured. Anyone saying s they know how the Russian would have reacted is making bold assertions. The rules are simple the better the Russians are doing the more the US gives Ukraine effective weapons, but it is never going to be enabled to hit the Russian army really hard.
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  1059. In the real world you cannot always get rid of a bully.
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  1060.  @brigidtheirish  Of semi alcoholic men in their 50s who life has not much left to show and are not too interested in going on living, but want to leave their kids and wife a pension.
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  1061.  @brigidtheirish  From prison.
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  1062. When you take out a temporary injunction against the press mentioning something it is oft times very counter productive.
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  1063.  @jessehachey2732  Zeihan was predicting US war with Japan not so long ago. He has been predicting a collapse of China for over a decade.
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  1064.  @kaasmeester5903  Ukrainian troops in Bakhmut would disagree with Zelhan. They allege the Russian soldiers must be on drugs because they attack without regard of the consequences and even climb over the bodies of their dead comrades without emotion.
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  1065. Public ' altruism ' is usually virtue signaling at bottom. Helena is a worthy person and not wrong that Mone did wrong , but Helena's training and expertise is not in business,
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  1066.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  America has painted itself into a corner with statements about how Putin cannot be allowed to get any result he can consider a win. Putin has burnt his domestic political bridges by making territory captured and since lost back to Ukraine deemed part of Russia, and even making territory never occupied by Russia and still controlled by Ukraine in Russian law officially part of Russia. The Russian army has no problem retreating; that makes them difficult to destroy, impose prohibitive attrition on. All indications are that even if they strategically withdraw back to the borders of Russia they intend to end the war only when that have much more territory than they have so far occupied. The workarounds for a country of Russia's resources and technical infrastructure will be many in the medium term My feeling is to get the Russian's to accept they are in a stalemate will take several years; we are going to be still discussing this in a year's time.
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  1067. They were human but they didn't look or act like it.
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  1068. Or it will keep attacking other countries in Eatern Europe is suppose you mean every World War started like WW2, WW1 didn't. The mindset that stopping Russia gaining anything at all in Ukraine is necessary to prevent it keep from going West and invading into actual Nato members countries even though it would be fighting an actual Nato army whereby Russia would be outclassed technologically, and outnumbered 4:1 in forces on the ground even in Poland is far fetched. They would not do it because they could not possibly hope to win. Good grief they can barely get even a draw in this war against puny Ukraine. That through defeat by Ukraine Russia ought to be schooled in liberalism, whereupon its civilisation an societal organisation must become different to what it has been for half a millennia is no less unfeasible than any Russian idea of Nato being undermined and divided. Attrition strategies depend on what the opponent is willing to accept, and it is now apparent that whatever its deficiencies in application of military science to actual war are, Russia has been widely underestimated in regards to its reserve of stubborn persistence. If battered to its knees (this is an extreme hypothetical) Russia, will issue a very unvague and unmistakably specific threat, and that is why the Ukrainian caprice that they can get back Crimea by using the unlimited arms and money from the West is being backpedaled in the West. So don't be too sure what the quickest path to WW3 is.
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  1069.  @manuelmachado9284 "Reconnaissance in force" as practiced by the Russians is completely unlike how Western armies' recce missions are supposed to go. What happened in Bakhmut seems to have been an extremely bloody form of a distinctively Russian tactic
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  1070.  @manuelmachado9284  It almost sounds like you think lack of stealth makes for a good recon mission, but I can't help wondering how the information got back if the guys were unalive.. It works with drones _and _ a source of expendable manpower but both those together are completely novel.
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  1071.  @manuelmachado9284  That must be why to join the WW2 Reconnaissance Corps units of the British army soldiers had to pass an IQ test, because only the intelligent would understand the necessity of them becoming casualties.
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  1072. @ That is exactly my point the convicts were to advance and be fired on so the drones could get the info on where enemy positions were for artillery's pinpoint hitting them. The Reconnaissance Corps in WW2 British army used quality personnel who were often trained for more than one specialized role. Russian convicts were used to soak up firepower, thereby enabling drones' locating where it was coming from.
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  1073.  @malcolmgibson5088  So Ukraine (Makinder's Heartland of the World Island) is not vital to Russia's status as a great power like Zbigniew Brzezinski said, but some heron nesting ground in inner Mongolia is?
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  1074. Ukrainian plan must be to lure the Russians into surrounding Kharkov. Challenge accepted!
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  1075.  @MarvinWestmaas  Do you know any Ukrainians. One I know from Kerson has just had her 22 year old grandson killed, he had been fighting for three years. And I have heard from another female refugee that the army come and take boys from 18 up; its not voluntary as we are told.
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  1076.  @MarvinWestmaas  I know some Ukrainian refugees, and they tell of 19 year olds press ganged into the Ukrainian army, one had a grandson 22 years old after serving in the army for three years recently KIA. This is from a very small sample.
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  1077. Two replies disappeared, but I will try again. I know a couple of Ukrainian refugees who tell a different story about the position Ukrainian males turning 18 are in as regards coercion to serve in the Ukrainian army than I get on mainstream news. One, she is a 100% Ukrainian from Kerson, lost a 22 year old grandson last week. He had been in the Ukrainian army for 3 years.
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  1078. Has he ever said or written anything that suggests that Russia ought to attack any current Nato member country?
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  1079.  @kevinwarburton2938  We have been told that Bakhmut is strategically unimportant but I would point out the staunch Ukrainian defence of it suggests otherwise. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=du8IaRJWDsE Retired Major General Tim Cross, a British logistics expert. allows that even although the Russian high command were not told about Putin's order to invade Ukraine until very late and had no opportunity to plan properly for it, the Russian army has been exposed as woefully weak. However he says trying for negotiation and a settlement in the next 3 to 6 months avoids whatever danger there is is loudly announcing that the boot we have on the Russian neck will be pressed down harder until they quit. A Russian winter offensive that might improve their positions so greatly that Ukraine will be forced to negotiate is far from impossible according to Cross.
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  1080.  @hansunbekannt8208  It's not in my power to ensure nothing similar happens to you, but it won't because you are suspicious of others. Kris and Lissane were gentle souls. Only the good die young.
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  1081.  @hansunbekannt8208  Not a puzzle, no doubt in my mind who did it
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  1082. Absolutely
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  1083. The Bakhmut Operation must have been the brainchild of the regular Russian army commander in Ukraine. Wagner are being withdrawn for reequipping and retraining because there will be no more offensives by Russia, which is digging in for a Kusk style defensive battle, and Wagner are specialised assault infantry, a one trick pony.
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  1084.  @RichardPhillips1066  The army parachutes of the early 1960s when my dad was doing his jumps in the TA led to a landing like jumping off of a wall several feet high. So no joke even if you did not land on a cow or fence ETC. Some of the early freefall para hobbyists with a huge number of jumps went 'punchy'.
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  1085.  @fredbloggs5902  I think as Ed says bad landings lead to injuries. There was a fad for doing sponsored jumps for charity a while back. I remember an surgeon near one of those para schools was complaining because the of all the people (women especially) sufferings nasty fractures. As i recall one was was left paralyzed.
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  1086. Anyone who thinks Ukraine is going to be open endedly backed ad infinitum by democracies is kidding themselves.
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  1087.  @paulgibbon5991 . The Ukrainians are being backed and it makes sense geopolitically to do so. However the deep strikes against the ICBM defence radar of Russia by Ukraine is the sort of thing to be nervous about. It's all very fluid and totally unlike the static Warsaw Pact NATO confrontation, which was posturing. Anyone who says they know how Russia will perceive a campaign of such strikes by Ukraine is being bombastic.
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  1088. I am definitely going to buy Sabine's new book and enjoy her forays into questions of the day, however I think here she does not come to grips with what concepts are at issue. In my opinion the opening Disorders of Sexual Development arguments has little or nothing to do with the actual complaints which are of unfairness. One trans athlete Sabine mentions Lia Thomas and I agree with the objections to her being in an all woman competition, and not because she had external testes and a normal penis when winning a prestigious college swim meet with pool and meet record time, and only 1% of female athletes manage to get to that meeting. The Spanish lady who was a high level athlete was disqualified from Olympic competition between females in her chosen sport. At this elite in effect professional level, where large amount of money are involved, trans are banned and biologic tests can establish if females have objective masculine features exceeding the level permissible for elite female only competition, and that is absolutely clear cut and will not change. At a much much lower college and other lesser levels, partially due to a fear of discrimination suits and possibly because colleges are at the cutting edge of 'woke' and anyway college women's swimming does not matter much except to the participants, trans women are often being permitted to compete as what they say they are, no questions asked . The problem has arose not because Thomas got banned from amateur competition against other men because of her being insufficiently biologically male, but because Thomas had been permitted to go from competing against only men in a certain sport to competing against only women in that same sport. That, although undistinguished while racing against men, Thomas had participated in a sustained way is a red flag. Whatever their chromosomes or unusual developmental conditions, that a person was able to hold their athletic own in male only competition enough to not be an anomalously slow competitor in an activity they choose to compete in against males ought to be the criterion for it being unjust for that person to transfer into a women only sphere of their already chosen sport. In all fairness, even very mediocre results against men in competition disqualifies a person forever more from competing against women. Some people don't care very much about sports of course; genetically engineered champions might end the Olympics as we know it, but genetically engineered physics geniuses ...?
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  1089. Is he supposed to have had these things wrong with him he was 56 years old? Putin's first move against another sovereign country was in 2008 (invasion of Georgia) and preceded by very anti American international conference speech he gave in 2007, and the 2008 announcement that Georgia and Ukraine would join Nato. CVR may not think that was any threat to Russia's security then, or has got more menacing to Russia since, but Russians other than Putin were extremely alarmed by 2008, and warned that Ukraine would be invaded it it tried to enter the West's orbit. The current head of the CIA said in a book that during his years as a Moscow diplomat he never met any Russian, be they hawk or a liberal critical of Putin, who thought it was OK for Ukraine to become part of the West. Despite what happened in 2014, they counted on Russia to remain passive, they counted wrong.
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  1090. There is no deal for Russia the current Kremlin leadership could accept. Keeping Ukraine from getting close to Nato is why Putin invaded, and after tens of thousands Russians killed in action he is going to accept Ukraine could join Nato, thereby as good as admitting it was all for nothing? Not a chance. There is not going to be an end to the war, because just ending the war without attaining its objectives is something Putin will not and can not do. The war being kept going prevents Ukraine joining Nato, and that not taking territory is the objective. What is most likely is a slow running down of the actual fighting, which is what already happened to the 2014 fighting in Donbass.
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  1091.  @gumby2241  Look at the Wiki for Mearsheimer; almost three decades ago he most certainly did advocate Ukraine having nuclear weapons as an independent country, because he said that would stop Russia bullying it. The West got Ukraine to renounce nuclear weapons; then announced it would become a future member of Nato., This was indeed leading Ukraine up the 'primrose path', by making it both vulnerable to Russia and a and a future threat to what Russia predictably saw as its vital security interests.
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  1092. Isn't that just what he wanted?
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  1093. The important detail is the victim being 56 years old and knocked unconscious by a 30 year old who has already been given a chance. Not attempted murder, but even with a helmet to stop his head hitting the road, used the van to put him over on the bike (itself a serious risk of life changing injuries) and then seconds later knocking the still dazed cyclist unconscious when he could see he was an old geezer was done with far more likelihood that the victim would be injured than the previous offence. So his behavior had escalated. This judge's sentence ought to be appealed as unduly lenient to get a very wild young man where he can mature before he kills someone. I am sure the furore has already reminded this judge of his responsibilities to rehabilitate extending to a giving a term in prison that actually must be served, not a faux one.
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  1094. The West has never given Ukraine troops, and that is what they would need to beat Russia.
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  1095. When Trump said the Pandemic came from a Chinese lab the biggest social media banned mention of it as fake news.
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  1096. wHERE S THE MONEY FOR AID TO UKRAINE SUPPOSED TO COME FROM? tHE DEFENCE BUDGET HAS BEEN CUT TO PAY FOR SOCIAL SPENDING FOR DECADES.
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  1097. I don't think ensuring Ukraine wins the war with Russia is an obviously proper priority for Western countries to set themselves. Important yes, but supreme objective over all other considerations no. And Ukrainians have not even drafted their young men yet for fear of a mass exodus, so Ukraine has other priorities over winning the war too.
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  1098. If Japan had attacked the USSR would have been defeated in 1941, that did not happen because of internal Japanese politics, but was the prospect that terrified American strategists most. Sealion worked, as a deception operation that enabled a surprise attack on the USSR. In early 1941 Stalin upped delivery of raw materials to Germany tremendously--to enable the cancelled (Sept 1940) Sealion one might surmise. What he got was Barbarossa. Hitler and Field Marshal von Bock were in agreement about Moscow being a secondary objective, though for very different reasons. As Bock wrote in his diary: "I do not want to 'capture Moscow'. I want to destroy the enemy's army, and the bulk of that army is right in front of me". One thing is certain, had Bock's planned attack of August 17 on Moscow gone ahead, the Soviet army would have been defending the capital with the eroded forces available at that time and place rather than what was there 76 days later when Bock's attack actually started--five days before the muddy season bogged it down.
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  1099. The Americans told them exactly what was going to happen at Hostemel airport but the Ukrainians did not believe them. If Zelensky had listened to the CIA and taken proper precautions, the professional core of the Russia army could have been destroyed.
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  1100. Russians trying to desert en mass but they can't catch the retreating Ukrainians to surrender to them.
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  1101. The North Koreans would rather be dead than be captured. And they prolly volunteered to fight in Ukraine. As long as they are getting three square meals a day they'll be happy.
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  1102. China reading Minihan will decide it needs to not have Russia knocked out of the balance of power. I happen to think that generals must have had some kind of confidential briefing warning of China taking advantage of US commitment to Ukraine, because not long ago a long ago an American admiral (Mike Gilday) publicly urged readiness for a war with China within a year. If Russia seemed to be about to be relegated from the ranks of the great powers, which it would be by losing to a middling country such as Ukraine, then China would surely use its sockpuppet North Korea for an attack on South Korea, where there are tens of thousands of US troop within easy striking distance. More likely is a NK build up that seems to be a prelude to invasion. preperationd for a naval war inside the island chain is what the airforce and navy need to be relevant. However the Ukraine war has shown the fundamental irrelevance of enormously expensive big ship and F35s. Army heavy artillery is king in Ukraine, so the US artillery will be getting those tax dollars.
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  1103. Zelensky wants Trump to back Ukraine open endedly with no actual end in sight. That is not what Trump was elected to do.
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  1104. There was only one incident where the supposed method was violent: swelling deduced to have come from a blow to the liver. It is the supposed injection into breathing tubes and direct obstruction of the airways causing rashes and inflamed vocal cords that was key in convicting her.
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  1105. Rusfed is not autarkic or isolated; were they to become so, theatre thermonuclear weapons use is quite plausible. Washington is not looking to find out.
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  1106. I am sorry but I don't see how anyone could have 'blocked' the details of such an incident from their mind like that woman is saying,
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  1107. Post puberty, males just like to inflict injuries on people. Deep down that was the cause of the injuries
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  1108. Re the thumbnail: Chris Kyle was shooting at anything that moved in an area full of noncombatants. That is how he got so many kills. That Special Forces YouTuber Jocko guy was Kyle's commander yet hardly talks about him.
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  1109. Eight is only average for name adult performer blacks. It's the top of the range.
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  1110. It may be illegal, but it was hardly unprovoked. Ukraine ignored over a decade of warnings by Russia was that it was not going to stand for what Ukraine was doing with the West.
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  1111.  @ComradeOgilvy1984  They cannot compete in innovation or enterprise anyway. Their strong point can be seen is how they are taking T55s out of storage and sending them to Ukraine, and criminals from prison. I think the Russian way is to drag things down to a level where individual intelligence is superfluous.
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  1112. For decades the British defence budget has been raided to pay for social spending without raising taxes.
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  1113. There was sufficient evidence but the prosecution wanted it cast iron and when you look at the circumstantial evidence it did not support the statistical probability calculation.
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  1114. General Commander Zaluzhnyi was sacked because he was favouring units like the 3rd BDE with the youngest and toughest recruits and best equipment while demanding that young men be conscripted. Zelensky replaced Zaluzhnyi with Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi because he agreed to not conscripting young men, and is sending his best unit into a position of disadvantage in order to rescue a bunch of middle aged men who are burnt out from years in the trenches and will add nothing to a counter offensive. Syrskyi is going to run the Ukrainian army into the ground by attacking with insufficient and unenthusiastic men.
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  1115. Just before he became President Poroshenko was talking about evicting the Russian bases from Crimea. Zelensky was not elected to be more hard line than Poroshenko but to regain Ukraine's territory and bring peace.  @RikPol 
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  1116. Logical_if_ there was a strong line of fortification for the Russians to be attrited on.
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  1117. Eisenhower "Be slow to say what you will do, and never say what you won't".
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  1118. Interesting. The Soviet army in WW2 used the greatest possible compulsion and forced Gulag prisoners to fight, but Wagner Group are not about shooting slackers really . They are about incentives not very Soviet (or Western) . But they work. Yevgeny Prigozhinis a self made sucessful businessman. It seems business has something to teach the modern military.
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  1119.  @meganoob12  That sanguine view of how Ukraine is doing hardly explains why Ukraine are so suddenly getting Abrams tanks and the 150 km range Ground Launched Small Diameter bomb. The ATACMS rockets are not ruled out in the near future either. The Russians have a lack of operational level results, but their strategy is to concentrate on brutish small unit attritional tactics for an eventual strategic result. Whether they can overcome the ever more advanced weapons Ukraine has got and will be getting more of remains to be seen, but Russia is big and there are a lot of Russians. Eighty percent of the Russian casualties are convicts with a life sentence, some have been in prison for decades and training then to be all round soldiers would be a waste of time and resources for Wagner. They are a there to be a zombie member in specialized assault teams and completely expendable.
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  1120.  @ktermalkut8332  You have reversed the order of events
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  1121. I'm sorry, Bakhmut was a Russian victory. Pyrrhic perhaps, but a victory boosting Russian confidence and morale nevertheless.
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  1122. As if money is no object and we can pay war for a war without end?
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  1123. Opening a coat to show you are carrying a gun is a criminal offence. You have to shoot or not even flash it to be within the law.
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  1124.  @beambee0  The doctors ' careers were in the toilet for a huge spike on deaths on the unit. They did have a motive., so there could be some cognitive dissonance going on..
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  1125. "If the Russians were to use tactical nuclear weapons, the unit that used them would be wiped out" (by the US). That would be a massive escalation by the US inasmuch as it would be bring the Russians and US into direct combat. There is no way of knowing what that Russia nuclear unit would do if a massive incoming attack to wipe them out was ongoing. There are all sorts of nuclear weapons including anti aircraft ones, and what would they have to lose?
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  1126. Freedom to decide for yourself is what every person and every independent country has. Freedom from consequences does not exist for any individual or state; that is why decisions are always a trade off based on past experience and imperfect information. @des_smith7658 
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  1127.  @sdr24  If he prioritises winning in Ukraine, defeating him will entail killing about 100,000 Russian troops.
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  1128.  @nataliescott1914  Belarus. Ceasing to threaten Kiev was a major mistake. Almost as bad as not mobilising in March
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  1129.  @sdr24  Supposing Putin's army does run for it and retreats inside the internationally recognized borders of Russia proper; what is to stop the Russians continuing think that they'll win eventually and refusing to cease hostilities? You can tell them they won't win but I don't think they will believe you. Assuming everything you say is true, the war will not end if Russia continues to lose and even if they are pushed back inside their own borders there is little chance they will stop fighting and firing missiles. So what is Ukraine's plan for ending the war? You cannot be the victor unless you are the one that decides when the war is over
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  1130.  @sdr24  That would take several years.
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  1131.  @sdr24  While in the final analysis you are probably going to be proven right, the style of Russian soldiering in this phase of the war is less 'gets angry when you miss him' Joe Frazier, and more Ali. By now the Kremlin understands that there will be setbacks up against the manpower and strategic space of Ukraine allied to US advanced weapons and supply, so the best thing is to give Russian generals carte blanche. The Russian army since April have got very good at retreating without suffering prohibitive losses when the military situation warrants it, because aware of the mistake of the Tsar, Putin is staying out of military matters. His generals are now operating with and allowing their subordinate officers what, for the Russian army, is an unheard degree of freedom to modify orders. That flexibility does not alter the fact that the troops are pretty poor quality soldiers and easy to beat, yet makes a decisive victory that knocks the Russian army out of the war. extremely hard to achieve for Kiev Old Vlad in the Kremlin is not going to overdramatise the difficulties and use nukes; and his generals are not going to ask for them to be used. My bet is in 2024 Ukraine will have won a hundred battles yet the war keeps going on.
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  1132. Dobby The House Elf was a big joke at Putin's expense. Not so funny now.
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  1133. I have never understood why people think that Russia would end the war just because they got pushed out of all Ukrainian territory.
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  1134. Ukraine tried to join an anti Russia military alliance and persisted in its aspiration despite all the warnings from Russian diplomats. "It's time to realize that Russia is a fascist state where all government, military and people are united evil." Which is a perspectival truth dependent on not being a Russian. There are countries that fight and the world is none the worse for it. Wars happen when one, or often both, parties to a dispute underestimate their opponent.
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  1135. I think the lack of large scale swift maneuvers is not because of weather but rather as the Ukrainian military commander said the other day because modern surveillance capabilities mean surprise is no longer possible and both sides have realised how to get real time targeting and easily destroy the other's attacking formations before they have made much headway. Anyway, it is barely useful to use the word "win" without stating what borders Ukraine would have were Russia to 'win', but just the other day Mearsheimer assured us that Russia is not going to be allowed to win. Let us define a Russian win in the sense of Ukraine officially conceding it has lost forever after the currently occupied territory and capitulating on terms favourable to Russia; no matter who is in the White House, the US's protégée Ukraine making any concession to losing the easternmost parts of the country in return for peace would be such a shattering blow to America's prestige that no president could possibly acquiesce in it. True victory might have been attained last year but Ukraine failed to follow up its successes in a timely manner, and now the Russians are, if not skillful, stubborn in defence. A Korean war type ending without an official peace treaty is the most likely outcome and that will let America and Russia retain the status they enjoyed prior to 2022. It would be a mistake to think that anyone in the White House (or the Kremlin) will see their country's status in the world as not worth battling to almost the last extremity for.
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  1136. When the idea of Russia being driven out of Ukraine by the Ukrainians seemed far fetched it was fine for him to backhandedly scoff at the Kremlin' daring to chose a nuclear option. But that Russia loses conventionally seems a real possibility now, and nuclear weapons may well have utility for the Kremlin in rapidly developing losing endgame for them. Anders is trying to have it both ways with his talk of uncertainty and fear being part of a Russian psychological stratagem. There are some things, such as what the Kremlin would do with its theatre thermonuclear weapons in such an increasingly likely losing endgame for them, that have uncertain yet nonetheless credible outcomes it is wise to fear.
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  1137.  @harmless6813  The new Ukrainian minister of defence Budanov predicted in an interview the other week that there will be a revolution in Russia and it will break up. Putin's system and the existence of the country will be in doubt if Russian army just goes home making all the losses for nothing. There are obvious parallels in the Russia Japanese war and WW1so I have no idea why you have no idea of what I speak.
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  1138.  @harmless6813 Bad as using a nuke would be for Russia any alternative would be far worse from Putin's standpoint because it would (1) entail RusFeda being relegated from the ranks of great powers and (2) lead to RusFed breaking up. Zelensky' closest advisor Podolyak has just predicted the break of RusFed as a result of the coming defeats and casualties. Anders spoke of 'some people' who talked as if nuke us was a option for the Kremlin . One of those is Vad, former brigadier and German military advisor to Merkel, who is now predicting an inevitable Russian defeat by Western technology in Ukraine and a decision to use nuclear weapons on Ukraine rather than going quietly. Anders is a naval expert.
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  1139.  @harmless6813  You are in agreement with Anders that what I suggest has a low order of probability, yet the Ukrainian success Anders is reporting is a clear pathway to Putin having to take a decision of what is the least bad outcome. Can't have it both ways, either Russia is heading for defeat or nukes are going to be completely redundant. In the doctrine of the US and as well as RusFed the purpose of nuclear weapons is to halt an enemy's successful conventional offensive, and the US is not giving Ukraine many conventional weapons such as ATACEMs even though Ukraine is completely dependent on US supply of the coordinates for HIMARS and would be for ATACMS too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WC1_lpy8TVE That speaks for itself about the US worry that sudden reverses for Putin could lead to him seriously considering the option. At present he thinks he is winning, the US want to keep him oblivious to what is happening, but eventually he will realise he's going to lose. Is he going to have to accept that?
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  1140. ​ @tokeherkild8038  A "units along the border" stance by Russia was politico military pressure, yet unconvincing as a threat because they would be outnumbered four to one on the ground and even more in the air if they crossed that border in an actual offensive Far forward and stationary mobile units are sitting ducks for surprise attack t so the Russian posture was sabre rattling, not defensive, as can be seen in Belarus right now. The present conflict between Russia and US led Nato is political/ hybrid. As I recall important US officials considered the electoral advances of the Italian Communist Party in the 70s/80s as a threat to Western security, so I expect that Putin is threatened by democracy in Ukraine heartening his Russian opponents and in a time of crisis contributing to by a colour revolution example. However, the simple fact is that Russia's accelerating relative technological backwardness means that in the future its going to become increasingly helpless in any real war, and any sabre rattling it does will be risible. Putin has foreseen this (his Munich Security Conference speech about the prospect of the US developing a complete defence to ICBMs and becoming the sole centre of international decision making), therefore he understands that US Patriot and anti ICBM bases on Russia's borders are bringing forward the day when Russian inferiority is so complete that no one pays any attention to waht the Kremlin says. Holding back that day is Putin's job as leader of Russia.
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  1141.  @harmless6813  Russia is not aware it is destined to lose yet. so one would not expect them to think there could be a reason to actually use a nuke. that lies in the future IMO.
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  1142. Sounds like a "counterfactual" a la Chiara Marletto.
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  1143. But they both took off their bras at an early stage. Kris died without her pants on.
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  1144. Not much doubt about that!
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  1145. Braess's paradox holds good in electrical engineering.
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  1146. I think they will try to hold it and may succeed because Belrogod is where the HIMARS have been used a lot as a defensive measure. Now the Ukrainians have attacked it, which is leveraging the 'defensive ' HIMARS strikes that have already occurred there on troop concentrations command and control and supply hubs. Ukraine is slick.
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  1147. There are targets other than Kharkiv they could go for. The area where Ukraine took back all that territory in 2022 has a proven lack of obstacles to an offensive .
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  1148. General Hodges is perhaps forgetting that all Putin's actions indicate that he considers Ukraine an existential threat to Russia, so he will stop at nothing to avoid losing. If Russia began using nuclear weapons on the battlefields of Ukraine it would be because Russia was about to lose the conventional war in Ukraine. You cannot fight conventionally against nuclear weapons, and is America going take the first steps in a nuclear war over Ukraine? It seems America's aim is to totally defeat Russia in Ukraine, yet Hodges and other Americans presume Putin would meekly accept what he has denied he will; would not do what he threatened to do at the begining of the invasion, and go full thermonuclear. I note that Putin's threat to invade Ukraine was not a bluff, though everyone thought it was.
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  1149.  @4TheRecord  But the Ukrainians know what targets they have hit with HIMARS and so would know it was not their HIMARS strike that killed the POWs, and so the main value of the deaths for Russia (inhibiting the HIMARS strikes of high value Russian targets as too politically dangerous for Zelensky in case one resulted in the deaths of a hundred Ukrainian patriots) would be lost. I think the Russians tricked the Ukrainians into doing it, and so does CVR. My bet is there are Ukrainian POWs dispersed in many apparent Russian supply and command and control hubs now, and that will be a fast and dirty solution for the Russian's HIMARS problem.
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  1150.  @4TheRecord  If you go to The Creepy Disappearance of Lisanne Froon & Kris Kremers? What Happen To Them? Murderer or Accident? and look at my extremely long and detailed comments there and elsewhere about the case you will find how I occupy my time. I like true crime ECT, and I think I have pretty good instincts about the way things go down in real life. Anyway CVR is more or less saying it was the Ukrainians, so I am not alone. I think it was a Russian ploy that tricked the Ukrainians into the HIMARS strike on their own people in Russian captivity, but Ukraine is telling porkies about not having hit the building so they are playing into the Russian's hands
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  1151. I don't think Russia would respond with nuclear weapons against a nuclear armed power. Ukraine does not have nuclear weapons. Russia can use nuclear weapons against Ukraine. Whether it will depends on the Kremlin assessment of how the war is going for them.
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  1152.  @luzr6613  Nuclear forces understand how to minimize fallout, but I agree It would be very difficult for Russia in the court of world opinion, were they to go nuclear against Ukraine. Nonetheless, in my opinion Russia would feel they would have no other option but to use nuclear weapons if they came to believe the tide had turned against them they are definitely losing. The geopolitical fallout from actual defeat at the hands of Ukraine would be too unbearable for the Kremlin.
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  1153. The content does the work on this one, not his presentation or delivery. Robin Williams said this subject always gets a laugh.
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  1154. Yes. Fortifications are underrated, and so are minefields. Time training is not the problem, nor is aircover. Those giving the Ukrainians training in achieving breakthrough are completely armchair: they have never actually did it, which air protection or without . All the the training and equipment in and aircraft in the world will not alter the fact that this is not 1941, when the offence held a decisive advantage--for a time. Eight decades of developing arms and tactics to stop combined arms offensives followed. Zero reason to expect traditional breaching and exploitation by maneuver warfare elements against an opponent all set up and waiting with a full suite of modern countermeasures (including anti aircraft missiles), can result in anything but a snail's pace advance with prohibitively huge casualties at best. And that goes for any army trying it; those operations simply cannot work any more.
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  1155. I have read that the longer your legs the less likely you are to have heart trouble. Sabine looks to be OK in that department.
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  1156. Whatever. Putin is genuinely popular among the people of Russia. Gorbachev, who was appointed not elected, is hated as a disaster, so there won't be another Gorby if the people of Russia have anything to do with it.
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  1157.  DOLLY PRANE  The cameras were in places like Paris where the women were often actual prostitutes, who were humiliated but rarely killed. They keep quiet about it but in small towns there were a lot of killings and many were killed as collaborators for nothing more than going out with Germans.. Revenge would be shooting the Germans but these heroes did not have the guts so killed silly girls when it was completely safe to instead. Many thousands of people, not infrequently female, were shot as spies during the battle of France (ie before the Germans had occupied France).The French had something of a predilection for shooting women, and I think some peculiar sexual motive was the basis of it.
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  1158. It is said the Russian "kill chain" was several hours long during the earlier stages of the war. I would say the lessons of the latest stage is that the Russians will eventually run out of mistakes to make. and get back to leading with their strengths, which are willingness to be profligate with their manpower and in the case of Wagner's tens of thousands of convicts, actually send them forward to be fired on by artillery, whereby enemy artillery reveals itself to drones and then be destroyed. Wagner in Bakhmut operates by constant rigidly planned reconnaissance in force infantry probes with lots of drones observing yet only a bit of artillery support, following which the Russian artillery (now having got its targeting info) opens fire in earnest.
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  1159.  @Marvin-dg8vj  Such payments would be for technical specialist. Consider the cost of keeping a man in a high security prison for the rest of his life.
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  1160.  @Marvin-dg8vj  https://youtu.be/Oxc9vtQJPsg?t=65
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  1161.  @rupes3618  He says the only explanation for the invasion is Putin genuinely thinks a Western allied Ukraine is a threat to Russia. The West did not understand that ..
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  1162.  @rupes3618  You think Trump is sincere in what he says; he is trying to con Putin. Worth a try, but if a country goes to war then you likely cannot get it to desist with BS any more that moral arguments and accusations. Because Russia will be the judge of what is right for it to do. The get them to cease fire Trump would likely have to escalate the war to an unbearable level. Biden didn't do that in three years because there are very real risks for America in doing so. It is a bit much for Ukraine or Europe to imply the that the US under Trump is under some obligation to take drastic action even if it remains indirect; Ukraine has not even drafted its under 25 year olds yet!
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  1163.  @CheeseLovingGuy Well because you asked, Ukraine could have abjured NATO. that is, renounced a Western alignment and become neutral forevermore; it might not have worked but it surely was worth a try. Unless being the West's crash test dummy was what Ukrainians aspired to.
    1
  1164. & Pundit, they renounced nuclear weapons though. It seems clear Kyiv politicians were planning on Nato links doing the heavy deterrence lifting, and they were holding military exercises with Nato countries in Ukraine including on Crimea by 2002. As if Nato would ever directly fight Russia. But Ukraine is not that important to the West, so it was always foolish to think Russia did not have escalatory dominance.
    1
  1165.  @brady3474  Put it this way, if China's increases in military spending were proportionate to their economic growth then their military spending would be far more than it is.
    1
  1166.  @magikclown  I don't think Washington wants Russia to really lose in Ukraine.
    1
  1167.  @pRahvi0  Mearsheimer is extremely controversial among international relations academics. He always has been.
    1
  1168.  @markhulbert4537  How could Putin stay in power were he to withdraw from Ukraine after getting on for a million Russian casualties? The EU has no money to pay for even a rump Ukraine's convergence. So the Ukrainian aim to be like Poland is now unattainable, even if it were to be allowed in NATO.
    1
  1169. Colonel Reisner says the Ukrainians have realised that using Nato tactics is playing into Russia's hands.
    1
  1170. You have an absolute legal right to do a lot of things (such as having a drink or three and walking home alone through a bad area on a Saturday night), that it is hardly advisable to do in practice because there are predictable real world consequences.
    1
  1171. They are. But a path to victory for them is begining to be discernable.
    1
  1172. If they were storing them then they thought they might need them, and they were right! You can hear artillery', mortars and grenade launchers firing before the round hits you. But that's not true of a tank gun darting forward to shoot at a line of sight target hundreds of yards away then backing into trees ect.
    1
  1173. There seems to be an assumption that, were the Russian army to be driven out of Crimea and Donbass, Russia will admit defeat and stop disturbing Ukraine with hostilities. In other words the Kremlin would sign a final settlement peace treaty . Let me ask this,: if and when Ukraine regains all its territory by military victories, how will that compel Russia to stop fighting? If anything Russia would be stronger (in logistics) fighting on the border.
    1
  1174. Biden suddenly supplying antipersonnel mines suggest Ukraine’s use of weapons other than anti personnel mines is insufficiently effective in attriting Russian infantry. But neither side is anywhere near to breaking point yet. Although Russia is suffering, its taking Ukraine down with it. It is the relative losses that matter.
    1
  1175. Instead of convalescent leave, they are issued with bottle of rum and parrot. Arrrrrrrrrr Jim Lad
    1
  1176. The geopolitics of his time yes. All anyone can be is of their time.
    1
  1177. I think Kremers's beauty was her downfall.
    1
  1178. Nato is for deterring the USSR and now Russia. Well it has worked well to defend Nato countries but in regards to Ukraine (not a Nato country), it can't deter Russia Two thousand and fourteen and 2022 are proof of that. Macgregor is exaggerating, but he is correct that by attempting to incorporate Ukraine into Nato since 2007 Nato is creating as much as confronting threats. Top officials and officers are probably not to different from ex Nato commanders Breedlove and Hodges, who see no danger in Russia being trounced (forced back out of) Ukraine through being given more US help. We do not know where the tipping point of Putin releasing he is going to lose is and considering options we do not want him seriously considering is, how suddenly it might come. So caution about what is given to Ukraine for strikes into Russia, talk about Nato forces going into Ukraine and preparations to fight Russia is warranted.
    1
  1179. Yes, Russia is being hurt over and over again. Yet they're not getting weaker, just tougher and smarter. Russians are like roaches you have to kill them all, otherwise what's the point? But there are a lot of them and more all the time.
    1
  1180. Putin is not lying when he mentions that he tried to join Nato Multiple Western leaders and Nato officials have said he did. He was fobbed off of course (as Yeltsin was before him). That was when the scales fell from his eyes: Nato was not an anti Soviet alliance but an anti Russian one
    1
  1181. Putin's job as leader of Russia i was to maintain and if possible increase its security. His duties did including no obligation to give other countries the benefit of the doubt about what their intention were or might become, let alone ignoring official Nato statement reiterated each year, to the effect that at some point in the future Ukraine would become a full member (so it was already more than a candidate). Was he supposed to wait and see if Ukraine became a full member and when it did start WW3?  @ABCBCNM 
    1
  1182. So Russia ought to have done nothing; what makes you think so?  @ABCBCNM 
    1
  1183. There is a way to avoid fighting and that is to not have different counties that can have conflicts of interest. Ukraine chose to become a separate country and it parted of friendly terms from Russia. Lo and behold, Ukraine then almost immediately began trying to join an anti Russian military alliance.  @ABCBCNM 
    1
  1184. If in doubt, RTFM. The effing manual says never use slap rounds on a 50 with a muzzle brake.
    1
  1185. The help the US gave Ukraine was in many cases not available on the open market at any price. Moreover, there was a non trivial risk of a war even a limited nuclear exchange with Russia. A big stick confrontation with Russia by throwing weapons at Ukraine would be very risky. So Ukraine has been given huge gifts. Now continuing the war is going to cost more Ukrainian lives and reduce the territory it holds, because Russia is advancing. Another year of war is not good for Ukraine or Ukrainians, especially the ones in their graves during the next 12 months. The differences between Trump and previous presidents have been exaggerated. JFK was reckless compared to Trump. Eisenhower became pres and ended the Korean war by thinly veiled nuclear threats. Did the aggressor in Korea get their just results? Nope.
    1
  1186. Musk acknowledged nothing of the kind he merely pointed out that in order the mount a major attack Ukraine was asking for Starlink coverage to be where it had never previously been provided and Musk has always made clear that Starlink is a civilian system, and in line with that it was not going to be extended for specifically military purposes. Space X is building a military system for the US to use as it wishes.
    1
  1187. Audie Murphy was a runt.
    1
  1188. The news from the Russian point of view is important to consider. Given that Putin withdraws out of all Ukraine's lands, how do you stop him continuing the war from Russia? The commentary tends to assume he would have no option except quitting. (capitulate) if Ukraine drives him out of all Ukraine. Yet exactly why he would have to is never spelled out. I suspect he would think precisely the opposite is the case, and fighting on essential to maintain the integrity of the RusFed state.
    1
  1189. They will need to reposition their artillery and its ammunition supply dumps further back, so there will be a pause before it starts up again at full intensity and effectiveness, during which time Russia can make further advances. That's momentum.
    1
  1190.  @garethamery3167  Anders is talking about the changes at Twitter and Twitter changed because it was bought by a man whose has said he is going to destroy the trans virus because he lost a son to it. Well, I provided a link to a conversation between couple of reputable commentators whose talk was taken up by the NYT, and in it Michael Lind says that the same kind of damage done to Kamala by trans Tweeters and defund the police types in their heyday on Twitter is now going to be done by right wing autodidacts on Twitter to Trump. That is looking to the future but I think it is on topic.
    1
  1191. We need a book from you on this subject Sabrina.
    1
  1192.  @katyelder.5  The Pentagon insisted that they pre approve each target inside Russia before it is hit with ATACMS. They don't trust Ukraine to not try and bring Russia into direct conflict with America.
    1
  1193. Disagree, everyone knows who did it. So to all intents and purposes it's solved. The perpetrator was protected by his country; so be it, the whole of Panama can get that bad publicity forever after if that's the way they want it. It is Costa Rica's gain.
    1
  1194.  @Suzanne1999  Disagree there is a need for an informant. I think it is as certain as can be who did it. An informant can lie but the amount of circumstantial evidence we have already is the best proof And by the way, neither the Dutch or Panamanians ever said the girls got lost. In fact that was ruled out. The accident had them falling over a cliff where the night photos were taken, and the first person to identify that location is ... you can guess.
    1
  1195.  @Suzanne1999  I am not sure about this guy being at all easy to catch in any country. What the perpetrator did making use of knowledge gained in his line of work and cellphones and cameras, was so planned, thought out in advance, complex and unusual, it took almost a year to realise it was him all along. By then the evidence was surely long destroyed. Detectives in less civically advanced countries have their ways of getting confessions, and I am not talking about subtle tactics, so if Panama had wanted him, they'd maybe have had a better shot than the police in the US.
    1
  1196. I really did LOL
    1
  1197. Prolly while banging a woman other than his loyal wife.
    1
  1198. Is the Ukrainian offensive against retreating Russians also going to be called a "counter attack"?
    1
  1199. If you read (carefully read) the article, the Ukrainians actually sent that video to the British as a response to an official request for proof that the Ukrainian military were using the NLAWs properly! This stuff they were using for a glorified fireworks show has to be paid for by cuts to UK social spending, such as the care for my old mum and dad, which is a matter of quality of life, and death. Meanwhile 24 year olds are cavorting in Kyiv nightclubs. Brits have ever right to be angry and feeling let down.
    1
  1200. They can quit, but they cannot be defeated in Ukraine without unspeakable risks. America is not trying to defeat Russia, that would be too dangerous.
    1
  1201. Or Trump is trying to lull Putin into thinking he has a friend in the White House. And once he hooks Putin Trump will do the dirty on him. He has a rep for that kind of thing.
    1
  1202. Anti Turtle Tank rifle.
    1
  1203.  @phd1313 But we know that on day eleven someone is still strong enough to put the phones and camera (without any message for their families on either) in the backpack and securely fasten it. Of course that is easy to come up with an innocent reason for, just as can be done for many other strange facts known, yet while each odd thing can be easily explained when considered individually. Yet, if taken in the round the totality of anomalies is persuasive (by my way of thinking) that in all probability we are dealing with male criminal activity towards undefended young women with a contemporaneously fabricated cover narrative on the phones and camera. That the night photos where Kris's hair is seen were taken in the early hours of the morning during a thunderstorm a week after they vanished reeks of the clandestine. It is highly unlikely they left the trail willingly to enter scratchy forest as they had bare arms and legs. Judging by how clean their bra were they both took their bras off at an early stage. Lack of decomposition products on the denim shows Kris died without her shorts on. Them getting naked in the jungle pretty far fetched. But what makes this an obvious double homicide is on the day of the hike both their phones got switched off one hour after the sole emergency call attempt (one from each of their phones twelve minutes apart). To accept an accident what happened after the failed emergency call each is neither made any retry, and instead decided to be early to bed for their first night lost in a strange jungle (maybe in order to not be bothered by people calling them during what they hoped would be a good night's sleep, they switched both their phones off at the same time and left them off for a whole 13 hours. On the 2nd (day after they went missing ) an attempted emergency number call from Froon's phone is said to have made a short-time connection, following which the call was terminated. It is an undisputed fact that Froon's phone was then left on without making a call or other activity all that night running the battery down completely by 5am and there were no more call attempts from it or Kremers's phone after that time (5am the 3rd). Everyone knows who did it.
    1
  1204. Its thermonuclear arsenal is essentially equivalent to America's, so they're not bouncing
    1
  1205. There won't be any money left for the genuine victims.
    1
  1206. Not much doubt about that, or who did it.
    1
  1207.  @gbessone  Foxtrot
    1
  1208. Not as unusual as one might think.
    1
  1209. Trump is a con man trying to get Putin to the table.
    1
  1210. Did the Warsaw Pact attack Nato?
    1
  1211.  @tihonannenkov4114  No but they kept advancing Nato until Russia decided to take military action.
    1
  1212.  @tihonannenkov4114 "Ukraine only tried to get into NATO after being invaded". Ukraine wanted a security guarantee from America, and that is still what they are after. Zelensky annoyed Trump the other day by insisting Ukraine must have such a guarantee as part of any deal to end the war, which is a perfectly understandable. After a deal the objective for Ukraine will to be to get the lost territories back. However, would it be a good strategic idea to fearlessly give Ukraine a security guarantee? Might they be motivated by revanchism to use the the security guarantee to bring Russia into direct hostilities with America?
    1
  1213.  @ChucksSEADnDEAD  No it didn't. The US made sure the text of the 1994 document specified what Ukraine was getting did not constitute a security "guarantee". When Crimea was annexed and Donbass undercover invaded in 2014 Ukraine did not have a guarantee. The sticking point currently is Zelensky is still insisting Ukraine gets a "security guarantee" from Trump. Zelensky would hardly want one now if Ukraine had already got one and it didn't work.
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  1214. trump's had more beautiful women that you have had hot dinners.
    1
  1215. WW2 started because of appeasement. WW1's origins were different. So don't imply that all we have to do to avoid WW3 is to avoid appeasement , because then you might inadvertently find yourself in a general war no one wanted.
    1
  1216. Prosecution summing up of their case, it is not the evidence,
    1
  1217.  @corellonable  It is not in America's interest for that 'exciting' scenario to be coming about, because Russia ia going to be needed to deal with a future mega power China.
    1
  1218. Mind boggling dangerous to get in the way of that heavy a vehicle's momentum especially when you are not sure what the driver is going to do.
    1
  1219. As to what ought to be treated as an existential threat by Ukraine to Russians, none but they get a vote. When Ukraine became a separate country to RusFed, it gave up the right be assumed to be no threat to Russians either now or in the future.
    1
  1220. There was an acandemic who said there was a potential for huge fires in London suburbs because of the amount of contiguous trees
    1
  1221. The general says Putin is bluffing about using a nuke. Hmm, is that 'bluffing' like he was bluffing about the invasion, eh?
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  1222. It had no value as a springboard for a Russian offensive, which is proven by them not advancing beyond it, but I think Ukraine could have found it handy for mounting an attack from.
    1
  1223. 3:19 Given that Putin is driven out of all Ukraine's lands, how do you stop him continuing the war from Russia, give the Ukrainians missiles to fire deep into Russia?
    1
  1224. 21:11 So Russia has not been able to figure ANYTHING out, and their troops are totally demoralized or dead. If that is the case why are the tanks Ukraine has been requesting for 10 months suddenly being sent?
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  1225. Storm-Z hackers! They'll be the net pedophile battalion.
    1
  1226. Wife's an M. D. , Does she wonder what you do all day?
    1
  1227.  @timonsolus  More than a decade ago the US said it would use nuclear weapons and China retorted it would hit the continental US with nukes if America tried to use nukes to defend Taiwan (this was all public although phrased in in diplomatic code but the meaning was clear). The choice is Taiwan's; their words will be taken very seriously by China
    1
  1228. She was the most experienced nurse there (although she was very young) and the doctors were doing a tiny fraction of the rounds they ought to be, she lived nearby and was sent for when the unit was short staffed . She also worked mornings a lot and that is when patients tend to die. Anyone who worked the large amount of hours in that year, when thre was a several times normal spijke in baby death spike did would be in the unit for as many deaths as she. Moreover half the excess deaths over what would be expected were ones that happened when she was NOT in the unit, and it is not clear how these were determined to not have been murder.
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  1229. Re an algorithm allowing bots to run wild promoting CIA biowarfare labs in Ukraine stories, Yup, that is bad housekeeping by Twitter. However, it must never be forgotten that spreading Trump's assertion while resident that the pandemic came from a Chinese lab was outright banned by social media on the grounds it was 'fake news' or disinformation. That ban was then quietly withdrawn. Quite a few people are saying they now think the explanation Trump subscribed to was correct. Obviously I am not a so schizy enough to believe in CIA labs in Ukraine, and I am pretty sure the COVID pathogen was accidently created and released unawares through a series of bad biosafety mistakes.
    1
  1230.  @andrzejklein7846  Roosevelt was obstructed until his second term, at which point it was accepted that his policies were the people's will. Nixon had a rapprochement with China because as he said Russia and China being close tipped the balance of power irreparably against the West. There cannot be open ended support of Ukraine without reference to global considerations or other demands on the US's resources, which are limited whatever ethereal rhetoric about freedom may suggest.
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  1231.  @thomaslangdon2516  Yeah , yeah Putin got Trump elected the first time. But he has been elected Pres again, with an actual majority of the votes this time, so if you are talking about democracy you are talking about Trump.
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  1232.  @Takeawayking971  Maybe so originally, but it is a status thing for Russia now, It cannot quit and continue to be taken seriously.
    1
  1233. It is also a clear path for Russia coming into direct conflict with American forces, if Putin fails to act as Anders expects.
    1
  1234.  @AfterTheIce-q4j  It ought to have happened in 2007. The mistake was not following though.
    1
  1235. Britain announced a "Total Exclusion Zone" in the Falklands war", and destroyed a ship outside it. Maybe Anders and others ought to consider whether Russia thought Ukraine was low hanging fruit, or whether Russia just got desperate to halt the move of Ukraine into the Western camp. Personally, I think the Russians see themselves as having a Nato boot on their neck, one that is pressing down. The Russian Black sea fleet is only weak conventionally
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  1236. The EU don't like that Trump insists EU countries start paying for their own defence instead of freeloading on American taxpayers; the EU hate him and will harm his chance of becoming Pres again any way they can. Judges do pay attention to public and elected politicians' concern. Never forget, the government can do anything it feels it has to do, such as conscript you into the army and send you off to die in a war. There has to be order in the country so it is fair enough to convict those who are involved in advocating disorder. The reason there were these riots is because the far right men who were actually rioting already have criminal convictions and no substantial job to protect. I don't agree with people making inflammatory social media posting people being sentenced non suspended prison sentences unless they have previous convictions some kind. It is making clear that there is two tier policing.
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  1237.  @johnsmart2616  What great evidence of intelligence did his predecessor show during years in the job pray tell?
    1
  1238.  @johnsmart2616  The UK has relatively stagnant growth and an inexorably rising social spending share of the national budget which the Exchequer balances by taking ever more from Defence. All a politician can aspire to be is a master of rhetoric
    1
  1239. I was waiting for Mr Edward Lucas to provide a way out of this current drama but he almost seems to be saying that its too late for that now. It is a bit puzzling to me why Lucas thinks decision making that avoids war is a weakness.
    1
  1240. Ukraine wants to bring the US into direct conflict with Russia. Tail wagging the dog.
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  1241. I never understand why people think Russia would quit because of Western resolve. If Russia did that they might as well disarm because no one would ever take them seriously again. Even the Russians would cease to take their country seriously if it could not sustain a war in Ukraine. At present, after two years the Russians are fighting to take a city only 20 miles from their borders, which is a truly bathetic performance. So no, it is not a matter of mere Western will, the self image and objective status of Russia in the world is a factor in how much will the Russians have to go on.
    1
  1242.  @HuskyOwner-bl1jf  That is very exaggerated But the US would have to do something..
    1
  1243.  @conflictclips  Difficult to say but I think it would be chosen as a demonstration of Washington's resolve but hot one that Russia might feel obliged to go tit for tat in response to,
    1
  1244.  @jonesmorales-tu6kq  Yes the jungle does not preferentially target sexy young women.
    1
  1245. He knows his way around town, not the remote trails.
    1
  1246. Steroids will do that to you.
    1
  1247.  @JOHNDOE-ry6rd  At Golds gym?
    1
  1248. An appeal is a different thing. She would be wise to get a specialist in that area.
    1
  1249. Russia has retreated behind rivers where it was losing and where they are staying put they will rotate units out of the front line. If things got as bad as you say, the Russians are as likely to do a flight forward and advance rather than stay put' and die anyway.
    1
  1250. Putin tried to join Nato you know, this was in 2001 and he was given the runaround. Be all that Dark Triad stuff in his make up as it may, the question is would any Russian leader have acted differently? The current head of the CIA published a book in which he recalled a memo to Bush noting that during his years in the Moscow Embassy never one did he meet any Russian (even liberals sharply critical of Putin) who thought the Ukraine joining Nato was acceptable. Bush ignored that advice and the accompanying conclusion that Russia would make mischief and went ahead with persuading the other Mato members to agree to an announcement Ukraine would join Nato. I would also point out that Ukraine has not joined Nato because Putin prevented it by sponsoring an uprising in the Donbass in 2014. Ukraine is a Nato partner working towards full membership officially. If it was never going to join why did Biden not announce that, it would be cocession but a meaningless concession. Biden and his advisrs didn't think Putin would invade. Putin said unless he got some concessions on Ukraine he would take 'military and technical measures'. The people in charge of US foreign policy are liking in the past; Ukraine is not West Germany during the Cold War. Did JFK had psychopathic traits for trying to overthrow the government of Cuba for allying with the USSR? Cuba was a sovereign state. Then he almost started a nuclear war because Cuba hosted US missiles. There is a US missile base in Poland opening later this year and it would be 300 seconds hypersonic flight time from Moscow
    1
  1251. It will be even more of a failure if they don't take any more of it.
    1
  1252. Who wants Poland? @rorychivers8769 
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  1253. Is he going to pay back his surities now?
    1
  1254. @ Guarantee has a very particular meaning in international diplomacy. Obviously the American State department did not want to give Ukraine a guarantee, and they didn't..
    1
  1255.  @matthewpollard5689  The interviewer used the words security guarantee and the ex ambassador used the words security assurance as if they meant the same, which implicitly asserted that Ukraine was given a security guarantee.
    1
  1256. That is what people (including Zelensky) thought when he threatened to invade Ukraine
    1
  1257.  @mylifeasmalu  Are you serious? The rucksack had not been in the water.
    1
  1258. Say Putin had raised no objection to Ukraine joining NATO. Then he would have to fear being overthrown.
    1
  1259.  @justaguy-69  Yes and Tsar Alexander I could have agreed to Napoleon's terms, the army would have just accepted that. Not
    1
  1260. The Russians will get a vote of what their reaction to the Kerch Bridge being destroyed with the close assistance of Germany and Britain. They might decide some kind of dramatic escalation was necessary. From their point of view it certainly would be.
    1
  1261. But it is worth it to them. And they are not going to quit. So what is Ukraine's plan for winning the war?
    1
  1262.  @mikoto7693  OK they have lost the war. Meanwhile. they are still fighting, and the Ukrainians cant make them stop.
    1
  1263. Matt's book says we fight for belonging and status. Failing against Ukraine would make Russia not longer a major league country. And the deaths of Russians in Ukraine are a 'sunk cost' So how are the Russians going to be made to quit?
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  1264. He is in show business so he gets a show trial (being brought into hearings in chains). We saw him hit his partner of 11 years once in a hotel lobby, and the judge asking him 'what's love got to do with it'. In other words 'Case closed'; he is getting at least 20 years.
    1
  1265. Trump is trying to con Putin. And pressure Zelensky. Who stands to benefit from peace? Not Zelensky!
    1
  1266. Mistakes have been made by everyone. But the biggest one of all was made by Zelensky, who did not believe Putin would go through with it until Russian tanks were revving up across the border.
    1
  1267.  @namesurname2205  Could you expand on that please?
    1
  1268.  @arildsther2626  Mearsheimer's military analysis is basically the big battalions win, and the invasion force was small for a full on invasion. Every military expert said the force was too small. So Mearsheimer may have been influenced by that. He apparently thought it was a bluff ploy build up to exert pressure. (as did Zelensky). One thing that ought to have been considered by Mearshiemer is the the preceding Russian build up amassed huge artillery ammunition dumps near Ukraine, which remained in place and were added to. So if you looked at artillery there was a logistical basis.
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  1269. In the current battle for Bakhmut Ukraine is avoiding urbanised combat in the city but on the offensive around the it while using HIMARS strikes to attrit the Russian artillery. This is a cleverer operation than going toe to toe with an ever burgeoning Wagner was, and while it is true that Wagner surely lost good troops at a high rate in the begining of their offensive the Bakhmut battle, their methods altered and they brought in the Z penal volunteers to front the advance and take many of the casualties, which although little reported are in a great many cases caused by mines. I think Ukraine ought to have adapted to the change in the Russian tactics with one of their own. Instead, Ukraine kept on with with the same dogged defence throughout.
    1
  1270. Maybe but he went down that path to avoid passively remaining in an inexorably and ever less secure position Nato was maneuvering the country he leads into; he doesn't see any other way. And if Russia goes it will take the West down with it. So a suicide pact then.
    1
  1271.  @gorillaguerillaDK  Moving them back simply means that the closer they get to the Russian border the more densely packed and abundantly supplied the army of Russia will be. Austen is asking in the news today for a Western effort to provide Ukraine with arms f This is all very well but there are limitations in the range and quantity (HIMARS for example) of what Ukraine is given. A final victory is unattainable with this underwhelming help, which is a recipe for a bloody stalemate; exactly what Austen has already said the US wants. I think eventually Ukraine's population will call a halt to the sacrifice when it dawns on them what any attainable 'victory' will look like. Namely, Ukraine sufferings death and life changing injuries to tens of thousands of patriots in endless combat for modest gains with a less agile but more fatalistic opponent, and being depopulated by emigration to avoid the war and endless conscription. .
    1
  1272.  @daledelatte9607  The victory for Ukraine would have been deterring the Russian invasion, which happened after Ukraine had already lost Crimea and eastern Donbass.. Ukraine already had a demographic collapse problem, a long war without any prospect of ending will lead to a loss of the best people be emigration and refugees he decline to return. There is nothing worth going on with the war for over a year. Unless you think they can just import Turks en mass to get the agricultural work done after it is all over and Ukrain had a massive shortfall in workers and taxpayers.
    1
  1273.  @gorillaguerillaDK  We are back at how badly the Russians are doing. While that may well be true, the cost for Ukraine of humiliating Russia is a very high one already.
    1
  1274.  @legrandliseurtri7495  Other wars ended. Ukraine was offered a deal and in 2019 Zelensky was posed to accept it. but Poroshenko and the nationalist demos made him go back on the agreement. It is really hard to understand what was offered then as more unacceptable that the death and infrastructure devastation of the current war,. which will not be over until Russia says so and Russia can never be trusted not to restart it. A loss for Russia is already a fact but that does not mean Ukraine gets a win, especially as what was offered to them in 2019 is better than anything they will get now.
    1
  1275. They don't care very much what Europe thinks now. They voted him in and knew exactly what they were getting . America did its best for Nato and for the last three years Ukraine too and now the free ride is over. Europe is not the centre of the world any more.
    1
  1276.  @pjhgerlach  American see it differently.
    1
  1277.  @XxmillerniaxX  Factor in the risk to America in targeting Russian army sometimes even inside Russia. ATACMS stirkes require the US to load an appropriate set of terrain recognition images for each target. But no good deed goes unpunished when you are trying to help Ukraine.
    1
  1278. People said that about fracking, that it wouldn't recoup the huge loans used for investment in it.
    1
  1279. They will but just keeping the war going does not make much sense for anyone by now.
    1
  1280. Very fast landing and killed a number of good pilots.
    1
  1281. Rhetorically shaky Sabrine, although there may be some misunderstanding because you are not using words from your first language. Anyway, the F word is not used by native English speakers of your intelligence and qualifications in a public intellectual context . I am here to tell you'll be taken MUCH less seriously for having uttered it.
    1
  1282. If Bakhmut really was important, Combat Veteran Reacts would say if was unimportant.
    1
  1283.  @SwissMarksman  "I don't understand why people still debate this". Say things like that and you throw down the gauntlet. As challenger you don't get the choice of weapons..
    1
  1284.  @jjmbeausoleil  There are no missions or tasks beyond drawing fire as a way for drones to gather targeting intel on Ukrainian heavy weapon positions to the rear of the trenches. The Wagner convicts' lack of battlefield survival skills is a feature not a bug.
    1
  1285. Michael Bynon is like virtually everyone in the West, careful to never say anything that could encourage the Kremlin, although I suspect he knows some things that might. Just remember that no analysis you hear is completely independent of who the person giving it wants to win. Despite being told by everyone that the Kremlin to ask for terms to stop a revolution, they are stubbornly fighting on. Attrition strategies depend on what the opponent is willing to accept, and it is now apparent that Russia has been widely underestimated in that regard. No one knows what will happen if Russia keeps fighting to the better end, because it definitely remains a non conventional superpower
    1
  1286. It's not like he had tremendous potential for a regular life, his father was a criminal.
    1
  1287. You may want to take a look at what is being said about the late Chis Kyle (American Sniper) and his commander Jocko, who has a YT site and other businesses cashing in on his Special Forces cachet. They were shooting at anything that moved. Seagal's portrayal is the most accurate.
    1
  1288. They are using T55s and convicts.
    1
  1289. Every advance of Russia (100 million more people than Ukraine) has been and will continue to be attributed America not supplying enough arms,
    1
  1290. It is a smokescreen to hide that if Ukraine gets nuked because Putin is not willing to take any more humiliation, Nato will do nothing.
    1
  1291. This is going to be a hot potatoes for Starmer.
    1
  1292. Not much geopolitical analysis of how Putin saw Ukraine as anything but a victim:. 'Putin assumed Ukraine was a politically weak state that would give in under pressure from great power Russia and when it didn't he underestimated it militarily and attacked it'. The use of force had nothing to do with the fact that Ukraine had an official NATO decision that it was at some point in the future going to become a full member of NATO, which was reiterated ever year since 2008? As a Russian leader Putin was wrong to believe the NATO announcements and act to permanently forestall them? Putin had tried pressure, hybrid war/ annexation/ undercover invasion by whole battalion tactical groups by 2015 and still failed to achieve his key objective of ensuring Ukraine could never join NATO. We don't actually know that Putin was certain an invasion of Ukraine would be easy by 2022, when Ukraine had improved its capabilities and had already got some military understandings with and support from the US and other Nato countries. We do know he ordered a full scale invasion in 2022 and it did not work at all well. Prediction requires understanding of the motivation of possible actions, not assuming they were some sort of caprice.
    1
  1293. That is why the Ukrainians are advancing.  @AnthonyOMulligan-yv9cg 
    1
  1294. I started off having sympathy for Ukraine  @Paraiso001 
    1
  1295. I was watching very good TV interview with the former deputy head pf the Treasury and as a matter of fact the defence budget had been raided for a very long time to avoid putting taxes up because social spending is inexorably increasing. Robbing Peter to pay Paul is an alternative that no longer exists.  @stephenmuir5030 
    1
  1296. Ukraine can't negotiate because it can't trust Russia? Well, given that the Russians no doubt now regret halting their offensive in 2015 against a weak and demoralized Ukrainian army in return for the Minsk agreement, which proved worthless because Ukraine only agreed to it as a ploy to stop the fighting because they were losing (Poroshenko has admitted this) , I doubt Russia would take Ukraine's word on anything now. .
    1
  1297. It has always been standard practice in the North Korean army.
    1
  1298. John Gray: Net Zero and the age of absurdity https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5g-zIudeFAU
    1
  1299. She could be but the evidence is not there.
    1
  1300. Totally agree. And General Miley who is no fan of Trump was advocating negotiation years ago.
    1
  1301. Shortening their line. Freeing up their best troops. This was not factored into the Ukrainian plan I suspect.
    1
  1302.  @yuriydee  It is noteworthy how the Russian generals have no problem with getting this withdrawals authorized by the Kremlin. If Putin is starting to give his military professionals carte blanche to do their job, then that really is the worst case scenario for Ukraine.
    1
  1303. Obama stood alone and refused Blinken's advice to start supplying arms to Ukraine in 2014. Trump needed a lot of persuading to supply arms to Ukraine, and they did not get much. Biden came in and there was a deluge of weapons for Ukraine; how is that working out for them?
    1
  1304. Although it certainly is within the bounds of possibility, your proposed explanation cannot be accepted as the least unlikely way the night photos came to have been taken. The photo of the back of Kris's head was in perfect focus and framed so only her hair was visible. While this might have happened by accident, much more probable is it was the result of careful staging. If the photo of Kris was staged then the apparent fearful or hopeful signaling use of the flash in the same time period of that night is not genuine.
    1
  1305. The superannuated supreme commander seems to think if we show we mean it then Putin will just give up, not reciprocate by showing he means it even more than we do, as the Kremlin has been reacting since 2008. Wake up Clark!
    1
  1306. Russia has had an artillery advantage so far but in a year the Ukrainians will be benefiting from Western artillery production lines. The isea is to make the Kremlin come to terms, not make them desperate
    1
  1307.  @Sandoz-tq7qj  F has demolished it,
    1
  1308. That Russia is not gaining from this war in absolute terms is true but that tells us nothing about who is winning you have to elate Russia's plight to Ukraine's. Back in the 1960s there was an Italian fish 'n chip shop worker in Scotland who got really obese and decided to go on a diet. You would think such a person would not have what it took to starve himself consistently enough to be able to stick with a diet and he didn't diet, he entirely stopped eating. He fasted for a YEAR. Something very far from pleasant is going to have already happened to the people of Ukraine by the time Russia collapses from starvation.
    1
  1309. One possibility is retaliation for the killing of Ukrainian grain logistics tycoon and militia funder Oleksiy Vadatursky, who was killed 3 weeks ago in what Ukraine said was an assassination by Russia using a targeted missile attack on his mansion, shortly after negotiations in which he participated that ended with the Russians had agreeing to let the shipping of grain resume. I could have being a 'wild' (ie unauthorized) operation by some hotheads in the many militias and army branches. That Ukraine is denying any involvement at all certainly raises my suspicions. The argument that Ukraine would not have done it because it would be counterproductive is weak because Ukraine is in a war with Russia, which invaded it after Ukraine refused to compromise, and you cannot get more counterproductive than that. I think it is very telling that the woman being accused is a real person, yet she has not come forward to say she was innocent, or even reveal where she is.
    1
  1310. 18:25 well the Russians initiated the war by invading Ukraine and despite endless disasters and disappointments they show no signs of quitting, so its dubious that they lack morale or faith in their cause.
    1
  1311. But will there be any Ukrainian soldiers left. Troops are the one thing the West is not going to supply.
    1
  1312. But by John Kirby's own account at least half the casualties were convicts and thus them being KIA rather being kept in prison is a saving to the Russian state. The Chinese Nationalists disregarded US advice on how to employ US military aid. How did that work out for them? Ukraine may, like the Chinese nationalists, think that US aid is open ended but that will not apply if Ukraine just does what it wants with it and assumes America has no option but to keep giving.
    1
  1313.  @Cannon_Fodder_Russians  But you do not know how the straightforwardly worded comments get voided. Good luck in your echo chamber
    1
  1314. PS. The Ukrainian fanfaronade about their imminent mighty offensive was intended to get the Russians dedicating all their resources to digging in, thereby obviating any Russian attack. Ukraine is not going to seriously attack. It's 'leaves on the tracks' BS.
    1
  1315. So the Russians are going to quit? I don't think so.
    1
  1316. Shkreli finds Ellison's looks egregious for a big time fraudster's girl, but Sam didn't pay for his women.
    1
  1317. Females with medical experience are also going to be coscripted in Ukraine.
    1
  1318. Better that than his evil grin.
    1
  1319. The tail has stopped wagging the dog because its taxpayers got fed up.
    1
  1320. Very impressive modern Mandarin.
    1
  1321.  @Tom_Quixote  I think it was fun for him at first.. He actually says in this one that it is not clear who is winning, which is a lot more downbeat than his usual summary. Reading between the lines, I think he is becoming a lot less sanguine about Ukraine's prospects.
    1
  1322.  @GalAxy-u9s  I think this whole thing is the tail wagging the dog because countries like Poland and Denmark were instrumental in pushing for Ukraine to be in Nato.
    1
  1323. He as a NATO commander would have used tactical nuclear weapons on a Russian invasion of NATO if NATO were losing conventionally. It is not clear why he would think the Russian commanders would react differently.
    1
  1324.  @Mt-zr5bf  The oversized main gun means that turret ring would have to be larger than any existing tank. In Ukraine Western tanks like that are not being used in their traditional role but as fast SP guns.
    1
  1325.  @marygersten862  JFK insisted the protective Perspex shield be left off the limo in Dallas even though his wife was beside him. Innately reckless not just with himself but with those who depended on him. All the Kennedy men were like that.
    1
  1326. It was a deliberate strike on that building by Ukraine using HIMARS. Of course the Russians are going to break the rules to trick Ukraine in order to stop them blasting Russian command and supply hubs non stop.
    1
  1327. If Britain was anything like a closed system then yes, but that is completely unrealistic. There not only is immigration, but the civil service economists consider it essential that immigration increases (publicly they don't say that but former members of the Tory government have said immigration is pushed very hard by the Treasury). The number of people in the UK is already more than the government figures estimate, maybe many millions more, and is going to climb annually for the foreseeable future.
    1
  1328. Your smile when you says 'that's what we will talking about today' never looks right. But your faces in the thumbnails are priceless.
    1
  1329. A lot of stuff the West talks about they have never actually done against a peer. No one has, and it seems when put to the test all this combined arms mobile warfare clever stuff does not work any better for Ukraine than it did when the the Russians used similar methods in the initial attack on Kiev.
    1
  1330. Re 4:50 which is a scenario of a American conventional attack on Russian forces in Ukraine in retaliation for Putin's battlefield thermonuclear weapon use, Russia would have already crossed the Rubicon of theatre thermonuclear weapons in anger when conventionally bested. We are being led to believe that Putin using more tac nukes on the Americans (while the US is directly attacking the Russian army and killing tens of thousands of its soldiers) would be out of the question for him. Well why wouldn't he?
    1
  1331.  @kristycampbell5986  It will not happen . because Putin is about to more than double his force, and because it is part of Russia now he can use conscripts in the occupied territory and the parts of Donbass and Kherson that have never been occupied, maybe triple it, That was the real reason behind the annexing. Let us put how the war is actually going for Russia to one side. Now, assuming a hypothetical looming defeat for Russia, what might their reaction be; to think they are obliged to accept that they are a third rate country?; because that is what being defeated without daring to clearly threaten to use and then if ignored actually use some of the smallest types in their enormously expensive collection of various nuclear weapons against the conventionally armed medium sized country of Ukraine would amount to for Russia. To be clear Russia in this scenario would not be able to get Ukraine to surrender the land currently unoccupied by Russia; no, the most that would happen I think is Ukraine has to be satisfied with it being a somewhat smaller county.
    1
  1332. Dr Grande isn't talking about those photos( he nighttime photos that were taken in the early hours of 8th April). , Dr Grande is talking about the last photos taken on a week earlier, the day Kris and Lisanne went missing, which was 1st April. He has got completely confused about the timing of the attempted emergency calls on the day they disappeared and thinks the girls tried to call the emergency number, then went back to taking touristy photos that day. Such is not the case and he has misunderstood the sources. The last photo taken by the girls on the day they disappeared was at 215 pm.. It was two and a half hours after they took this, their last photo on the day they went missing, that a single attempted emergency call came from each of their phones. If you don't believe me you can hear him state his incorrect version in the above video at 10:52.
    1
  1333. The AMX tanks are death traps that don't protect from even artillery fragments.
    1
  1334. The Russians would have the ammunition, but they can't win key artillery duels any more
    1
  1335. Why wouldn't they want to be in an assault unit? Being in combat is good for a career officer's promotion prospects.
    1
  1336. The average Russian man dies in his 50s anyway.  @herbtapp3031 
    1
  1337. Ukraine has not even drafted its young men but it wants to be part of Nato to be defended by other countries' young men.
    1
  1338.  @stevenpace892  Zelensky proposed the minerals deal, not Trump.
    1
  1339.  @trustnoone98  Zelensky broached a rare earth deal, not Trump. Weapons, intel and targeting system usage Ukraine gets from the US are in a great many cases unavailable on the open market; the value of them is realistically orders of magnitude more than the accounting has it.
    1
  1340. Ukraine still wishes to maintain its (theoretical) total freedom to (try to) ally with whoever it wants. Ukraine does not like the practical real world consequences of its theoretical freedom: war without end.
    1
  1341. Dr Ramani is overlooking a possible path to undesirable escalation because if what he says comes about it is hardly likely to merely result in an end to denial in the Kremlin assessment of how the war is going for them and evolve into seeing things just right. Isn't Russia's view much more likely to overshoot an accurate perception of reality and land in some degree of erroneous catastrophizing. None can say what further octave of human conflict the Russian military leadership might ask Putin to authorise while over dramatising their situation.
    1
  1342.  @MarkErikEE  So far the military experts' about how the much vaunted combined arms can still be effective in offence by mobility against a network of AA missiles with drones and other innovations have proved to be wrong, and defence is stronger. Modern defences consist of ever denser layers with the initial ones intended to take the steam out an attacker rather that stop them instantly. While the Western way of war is don't sent a man where you can send artillery shells, Ukraine cannot just lob mines into the Russian rear areas, they will have to breach the multilayered defences and then move though to regroup then tackle the next defence belt while dragging a ponderous logistical tail with them. They are not even into the first line yet IFAIK. Mines are key and artillery laid mines a good thing to have, yet Russia has been given time for constructing multi triggered minefields in the main defence belt that is still to be encountered. Rely on it, we will be hearing much more about the Russian minefields, which clearing while under pinpoint drone recon/ targeted artillery's fire will require an extreme level of commitment
    1
  1343.  @nataliescott1914  Ten days of operations like this and Ukraine would have none left. Moreover, the troop who survive such jaunts will be forever after loath to advance as insouciantly. That is the other side of the 'battle' hardened coin: those who have never seen action and are fresh from training are the most willing to push forward.
    1
  1344.  @MarkErikEE  Russian minefields that stop Russian troops retreating; are you sure that is a bug and not a feature? I think you mean the second layer of the first defence line not the second line. Having the enemy unable to move due to HIMARS being used on the actual battlefield is also going to force them to stay in their fortifications where the officers will make them stand and fight. This is not going to be Kharkov where social media posts about the Ukrainians behind them will get the Russian army abandoning their positions (and being hunted down individually by little drones), they'll be safer where they are. The last layer of the Russian defence line is all round fortified on the bases, so the Ukrainians will be fighting on reversed fronts while still having to press on, and resupply columns will add a ball and chain of impedimenta. Even if resupplied, how will they rotate those manning the spearhead to prevent exhaustion as they encounter one lot of fresh Russian defenders after another? Sounds like the unfeasible attempted application of cherished military theories to an Everest of practical 'friction' difficulties to me
    1
  1345. The defence budget has been raided for social spending for decades. They can get Nigerians to keep troop numbers stable.
    1
  1346. It's more Hydra. Russian can add 100,000 trained soldiers a year. They are not losing unless more than that number of regulars are being subtracted from the Russian armed Forces though KIAs and seriously wounds and the attrition ratio greatly favors is the Ukrainian army. It is a big ask.
    1
  1347. 'Over here mate, on me head!'
    1
  1348. Yes I agree. He will be remembered for showing us what they actually looked like.
    1
  1349. Artur, Musk at considerable cost to himself was assisting Ukraine to defend themselves and their territory from an invasion. Then they used used Starlink to attack deep inside Russia proper with drones. He does not want his satellites shot down.
    1
  1350.  @nil7148  He is the most inexperienced person to ever lead a country, and got elected promising to end the Donbass conflict while regaining Ukraine's lost territories (implicitly suggesting he'd achieve all this while maintaining a Washington alliance orientation). Unreasonable promises to make.
    1
  1351. You said at the time of the video with the pile of bodies he was showing signs of mental instability.
    1
  1352. Putin started the war, which was a huge escalation. Russia being conventionally fragile does not affect that they have nonconventional options to escalate the war, and keep escalating.
    1
  1353. Is Orla trying to get herself killed?
    1
  1354. Seven hundred thousand military age Ukrainian men have left the country since the invasion and 200, 000 are in Germany living on their generous full state benefits as ' conscientious objectors'. Yet even though many left the country and of those still in it no one under 25 has to serve in the Ukrainian armed forces, Russia cannot take Kharkov, which is less than 20 miles from the Russian border. Ukraine has to be admitted to Nato to defend it but if Ukraine loses Russia is supposed to keep going and attack Nato countries, so what use in Nato membership for Ukraine then?
    1
  1355. Half of the population of Gaza are kids. Literally.
    1
  1356. Russia did not continue the attack after taking Bakhmut, yet Ukraine is trying to recapture it. I think that Ukraine in Bakhnut threatened the Russian line which is why it is being so doggedly held against the current Ukrainian effort trying to break the Russian line in Bakhmut; both sides obviously think deeper behind Bakhmut is an an inviting weak spot for a Ukrainian exploitation and somewhere Russia will have trouble getting their reserves to.
    1
  1357. You cannot give foreigners big payments and ask ordinary Ukrainians to serve beside them for nothing.  @peetky8645 
    1
  1358. He said in an Economist magazine article a few weeks ago that the technology of military's surveillance was making defence dominant over mobile warfare, And the Western MSM are attributing his sacking to the fact that he asked for 500,000 more men to be mobilised.  @betterdonotanswer 
    1
  1359. Too dangerous. They'll draw fire.
    1
  1360.  @philipmulville8218  As an active duty officer in the Danish armed forces (Denmark was red hot for Ukraine joining NATO), he cannot be rude about the Ukrainians, but Kofman is an easy target
    1
  1361. I liked him in the begining but the quality of his analysis declined as he increasingly looked for a bright side from Ukraine's point of view
    1
  1362.  @dpelpal  Going toe to toe with anyone is in the real world going to result in getting hurt, but something pretty unpleasant is going to happen to Ukraine before Russia is on the point of collapse
    1
  1363. Assaro was a POS who had the Lufthansa robbers (and in several cases their wives girlfriends too) murdered to avoid paying them.
    1
  1364. Desperate for light at the end of the tunnel the Kremlin must indeed be by now; Ukraine is an opponent best avoided; there has been to much sacrifice of troops on both sides for either to quit. Yes, Ukraine is Putin's nemesis, but he is also Ukraine's nemesis. In other words just because Russia is doing increasingly badly that does not mean there is going to be any future improvements for Ukraine
    1
  1365. If it comes it won't be there. The feigned one then the surprise attack against a weakly held section. Surely the Russian are not going to fall for that ploy again!
    1
  1366. It is a fetish the guy had. He obviously got into that case for his own sexual gratification, maybe he liked to be humiliated or even beaten. There was a British MI5 guy who died that way. Kinky stuff that the partner asks you to do is not a crime unless there is a reasonable expectation death or serious injury might result. Or intent to do such. They have to prove their case and this is not the Feds. Yes for a woman release in her 50's would mean she alive but it would also mean she was past the menopause by the time she got out and in a female's lived reality that is a HUGE consideration. . I think the answer to her question of whether her decision to reject the deal is worth it has to be: yes to her it is.
    1
  1367. "He {is} an attention whore". You cannot get more feminine than that!
    1
  1368. But that will be extremely difficult because it is the interpretation of the evidence that is at issue. There has to be new evidence for a Criminal Case Review
    1
  1369. ​ @thomasbaader6629  Hodges was so right at the very begining about the invasion not working, but since then he has been completely unrealistic about the big picture. Like all these guys he has been conditioned to see the Russians as the main threat. They are not and moreover will be needed as allies against a future mega power China. Trouncing Russia using Ukraine as a cat's paw would be relatively easy, but counterproductive in the long term
    1
  1370. Hodges was uniquely prescient about the invasion, but Washington is thinking a few moves ahead.
    1
  1371.  @maritaschweizer1117  In 1994 Mearsheimer published an article told the Ukrainians the would need their own nuclear deterrent to Russian bullying. So the Ukrainians ignored him and you can judge for yourself how good his analyses was . Putin is now using an army three times large to take a fraction of Ukraine.
    1
  1372. US taxpayers are not willing to pay for a Ukrainian victory as a gift. Putin invaded when Obama and then Biden were in the White House. It's not Trump's war, he's just here to clean up the mess.
    1
  1373.  @s0ycapitan  It's the most competitive profession there is, so they have to do podcasts that get views but it really is a waste of my time watching these I am begining to think.
    1
  1374.  @Cannon_Fodder_Russians  More attribution of strong negative emotions to Putin. Times Radio will always have an audience and commenters but henceforth I'll leave them to it. I want more concrete content than this channel can offer.
    1
  1375.  @richiecooke69  Do you think Putin comes here?
    1
  1376.  @Cannon_Fodder_Russians All I wanted was some insights on geopolitics and military science, and all I am getting lately is psychologizing.
    1
  1377.  @s0ycapitan  It has been progressively more disappointing content for some time, Especially thin for something with the Times name
    1
  1378.  @Cannon_Fodder_Russians  So for you it is all about others feeling strong negative emotions. Not the objective situation.
    1
  1379.  @Cannon_Fodder_Russians  You think what you are doing is useful?
    1
  1380.  @Cannon_Fodder_Russians  Ask to be a guest on the channel. There is increasingly less substantial content on it.
    1
  1381. Assad heads an tiny ethnic minority regime .
    1
  1382. Something in what he says, but I don't know whether Britain is going to be a long term high growth country, whatever we do. And that is mainly because of the people who inhabit it.
    1
  1383.  @mjbcswitzerland  That is what the West and Ukraine desperately hope Russian soldiers will believe. Otherwise the steamoller will meatgrind on inexorably
    1
  1384.  @mjbcswitzerland  Ukraine would do something more effective if it could. Worth a try as Russians are surprisingly gullible about Western MSM output.
    1
  1385. No Anders, for once you really ought to not end it with the conclusion that the West needed only harden its will. Perhaps you might consider what happens if the West took the total commitment to supplying Ukraine option , and those stubborn Russians' will hardened as a result of facing the humiliation of losing to Ukraine, and the Kremlin considered the final option. Ukraine is a country the West is doing its best to help; yes, in a limited way because there are constraints.
    1
  1386. They will, but if they are hit hard enough they might decide to covertly sabotage a pipeline important to the West in a third country.
    1
  1387. Wagner are highly specialised for urban offence with small assault squads and the mission in Bakhmut is going to switch to defence, which the Russian army proper are going to be best equipped and trained for.
    1
  1388.  @ericcook8254 Zelensky's fanfaronade ('we are about to mount a victorious combined arms offensive') is likely a psy op done purely because Ukraine cannot do anything more effective. Nor can Russia, because what armies have trained for since WW2 just does not work. The incremental Russia campaign in Bakhmut is not scalable.
    1
  1389. Would they be any less pathetic back in the taiga? Russian male civilians live short inebriated lives. The Wagner recruits from the Gulag are only there for the alcohol, and one last .mission. on the vodka. My cousin worked with Ukraine soldiers on a UN peacekeeping deployment and he said their intake of alcohol was constant.
    1
  1390. Slick Trump seems to give a good deal but them bilks you and walks away laughing. That is how he succeeded in business. Putin would be a fool to trust that any concessions he gets in an Ukraine agreement are solid or permanent. If there is a deal it is because Trump has duped Putin. Even Stalin was dupeable, a certain Austrian better left unmentioned managed it.
    1
  1391. What on earth is Clarke talking about Arabs thinking this might be war to destroy Israel?; sounds like an attempt to make Israel seem under an existential threat, which in reality it is not.
    1
  1392. He had surprisingly small hands, maybe they were fragile. Scott Ledoux said Holmes was the lightest punching of any top heavyweight. The Tex Cobb bout seems to support that.
    1
  1393. All this propaganda putatively pitting Prigozhin against Putin is a sign that Western intel is scared. They know what is coming.
    1
  1394. Ukraine agreeing to the minerals deal is surely a sign America is suddenly helping Ukraine in all sorts of unacknowledged yet invaluable ways under Trump. The glide bombs are reverse engineered from US smart bomb technology used in Iraq and acquired by Russia when one failed to detonate. My bet is the Pentagon had been keeping a few tricks up its sleeve on countering the Russian glide bombs until Trump put them on the table and monetarized them.
    1
  1395. A possible path to undesirable escalation. Putin getting reality therapy is hardly likely to merely result in an end to denial in the Kremlin assessment of how the war is going for them and evolve into seeing things just right. Isn't Russia's view much more likely to overshoot an accurate perception of reality and land in some degree of erroneous catastrophizing? None can say what further octave of human conflict the Russian military leadership might ask Putin to authorise while the Kremlin and their armed forces advisers are over dramatising their situation.
    1
  1396. The West could help Ukraine beat Russia but Washington just does not dare, because Russia would have non conventional options.
    1
  1397.  @stephenhill545  Eisenhower had a plan to give Germany a say in the use of Nuclear weapons and when JFK started to implement it it Khrushchev panicked. That is what Cuba was really about and the Russians got the German finger off the nuke trigger forever more. Reagan was dealing with Gorby, nuff said.
    1
  1398. Russia's troubles are relative to Ukraine's.
    1
  1399. He was extremely controversial on Israel long before Ukraine hit the headlines.
    1
  1400. The majority of Russians do not think that Ukraine ought to be allowed to become a part of what is seen as the anti Russia Washington alliance known as NATO. Had Ukraine continued its journey into the Western alliance it would have discredited Putin so much that he would have been replaced by a political opponent . Putin started the war in order to avoid being overthrown. And it has worked. He cannot lose it unless he refuses, in the final extremity, to step up to the nuclear strike on Ukraine level; why wouldn't he?
    1
  1401. Although Russians can be difficult to read, I think Putin is proceeding very cautiously by starving his commander of troops. Putin's worst nightmare is generalship like WW1's Brusilov who was militarily successful at the cost of fatally weakening the belief in the Russian supreme leader. In my opinion, Putin is currently very far from desperate, but were he to become so I very much doubt his preferred option would be throwing myriads of troops into a 'neck of nothing' offensive. Nor would he ask for terms.
    1
  1402. But until they have Nato membership and until they have a deliverable nuke, Russia would have the very best of motives to try and win the war by any means necessary
    1
  1403. The Ukrainians could get too many weapons through. Supposing they Push the Russians right back into Russia? There is a danger of an invisible line being unknowingly crossed when you say 'give then everything now'. Are we not aiming for Putin to save face and agree to a peace deal ASAP. He will not do that if American armed Ukrainians trounce his army.
    1
  1404. Some things are very difficult to explain. Dr Jayaram says he walked in on Letby trying to kill a baby, he didn't just go to the police about it but he did tell the unit managers. He and four other doctors only went to the police much later after they y were criticised for giving very substandard care to the babies in the unit in a report commissioned after a unusual splike in the number of deaths at the unit. Letby could not have been responsible for half of those deaths, and any nurse who worked as many hours as she did would have been present for the same number of deaths.
    1
  1405. In time Russian troops will seize everything he was saying he had taken, they have just have crossed the Oskil
    1
  1406. Is Biden one of them? Biden could have sent Ukraine all kinds of things two years ago, but didn't.
    1
  1407. The Western way of war taught to the Ukrainians is completely unrealistic, and they have said their instructors have no clue . In Ukraine you cannot just go around Russia minefield and they are too deep to clear a way through without being targeted. Supposing they did do it , the Russians are going to accept their defeat by Ukraine and just go home; not a chance!
    1
  1408. Xi is now stuck with Putin and vice versa. Great thinking America!
    1
  1409. It is holding on to their population following a peace deal that is Zelensky's problem. It is generally assumed that huge numbers of families, especially those with sons of 17, will leave the country as soon as the restrictions on men leaving are lifted. The aid the US gave Ukraine include things that are not available on the open market and are therefor invaluable. Moreover, the US incurred a non trivial risk of direct war with Russia by helping Ukraine and being complicit in the HIMARS/ATACMS strikes. Trump is giving Zelensky some reality therapy.
    1
  1410. Kherson in Ukrainian hands lets Russia of the hook of trying to get artillery ammunition through easily targeted bottlenecks across the river. Russia if well suppled can win artillery duels by mass effect, as is now being demonstrated in Kherson where the Ukrainians can't concentrate. Defeating Russia in a battle of attrition is not a very good strategy in my opinion. Perhaps that is why we hear so much talk about a Russian collapse. Rely on it, we will have a long wait.
    1
  1411. It was not an 'open door' to Nato for Ukraine to announce it would be joining.
    1
  1412. All this stuff about Bakhnut being some silly objective is Ukrainian psychological warfare. They would do something more effective if they could.
    1
  1413. They did not plan on the Russians withdrawing from Kherson, so that is an unanticipated reserve of good units that the Russian generals have to play with.
    1
  1414. ​ @happyjonn9242  Not qualified to deem it legally proper, no. But the way her appeal was denied because of her mere acquiescence during an interrogation when it was put to her that blood sample tests showed insulin had been used to poison babies on the ward is clearly unfair in common sense. She actively denied it was her that did it in the same response;. It was not an admission of there being at least one murderer at work in the unit, as the denial of her appeal deemed it to be. The reasoning by which the this top judges' refusal of leave to appeal said there was most unlikely to be two separate murderers at work and Letby had not contradicted the lab results assertion in the interview so she had surely been the one one using the insulin to poison is extremely convoluted. I understand that jury verdicts ought to be sacrosanct, but the defence in this case was appallingly inept, so the jury got one side of many key issues before coming to its verdict. No expert witnesses for the defence in a ten month trial heavy on prosecution medical forensic evidence is not normal.
    1
  1415.  @leew5647  Funny looking but that is what they looked like.
    1
  1416.  @matthew2531  They may have had skins to drape on them but it its known they had no ability to sew the skins to together. So they were very limited in how far North they could go because they lacked tailored clothes and portable tents.
    1
  1417.  @simonh6371  The US was changing out its golf trousers while Britain was fighting Germany. My point is Germany is a part of the West and so WW1 and 2 were Western civil wars. To get out of that unfortunate fact Nato is being used as a synonym for the West in the 30s.
    1
  1418. Russia is going to have reservists called up and trained non stop, and I expect the Russian army in Ukraine will triple before they go on a major offensive. A farther quarter of a million will be in training to serve as replacements. This is a minimum.
    1
  1419. Britain needs to invest and anyway defence spending is consumption so you cannot borrow as with productive investment. The government are predicating these defence spending increase (modest as they are) on optimistic projections of future growth over the next few years. For decades after the end of the Cold War Britain has been taking from the defence budget to pay for inexorably rising social spending without making cuts or increasing taxes.. Where does the money come from now it cannot depend of the US taxpayer to foot the bill? Europe is an economic dead zone.
    1
  1420.  @drewmalesky9869  Like Georgia
    1
  1421. If you saw one you would perceive its behaviour and appearance as that of a big ape. Neanderthals could not run, jump. or throw spears. They hadn't the brains to organise for war against other groups. They might well kill an isolated modern human that was wandered into a dark forest, but otherwise they were no match for Cro-Magnons.
    1
  1422. Boots on the ground in non NATO country Ukraine even if an NATO country is not attacked? World war three ought to be on the table unless Ukraine wins according to this superannuated commander. A Western army would trounce the Russians , so they are going to accept that . Maybe. Maybe not, and we could not control their reaction or predict it; its an untruth to imply otherwise.. Such an an uncertain outcome for Hodges's suggested course of action is worth it in order to avoid a genera; war, but clobbering the Russians with the most advanced long range strike conventional missiles would make them desperate. This either/ or extreme solution thinking of Hodges is way off kilter and is a direct path to Russia deciding to use tactical nuclear weapons. We can ll too easily guess what Hodges's solution would then be! I am not sure it anyone in power still was, but one is ever going to take Hodges's geopolitical prognostications seriously again.
    1
  1423. Ukrainians' elected representatives are the only ones who can officially cede national territory, and yes that would signal a terrible diplomatic defeat for the country and when hostilities cease Kyiv might see some changes, yet this punishment of failed elected officials by replacing them is supposed to be the Western way. Biden started as Pres by calling Putin "a killer", then had almost three years after a full on invasion of Ukraine by Russia to give ATACMS, F16s to Ukraine, and most dreaded of all by Russia, draconian oil sanctions, but did/ is about to do so only when he knew Trump was going to be the one to deal with the results. The latest Ukrainian strike inside Russia were on Taganrog which is a Black Sea port nowhere near Kursk or the North Koreans Biden was worried about Russia red lines until he lost the election but then starts expanding the strikes deep and wide so Trump takes power inextricably entangled in tit for tat escalation he cannot get out of without looking terribly weak. Biden is also giving the largest ever amount of US money yet to Ukraine and using the interest on Russian money to pay for the rest of the aid. The much more stringent oil sanctions will cause general inflation globally, and send Germany's economy down the toilet; not clear who in going to pay for the massive cost of EU convergence payments for Ukraine with the economic outlook for Bessel's banker Germany. Similarly, Trump is not going to be the one who has to deal with the fruits of mature mega-alliance between Russia with its vast untapped resources being exploited by the industrial giga workforce of China that will tilt the whole balance of world power irreparably against the West. So I expect that Trump will have to continue the war at the intensity Biden's own 'Christmas Bombing' has amped it up to by January. What I think Trump might do as an initiative against Russia is impose sanctions against China for helping Russia in Ukraine, which will kill the Russians' war effort (from microchips to spools of optic fibre for one way drones) in an attempt to slow down Chinese growth. German diplomats chuckled as Trump opposed the German reliance on Russia energy being cemented by a new huge pipeline, but Trump was right.
    1
  1424. Has Putin asked for this deal? He has only about a third of the four oblast he is has already legislated to be part of Russia.
    1
  1425. 10:10 Yes there is no discernable Russian plan to concentrate forces in concentric attacks on a decisive objective. Yet its also evident that Russia has zero intention of disengaging.
    1
  1426. Johnathan with an AN looking big and bad. Whoa, it's a slamfire
    1
  1427.  @milesnixon9554  Putin said that each of these strikes are done with the assistance of the US (terrain recognition system) and no target that the US objects to is hit, Whether of not that is true or amounts to America participating in the he said it as the rationale for saying Russia has the right to hit military bases of America in Europe in retaliation and expounded that theory as fact in an adress to the nation, which was very explicit and public, Putin can't pretend to the Russian masses who watched his speech on TV that he didn't say if the ATACMS strikes continue inside Russia then American bases in Europe will be hit in retaliation, or he meant something different. The ball is in Biden's court, his team didn't expect anything like this but the Pentagon did, which is why they opposed using ATACMS inside Russia.
    1
  1428. Oh? if you are right then America will not back down. If the US do back down over the ATACMS strikes into Russia, America will massively increase arms to Ukraine because the US cannot be made to look silly. So worse is better for Ukraine. If actual direct hostilities between Russia and the West occur that is good news for Ukraine. Zelensky wants it.
    1
  1429.  @talkingonthespectrum ATACMS have multiple systems for navigation, some can be jammed. Ditto Storm Shadow. The Americans have the cartography images that the unjamable terrain following relies on. A different set pf pictures has to be loaded for each target location And of course the target selected is often located because of US surveillance and intel. So the weapons Putin is saying Americans (and Brits to an extent) are supplying are not able to be used independent of continuing access to select the US library of terrain images, and the targeting is also quite a bit American. Yes the Ukrainians fire the things and know where their going but they need important help each time.
    1
  1430.  @talkingonthespectrum  Well you seem to know about what Ukraine might be able to do, but nothing you are saying contradicts the point that Putin made about these 2 strikes having been done with essential US assistance, and that follow are going to be seen by the Kremlin as further direct involvement on the strikes into Russia by the US, not just supply of the missiles . Putin has said this in a TV address to the nation, adding any further ATACMS strikes into Russia will ne met with retaliation in kin, on US bases in Europe. Him walking such an explicit statement back is barely possible; I think it is more likely he will do what he says.
    1
  1431.  @talkingonthespectrum  That is what Biden seems to have thought, but I very much doubt that that Biden expected Putin to go on Russia' TV virtually saying' if we get more of these ATACMS hitting a target in our country we will hit a US base'.. And by the way the US evacuated their embassy so the intel Washington is receiving alarms them.
    1
  1432. To maintain its dominance, America has to divide China and Russia. Not only would forcing Russia to accept defeat in Ukraine be extremely risky, even if the Kremlin meekly accepted the loss , Russia would be driven into the arms of China.
    1
  1433. What comes next is the war ends with Russia occupying less than a quarter of Ukraine, which builds defensive lines
    1
  1434. Live like a Russian. Die like a man.
    1
  1435. The Russians have not destroyed the bridges across the Dnieper. Why is that do you think?
    1
  1436.  @me73941  The parents sued the Panamanian government. The Panama authorities' cover up has cost their country dearly. Who would let their daughter go there now?
    1
  1437. Why keep assuming the Russian are unsuccessfully doing maneuver warfare? The Russian generals who tried showy cauldrons have failed at great cost without inflicting much in the way of causalities on Ukraine and been sacked. Some people say the Russians are trying to get Ukraine to send more into the salient, where it can be pinned and eroded through mass effect bombardments. Isn't it more likely the Russian commander is trying to bleed the Ukrainians in the only way that has been found to work? Zelensky can hope to win back most territory, but the now rapidly mounting toll of dead are all gone forever, and are being killed in a stalemate of an unimportant area inhabited by many ethnic Russians rather than a defence of the capital. It may not be militarily pretty but politiacally the Russians are being highly effective in pressuring Ukraine. Zelensky is hping to get reelected don't forget, he was actually elected on a planform of ending the long running Donbass conflict with Russia. He heeds to stand up to the nationalists instead of cave in to them as he did in 2019 when he backed out of of a final settlement brokered by France and Germany.
    1
  1438. If what you have been saying in these videos is correct Anders , then Russia's leadership is either completely deluded about how the war is going for them , or ought to already have seriously considered using a nuclear weapons against Ukraine. The only reason to think Russia won't use nukes, is because the Russians seem to think they are slowly but surely winning conventionally; if they become convinced they are losing conventionally then using theatre thermonuclear devices would surely become a viable alternative for the Kremlin to seriously consider
    1
  1439. The age of mothers at the birth of their first child has gone down in Russia even as it went up in the West ; Russia is a strange place. Anders's vid about naval drones was very informative (he ought to do more stuff like that) , but he is not a specialist in how ordinary Russians think. A Foreign Policy article: 'Ukraine Isn’t Putin’s War—It’s Russia’s War Jade McGlynn’s books paint an unsettling picture of ordinary Russians’ support for the invasion and occupation of Ukraine.' @dpelpal 
    1
  1440. I will not deny that Anders knows his stuff about sea drones. There is an academic called Jade McGlynn who likes Ukraine but hasmade a very deep study of Russians' political views, and she says that opposition to Putin is no stronger that extreme pro Putinist sentiment. The strategy of the Putin regime is to make the average Russian disinterested in politics, and conventionally patriotic by default. Yes many, many people in Russia live in villages lacking indoor plumbing, but that just shows how untypical of Russia the Moscow and St Petersburg elites who disdain Putin and want to do business Western style are.  @SianaGearz 
    1
  1441. Very opiniony. But is a useful index for how neutral the financial analysis on this channel is.
    1
  1442. The bag was also in a region not all that far from where F has a strawberry growing plot. A hike to see it was one of the tours F offered Kris and Lisanne. The other was to F's coffee plantation in Alto Romero. Seventy three days later six percent of their bones and a ball of Lisanne's skin ended up in Alto Romero.
    1
  1443. That is what war is.
    1
  1444.  @lesterquintrell4844  A very perceptive comment in my opinion.
    1
  1445.  @13thmistral  Because it is so strong in advanced aircraft and precision missiles , America does not have a much spare existing artillery supply production capacity, so the only way to nullify the Russian advantage in mongo howitzers is for the US to give ATACMs, which they are not doing.
    1
  1446. That is the problem; Neanderthals were not smart enough to prey on modern humans, because Neanderthals were not modern humans they were a different species and this was reflected physically and mentally. The Neanderthal genes that got into modern humans were just a nuisance.
    1
  1447. Portraying Neanderthals as like modern human hunter gatherers is treating them as a race of humanity instead of a separate species. They lacked technology to cope with the cold. Although their brains were large in size, Neanderthals were lacking important gene variants associated with human cognitive capabilities. And the fact is they had the evolutionary time. The Neanderthals had the time yet ever came up with tailored clothing, tents (and spearthrower darts) necessary to hunt the huge herds on the steppe tundra. Hunting humans (the most dangerous game) would be far beyond them. But they did look like big apes, and they were furry.
    1
  1448. The days of breakthrough tank drives are over.
    1
  1449. Tanks don't work offensively which is why Ukraine is copying Wagner tactics. Those work well in bad whether that tanks can't fight defensively in.
    1
  1450. Denmark was the original prime mover in trying to get the Ukrainian military qualified for incorporation into Nato. Remember that when you listen to Anders.
    1
  1451. How? How is Russia going to be compelled to quit the war by losing Crimea?
    1
  1452. When there was a freeze on US aid to China's nationalists it was a watershed, not so much because of lack of supplies, but because of the effect on the morale of nationalist troops. Evey Ukrainian soldier in Kursk knows about the new US policy and none of them want to meet their end inside Russia.
    1
  1453. Territory can be regained, supplies can be replenished, but the dead do not return to life. The Ukrainians are loosing a few hundred troops killed a day, and their biggest loss recently when they tried a bold offensive the Maneuver warfare just does not work, and the Russians now understand that and are trying to destroy the best of the enemy army by slow attrition. Moving slow lets the heavy artillery, and even more importantly, the shells for constant firing, be moved up as far forward as possible, then the defenders can be blasted out of their positions. Ukrainian casualties and Russian ones are likely about even, so it is going to be a battle of wills.
    1
  1454. There is a counter productive fringe of both left and right though. When they have Twitter dominance any fringe will have too much influence on the policy and the bounds of acceptable debate. Kamala found that out, and Trump is going to.
    1
  1455. Lissane was probably killed very quickly and put in a jungle grave where water kept the corpse cool. The perpetrators always intended to leave the phones; I think the perpetrators' intention may have altered after the reward was upped to $30,000, and they thought they needed more than the backpack for the reward A pay out for just the backpack was benied and then the boot with the foot was found. I think they's dug up the corpse of Lissane up and recovered a leg for reducing to fragments. 'finding', and claiming the reward. Kris's corpse was likely buried with lime or lye. All the bone fragments recovered were from Lissane leg bones, and the ball of skin was also from a lower leg. Hence the boot.
    1
  1456. Russia is deterred by Nato from attacking any Nato member country. But Russia could be not deterred by Nato from attacking non Nato member counties. China does not want Russia defeated. Ukraine cannot end this war, even if Russia is pushed back to its 2013 border.
    1
  1457. Russia has not had a another mobilisation because Putin wants to remain popular but also because he knows it would provoke America into giving more and better equipment. As many Ukrainians as needed to hold the Russians back can be equipped and will be equipped by America. The Russians understand that every move they made will be countered by US donating more and better equipment. Both Russia and Ukraine are instituting tough military discipline, so the troops are not going to have any choice but to fight. It is said that the Russian trenches are being constructed so the troops cannot withdraw from them safely. RusFed is not a polyglot empire like the USSR it is much more an ethic overwhelming majority nation state, and the Russians are going to benefit from patriotism no less than the Ukrainians. The Russian may lack will, but he is willing perhaps more than willing to suffer (Dostoevsky's Russian 'soul'). Breaking the morale of the populace Putin rules would be a challenge.
    1
  1458.  @wlyFwd2140 I want to learn something new. Someone who is pro Nato but sort of balanced like Maj Gen Tim Cross .
    1
  1459. If the West really wanted to defeat Russia in Ukraine then they could (it'd take 10X more arms than the West is giving though). But removing Putin from power is not a realistic objective.
    1
  1460. It is extremely bad international PR and a gift to Russia's enemy morale, but it could be seen in another way. It perhaps shows that Putin has given the Russian army generals carte blanche for politically embarrassing military decisions such as disengaging where the local dispositions and situation warrants it. Ukraine's gains made a certain area untenable no matter how well fortified, so the Russian general commanding that sector got to withdraw and straighten his line out. Putin gives the army a job to do and lets them get on with it. Generals that screw up get sacked, but if they are not rigidly controlled apart from that and left to get on with tit then the Russian army will be more effective not less.. I think Russia is minimising regular army casualties by using Wagner infantry after week long artillery bombardments and snali like progress. The plan seems to be thinking in terms of years at the current level, and anticipating Ukraine's civil society will being destablised by a war without end.
    1
  1461. North Korea is a Chinese sockpuppet. Just look at their obviously Chinese ICBM!
    1
  1462.  @evgeniya7853  'It is not impossible' that Ukraine wins if the West backs it 100%, it is also not impossible that the US would have won in Vietnam if they had been determined to.
    1
  1463.  @evgeniya7853  Neither Putin or Zelensky can end this war and survive as leader. So Trump will have to make them.
    1
  1464.  @Princip666  We do our best then they tell us what we still owe them. The money is needed at home.
    1
  1465. ​ @Princip666  There is an escalating stalemate with the cost of keeping Ukraine in the war climbing inexorably. Western countries can't borrow for military spending, because it's consumption, so there will have to be cuts or new taxes. Continuing this way would be directionless.
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  1466. Eliezer Yudkowsky's nightmare coming true: "what's a risk assessment" Russians messing with advanced AI they probably stole from the West.
    1
  1467. In reality anyone who took a shot at them was inviting death.
    1
  1468.  @kansaswildfan7106  Okay, so China is going to let its new buddy Russia lose in Ukraine? If they keep going there will be further sacrifice of Ukrainians' men's lives and there is nothing to be gained by fighting on another year by which time a settlement on the borders might mean Ukraine is left half its size..
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  1469. My impression is he is saying Russia will win and the Washington establishment have come to understand that now although it is still a publicly unspoken understanding. The forces Putin had poised on the border in 2022 were totally inadequate for what Putin seemed to expect them to achieve. Now he is using mass effect for lesser objectives
    1
  1470. If Hodges is right then is seems Russia will use a nuclear weapon. And after it crossed that Rubicon the US is going to punish Russia by attacking its armed forces directly? There would be no telling what might happen.
    1
  1471.  @Sterben_knight  What kind of a man throws his family under the bus?
    1
  1472. They have no such thing, and their weapons are inferior. Russian fragility is the problem no one is talking about.
    1
  1473. The Bank Of England was selling the county's bonds trying to tank the economy in an attempt to get rid of Truss ASAP. Sounds like the criminal offence of misconduct in a public office by the Bank. Truss was a disaster but the Bank ought not to be messing in those matters. Reeves is going to be blaming Truss every week for the next 5 year, but the truth is Britain is not going to be stable just because she has left because the economic problems are much deeper than the Truss blip (which had more than a little clandestine help from the BoE).
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  1474. That is why the West is not willing to give Ukraine what it needs to win. They want the Russians to be discouraged, not desperate.
    1
  1475.  @jcc019  Nothing?
    1
  1476. Er, there were people on the streets of Britain the other week.
    1
  1477. “The Ukrainians, increasingly with better weaponry, can make the front line quite a miserable place for the Russians.” And in all likelihood the Russians would suffer unbearably, until they found some sort of dispersal and semi counter measure to substantially ameliorate the effect of that Ukrainian weaponry to something tolerable. as the Russians have to every 'game changer' so far. Much of the Kremlin's domestic opposition left the country to avoid the draft, so while there is dissent, the war has had the net effect of politically pacifying the Russian population. Ukraine will never stop fighting without a complete Russian withdrawal?; then there will be war without end.
    1
  1478.  @GARYGUYTON-c7i  I'm sorry, Ukraine is not a member of Nato.
    1
  1479.  @michaelbinbc  Apart from the British sidekick, Europe didn't go along with the invasion of Iraq. That was the beginning of Washington wondering what they were getting for their money. America is not a charitable institution. Or an Amazon for arms.
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  1480. @ The West behaved honorably and did the best they could.
    1
  1481.  @mobiusflammel9372  It was suggested last year that massed drones would be the best way to defend Taiwan, but China using an massed suicide ones in attack on air and sea assets would be an awfully daunting prospect. Taiwan lacks strategic space and population. soould require an army of US troops there to defeat an invasion, if it got ashore. I think that the rapid development of a drone saturated low level airspace in the combat zones of Ukraine will make the US very chary of putting troops on a battlefield under constant surveillance and targeting. The American Navy must have taken note of how the Black Sea Fleet has been totally nullified The Air Force are also worried about their planes and carriers, given the use of drones to mask cruise missile attacks. China is the one benefitting from the rapid development of cheap drones, and they have the productive capacity to have unlimited numbers; they'll use surveillance ones as a series of meshed swarms in overwhelming numbers and massed attacks of low tech suicide ones to complement their high tech shire bases missiles.
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  1482. This one is about Biden, his gaffes, his gait., and his judgement in greatly increasing arms shipments to Ukraine, which happens to be one country that Russia is perfectly positioned to invade and that Russians have been threatening to invade since 2008. Obama refused his advisors' (especially Blinken's) advice to supply arms to Ukraine. The trouble with Biden is he listens to people, but the wrong ones. So much for the superiority of the US democratic system over Russia's.
    1
  1483. Those witnesses are people who earn their living from tourists visiting the trail, they did not want it thought dangerous. So they said the girls returned from hiking on it, which they did not.
    1
  1484.  @chrisgwynne1586  No witness said they were in Boquette after the hike Two men, both of whom happen to have business at the trail head depending on tourists using the trailhead, said they came back down the trail and were hitchhiking. The local police did not take that seriously, and everything else about the case suggest they died on the far side of the mountain/ continental divide. The hot springs bathing is a popular local spot, and that photo was almost certainly taken on a previous day. The reward offered would be a life changing amount for a Panamanian, someone could move to the other side of the country, buy land, a build a house and start a business with such a sum; it would have been claimed by people who saw them at the springs that day if KK and LS had been there that day. The trail ceasing to be patronized by tourists would have ruined those people who claimed to have seen Kris and Lisanne return from hiking the trail that day. Ensuring you could continue to suport your family is a massive motive to mislead in my book.
    1
  1485. Can Russia win the military production race? The the West even trying to push Russia that hard; they do not dare.
    1
  1486. Polite pinkie mag dump.
    1
  1487. They were funding research in Wuhan. And how did that work out?
    1
  1488. Seems from when he started as a doctor he must have retired from practice a long time ago.
    1
  1489. The defence had a very unusual strategy throughout the trial. It seemed to rely on cross examining prosecution expert witnesses. In a case of such extreme seriousness one wonders why it was done that way.
    1
  1490. The only person this disturbed lady was trying to do away with was herself.
    1
  1491. France is a nuclear armed state.
    1
  1492. Xi said nuclear war is unacceptable, but Ukraine has no nukes to fight a nuclear war with so Russia could nuke them with impunity. The public were told at the time of the V2 attacks on London that they were accidental gas explosions.
    1
  1493.  @q.e.d.9112  All this discussion pf whether Russia would dare threaten to use or actually use a tiny specimen of its thermonuke capabilities to stave off decisive conventional reverses is highly hypothetical. With the exception of Ben Hodges (who thinks the RusFed will be defeated and break up but not dare use nukes to stop the slide (why?), the balance of military expert opinion is for Ukraine to push the Russians back inside their own borders will be a challenge. The US does not seem to be supplying Ukraine with the advanced missiles to really shatter the Russian army. My impression is the US objective is weaken Russia slowly and surely <i>rather</i> than enable Ukraine to win ASAP. Ukraine has not accomplished a major encirclement, and their casualties are prolly running about equal. As Russia retreats the density of its forces in occupied Ukraine increases, and their lines of communication shorten, as does the front line. Hundreds of thousands of Russian reservists equipped from reserve stock across the RusFed will enable rotation of units out of the front line for resting and refitting. Xi merely said don't start a nuclear war. The Ukrainians don't have nuclear weapons if they were hit with them there could not be a nuclear war. Unless the US decided to start one which nothing in the Budapest Memorandum commits America to as it made clear at the time by insisting that what Ukraine was being given was not a " guarantee". Britain is a full member of Nato, and island with allies between it and any invader, plus an extremely close 'sidekick' relationship with the US, and yet Britain also has its own nuclear warhead ICBMs. Clearly, the US getting into a strategic nuclear war with Russia for any other country even the Nato member closest to the US ( Britain) lacks credibility. While I admit Ukraine may have more will to win, they lack escalatory dominance inasmuch were they to push Russia back out of Ukraine completely, Putin would always have an option to threaten nuclear weapons and them use them. Ukraine cannot make Russia give up and go home because Russia cant do that. I can't because it would not merely be back at square one, it would have ceased to be a credible military power conventionally, and shown itself to be a thermonuclear paper tiger. The reason Russia has so many tactical nukes is for using on China so Putin cannot let Xi tell him when he can use them.
    1
  1494.  @dearmas9068  The Ukrainians don't have nuclear weapons if they were hit with them there could not be a nuclear war. Unless the US decided to start one which nothing in the Budapest Memorandum commits America to as it made clear at the time by insisting that what Ukraine was being given was not a " guarantee". Britain is a full member of Nato, and island with allies between it and any invader, plus an extremely close 'sidekick' relationship with the US, and yet Britain also has its own nuclear warhead ICBMs. Clearly, the US getting into a strategic nuclear war with Russia for any other country even the Nato member closest to the US ( Britain) lacks credibility. America would do something to punish Russia but it would be conventional and peripheral. All this discussion pf whether Russia would dare threaten to use or actually use a tiny specimen of its thermonuke capabilities to stave of decisive conventional reverses is highly hypothetical. With the exception of Ben Hodges (who thinks the RusFed will be defeated and break up but not dare use nukes to stop the slide (why?), the balance of military expert opinion is for Ukraine to push the Russians back inside their own borders will be a challenge. The US does not seem to be supplying Ukraine with the advanced missiles to really shatter the Russian army. My impression is the US objective is weaken Russia slowly and surely <i>rather</i> than enable Ukraine to win ASAP. Ukraine has not accomplished a major encirclement, and their casualties are prolly running about equal. As Russia retreats the density of its forces in occupied Ukraine increases, and their lines of communication shorten, as does the front line. Hundreds of thousands of Russian reservists equipped from reserve stock across the RusFed will enable rotation of units out of the front line for resting and refitting.
    1
  1495.  @dearmas9068  The West would rip apart a country that had already used a nuclear weapon and was presumably ready to use one or more again again? I don't think so. The West would definitely do something but it would be deterred from going all out. China needs Russia to survive as a great power so it can be China's ally against America. Xi would say 'if you had to do it then you had to do it'.
    1
  1496.  @dearmas9068  I think an analogy is the Suez invasion of Egypt by Britain and France, which was secretly agreed with Israel (provided the pretext). The US told the European powers to cease and desist, which they ignominiously did. There was then a fundamental reassessment within the British Deep State/ Civil Service to the effect that henceforth Britain had to have foremost in its mind the requirements of Super Power America. Churchill said of the Suez misadventure: 'I would never have dared to start, and if I had I would never have dared to stop'.
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  1497. Barely and whether it can sustain this costly war at the current intensity is questionable. However, I have never understood how anyone thinks Russia can be made to completely stop fighting. Russia is such a snowflake and fragile that losing a few battles would lead to it imploding?
    1
  1498. I can't believe any human would try and mate with an unfamiliar Neanderthal. Much more likely they killed all adults but sometimes have left infant Neanderthals and brought them home as pets for the human children. Females would be less dangerous, and more likely to be fed and allowed to mature; they could be mated with quite easily.
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  1499. Former Ambassador to Ukraine Leigh Turner's plan for winning the war is the Russians start fighting themselves. But Ukraine has to win on the battlefield first. That is diplomacy for you.
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  1500. Galeotti is talking about Putin as if he can be cancelled as a purely domestic fascist agitator inside the West could be denied the means of attaining control of a democracy, but Putin is already in charge of a hugely powerful country; he is not trying to come to power in the West so deplatforming him inside the West is not going to affect him very much. The aim in detaching Ukraine from the Russia sphere of influence was to overthrow Putin, and Carl Gerschman the former head of the US National Endowment for democracy was quite explicit about this in a high profile OP Ed in 2013. Most Russians agree with Putin about Ukraine so Russia can stand alone; what it does depends on what Russians think, not Westerners. Ghosting Russia is not going to achieve anything.
    1
  1501. Biederbeck: What kind of a fiend are you? Phibes: The kind that wins, my friend (Dr. Phibes Rises Again 1972)
    1
  1502. Half the unprecedented spike in deaths taking place she could not have been responsible for; the ones while she was in the unit were classified by the prosecution experts as 'unexpected' and deemed due to air injected into the nasogastric tube while the other deaths in the spike which occurred when she was out of the unit were classified differently. It is not clear that there was any reliable way of determining a difference, and the paper that the prosecution doctors relied on to diagnose the air injection by a presence of skin rash was studying something quite different. Many in the field of statistics insist the 'she was there for all the deaths' chart shown to the jury was misleadingly presented and just plain wrong . As for "Defence disputed the causes postulated by the prosecution and were free to call their retained expert but declined to so". Since they have been allowed to comment, doctors of the highest eminence in neonatal care have expressed very grave doubts about the opinions that were delivered by the prosecution's expert and medical witnesses. There is general skepticism by doctors who work with newborn babies that the injection of air into a baby's gastronasal tube could kill a baby as the prosecution's top expert witness (who retired decades ago) said was how most of the babies were murdered. There are things that are to say the least difficult to explain away for anyone who believes Letby is totally innocent: Dr Jayaram testified he'd walked in on Letby standing over a baby gasping for air with no alarm sounding even though the breathing tube was dislodged, and her doing nothing to help. There may have been a motive to complain about Letby for this doctor. Yet he did originally go to and tell the unit managers what he had seen well before all this blew up and the police got involved. Would he have dared fabricate that incident and go to the unit managers with it if it was untrue? Then again, there is a lack of doctors coming forward to support the medical theories (especially the completely novel one of air injection into nasogastric tube) that prosecutors relied on quite a bit.
    1
  1503. It cannot be used to help you in court
    1
  1504. Her beauty was her nemesis. But her forever young clickbait looks are also Panama's nemesis.
    1
  1505.  @stevemorse108  I consider the involvement of F to be virtually certain. One thing we definitely know (because he gave two mutually incompatible accounts): guide F has uttered untruths about whether he had a meeting with Kris and Lissane the day before they disappeared. I think he did, just as he originally said; he told of trying to sell the girls guided tours at the language school where he is the default guide . According F's original account, this happened on Monday the 31st of April and in his detailed account Lisanne read and Kris lay in a hammock as he was giving them his sales pitch. His card was in their room and what he said about them is consistent with what we know of their personalities. It is important to remember that the trip they got the school intern Eileen to book sometime on Tuesday by phone/ internet for Wednesday was to Alto Quiel, and on a complete different trail in another direction to any part of the Pianista and the continuation of a rough trail behind it. A certain site (not Scarlett's) will tell you that Eileen was an employee of F, but this is incorrect. Eileen was a pretty young German woman who was moved around the various schools, and was new to Boquete. She booked F to be a guide on Wednesday for herself Eileen as well as Kris and Lisanne. Eileen did not see Kris and lisanne on Tuesday at all, so the book must have been decided on the day before. You really cannot beat Scarlet's site, the others are all all plagerising her and just making things up; managing to get very important details completely wrong withal. In my opinion F went away from his Monday meeting with the girls thinking lascivious things, but is not stupid enough to have ever believed he could be the guide taking them on a hike/ tour and then have them 'disappear' on that tour; he would've immediately been arrested and be as good as convicted. What I think happened is he saw them and thought he would like to victimize them (or maybe just Kris) , but it was just fantasy for the aforementioned reason. How did it go down then? The next day he may have simply bumped into them on the trail when he happened to be walking it, and thought he had the perfect set up to do what he wanted, and not only get away with it, but have no criminal investigation by faking them dying accidently because they were lost. They knew him as a trustworthy guide, and if just running into him, he would be able to trick them into leaving the trail by offering to show them something like a waterfall. If he had neutralized Lissane out of the blue, he'd have been able to control Kris quite easily. Of course he may have somehow known or suspected or been tipped off they were on the trail some way and/or had help, but I think him acting alone with what he'd regard as luck in the way I have just adumbrated is an underdiscussed scenario.
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  1506. ​ @stevemorse108  While Amanda was portrayed as a beautiful evil genius, Kris and Lisanne were made out to be dumb blondes completely lacking in cognitive ability, sense of direction and even the baby ability to scream endlessly for help. Not to say that Amanda like Kris/ Lisanne) did not make some mistakes. But their biggest mistake was thinking that the country they went to was as safe as where they had came from.
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  1507. This channel needs to tone down and cut back on attributions of mental turmoil to Putin. If you want to remain credible that is. Partisan clickbait is what you are about? Going to lose views in the long run,
    1
  1508.  @anthonyhulse1248 I click on clickbait all day every day. But I am not happy about it.
    1
  1509. The Major Error seems to be military subordination to and faith in the government: implementing Hitler's decision with the resources made available and doing so in the expectation of success although Russia was too big and well armed for the German force that Hitler tasked with conquering it. That is what I think what MHV is saying. However, the encirclements that the early German campaigning in Barbarossa enjoyed was substantially due to having the element of surprise over stand their ground Soviets (no Soviet plan to fall back to defensible lines along rivers) which would have been lost with more thorough preparations than the ones the Germany army actually did make. Whether there was any real blunder is unclear; it might well have been telegraphing Barbarossa much too early to have something as ponderous and difficult to conceal as an enlarging and reequipping of the German army. Hitler fooled Stalin and gave his army the best chance, they were careful not to waste that advantage. While the argument that a non-diverted drive on Moscow would have had its flank exposed to the strong Soviet forces unmolested in the south is a very tenable one, that is precisely why after some wargaming there was an Army Group South (and North) incorporated into the original Barbarossa plan. Army Group South had the job of preserving the flank of Army Group Centre's drive on Moscow. So the Soviets in the South would have been moving to fighting on a second and reversed front when they attacked German Army Group Centre's drive on Moscow. At this stage of the war the Soviets were much worse in offensive mobile operations than when defending ground, where they could use artillery. Lastly, a relentless drive on Moscow was not actually made although every German military professional was of the opinion that it ought to be. We can say a German offensive such as Stolfi postulated would in the event have probably gone the Moscow defenders' way, but you cannot say it certainly would have because Germany lost the war without trying that stratagem. Hence, there remains a possibility that going straight at Moscow, as not merely Guderian but Von Bock wanted to, might have succeeded. It follows therefore that swiftly going straight at Moscow with all of Army Group Centre offered the only possible chance of victory at that stage of the war, and ought to have been tried. Both Hitler and some of his generals share the blame. For an objective of Nazi Germany becoming a World Power, Hitler after having made the big decision for a rapid conquering of European Russia by surprise attack on the USSR, should have then deferred to the Army's judgment on how to do it. In the summer of 1941, Germany's Generals should have presented a united unwavering demand for a concentration of all of Army Group Centre's resources on attacking Moscow ASAP.
    1
  1510. These places being captured by the Russians lack strategic significance say the Ukrainians, but they would say that, wouldn't they? Kind of the Ukrainians to keep telling the Russians where they are going wrong. You think maybe Ukraine is trying to trick the incredibly gullible Russians a second time?
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  1511. They are not suddenly bad, yet Russia is still there.
    1
  1512. "Yes we're wet robots that only act according to our programing. Yeah come on we all know that's not true intuitively." We know that because we instinctively believe it, in terms of reproductive success it is likely to be advantageous. But that having some belief in free will ultimately works to reproduce and spread the DNA of believers does not mean the belief is true. It could be a widespread belief among human beings because it is an evolutionarily advantageous illusion.
    1
  1513.  @cleopatra7377  Yes and maybe that is why so many of the Russian speakers in Ukraine voted for Zelensky. The forcible drafting of Jewish men into the Russian army from where they never came back was why .so many Jews left Tsarist Russia. permanently Ukraine is going to be an ethnically pure place, but a rather empty one.
    1
  1514. Unfortunately, the single issue crowd are all about taking pro social issues and going one step beyond common sense to draw pushback and counter pushback donations from BILLIONARES (Musk is not a typical billionaire).
    1
  1515. Anything is possible but Shea's seems a very vague feelgood analysis highlighting the undeniable facts that Russia has limited stocks of Soviet era armaments, and it is it is burning through them. Of course they have all sorts of ongoing supply shortfalls: they are in an all out war! There is no attempt to relate the Kremlin's dilemmas to Kyiv'. .Ukraine's main problem (the reason its men are being killed and severely wounded is it is a war with Russia. All the West's arms are not going to alter that.
    1
  1516.  @Rozerand  Even a peacetime soldier is signing off on an unlimited liability 'contract. It's not supposed to be a sinecure with benefits and a pension, although that can be a legit reason to make it a career.
    1
  1517.  @Lucas-wn5wm  They have the men and the resources. To organise them money can be printed as needed.
    1
  1518.  @pavloburyanov5842  But there all sorts of extra benefits whereby officialdom make things easy for the soldier's family forever after especially they end up dead or permanently debilitated And again, it is simply isn't true that they are probably going to get killed or be seriously disabled
    1
  1519. The Russians want to overstretch the Ukrainian army; encircling their cities, would overstretch the Russian army.
    1
  1520. So Russia is behind Iran who is behind Hamas. But who is behind Russia? China obviously.
    1
  1521. Yeltsin let Ukraine go , not because because he respected the will of the Ukrainians but because he wanted nothing to interfere with him attaining supreme power. Russian leadership since Yeltsin has been a reaction against him not doing his job.
    1
  1522.  @anthonymorris2276  Ukraine did not want to be in Yeltsin's explicitly Russian Federation, so they became independent.
    1
  1523. Don't underestimate the value of drinking spirit for fighting spirit.
    1
  1524. Nikki Haley, was but one of three Indians who challenged Trump for the nomination. Not only the British PM Hmae Secretary and Foreign Secretary but the First Ministers of Wales and Scotland were not white (the head of the Labour party is Scotland is also not white). I think it is clear that the white British (or the influential sectors of them ) prefer to have exotic leaders. And in many cases, such as Sunak, they represent affluent constituencies where hardly any ethnic minorities live.
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  1525. 6:06 'we are not running any big risks'. Has Snyder considered that what he wants to do will cement a China Russia alliance. It will be a humiliation of Russia in Russian eyes.
    1
  1526. Biden was pres with most of his term ahead of him when Putin launched his invasion. Russia has never counted on Trump. How is Ukraine being 'kept safe'; I was under the impression that there was a high intensity war being fought in its east, which is being slowly leveled,
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  1527.  @enysuntra1347  Drying out weakens bones, not being in a river.
    1
  1528. Ha ha ha , you have just proved thatLlisanne's corpse was in a cool high altitude jungle grave for ten weeks, because there was flesh on her bones and n remarkably undecomposed piece of skin from her shin. Everything found from Lissanne's body was from a leg. Also, "bodies" plural.There is no previous example of two women dying accidently in the wilderness like that. The Babes in the Wood Epping Forrest deaths were decades later discovered to be a double homicide. The death of Julie Ward on an African game reserve was also found to actually have been a homicide that was made to look like an accident (by guides).. The first two women such a double accident deaths happened to, just happened to be young and beautiful? Please!
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  1529. Wagner's convicts are not skilled but they are advancing in a very rigid way quite possibly as sitting ducks for locating Ukrainian positions (per drones that are always overhead of Wagner assaults bands) when the Ukrainian open fire. The convict Wagerites' lack of skills is a feature, not a bug. They are not there to take territory and are expected to die in the process of not taking it.
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  1530.  @JRtired  Seagal lives as he wishes, indulging every appetite. He is not what he was, but who is?
    1
  1531.  @JamesBrown-fd1nv  He's not acting he really is tough. He likes hurting stuntman and co stars and has done dental and tesicular damage to them multiple times. He also allowed a famous one Gene LeBell,to choke him, which is like inviting Mike Tyson to punch you.
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  1532. John Wayne? @A_Haunted_Pancake 
    1
  1533.  @Chapman005  So bad movies don't make money?
    1
  1534. The Ukrainian fanfaronade about their imminent mighty offensive was intended to get the Russians digging in. Ukraine is not going to seriously attack. It's 'leaves on the tracks' BS.
    1
  1535. Israel is not a country bound by Western norms, and this response makes that obvious.
    1
  1536. It's clear to me that Russian tactics are making a virtue of necessity. They haven't got trained all round infantrymen, but for their mode of war lack of small unit tactics and initiative are a feature not a bug. What Russia (specifically Wagner) has are expendable low cost low skill basic assault troops, who fantastic as it seems are being used as bait for concealed Ukrainian artillery in the rear areas of their defence system to reveal themselves by opening fire on Wagner attacks. It has been reported that the Russian bombardments in support of Wagner's advances by relatively small groups on a pre plan route are desultory, but the follow up counter battery fire on the newly pinpointed Ukrainian artillery positions is seriously intense.
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  1537. Ukraine gets far more support with every piece of territory Russia gains so there is no strategic motive for Russia to try and take territory. They are attriting Ukraine in place so to speak.
    1
  1538.  @TorianTammas  Sure, but Ukraine is burning through things too, and they cannot win manpower attrition with Russia. Given Russia's reserves of manpower, the West will have to supply a truly vast Ukrainian materiel superiority to hold the line against Russia in Ukraine. Even then, Ukraine is going to be losing a relatively high proportion of its young male population in the war and, suffering emigration too.
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  1539.  @Carolina-rd3gh  The review may not be legit. It is not clear how he knew they were going to be on the trail that afternoon. and he could not have known they would be going down the rough trail I don't think because that was a result of them getting to the peak much sooner than anticipated. I think for all the things we don't know, and will never know, him reporting them missing so precipitously was suspicious. That he ten weeks later was the main finder of the remains and close to his property is conclusive. No one thinks those finds he made seem likely without guilty knowledge, not even the other guides, who know more about the terrain than anyone . And why would he not worry he was being framed and stop finding the body parts so close to his own farm?
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  1540. He is at liberty to bluff or not against Ukraine.
    1
  1541.  @terryharris1291 Ukraine would assassinate Putin in a minute if they got the OK from Washington.
    1
  1542. Assuming Ukraine got all their land back, why would Russia not continue the hostilities?
    1
  1543. Long term thinking in Washington is Russia may well not stand for certain things. The US is not trying to help Ukraine to defeat the Russians; America is just tying to keep Ukraine in the war. Ukraine has to start doing badly to be given effective arms like F16s or ATACMS . So the F16 will be eked out in direct proportion to how dire Ukraine's situation is. Right now Ukraine is doing reasonably well, so the number of F16s will given will be designed for PR rather than victories over the Russians; just enough to keep Ukrainians from getting too discouraged. If Ukraine wants the really effective US arms, then the best thing Ukraine can do is start retreating.
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  1544. There was quite good circumstantial evidence against her but they presented it as far more damning than it was.
    1
  1545. It is already of a sort: class war. The white working class theoretic power in a democracy is distrusted by the white elite. So democracy has to be subverted.
    1
  1546. I am sure he knew it was going to end like this.
    1
  1547. Maybe, maybe not. But the clothing being found had telling parallels, Both bras, both shorts, one boot from each (both found by F 48hours apart), neither's top and neither's panties. I'ts like someone was picking stuff to plant.
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  1548. Trump's plan is to force Europe to pay for its own defence. Free ride is over.
    1
  1549. The hospital was under resourced and under administered. But is that unusual north of Watford?
    1
  1550. They have the basis for a credible nuclear threat. Maybe more
    1
  1551.  @JD-ir5fj  Why has America not given Ukraine the Army Tactical Missile System yet? Quite obviously the US is scared to give Ukraine it because they think Russia might not just say "Oh well we lost fair and square, to 16 HIMARS launchers and then a few ATACMS, and so now well give everything back, make our apologies and leave taking our getting on for a hundred of thousand dead and seriously injured with us".
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  1552.  @JD-ir5fj  No one including President Biden is going to get into a nuclear war over Ukraine. That is why Ukraine s not getting the most effective weapons.
    1
  1553. Why? Ukraine is going to have to be rebuilt and we will have to pay.
    1
  1554. Vlad Vexler who understands Russia although he is not friend of Putin says the maximum limit of Russian army KIA that Putin regime could stand is well into the hundreds of thousands. That is hundreds of thousands killed
    1
  1555.  @jamesdrummond7684  Zelensky may be the "bravest leader of the free world" but Trump has twice been elected by the taxpayers who fund the free world.
    1
  1556. I think the standard military doctrine that worked so well in Iraq has been shown to be ineffective, and that is why neither side is keen to mount a committed offensive.
    1
  1557. The exclamation mark ought to have been a question mark.
    1
  1558. The original invasion was a mistake by Putin, and badly organised in keeping with that supreme leadership without delegating style. But in 2024 you have to say the Russian effort is quite methodical and coordinated. This is the Russians as a group we are seeing now, not a capacious individual. The Russian Federation as a state is what Mearsheimer's theory would try to explain foreign policy continuities in
    1
  1559. Newsflash: Russians are fatalistic and always have been.
    1
  1560. Ukraine in NATO would make it easy for Ukraine to invoke Chapter Five and get all other members fighting Russia. Ukraine would have the very best of motives to do that. Sorry Max, If Ukraine joins, the other countries will leave.
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  1561. I think because Russia is now going all in and staking its great power status on something it can present as a victory, America does not want Russia to be faced with a total defeat in Ukraine, because the Kremlin might consider alternatives that Washington does not want Russia considering.
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  1562. The forces used in Bakhmut are highly specialised convict cannon fodder Wagner units; indeed they seem to have been created precisely for the purpose of the Bakhmut campaign . I don't see how they could easily be employed elsewhere in the front. The Russian artillery may be weakened elsewhere because of Bakhmut, but I don't see it as an overall economy of force operation for Ukraine
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  1563.  @baronvonlimbourgh1716  Wagner methods in Bakhmut require massive artillery support for tiny assault groups, which get preceded by expendable screens of convicts there simply to draw fire, and aren't scalable to the whole theatre. Anyway, the Russian army effort want to do what they have trained and equiped to do; in the Vuhlidar operation there was a standard mobile warfare advance using elite formed up regular units and it failed miserably. I think such attempts to advance by Russia are a boon for Ukraine. The Americans would have liked Ukraine to stop fighting in Bakhmut in the hope that the Russian army would try major offensives using the outdated maneuver over distance with large motorised formations method.
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  1564. But America and Europe do not dare fight Russia directly. If they are in the expectation of Russia quitting then, rely on it, they will have a long wait.
    1
  1565. like the ICC would indict Ukraine.
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  1566. Until D Day the Allies were losing more men in traffic accidents than in combat.
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  1567. Angel Reece is 6'3''.
    1
  1568.  @rachelnise2473  No side in Syria was given a guarantee. To get into NATO a country has to be stable and show it is interested in diplomatic solutions.
    1
  1569.  @rachelnise2473  Actually, Chapter Five is not a guarantee other members will come to a NATO country's aid if it is invaded. The text states each member country must decide the country did not bring the invasion on itself in the knowledge that it was a NATO member.
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  1570. Be serious, they almost certainly are going to become a casualty, but being killed is not actually probable for a Russian unless they are a convict recruit. Real war always has been a process of feeding raw troops into combat with the expectation that they will become casualties within a week or so. That happens to be the most efficient use of resources, Being a foot soldier is a ticket to being wounded or unalived, and not just on the losing side The US infantry in post D day fighting was no different.
    1
  1571.  @ZacharySturgeon-bq5fj  They are not heading for certain death.
    1
  1572.  @CatManOfTaste  Well what about Vietnam?
    1
  1573.  @CatManOfTaste  Afghanistan is an outlier in Russian military history, just as Gorby was an outlier among Russian leaders. Putin is not Gorby, and I don't think a Gorby style leader succeeding Putin is likely to come about.
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  1574. So enlightening and no-nonsense.
    1
  1575. The ultimate outcome has never been in doubt.
    1
  1576. Those were medium sized countries completely helpless to do anything.
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  1577. He went to jail for months before the trial and was not acquitted on all charges.
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  1578. Ukrainian cities such as Bakhmut and Advika have been destroyed; how much is a city worth?
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  1579. Russia is a backward country, and has been for 500 years. It's not just the army that is bad.
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  1580. That is why none was sent.
    1
  1581.  @boreopithecus  The man operating Kris and Lissanne's phones did not want to leave any clues. Unsporting of him, eh?
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  1582. For generations Europe was the most important area of the would, now it isn't. Trump cannot confront Russia and China. Trump is a con man and I am sure Putin understands that he is the one being flattered.
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  1583.  @michasunafish4844  I think if it was a choice between a theatre thermonuclear use by Russia or it going doin to a devastating defeat (and possibly coming apart in the domestic turmoil that would follow), Xi would say to Putin "Well if you had to do, it you had to do it".
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  1584. 4:10 Yes but how does Ukraine end the war without attacking Russia proper? If it takes back everything including Crimea, and Russia refuses to stop fighting, what are the Ukrainians going to do?
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  1585.  @leopoldbloom4835  The German army was good. Russia's is not.
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  1586. You could see she was not right for the job by the way she dressed (with her tits jiggling in a figure hugging dress as she walked away from her first open air PM's press conference in front of Downing St). But her book is correct about the Bank Of England jumping the gun in an attempt to get her out ASAP, and having made announcements and acted to destablise her premiership through precipitating a crisis of confidence about the UK in the money markets. That was not the Bank's place, they are not elected and those who are would have dealt with the problem quite quickly anyway. At least Truss tried to deal with the long term economic decline of Britain.
    1
  1587.  @MsChitterchat  i was impressed by a TV interview with former deputy director of the Bank that said the money for inexorably growing social spending without raising taxes is coming from the defence budget. It's not sustainable, but no one seems to be talking about that. Sorry about the languge. I suppose what I was trying to say is It is not that she is well blessed in the bust department, but that she chose clothes to highlight something that was already noticeable. Oddly tacky for an intelligent woman I thought.
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  1588. Conventional warfare tricksters these Ukrainians. Nevertheless, the real Russian firepower has not been even 1% wasted, because it hasn't been used at all. Yet.
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  1589. Professor Jonathan Haslam, author of a large book on the subject says Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary were the main NATO members insisting peace would be secured by Ukraine becoming a full member of NATO, but Denmark was the foremost advocate for Ukrainian membership of NAT0 among West European countries, and it pushed hard for military cooperation with Ukraine in peacekeeping operations all over the globe to qualify it as a NATO partner. What the Russians might think was behind all this was not much considered. The suspicion was mutual nevertheless; as Mearsheimer says countries can never be certain of each others intentions, or of what those intentions might become.
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  1590.  @oliversissonphone6143  Zelensky didn't think Russia was actually going to do it.
    1
  1591. There had been a war in Donbass since Russia invaded in 2014.
    1
  1592. Almost the last person to talk to them was the one who they hired as a guide for the trail on Wednesday (he says) but declined a trip to his ranch so distant it required an overnight stay; they then failed to cancel the Wednesday trip and just went by themselves on Tuesday (he says, it would have entailed not turning up for the Wednesday trip on the same trail anyway because they'd have done it themselves the previous day). He raised the alarm on Wednesday, and ten weeks later found their remains near his ranch. So they, or rather their remains, ended up there after all.
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  1593. Journalist understand the importance of perceptions though, and how are the Russians going to be persuaded to stop if as a result of tactical victory they think things are going well. strategically?
    1
  1594. For the Panamanian government, yes.
    1
  1595. Everyone is ready to act in absolute accordance with morality when it is identical with what brings worldly success, but not many people act morally irrespective of the consequences. There is a thing discovered by dementia researchers called cognitive reserve whereby the more intelligent you are the less organic problems are reflected in behaviour.
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  1596. Every border in the world was formed by the balance of forces on either side of it.
    1
  1597. She was paying handsomely to climb Everest and get back safely. He took her money and did not want to give it back so he preferred to put her (and everyone else) in harms way.
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  1598. There is dispute among experts about whether those babies condition could be characterised as stable. One definitely seemed to be improving.
    1
  1599. The US can't pay for the West's defence against an alliance of Russia and China. You add that billion people to Russia's resources and it's Goodnight Vienna. Trump is giving the Nato countries some realty therapy. As for Ukraine it never received a guarantee of military aid, still less unending military aid that pushed Russia closer to China.
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  1600. it is and it isn't. The trajectory of the war seems to indicate Russia has the advantage, but they are going to pay an enormously heavy price if they press on.
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  1601. It is horrifying, but there is not a mystery.
    1
  1602.  @Alvin-eq5rc  What really happened will remain a mystery, but that is no "guide" to the identity of the murder being unknown to anyone who takes an interest.
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  1603. Z Storm America advancing at the speed the heavy artillery could be moved up to blast the Germans out their new entrenchments. The bulk of the US infantry were not convicts but barely valued because they were ill educated Southerners.
    1
  1604. He is confident of military success, but I doubt he really understands Putin and the Russian mindset enough to predict what the Kremlin's reaction to losing Crimea might be.
    1
  1605. American surveillance is omniscient and setting up these killings of generals / admirals and their staff's and the surviving ones know it. The Black Sea Fleet HQ barely qualifies as not Russia proper. Ukraine is deliberately and imperceptibly inveigling the US into being complicit in progressive escalation. Are the Russian commanders going to to be less likely to support strikes on US surveillance or use of a theater thermonuclear weapon on the battlefield as a result? Or, are they going to support such escalation out of fear that they'll be killed unless the US is persuaded to step back?
    1
  1606.  @edthebumblingfool  But he has to spend the rest of his life in Australia now. He was in London and visiting Sweden for the lifestyle.
    1
  1607.  @righthand7965  Ha ha. He is never going to be let into Britain again.
    1
  1608. The territory can be regained but the dead are gone forever. Russia has 100 million more people that Ukraine. Nuff said.
    1
  1609. The online beefs are fake, he pays for them.
    1
  1610.  @louisbeerreviews8964  Military training successfully completed!
    1
  1611. Syrskyi’s propensity is for for counter attack irrespective of the losses, but he will not be given the hundreds of thousands of extra troops Zaluzhnyi was sacked for demanding, so Syrskyi’ will have to be more frugal with the men he has. Or so Zelensky hopes.
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  1612. Not every World War started like WW2, WW1 didn't. The mindset that stopping Russia gainin anything at all in Ukraine is necessary to prevent it keep from going West and invading into actual Nato members countries even though it would be fighting an actual Nato army whereby Russia would be outclassed technologically and outnumbered 4:1 in forces on the ground even in Poland is far fetched. They would not do it because they could not possibly hope to win. Good grie,f they can barely get even a draw in this war against puny Ukraine. That through defeat by Ukraine Russia ought to be schooled in liberalism, whereupon its civilisation an societal organisation must become different to what it has been for half a millennia is no less unfeasible than any Russian idea of Nato being undermined and divided. Attrition strategies depend on what the opponent is willing to accept, and it is now apparent that whatever its deficiencies in military science, Russia has been widely underestimated in regards to its reserve of stubborn persistence. If battered to its knees (this is an extreme hypothetical) Russia,will issue a very unvague and unmistakably specific threat, and that is why the Ukrainian caprice that they can get back Crimea by using the unlimited arms and money from the West is being backpedaled in the West. So don't be too sure what the quickest path to WW3 is.
    1
  1613. This is very irresponsible of Lucas, he is being wayward and deliberately obtuse. If it comes down to it, why would Putin not use nuclear weapons on the army in Ukraine rather than accept conventional defeat? And the existential threat to the West is hardly going to be reduced by trying lunatic gambits like using the war in Ukraine to overthrow the Russian state. And by the way, such rash bravado would not be doing Ukraine any favours either. Ukraine ought to be supported to defend itself. Who runs Russia is a matter for Russians.
    1
  1614. In nature the parasites have parasites.
    1
  1615. North Korea is a Chinese sockpuppet that does nothing until Donald 'Trade War against China' Trump is in the White House. The NK ICBM rilled out in Trump's previous term is an obvious copy of China's design and is carried on a Chinese transporter. China did the same thing for Pakistan. But Russia getting in the mix is worrying. South Korea is like the Germany, addicted to being defended at the American taxpayers expense.
    1
  1616.  @d-rush1219  If someone is exultant, every other word is an obscenity, and they are monomaniacal, as Lukashenko said Prigozhim was, then that is as good as saying they are coked out of their skull. Lukashenko said he could hear Prigozhin's minions in the background and they were the same.
    1
  1617.  @d-rush1219  It was implicit in what Lukashenko said about how Prigozhin and his sidekicks sounded in the phone calls.
    1
  1618. Their manufacturing has unbeatable economies of scale. Anyway, The West don't want to have manufacturing jobs back, that would equal organised labour and political power of the masses.
    1
  1619. 15:33 Yes Kofman has been attacked for saying something similar. One has to look at how the Russians responded during Bakhmut when they were forced to abandon their original intention to encircle it and channelled into go through it in highly urbanised fighting that Ukaine obviously intended to attrite the Russians. What the Russians did was create the assemblage of expendable convicts drawing fire and screening the professional soldiers that Wagner morphed into by the time of the heaviest fighting for Bakhmut. Only then is it possible to judge whether in hindsight Ukraine ought to have persisted with the same operational concept it started with, or disengaged due to an evolution in Russian tactics over time altering the terms of the battle to Ukraine's disadvantage
    1
  1620. Kofman is a land power guy. O'Brien is more enamored of sea power as determinative in the grand scheme of things. Anders is a naval officer of course.
    1
  1621. I don't think taking territory is a Russian priority any longer. You need to relate Russian losses to Ukrainian ones. Russia might lose a division a in Bakhmut each day and yet win the entire war, if Ukraine's military casualties each day were comparable in number and quality of human resources.
    1
  1622. MacArthur does not like Trump's rhetorical style, but rhetoric is what politics is about. Trump defeated a woman and lost to a man, so for the rubber match the Dems put up another woman.
    1
  1623.  @ChucksSEADnDEAD  Thanks, that explains why the Russian used the Z convict storm units when forced to fight where they originally didn't want to, but it doesn't explain why the Ukrainians did not stage an economy of force fighting retreat when it became clear the Russians were driving an inexhaustible screen of expendable goons in front of the actual professionals of Wagner that were supported by fires. Currently the Ukrainians are advancing on Bakhmut, which indicates it does have value to them as a point from which to mount a deep penetration and exploitation. Furthermore the Ukrainians are methodically arttriting Russian artilleries by extensive use of HIMARS then slowly advancing in the latest offensive, which is a lot cleverer than trying to defend against Russian cannon fodder convict screening the adept professions of Wagner while they are being given massive fire support, which is what the battle of Bukhmut was in the latter part of it,. Kofman was critiquing a failure of Ukrainian flexibility and subordinating everything else to the main effort. I don't see there was a pinning of Wagner as they won and Ukraine could hardly have predicted the rebellion, could they? Wagnerites would have been available if not for Prig's mutiny. In fixing them the Ukrainians were fixing their own troops and the loss of morale after Zelensky announcing it would be defended was sapped the troops fighting spirits somewhat surely.
    1
  1624. Car (and bicycle) drivers who recklessly cause deaths of other drivers or pedestrians seem to get away with things every bit as culpable as what she did. She did something unusual.
    1
  1625. Sullivan says withdraw from Ukraine, but Crimea has been occupied by Russia since 2014. Ukraine is going to refuse to stop fighting unless it gets Crimea back obviously. Is open ended backing for that the West's 'job'?
    1
  1626.  Lawn Chair  Sullivan says it is up to the Ukrainians. But Ukraine is not getting the weapons it has asked for. So, is the US serious about what Sullivan says.
    1
  1627.  @cyndytung7477  Counter attack is the only way. Both sides would like the other to attack.
    1
  1628. Nuclear use is only going to happen if Russia is on the point of suffering a defeat in Ukraine. Which is what the West is trying to bring about.
    1
  1629. Were tanks ever what they were still supposed to be up until this war? If not fancy tanks are not a good use of resources. Air superiority has certainly been altered beyond all recognition by the advent of the plethora of drones on and behind the battlefield . The Russian advances are basically led by and always consolidated by infantry, which are suffering terribly from little FPV drones hunting them even inside trenches and buildings. Usually when the Russians gain territory there are no houses with roofs on or intact fortifications because everything has been demolished by the Russian artillery. The short answer to the question is that a lot of Russians are being killed in these advances. However they are not staging a full mobilization so the Kremlin are accepting the losses and seem confident they can be sustained.
    1
  1630. Russia is more about mass effect than advanced tech. They are firing off silly drones scores at the time instead. Quality over quantity is the US way.
    1
  1631. Russia is three and a half times the population of Ukraine, but Russia has exhausted its manpower?
    1
  1632. Clearly, Zelensky's priority is stop the Russian advances and to get Russia to stop he is offering a carrot is ceasing to demand the return of all territory currently occupied.
    1
  1633. I have seen assertions that Ukraine has unstoppable momentum, the Russian army is out of missiles, low on shells, soldiers and food, is about to collapse, and Putin will be lucky to not end up dangling from a lamppost.
    1
  1634. Thanks. Packed with great analysis. Your best vid ever.
    1
  1635.  @petergerdes1094  Maybe the Russians are proceeding on the assumption that their enemy's advice on what Russia ought to be doing may be less than trustworthy!
    1
  1636. American surveillance is setting up these killings of generals and they know it. The Black Sea Fleet HQ is hardly occupied territory. Ukraine is deliberately and imperceptibly inveigling the US into being complicit is progressive escalations.
    1
  1637.  @AnotherPointOfView944  Does the character of Russians change when they are not on our side? They seem to be fighting as they did in ww2, which was not skillful but almost masochistically stubborn. I would not hold your breath for them giving up no matter what they face.
    1
  1638.  @AnotherPointOfView944  Russians don't change just because they are fighting against us now. They didn't quit then and they won't now.
    1
  1639. 30mm is too big. Too much recoil and weight.
    1
  1640. Better than the one that listens to Nickleback then.
    1
  1641. Only by stopping Russia being conventionally defeated can China stop Russia using theatre thermonuclear weapons. Only not aiding Ukraine to defeat Russia can America prevent Russia using theatre thermonuclear weapons. What everyone except Kiev needs is a limited Russian victory. So of course the Ukrainians are trying to tell us that it is impossiblel Russia cannot have any kind of victory except a total one.
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  1642. All indications are Russia's leadership thinks it is facing an existential theat The ones who don't lack the ability to overthrow Putin. . The Russians are not going yet preparing a battlefield nuclear weapon because they will have to be defeated in the defeated in the Donbass before begining to consider such a risky gambit. However, the Russian army is no match for the Ukrainians and the US is now giving Ukraine the most modern Reaper and Predator drones, which are ten times better that the ones they already have, and much else. So it is looking likely that in a few weeks after yet another total fail by the Russian army, and while they are being driven back to their own borders, Russia will prepare a tactical nuke for use. By that stage it will have become clear to Russia that they are in effect fighting Nato. Galeotti burbles away that the world would turn against Putin if he used a tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine, but if he uses one then he has crossed the Rubicon and be likely to use another and not necessarily in Ukraine. Galeotti's reasons to be cheerful about the way things are going do not stand up when you look at them closely. I think the correct response is 'permission to panic'. Putin threatening an invasion of Ukraine and then making good on his threat is that Putin does what he threatens to do; he has quite clearly threatened to use thermonuclear weapons in this war rather than lose against Nato supplied conventional arms.
    1
  1643. You don't know much about business Darren.
    1
  1644. If this is true it is just a matter of time until he uses nuclear weapons on the Ukrainian army.
    1
  1645. Musk was being asked to do something that the US government does not dare do. He should stick his neck out like a giraffe?
    1
  1646. General Lapin is going to admit he is incompetent? Not a chance. Lapin is going to tell Putin the Russian army cannot defeat Ukraine now. At least not by continuing to use conventional means.
    1
  1647. The bit at the end is epic shade.
    1
  1648. They both have quirky senses of humour.
    1
  1649. Twitter was quite important for cancel culture. It got completely oit of control and was electorally irresponsible because as Michael Lind said to Klein, US elections are won by 'Big Tent' coalition parties. The Dem;s candidate for pres was espousing crazy stuff as a result (biological males in school female sports teams and defund the police).
    1
  1650. America may start one, but a tactical nuclear war will not be fought in America. It is easy for the Americans to be resolute.
    1
  1651. Germany was compelled to admit they were solely responsible for WW1, thereby totally demoralizing the political class.
    1
  1652. But for a bit more trouble than you say they went to, the Russians could trick Ukrainian intel into thinking there was a high value target inside the building , and thus draw a HIMARS strike on it. This would have an inestimable benefit for the entire Russian army of greatly reducing the HIMARS strikes in future, because of Ukrainian fear of making the same mistake/being tricked again. You think the Russians, who have been wracking their brains to find a counter to the HIMARS strikes are not capable of coming up with such a stratagem?
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  1653.  @jonathanjacob5453  It would have been militarily much better for Zelensky if Azov had fought to the bitrer end in the steel plant tying up poerful Russian forces, but the political damage that can be inflicted on Zelensky by protest by the wives, girlfriends and mothers of the Azov POWs is immense. Zelensky won't dare launch HIMARs strikes on a building that appears to be a high value Russian army terget now in case it it another Russian set up to get Ukraine killing its own celebrated hero POWs in Russian captivity.
    1
  1654. Energy piped from Russia, capital goods sold to China, and America 'defending' them from both for free. Well actually paid for the American taxpayer. Who could see anything wrong with peace-loving modern Germany?
    1
  1655. But he did speak privately about Russia joining Nato. Multiple Western leaders and Nato officials have said he did. He was fobbed off of course (as Yeltsin was before him), and that was a clue that Nato was not an anti Soviet alliance but an anti Russian one.
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  1656. Yes, but he was held in jail for many months, during which time he doubtless realised in those fifteen seconds he had remedies other than the the final option, which he used much too quickly. On the other hand, those who bank on the law protecting them while they make a fool of others have been reminded that you will always get the one poor decision maker with little foresight as to the consequences to them of terminating the interaction by pulling the trigger .
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  1657. China doesn't want to stand alone so does not want Russia defeated. Ukraine cannot end this war, even if Russia is pushed back to its pre 2014 borders. What is worrying the US is Ukraine is doing too well too quickly. The Russia state cannot survive having 100,000 troops killed or receiving life changing injuries, and yet failing to secure the capitulation of a medium sized non Nato country like Ukraine. Russians will not accept such a result. Use of nuclear weapons not as a way to win but as a settling of accounts with Ukraine is begining to come into focus.
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  1658. Prigoshin was quoted the other day as saying that Bakhmut was a rolling battling of attrition (being X3 times the size Russia need only to get a 1:1 ratio to attrite Ukraine) and possibly the Ukrainians took note of his statement and decided to disengage.
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  1659. You are starting to look unhealthy. Please curtail your drinking, because we need you to continue putting out more good stuff like this.
    1
  1660. The Ukrainians have not even drafted their own under 25 year olds yet.
    1
  1661. It is a very, very dangerous idea to entertain that due to his army commanders being nervous, weak and even cowards (what about the dozen killed in action in 2022), Putin could not get an order for nuclear use in Ukraine executed by the Russian army. Such a notion's influence on policymakers might lead to a catastrophe of immense proportions. The US is not going to retaliate with nukes to Russian nuke use in Ukraine. or over Ukraine under any circumstances short of a nuclear attack on a Nato member. Washington has said that. While it may, or may not, be true that Putin could not win the war in Ukraine with nuclear weapons, he certainly could stop the Ukrainians winning. Pace Volker's ostensible confidence in the validity of his opinion, there simply is no precedent or well worked out theory to suggest a nuclear superpower state losing a conventional war will not resort to its theatre thermonuclear weapons. Indeed that is what Nato said it would do. Early 80s Nato commander Gen Bernard Rodgers said he would have asked to use tactical nukes within hours of a Warsaw pact conventional offensive into West Germany. Why wouldn't the Russian generals seeing their army being routed request and even demand authorisation from Putin to use a tactical nuclear weapon or two on the advancing Ukrainian army? Judging by this interview Volker cannot even conceive of that possibility, and so he is not living in the real world.
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  1662. The nearby Jaywick On Sea is even worse. It was in the new for a fatal dog attack the other day.
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  1663. Well you are right that the losses of one side are meaningless unless related to those of the other, But then again the losses were the only metric in a stalemate, which this no longer is.
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  1664. The US has been trying to get Europe to pay for its defence since Eisenhower was in the White House. Their was always some reason why they could not.
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  1665. ​ @jasonsantiago6308  Seagal has never been KOed in a street altercation, Varenberg has. Dolph certainly could with a head butt as Lundgren has a massive noggin, and inside it about the largest normal brain in the world. Juiced up Varenberg has massively muscular buttocks , which is not what you I want to see in loving close up during any movie.
    1
  1666.  @rorychivers8769  I have a name for you: Kelly LeBrock. That's who he shared a bed with
    1
  1667.  @Rockoblocko  It would not be a man bites dog story then, would it.
    1
  1668. I don't think the US wanted this; there were a long series of miscalculations by Russia and Ukraine that America was powerless to prevent.
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  1669. Lapin is going to admit he is incompetent? No, Lapin is now going to tell Putin Ukraine is too strong conventionally and he needs to prepare to use nuclear weapons.
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  1670. You want democracy in Russia but you don't like the results of it in America!
    1
  1671.  @BengalCatChilli  Same reason they hung up on them?
    1
  1672. Mearsheimer had no influence on the diplomacy and knew less than Biden; US intel very successfully predicted the Russian invasion before it happened. The problem was that America could warn the Kremlin not to, but not prevent the Russians from following through with putting their invasion plan into action regardless. Mearsheimer has an explanation why the Russians were so determined in early 2022. And almost three years and hundreds of thousands of dead Russians later they still are determined, for reasons that are nothing to do with Mearsheimer trying to explain and comment on the war..
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  1673.  @evgeniya7853  Mearsheimer said if Ukraine had been admitted to NATO as a full member then Putin would not have invaded Ukraine. But Mearsheimer is not infallible, he may have been proved wrong about that too
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  1674.  @rawnukles  Not the issue. Ukraine is a signatory to the non proliferation convention and has agreed to renounce nuclear weapons forever. If Ukraine first used a nuclear weapon on Russia, then Russia would retaliate against America for Ukraine's first use, because America's hands would not be clean. It is on America if it supports Ukraine while it builds a nuclear weapon to use in a conventional war, because American intel will know if Ukraine starts building one.
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  1675.  @yellowtunes2756  The problem for Ukraine was not being in Nato as a full member it was that the Russians knew they were trying to get into Nato and decided to forestall that possibility. Similarly, the problem for Ukraine is the Russians would destroy any facility capable of creating a nuclear weapon were they aware that Ukraine was actually trying to make a . nuclear weapon.
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  1676. Hero in a rear area job. No one in their right mind wants to be right on the front line .
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  1677. If Hitler was right about how to defeat the Soviet Union, why did no military professional want to go for Moscow? It was not just Halder.
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  1678. If this is true, then use of theatre thermonuclear weapons is all but inevitable.
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  1679. Ukraine's leadership has a clear motive to inveigle American and the rest of the West into less and less indirect conflict with Russia. From Ukraine's point of view the worse they are doing, all the better to pressure the Americans to help with deep penetration strikes against key installations.
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  1680.  @KrisWustrow  In business his signature move was to tell the contractors either they settle for less or the project will fail and no one will get anything. After thee years of effort with victory no closer there has to be an end to the directionless policy of the West, which assumed the US has endless resources.
    1
  1681.  @Pho-KingSoupTonechasr  Biden had years and could not turn it around. Trump won't turn Ukraine into an absolute Western victory, but who could?. Sometimes nothing works. Vietnam was a defeat, and the sky did not fall in. Ukraine will be the same.
    1
  1682. I was enjoying this refreshing take until 9:46 Oh dear, why do otherwise interesting and perceptive people piss all credibility for their independent viewpoint away like this
    1
  1683. You think you can have a career in academia theorising that Neanderthals were brutish and unevolved ??
    1
  1684. No. In a full thermonuclear weapon exchange between Russia and America, the US would hit China to stop it dominating the post apocalyptic world
    1
  1685. Brutally honest. This is why we come here.
    1
  1686. It's not his first rodeo. He is almost a professional prisoners by now.
    1
  1687.  @olddogoddments675  General Milley said the casualties are about 100,000 on each side. Zelensky and his officials are at war and they are going to say what helps the cause of their country (eg the bs about the missile that landed in Poland. I doubt there are human wave attacks as Zelensky and his minions allege, that is just psychological warfare. as is the idea being put out that Bakhmut is worthless for military purposes.
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  1688. Partly due to the breakdown of relations with Russia, Europeans pay several times what Americans do for their electricity. With high energy costs Europe is deindustrialising (almost 50% EU tariff on Chinese EVs) and only China and the the US have growth. Couple of points: Russia's problems are not necessarily good news in the long term if we are going to need their help containing China, and Russia problems are relative to the problems Ukraine is experiencing .It is far from clear that Ukraine truly winning would be good for the West in the long term.
    1
  1689. I wonder if Martin Shkeli was ever in general population in a real prison. Gene Borello said he and other cooperators were in a special jail wing with Bankman and he was terrified and being extorted. But Bankman is too well known for the prison authorities to aloww something to happen to him, just like they have to make sure any inmate doesn't commit suicide. He is not going to be in any sort of real prison's general population. Not until years into his sentence.
    1
  1690. A good looking young white guy finds out why good looking young white guys are rare in MMA.
    1
  1691.  @NadaYoTengo  Okay, you have local knowledge so I accept that our person of interest does not spend his time there on an average day. However, he is very wised up about the internet and phones so I think when he does leave Boquete to attend to matters on his farm near Alto Romero, he would be making calls to Boquete to keep in touch with any new bookings and when he may have to be back for. He surely knows from doing this while walking between Boquete and the farm both on his own account, and while with tourist customers paying for trips to his coffee plantation farm, where the phone reception ends (so would other guides too probably). However it would not just be a case of knowing where the women would not be able to call the emergency number (hitting the unlock key five times would be all that would have been needed) and actually get through, there is another reason. Even if if they were waylaid too suddenly for an emergency call to be made, the phones being switched on within phone reception range might enable the exact location every 15 minutes to later be determined by examining the cellphone mast data. That info would not require finding the girls phones, because the call data is stored in the mast transmitting stations and could have been available as soon as they were officially missing. The perps had to do this thing well outside phone reception range, otherwise they would have been leaving the investigation a record of exactly when and where the victimization started. Inside phone reception range, not turning the girls' phones off once under the perps' control would be tantamount to giving a the authorities a moment by moment record of their movements while inside reception range. Kris and Lisanne left phone range at 1.39pm and one would expect that the perps made sure they had a broad extra margin to be sure. There was a guide (not F) who said he saw them on the summit/ overlook, but has since changed his mind and said he know realises he was wrong and it was not them. He admits he was there on the day though. Considering Kremers's unusual red blonde hair, pale skin of her exposed legs and arms, and Froon's almost as striking clothing and extreme height, I do not understand how any man could make a mistake like that.
    1
  1692.  @NadaYoTengo  Okay. I have maybe confused my commentary with counterfactual 'mights' in the perpetrators mind.. Back to basics. In a nutshell, the perps knew the area extremely well, and understood they did not need to worry about the girl's cell phones. Moreover, the perps actually used the phones to manufacture a cover story by storing the phones for ten weeks and subsequently leaving them to be found. That seems to me a very above average level of confidence in one's grasp of such technology in someone who also had a very detailed knowledge of the trail area (pretty disparate types of knowledge for one man to have). Our guy is quite intelligent, organized and patient enough for carrying out a long term plan. Scarlet R is the best on the background, but Arnold Donaldson has the first principles right. Scarlet is very fair in making allowances for 'F' and his attitude now being a result of the internet accusations he has been subjected to, but if a couple of local Boquete girls had disappeared like that their Panamanian fathers and brothers would be doing more than sending him nasty e-mails, eh? Scarlet ought to remember that he never faced an investigation that began from the starting point of having identified the girls' deaths as a double homicide. He was not professionally interrogated. In an interview in July 2014, he said the girls could not have gone off the trail, but then he said the danger is to keep going too far along the trail. This is a slander on the common sense of two girls. One must draw one's own conclusions as to why someone who is so familiar with that trail thinks a 4.39pm emergency call by two girls intending no more than a days walk. and understanding they had the same ground to cover on the return was made while heading towards the cable bridge, (which they could not have possibly reached by that time).
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  1693. Sounds like you know what you are talking about. Maybe it is foolproof, but you would need to be very (over) confident such was the case, and expert professionals could not detect some anomaly in the total data to stake everything on the SIM card removed log fraud duping everyone. The guy we are talking about was already identified as a figure in the case by being a guide hired by them for the next day for the very same trail. And raising the alarm. Finds of manipulated phones wouldn't need Sherlock Holmes to conclude it was likely a double homicide, and anyone who admits that possibility is inexorably led to the conclusion it was him. I think the phones were used out of range by him from a very early stage. If the girls were in signal range the most dangerous point for the for the perpetrator(s) would be the initial assault to actually getting the girls under his control, and that necessarily would have happened when THEY had their phones and were only seconds from getting through to the Emergency number. Women of that age can use their phones very quickly, and are fearful. I think being out of signal range had two benefits . One they could not call for help. Secondly it let the lost calls deception require only a normal amount of technical knowledge. Also, the phone data for the 2nd shows a gap between 8am and 11am when our man was In Boquete in the morning . The 2 second connection on the 2nd is consistent with him making a mistake about being in a signal free location due to all the running about he was dong that day.
    1
  1694.  @NadaYoTengo  I think this crime indicated a perpetrator with an extreme degree of local knowledge of the area where the girls last daytime photo was taken, previous experience of being around tourist using their phones all along the trail, and quite a bit of cunning. What you are suggesting would need only low tech to do, yet a massive surfeit of tech understanding to do without having any worries about a professional tech expert team spotting what had been done. I think our perp is like a fox, tricky on his own ground, but not off it.
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  1695. Russia has been backward in every way for half a millennium. They never were a threat. (except to China). America is seen as a threat by many other countries, which is why they will stand by Russia. In Ukraine, Russia has propinquity: a force multiplier. They have sunk too much into the war to quit and they cannot be forced to cease fire. Its true their losses are immense relative to what they thought, but they are getting tougher and smarter all the time. Russia cannot strike West now? Correct, but whether they ever had any such intention is highly questionable.
    1
  1696. He told them in 1994 they needed a nuclear deterrent against Russia. Wasn't wrong.
    1
  1697.  @olenmees9150  It was not Mearsheimer who told Ukrainian politicians to renounce nuclear weapons, quite the opposite. The Germans and Americans paid Ukrainian officials off in 1994.
    1
  1698.  @StunBuns  It was not mrely giving back Siviet nukes to Russia. Ukraine renounced building their own nukes, which they had the expertise and resources to do. In 1994 Mearshimer said it was was terrible idea for Ukraine to not have an independent nuclear deterrent to a Russian invasion and Mearsheimer was right. The West paid off Ukrainian politicians to agree Ukraine would never have its own nukes.
    1
  1699.  @steemlenn8797  He, and virtually only he, already has the credit for saying Ukraine needed its own nuclear weapons. He said that thirty years ago.
    1
  1700. He does nothing without being sure Putin approves; that is for sure.
    1
  1701. You have to read between the lines, as with any source.
    1
  1702. He was 62. CVR is talking as if 2021-2 was such a total surprise and out of line with Putin's thinking that his character must have changed because of an illness and he alone spontaneously thought Ukraine had to be invaded.
    1
  1703. He is not threatening to respond in kind to ATACMS strikes in Russia. ATACMS are not nuclear.
    1
  1704. Excellent point on inflation, maybe the most trenchant ever made on the channel. But the US pres election is going to be over soon. The Chinese have unbeatable economies of scale to make anything. And if the West tried to cut China off they might prefer that to being left facing America alone, China simply cannot let Russia be out droned (or anything'd), because Putin would then be replaced by someone who will be neutral rather than almost an ally of China.
    1
  1705.  @occamraiser  Bush claimed God told him to invade Iraq.
    1
  1706. Oh Chip again. I was hoping for Maj Gen Tim Cross the logistician. And Russia is not going to run out if anything unless China wants to face the West alone.
    1
  1707. She will do well to ever get out.
    1
  1708. Man, they said that kind of thing about the Falklands to explain the war there.
    1
  1709.  @goenzoy712  Russia is not short of resources, what it needs is capital and technology to develop the resources it already has. The invasion was surely not launched for resources, because Russia is now cut off from capital and technology.
    1
  1710. Trump is trying to get Putin to the table, that is why he is saying those things. If Putin does not play ball there will have to be another way. Adam Bolton understands nothing, ' fact of the matter is' American taxpayers no longer think it is their responsibility to sort out European defence, and Europe is not longer the area that the world revolves around. If Adam Bolton had his way the West would be facing a Russio--Chinese alliance marrying huge resources to vast productive capacity.
    1
  1711. After watching this carefully I have to say Denmark's greatest military thinker ever is Sven Hassel.
    1
  1712. I usually accept your conclusions, but in this case must demur. I don't think your explanation is identifying the main origins of the trend. Even in respectable mainstream media under communism back in the early 80s, Hungary had an awful lot of soft pornographic or semi pornographic content relative to what there was in other Warsaw pact countries I remember reading about how striking it was in article by a surprised Western journalist. Maybe partially cultural, and surely a way of giving more freedom while diverting the populace from political activity after the '56 uprising. A historical lack of Christian religious belief may well be an important factor. If you are talking about not just performers with a hardcore film credit but the greatest per capita concentration of actually famous stars whose name sold to their worldwide following, then I would say the Czech Republic had to be the top of the league.
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  1713. The leadership of Russia is not on tenterhooks to see if Trump or anyone else is President. They see the war as necessary and its continuation not contingent on this or that personality as US Pres. Those who think Washington has decisive leverage with certain election results ought to remember that Putin invaded Georgia when Bush was Pres, annexed and undercover invaded large portions of Ukraine the first time when Obama was in the White House and the full on invasion of 2022 happened despite Biden (a Ukraine hawk as Obama's VP) being Pres.
    1
  1714. Not clear how Russia can be made to feel so hard pressed on the battlefield that they feel the need to compromise, but not use their battlefield thermonuclear weapons.
    1
  1715. America is not trying to defeat Russia, even in Ukraine. It's trying to discourage Russia. When it comes down to it no one, not even the US, is going to fight Russia to save Ukraine. And Russia can always reduce its use of any arms it is "running out of" and keep fighting. So the whole thing comes down to whether Russia wants it enough or would be willing to quit Ukraine entirely, apologize, and pay reparations. So far there is absolutely no evidence discouraging Russia is something that is an attainable objective, because they are raising their game and they have allies; North Korea is a Chinese sockpuppet . so it can be seen who is Russia's backstop.
    1
  1716. Deafening Ukrainian fanfaronade about their imminent mighty offensive was quite possibly done with the intention of getting the Russians dedicating all their resources to digging in, thereby obviating any Russian attack. For all their US supplied intel omniscience, Ukraine is going to be tentative and probing, not throw its laboriously accumulated crack brigades at a Kursk style Russian defence so deeply echeloned
    1
  1717. It's the sort of thing that WW2 Western soldiers believed.
    1
  1718.  @giobbymenta  Duh, Russia has been backward for half a millennium.
    1
  1719. The Western trainers have never done what they are teaching Ukrainian soldiers to do (breach five layers of state of the art defensive fortifications). Nobody has done that in living memory and the surveillance capabilities plus dug in firepower of Russia are what Zelensky fears, not Russian ground attack aircraft. It is not going to work; simple as that.
    1
  1720. Clever communist infantry advances by infiltration during the Korean war were explained as human waves, whereby the defenders ran out of bullets. Bullshit,
    1
  1721. As an international power politic strategist Gen Hodges is one hell of a soldier. The Russians will not use a nuclear weapon in Ukraine unless they perceive they have to. And the Chinese would not want Russia to be eliminated as a great power, which means if Putin says to Xi I used a nuke, Xi will reply "Well if you had to do it you had to do it". But China will supply conventional weapons to Russia to if that is what is needed to it prevent it getting into the situation where is uses a nuke.
    1
  1722. Yes. If in doubt don't .
    1
  1723. Why are Ukraine leaving the 18-26 year olds out of the call ups and at the same time squealing for aid? If you cannot or will not help yourself then no one else can and no one else will.
    1
  1724. Given his title focusing on whether there is a military rationale, his analysis being that this benefits Ukraine militarily, and Ukraine having came into control of one side of the dam in November, it is not clear why Anders does not even canvass the possibility the Russians did not demolish the dam. It turned out they did not do the NordStream pipeline demolitions contrary to what he assumed, so the likelihood is he is wrong again. Pretty remarkable considering he is a naval officer with expertise in riverine and undersea operations.
    1
  1725.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  He was too busy to inform his viewers that the prime suspects are clearly nonRussian individuals operating in an unobtrusive way from a yacht , making a Russian state operation most unlikely. Morover, Russia would have did such a slick frame up and let everyone think that Russia had blown the pipelines for several weeks? Come on!
    1
  1726.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Nothing much was made of the destruction of the pipeline by Western governments .One might have expected uproar if it was Russia. as the sabotage was in Nato waters. As I recall. Anders had some convoluted counter hybrid provocation explanation for Western governments remaining tight lipped. But the truth is Western governments knew it was done by Ukraine not Russia.
    1
  1727. Israeli military intel makes mistakes, and they are being worked 24/7 to find targets at the moment. The Palestinians make mistakes too of course. Whoever launched the weapon that did it, there was no deliberate intent to hit a hospital I suspect. Totally innocent civilians die in wars, and this is a formally decaled war now.
    1
  1728.  @kurtwinslow2670  The threat of nuclear weapon use. in five months they'll be out of other options and have to
    1
  1729.  @pinkbono  That is true until it is a question of calling it a war or losing.
    1
  1730.  @kurtwinslow2670  I said threaten to use. Gorby is not Putin and Afghanistan is not crucial to Russia. The NED head Gershman said in an oped that taking Ukraine over to the West would result in Putin being deposed. Brzezinski said it would relegate Russia to being an Asian power only. That is two sufficient reasons to threaten to use a battlefield nuke, and if the threat is ignored, make good on it.
    1
  1731. Shocking levity about girls who died tragically. It is explained by him thinking that the day they went missing they made a emergency call each, then went on taking photos of the scenery with them posing. See 10:52. But Grande has simply misunderstood the sources, who are all in agreement that the last photo taken on the day they went missing was taken not long after 2pm. The emergency calls from Kremers's and Froon's phones were hours later, at 4:39 pm and 4.51pm respectively.
    1
  1732.  @meab12  "I know it's wrong", that is what you said about you LOLing. I was just agreeing with you about yourself. And explaining Grande made a factual error.
    1
  1733. Taiwan did not assert that it was an independent country. If Taiwan unilaterally deciares independence from mainland China, then China will invade Taiwan whatever the US says it will do. It is up to Taiwan what happens.
    1
  1734. Very dangerous objective this 'ending Putin's reign' stuff.
    1
  1735. There ought to be one standard of justice across the country. The same for a trial at Manchester Crown Court as the Old Bailly.
    1
  1736. It is missing the fourth and in my opinion most likely type of escalation.: that the Kremlin realise the tide has turned against them nd they cannot possibly hope to win or even survive in the long run with their current conventional strategy. In that case they would have to actually do something riskier. Or quit.
    1
  1737. It is not clear that Russia's war machine is operating at anywhere near maximum capacity. The US intel briefings to Biden and soon Trump may be to the effect that a flood of extra support to Ukraine would not necessarily lead Putin to end the war and might leave him an option to put Russia into higher gear.
    1
  1738.  @MMAproAtGOLF  She probably did some of them
    1
  1739.  @WeejimmySnazberry  No it is barely possible for Putin to back down from this and maintain his authority in Russia. The ball is in the American's court, Putin has publicly said they are a party to missile strikes on Russia and unless the ATACMS in Russia stop he will mount missile strikes US bases on Europe. It was very explicit; he said it in an official address to the Russia people on TV. So all
    1
  1740.  @WeejimmySnazberry  Well he wasn't bluffing about invading Ukraine, and he has not shown any sign of withdrawing despite about 100, 000 KIA. Actually, if you listen to him, Lucas is saying that Putin is going to do what he says.
    1
  1741.  @WeejimmySnazberry  So in a fair fight good will triumph over evil because evil will run out of money?
    1
  1742. Go to reddit and join the contrarian's club
    1
  1743. Denmark was the first country to support Ukrainian membership of NATO. Tail wagging the dog.
    1
  1744.  @sgt.grinch3299  He more or less admits that. Put his veiws/mistakes to one side then; it is difficult o believe the reason the Russuans are so slow is their combat power is exhausted.
    1
  1745.  @steveosborne2297  Of late he has admitted that Putin's purport is obscure. But the Western leaders in the last few days have publicly asked Ukraine to stop trying to keep up with Russia in artillery because the West will not be able to keep Ukraine supplied at the current rate.
    1
  1746.  @steveosborne2297  The Ukrainians are firing more rounds a day through their Western howitzers than the Western suppliers knew those weapons could fire (they are designed for) and that is from a Ukrainian gunner speaking on CNN.
    1
  1747.  @baronvonlimbourgh1716  America does not dare severely wound Russia per Ukraine because that would make the Kremlin desperate and too dangerous. Ukraine is not somewhere the US would ever have chosen to fight Russia, simply because it is too close to them, and given time they can and will draw on and properly organise more and more of their abundant resources. It is simply not true that Russia lacks allies; China is an undercover on at present but it seems clear it is not going to let Russia lose. What you are saying is not really wrong but the future course of the war is not so predictable. We don't know whether Putin considers this war of his in Ukraine to be defence, and so not one he can accept a loss in.
    1
  1748.  @baronvonlimbourgh1716  The US has made nuclear threats to China over Taiwan. Were America to be at war with China for any reason, Russia would back China all the way. China has no timetable for getting back Taiwan, and what use would it be devastated by war?. China has not renounced the use of force if Taiwan tries to declare sovereign independence. Otherwise China will be patient and wait for peaceful unification. So unlike Putin before the invasion China has made no demands , and so no change in their position. Ukraine was an internationally recognised sovereign state but Taiwan's status is significantly different. It is up to Taiwan whether it declares separation from China (and gets invaded). China being an ordering power in East Europe? That is a level of military might that China will not have for another generation at least. but why on earth would it want to even then? China will continue to concentrate on the West Pacific .
    1
  1749.  @baronvonlimbourgh1716  The Chinese are well aware Putin is not different to Gorby or Yeltsin in objecting to Nato expansion and warning it could lead to war, but he is different inasmuch as to the US's apparent surprise he has followed through and actually did something militarily (China did too in Korea when the US ignored a warning not to cross the 49th Parallel). For China America is an opponent best avoided because it is too strong in every way, but that does not mean China is going to be intimidated out of doing what it has repeatedly said it would do if, and I did say if Taiwan declares independence (I would note that it is currently not itself claiming to be a separate country from mainland China so UDI would be a enormous change in the island's constitution for Taiwan). China was built up by the US as a counterweight to the USSR, and China was relatively close to the US, and even the USSR was closer to the US than it was to China but now China and Russia are far closer to each other than either one is to the US. America has identified China as a competitor, RusFed recognises China as a partner. The SMO in Ukraine has all the earmarks of ultimately being a signal Russian failure. Assuming it is. the Russians are going to want to use China to get their revenge, and they can do that by encouraging China in its own backyard against the US.
    1
  1750.  @baronvonlimbourgh1716  It happened in 2000. Some Taiwanese politicians were advocating for independence and in response the Chinese government published a defence White Paper setting out what their response would be. America did not like the paper at all, and in this connection a US Undersecretary of Defence said China would face 'incalculable consequences" (diplomatic argot for thermonuclear weapon use) if it invaded Taiwan. I think that is properly characterised as a thinly veiled threat of nuclear first use by America against China.
    1
  1751.  @baronvonlimbourgh1716  LA Times. March 6 2000 includes the 'incalculable consequences' threat to nuke China if it invades Taiwan. The crisis was began by the then Taiwanese president appearing to refer to his country as a separate state from China and its equal. China responded by its own veiled nuclear threat to the mainland of the US. America has a long history going back to the 50s of threatening to nuke China unless it did not stop bothering Taiwan (by shelling some islands claimed by Taiwan) even before China had any nukes of its own .
    1
  1752.  @baronvonlimbourgh1716  As a 2013 Reuters Special Report by Elizabeth Piper entitled "Why Ukraine spurned the EU and embraced Russia" interestingly explains, Yanukovich was red hot to join the EU and Putin had to offer a lot of economic goodies to try and keep Ukraine in the Rusfed orbit. But as we now know Ukrainian preferred the EU deal, with its military cooperation conditions. They had their chance and they made their choice.
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  1753. The son of a friend of my father took up with the ex of a career criminal and ignored a series of threats because I suppose he loved her a bit . He was murdered by the good for nothing. Ukraine knew the kind of man Putin was. Whether all this is worth it or will be when it is over is not for me to judge. The war is certainly not in anyone's interest as far as i can see.
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  1754. But being a true believer in a religion does give one courage, even under the most extreme torture (Anne Askew for example). And there are other benefits such as social connection, and the ability to cope with stress conferred by a sense of control while exercising. Tai Chi is great at preventing falls. for old folks. Confidence, even objectively unjustified confidence, is very attractive to other people.
    1
  1755. Previous to the discover of those deposits, Hitler diverted his Barbarossa armoured spearhead into Ukraine because he (like others before him) thought it the key to world domination.
    1
  1756. Russian took Bakhmut and did not follow up so no, it was not somewhere Russia wanted as the basis for an advance. I think the Russians thought the Ukrainians could not be left in posession of Bakhmut because it was somewhere Ukraine would find ideal to launch an attack into the Russian rear area, which were favourable for exploitations..
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  1757. Which is why he tried to take Kiev.
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  1758. There is something frighteningly insouciant about a self styled 30 year old virgin who is not scared to talk about it and this subject.
    1
  1759. They knew formations manning the Donbass defence lines would be ground down by the steamroller Russia had prepared. Kursk works to get the best Ukrainian units out of the inferno. Probably preserving their elite reserve was an unspoken consideration in favour of the relative jaunt away from the coming bloodbath on an increasingly disadvantageous battlefield and into Russia proper.
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  1760. The prosecution put a gloss or interpretation on the data evidence about Letby being present for deaths that is plain wrong. The main evidence against her is a statistical argument that her presence at deaths and collapses being innocent is extremely improbable, but that just is not true for a nurse who worked as many hours in that unit during that year as she did, and medical statistics experts are explicitly come out and saying that the chart used to explain to the jury why they should convict contains absolute howler after howler.. The prosecution presented cherry picked data on deaths/ collapses on her shifts without relating it to the odds of an innocent nurse working the same same hours in the unit having the same number of deaths and collapses while she was there. The unit had a spike in deaths that half of which Letby could not possible be responsible for. It was an underperforming and under staffed unit, lacking experienced nurses and specialist doctors; there was also a very insouciant attitude to their duties by the doctors found by an report before those same four doctors told the police Letby (the most experienced nurse there even though she was very young) was killing babies.. Half of the spike in deaths were unexplained, but they are certain Letby killed the others by injecting air even though they have not validation of the method used of distinguishing air injection deaths from virus infection etc. Hmmm.
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  1761. "Did anyone join you in spurts?"
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  1762. He would know all about grabbing a country's resources.
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  1763. Because the victims preferred a civil settlement from a rich guy.
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  1764. Hezbollah and Hamas are not controlled from Iran any more than Israel is controlled from America. Iran is too close to Russia for Israel to fight it.
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  1765. Every single guest on this channel assures us the Russians are bluffing and they will do nothing.
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  1766. Dr Mathers is actually discussing what Putin said so thanks for that because the other outlets are going off on tangents and seem to be reluctant to mention it. He has no way to know how he will react but we know how he will? We can continue incrementally increasing the damage to Russia and at no point could Putin wonder of 'it's less dangerous to start returning the favour than remain passive?'. Hmmm. This is more like a Kafka story about learned helplessness that how a country like Russia is going to proceed. Maybe Dr Mathers is objectively correct that Putin can't know if there is going to be a counter retaliation from Nato, but if the ATACMS into Russia proper continue then now matter how slowly the heat is turned up under Putin sooner or later he surely is going to feel he has to try a retaliatory strike into Nato to check us.
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  1767. Putin will not quit now. He cannot even if he wanted to; with all the losses he must hold on to Donbass at least
    1
  1768. Conventional breaking point. The Russians have already done things no one imagined they would do.
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  1769. Ever heard of Halford Makinder? There are no winners, Everyone (not just Russia) ought to have thought of that beforehand. And there were NATO member countries holding military exercises in Ukraine including Crimea over twenty years ago. The sides were already formed up back then.
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  1770. The US likely provided key assistance for this counter measure, or just told the Ukrainians how to do it and even gave them Electronic Warfare parts. Maybe that is why Trump insisted on Ukraine ponying up.
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  1771. All depends what you mean by 'win'. Halt the Russian advance and attrite the Russians until they realise their efforts is futile and ask for an agreement freezing the front lines? Forcibly retake the land in the South and Donbass occupied post Feb 2022? Make remaining in Crimea untenable for Russia? Inflict so many KIA sons on Russian soldiers' families that Putin gets overthrown by popular unrest and Russia breaks up? Ukraine will try to attain the latter outcomes. The West won't help them achieve those, but Ukraine might just be able to do it anyway. Big if, but if Ukraine was getting the kind of victory they aspire to then I think Putin would use nukes on the Ukrainian army. Theatre thermonuclear weapons' as unignorable hybrid warfare; the US led Nato alliance would not have been attacked yet it would still have to do something but what would they dare do to a country that had already crossed the Rubicon? There would be uncertainty and fear of overdoing it and panicking the Kremlin, with good reason! In my opinion the greatest asset of Russia in deterring the Wesst in Russia's fragility. An endgame without a Russian rout and resort to desperate measures short of an attack on Nato forces but presenting them with a challenge will be very tricky to avoid because things speed up towards the end, in war as so many things. Although we hear a lot about Ukraine currently winning comfortably, no one spells out how taking that process to completion would actually be feasible without a period of extreme instability and danger. Is Nato willing to directly enter conventional combat, limited but nevertheless actual, against Russian forces if Russia gets so desperate it nukes the Ukrainian army?
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  1772. Dubious, the predictions that Russia is running out of men and machines have not worn well.
    1
  1773. They tried to jail Trump.
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  1774. For all the bluster, how many times has Revolutionary Iran been attacked by the US? Not a one. Iran is far too big and to difficult to invade. It would have to be invaded because it would retaliate against Israel, to a US attack. Hence America would be spread too thin. Not going to happen.
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  1775. Tunnels in Iwo Jima didn't work too good for countless Japs who were emolliated and entombed in them without getting to fire a shot. All Israel has to do is demolish every building then the exits will be buried under tones of reinforced concrete. Coming out in the open from a new tunnel exit away from rubble will make them a sitting duck as it will be a free fire zone in which anything moving will be targeted.
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  1776. The path to getting Ukraine into Nato is like the process of building a nuclear weapon would be. The problem is Russia would decide to act while it could to forestall any such possibility.
    1
  1777. Media want the viewers, that is why they twist Trump's words and say the world is about to end. Times Radio is terrible for that. It's obviously deliberate by the lead presenter who shuts down Kate every time she gives Trump credit for half a brain.
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  1778. The only levers Trump has are ones Biden did not dare pull. As should be obvious by now Putin genuinely thinks a Western orientated Ukraine is an unacceptable threat to Russia. Plus there is the little natter of a sunk cost of 60, 000 Russian men dead. It is unrealistic to think Putin might halt in Ukraine without facing a real prospect of the extinction of the Russian state. But applying that amount of pressure and putting him in such a quandary would be a gamble--Putin may overreact and start a direct conflict with the West.
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  1779.  @thegrumpygrunt3964  It depends on the channel's standpoint how much weight I give to a message. A relatively sanguine message here about Ukraine doing well that is not supported by mainstream media is understandable as CVR needs to get views. If he was to say that Russia seems close to major success I would pay a lot of attention because that would be an admission against his own interests. Other channels that are more likely to be optimistic about Russia's prospects would have a lot of credibility with me if they said Ukraine is doing well .
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  1780. The endless heavy FAB bombardments are what is doing the real destruction of Ukrainian defensive strongpoints for Russia, the shellfire is more area suppression. Russia is vulnerable to deep strikes on high value targets on the home front though. In a nutshell, neither side is doing well but neither has given up on a real win, which is what has to happen for a ceasefire to come about.
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  1781. He is quite right if they want people arrested for chanting 'Jihad', then they ought to have passed a law to make it specifically illegal. But of course they don't want to do that because it is a concept in Islamic piety, so they are leaning on the police to interpret the existing law in a completely new way that no one dreamt of when it was passed.
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  1782. You will have a long wait for Russia to stop advancing because they have ran out of troops.
    1
  1783. Weakness is strength for Russia, because the West dare not defeat them conventionally, unless he moves into the West, and Ukraine is not part of the West. Russia is never going to ally with the West against China if the West defeats Russia in Ukraine. A China--Russia assemblage would be unbeatable, militarily and economically, and that is something the West must take seriously.
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  1784.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Russia has quality (ie intelligent and easily trained manpower) hat has barely been touched yet. Even though the current army of reservists are from backward Taiga regions that are the only ones really mobilised yet. you cannot ignore that Russia will have double the number of troops and will be able to have double that again quite easily. Ukraine has not got reserves to match that.
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  1785.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  They are not green they are trained soldiers in the reserves who have been called up again. And they can man fortifications, three lines of which have already been constructed opposite Kherson on the east bank. Double the troops already and there will be more to follow.
    1
  1786.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  There are also reports that there is a big drive for blood donations in Russia, which means they are expecting a huge number of casualties soon. There is going to be an big Russian offensive, and freeing the elite units in Kherson for a big push is probably a large part of why there is a withdrawal from the west bank..
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  1787.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Exactly, they have won every battle but the war keeps going on. And the Russians are getting more rather than less numerous.
    1
  1788.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  It is apparent that Russia cannot win and Putin has zero intention of disengaging and is already gearing for a full albeit undercover mobilisation as that becomes necessary. Russia has made a terrible mistake, but the world is watching them; the Kremlin’s mindset is keep the war going at however great a cost or cease to be taken seriously (even by themselves). A hundred thousand Russians will killed in Ukraine before they’ll consider ending the war. With a quarter of a million of their countrymen dead or severely disabled in action and losing Crimea to the HIMARS rockets (allied to US surveillance pinpointing of everything they do, which they have no answer to). in a year from now Russia will start to think of tactical nukes use in terms of a final settling of accounts with Ukraine rather than a way to win.
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  1789. America could easily jam the Russian GLONASS, just like it could give Ukraine ATACMS. They don't dare.
    1
  1790.  @debbiesroommate  Yes, attractive and yet not vulnerable so she could have carried it off with a better story, at the end of the day she is an actress that takes direction and the production was slapdash for all the money spent on it.
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  1791. Putin may well have went into Ukraine believing it had to be done for maintaining Russia's ongoing security and not necessarily because he thought the odds were in his favour. It's like that scene in the Magnificent Seven where they find out that the bandits are not going away because they have nowhere else to go. Most Russians (including Navalny at one point) are in agreement with Putin about Ukraine however much they think he has mishandled it. Many Russian men die in their fifties from alcoholic poisoning.
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  1792. Just because you are not scared of someone that doesn't mean they are scared of you.
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  1793.  @FreeKanal  Lucas seems to be saying that, which is all very well in theory but as my father once told me 'don't start something you cannot finish'.
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  1794. The time to fight for Crimea was in 2014, but the Ukrainians didn't. They knew it was really Russian all along. Aided by the presenter, Hodges is determined to turn a blind eye to Russia's enormously expensive nuclear weapons. Are they secretly fake and is that why wouldn't the Russians wouldn't actually use them General? Nothing we understand about the Kremlin mindset would lead one to be as un/outspokenly confident as these two about Russia giving up after a conventional defeat.
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  1795. Putin this and Putin's goals that. Ukraine is at war with Russia.
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  1796.  @fftunes  Trump has won two elections.
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  1797. Of course he is. They are all Chinese the YT content supervisors BTW. That is why being a Trump promoter gets you undercovers sabotaged
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  1798. If I remember rightly, Len Deighton said the masts were actually very vulnerable, and there was a special unit of BF 109s capable of precision bombing that could have used drop tanks and equipped with that could have had the range and accuracy to hit the masts but the Germans did not understand the full significance. It is a bit like the mole at Dunkirk or the Atomic bomb,
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  1799. America could easily jam the Russian version of GPS and make all the missile guided bomb long range strikes cease. That it has not is like ATACMs being denied to Ukraine: an example of the many effective things thet could hamstring the Russians in Ukraine. America does not want escalation in case Russia does something 'irrational' (ie what the Kremlin from its point of view ought to, and probably would do if it could see into the future). Russia is a frog oblivious to the fact that it is being very subtly boiled according to a recent podcast interview with the Austrian Colonel Markus Reisner. He also says if Russia seems to be winning the heat will be turned up under it.
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  1800. He was wise about the Soviet threat and how to deal with it, but ultimately China may turn out to have been underestimated and Russia overestimated by Nixon. And absolutely everyone else.
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  1801. We are not fighting Russia. Ukraine is.
    1
  1802. Biden had years to end the war, if America spent so little on the war so far whose fault is that Getting Russia on the ropes is like getting Mike Tyson on the ropes: he bites your ear off. Biden knew that.
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  1803. China is going to leave its money in the US after seeing all Russia's confiscated is it?
    1
  1804. The Pentagon insisted on approving each target to be hit inside Russia. They obviously don't trust the Ukrainians to not try solve their problems by getting Russia into direct hostilities with the US.
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  1805. He may not have been trying to win.
    1
  1806. I think these small unit tactics show the effect of Western counter insurgency training not Ukraine combat experience, because you'd learn not to do this twice. It also shows how the Russians are digging in immediately and are difficult to catch napping now
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  1807. He tries to tell you about eunuchs and you castigate him! They were volunteering because they preferred the life of a eunuch to living in poverty and they were incels so their testicles were no use to them. If was not just the Emperor who had concubines, rich men did and. it became fashionable to ape the Emperor by having eunuch servants.
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  1808. Look at their stupid trousers. Not even their own nether regions were were protected.
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  1809. The original Rupert.
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  1810. Ukraine is not near losing the war but they are inexorably losing territory. Actual peace would mean recognition of Russia's gains and ceding the aforementioned territory to Putin as legally Russian now by the Ukrainian government. They can't do that, no way. The momentum of the Russia forces is slowly but surely accelerating and that is an incentive for Ukraine to end the Russian advances with a secession of hostilities without peace. Russia has no military incentive to end hostilities this year because they think they are winning. So Trump will have to offer the Russians powerful economic incentives and keep supplying Ukraine militarily to halt the erosion of the Ukrainian position in order to convince Putin to halt the war. Russia's offer to let Ukraine join the EU as part of any final settlement is a poison chalice for Europe, because the money for economic convergence of Ukraine with other members is just not there. Europe will fear a peace settlement that lands them with massive contribution obligations to Ukraine. An armistice is the most likely outcome.
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  1811.  @tuehojbjerg969  In kilometers taken there is an acceleration
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  1812. For several months Russian progress in Bakhmut has been so incremental, in territorial terns at least, that it has been barely discernible whether they were advancing at all. The battle of attrition has been going on nevertheless!
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  1813. My suggestion is start mentioning that lack of manpower is not something affecting only Russia , and no more than Russia does Ukraine have an inexhaustible supply of troops .You could also mention that Ukrainians are being killed in comparable numbers to Russians although Russia's population is three and a half times as big as Ukraine's, and so Ukraine is going to run out of troops before Russia does.
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  1814. The pressure on Ukraine is coming from Russia. What you are implicitly asking for is unlimited countervailing assistance from the West to Ukraine, and if the West says sorry we can't commit to that, you say the West is pressuring Ukraine
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  1815.  @evgeniya7853  Russia would have to be insane from their point of view to halt the fighting now and that is what Biden is counting on: Trump getting all the blame for Ukraine losing. The tide turned against Ukraine several months ago, and all that remains is to put it all on Trump.
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  1816. He is at the opposite end of life where genius and talent can be. Billy Wilder made the best film ever Double Indemnity in the 1940s an it was all downhill. Ditto Orson Welles
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  1817. Why is it important for someone in the West to remember anything about the war in Ukraine; that could only be because the crucial factor for whether Ukraine wins is the high level and open ended duration of Western support. Can Washington/the West provide such a level and duration of support? Yes. Do they want to? Not really. Russia is going to be needed to deal with a future mega power China.
    1
  1818. Well that explains why Germany started WW1 and WW2. But was Germany's geopolitical situation irrelevant?
    1
  1819. Well they did not do a very good job od avoidingstarting WW1 @theMRsome12 
    1
  1820. Ukraine has roads so it can get its grain out if countries send trucks. There is $40 billion for arms but not trucks? 'Matching them' suggests a stalemate but that would be unlikely. One side or another is going to push the other back, and the longer this goes on the more likely Russia gets clobbered.
    1
  1821. I don't think there is any diversion of resources by Russia. I think the Russian army proper has lost faith in the much vaunted combined arms maneuver warfare in the era of drones and artillery laid mines and now wants to fight defensive battles. Ukraine is wary of giving Russia what it wants, so this psychological ' we are about to attack' warfare is because Ukraine cannot do anything more effective.
    1
  1822.  @sri5876  That is why they did the futile raid into Russia proper, because they have a cunning plan for final victory up their sleeve? Or is the iceberg catching up with the Titanic.
    1
  1823. Not every World War started like WW2, WW1 didn't. The mindset that stopping Russia gainin anything at all in Ukraine is necessary to prevent it keep from going West and invading into actual Nato members countries even though it would be fighting an actual Nato army whereby Russia would be outclassed technologically and outnumbered 4:1 in forces on the ground even in Poland is far fetched. They would not do it because they could not possibly hope to win. Good grie,f they can barely get even a draw in this war against puny Ukraine. That through defeat by Ukraine Russia ought to be schooled in liberalism, whereupon its civilisation an societal organisation must become different to what it has been for half a millennia is no less unfeasible than any Russian idea of Nato being undermined and divided. Attrition strategies depend on what the opponent is willing to accept, and it is now apparent that whatever its deficiencies in military science, Russia has been widely underestimated in regards to its reserve of stubborn persistence. If battered to its knees (this is a hypothetical) Russia, will issue a very unvague and unmistakably specific threat, and that is why the Ukrainian caprice that they can get back Crimea by using the unlimited arms and money from the West is being backpedaled in the West. So don't be too sure what the quickest path to WW3 is.
    1
  1824. Front line shortened and troops doubled; Russia is not going to run out of any missiles. Bakhmut is a symbolic waste of Russian troops?; clever communist infantry advances by infiltration during the Korean war were explained as human waves, whereby the defenders ran out of bullets. That is what the West and Ukraine desperately hope Russian soldiers will believe. Otherwise the steamroller will meatgrind on inexorably. Luhansk offensive coming?; the Russians are not going to fall for the same trick again surely. The reason why some people want to give Putin and Russia an offramp is because they think Russia is going to turn the tide and it will be Ukraine that needs an offramp, which it will not get after the remarks by Merkel about why she brokered the Minsk agreement. Saying Putin ought not to be given an offramp is IMO a way of trying to convince him he needs one Russia will not fall for the same ploy again, even though they might be promised the moon and the stars.
    1
  1825. I think the Russians are being killed in huger numbers than even the highest estimates so far, but that is not any surprise because the Russian army are incredibly insouciant about casualties. They attack in echelons, and the first wave tends to do badly. The best units in the Russian army have barely participated yet, so there will be a new wave.
    1
  1826. Not a chance. Betrays a total incomprehension of Russian concerns. Anyway too much Russia blood has been spilt, The Russians think they are the good guys.
    1
  1827.  @RC_Turbo  Ukrainians are defending their country in the trenches. Westerners are helping Ukraine on YT. But no Westerner, SF or not, is going to accept orders that mean their certain death in Ukraine.
    1
  1828.  @lukewhitehouse4103  They would have to wet nurse him, just be a nuisance.
    1
  1829. Their answer is always the same received wisdom: the West must give Ukraine everything it needs to fight as long as it wants. How Ukraine could end the war is never explained. Even if Ukraine reconquers all of its territory, what makes anyone think Russia will stop its attacks. A war isn't over until the winner says so and therefore Ukraine cannot be victor because it has no way to end this war.
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  1830. Ron Jeremy, John Holmes.
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  1831. I don't think anyone would proceed like this twice. It would be pushing ones luck.
    1
  1832. They have nuclear weapons and there is no obligation to get into a nuclear war over Ukraine. Nobody in Nato has to and nobody will.  @jackduane5555 
    1
  1833. Value geopetroleum reserves so highly would pet Russia's reserves at what? Putin is more interested in Halford Mackinder's estimate of the worth of Ukraine @Haroun-El-Poussah 
    1
  1834. His wife was Ukrainian. @blahblah-qx4uk 
    1
  1835. I think it is becoming evident that Russia had a cadre army (the basis for expasion) at the begining of the war and suffered serious losses around Kiev. Ukraine let a great opportunity to finish that cadre off by failing to stop the irreplaceable professional core from withdrawing back across the river from West Kerson @donixion4368 
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  1836. Yes Quisling was a traitor, but was General Jaruzelski a traitor? I would say no he simply understood in a way Zelensky did not, what the Russians were capable of.  @mateuszzdyb3547 
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  1837. Sabine's at best lukewarm review of Chiara Marletto's book did not lead me to think I was going to see Sabine discussing the inferometer in terms of counterfactuals.
    1
  1838. Is it just me, or does Dylan have the same kind of face (especially dental arch) as JP. Mulvaney's family's professional background is showbiz PR, so he was incredibly successful in getting sought after contracts. Success as failure
    1
  1839. You've earned it. And been extremely informative about psychology. But the Kris Kremers Lisanne Froon deaths video was atrociously slapdash.
    1
  1840. Sometimes they have to break the rules to get a wrong 'un.
    1
  1841.  @marinka424  There was a case to answer, just not as good as the prosecution made it sound.
    1
  1842. This interview is going to hurt Philips's ability to get Minister on his program. He instantly interrupted Shipps because he was not giving yes or no answers.
    1
  1843. The longer it drags on the more chance someone will miscalculate/ escalate.
    1
  1844. They were ape like and furry as bears (had no tailored clothing so must have been naturally insulated to survive in the ice age that far north). Danny Vendramini has by far the most realistic reconstruction of what Neandertals looked like. The scientist in this field are virtually all adaptationalists who want to believe in Neanderthals as fully human. They weren't and they weren't up to hunting us.
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  1845.  @mateusfolletto6142  You know even the original homo sapiens inhabitants of Britain have be revealed by prehistoric remains DNA analysis yo have had black skin. Adaptationalists don't understand why.
    1
  1846.  @briseboy  Prigozhin told them they could expect the very hardest of duty and what their fate would be if he got them out of prison and then they refused to fight.
    1
  1847.  @grahamlucas2712  He started off wanting to join NATO.
    1
  1848. Sam's mother is tallish, taller than him I think, but she looked completely shell shocked and unaware of her surroundings while walking to court. Dopamine signaling is ' hey that went surprisingly well". Sam had got so much of that he fried his brain into an unrealistic gambling addict's' mindset. Plus he was dealing with people who were much less experienced in life and subordinate to him for so long that when he got into court he did not know how to behave. Nevertheless when you wager against the odds for the very highest of stakes and lose the sentence must reflect that.
    1
  1849. Facts. And it's not just their military equipment that is expendable their troops are are because civilian Russians aren't too bothered about staying healthy.
    1
  1850. Since 2007 Putin and his diplomats issued thinly veiled threats that Russia would invade and try to conquer Ukraine unless it stopped trying to join the Western block. Kiev did not respect the implicit threats, so he checked them.
    1
  1851. That is why the criteria for Ukraine becomeing eligible to join the EC included military requirements.  @justmy-profilename 
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  1852. Why was Putin was simply supposed to respect Ukraine's right to choose themselves in which international alliances they seek membership? It is my distinct impression his job was to maintain and if possible increase the security of the Russian Federation and, as he could not do properly both things it seems logical that the security of Russia would be the one he chose to take care of. And by the way, countries do not have to wait until they know there is a plan to attack them before taking counter action, and how can anyone now what a a foreign country's intentions really are, still less what they might become in a few decades ?  @justmy-profilename 
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  1853. Getting Ukraine into the Washington alliance was a way to totally humiliate the Putin system and cause a colour revolution in Russia. The ex director of the National Endowment for Democracy explicitly said this in a 2013 op ed. If anyone thought Putin's would response to such a gambit would be essentially impotent because ideological aggression was not a proper casus beli in international law, then they were cracked. Now people are saying that enabling Ukraine to outlast Russia in the war will lead to the implosion of Russia..  @stevesonnaquesta 
    1
  1854. Well that is the way the game is played, because a country that did not interfere would regret it. Why anyone thought that Russia would not escalate I have no idea.  @Muzakman37 
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  1855. Not forced at all; he could let his system be overthrow and someone like Yeltsin preside over the disintegration of Russia. view of the alternative, I just don't think it is remotely surprising he chose to use armed violence  @DartNoobo 
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  1856. You cannot call it common sense and assume that Kris and Lisanne had zero common sense.
    1
  1857. You have common sense, F has cunning.
    1
  1858. Sour grapes.
    1
  1859. Trump has the military whrewithal.
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  1860.  @charlesrozen987  The US insisted the text of the Budapest memorandum made clear that the US was not giving Ukraine a guarantee, merely an "assurance'. Clearly, Russia (like Britain), was not giving any unqualified undertaking to Ukraine in the memorandum.
    1
  1861. Big expert thinks Putin will get bogged down, that is what everyone mistakenly predicted when he went into the Civil War in Syria. There is an existing Civil War in Ukraine, with a large Russian speaking minority in the West so there will be no insurgency there. Nato waved their d**k in Russia's face and counted on it to remain passive rather than go full fatalistic Ruski. They counted wrong. The USSR withdrew from Austria and Finland on the understanding the were neutral. Russia will do the same in the Ukraine. Or the non Russian speaking part of it at least.
    1
  1862. They may be short of valid justification for an invasion, effective weapons, trained soldiers, allies, and intelligent generals, but Russia seems to have an inexhaustible reservoir of (misdirected) grit.
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  1863.  @OBEOneTwo  How do you explain it?; any normal country would have quit by now.
    1
  1864. All the 'well oiled' logistics in the world is not going to help if you run out of troops.
    1
  1865. Sardonic.
    1
  1866.  @zulubeatz1  Kherson was a Russian liability and Kharkiv an example of Russian gullibility. The surprise attack there was low hanging fruit, but as a result of Kherson and Kharkiv the Russian army now has all its forces on the East bank, only 400 miles with out the river as a handy moat, and as a result of the mobilisation, double the troops. In a nutshell the front line is shorter and held by far more Russians, who are fortified in depth and dug in across key road s that would be the route for advance. This will mean that any Ukrainian offensive will not have a weak point to concentrate against, or breakthroughs followed by rapid exploitations in light vehicles. Hence, to maintain momentum, Ukraine will need to mount a broad front offensive against Russians in fortifcations, who will fight if not skillfully, very stubbornly. Fighting real trench storming battles is not something Ukraine has shown much enthusiasm for so far.
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  1867.  @zulubeatz1  Those units' performance was poor and both their commanders were sacked.
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  1868.  @zulubeatz1  ​ @Olz Dee I think Putin is quite serious about conquering all Donbass. He is not going to go away; quite the opposite his forces are inexorably accumulating to where those threatening or already in Ukraine now number as many as 600,000. The West gives equipment but not troops. Whether Ukraine could have done things differently and avoided being the venue and providing half the troops dying in a Battle Royale of attrition is an interesting question. It is too soon for assessing Putin. Den Xiaoping ordered an attack on Vietnam in 1979 that went badly and had many similarities to the SMO. Yet Deng is remembered as a leader who made China great.
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  1869.  @zulubeatz1  I agree that no matter how many battles Ukraine wins Russian can keep on fighting and thus Ukraine has no way of ending this war.
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  1870.  @zulubeatz1  Will Ukrainians be willing to die over Crimea?
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  1871.  @zulubeatz1  They think they can stand back and pound Crimea and its supply lines with HIMARS/ATACMS until Russia withdraws. But that Russia will have trouble standing still does not mean it must retreat, it could go into a major attack, which it seems to be preparing. The current military situation is of a giant Kherson in reverse with Ukraine having a lot of forces across the Dnipro and while all the bridges across it remain intact that is no problem, but resupply would become very difficult were the bridges' total capacity reduced because Ukraine is sending a huge amount across them. I think the fact that Russia has not tried to destroy the bridges is proof that Russia is willing to accept the combat losses ratio it is currently experiencing in Donbass especially Bakhmut, and the flow of Ukraine's best equipped and most elite units into Bakhmut is bringing them to where Russia can most easily attrite them. I think Russia is rebuilding for a major offensive while taking the edge off of the Ukrainian army right now. Ukraine might be given ATACMS if that offensive does too well for America's liking (eg an immense encirclement) so I expect it will be planned as slow but sure closing of pincers giving Ukraine's forces time to withdraw across pontoon crossings rather than a blitz.
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  1872. While they have had serious losses one must relate that to Ukrainian losses. The Russian performance has been poor so far but their command control and planning has improved of late and they like will be able to make better use of the new troops. I doubt the Russians have lost multiple times more men than the Ukrainians, although the Ukrainian morale is higher they are less dependent on it because of the superior technology America has provided them with. Ukraine may be getting ever better equipment and intel from the US but the Russians are going to be able to draw on more human units. and throw manpower (expendable convicts in many cases) at their problems in Ukraine. I would not count on the Russian army's generalship not improving or their morale collapsing time after time, because there is such a thing as combat experience and learning from mistakes. So it will be Russian men against American machines. The outcome remains uncertain.
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  1873. I am sorry but it really will not do to mock Vendramini for portraying Neanderthals as what we know they were (a completely separate species) while endorsing mainstream reconstructions of Neanderthals as very stocky white Europeans with oversized ruddy faces. Whatever they looked like in superficially aspects such as noses we can safely assume it was every bit as different to modern humans as we are to chimps, gorillas and orangutans
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  1874.  @TheNightLawyer  Taiwan is not really recognised as an independent sovereign state you know. And the West Bank's status is extremely confused too. Anyway, there is no likelihood that in any modern conflict combatants are going to be openly visible and identifiable as such during a battle, yet obviously soldiers when engaging the enemy and taking fire can fire back at an enemy strongpoint whether it is in a civilian building or not; there are limits on this I think. The Gaza buildings being destroyed before the battle starts simply on the apparent grounds that they are large and might become useful to the enemy when the ground combat starts is a different matter. A preparatory mass effect bombardment in Gaza would not be permissible.
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  1875. Their professional standing is at stake though. There is a lot of expert criticism and not much expert suport for key opinions by the prosecution's experts and the doctors on the unit.
    1
  1876. True, but he and his wife are not doing anything that other businesspeople aren't.  @coppershark1973 
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  1877.  @ssglbc1875  Suravikin designed the Bakhmut operation and Seliverstov the airborne Majot General was involved in supporting it, and both are now sidelined as suspect So Prog's escapade has cost Putin two of his best commanders
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  1878. The interpretation put on the evidence ought to have been challenged by the defence by calling a medical statistician. Unfortunately, when the defence fail in that way it you have no remedy. But all statisticians are agreeing the main evidence against her was simply a false interpretation of the data.
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  1879. If they knew it was going to be like this they would have thought twice. Yet they are over the worst; to quit and withdraw now is not an viable political option for them. Russians are motivated by what they think of themselves, not how they are viewed by Americans.  @jordancobb7553 
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  1880. Even if the Russian army is driven of of Ukraine and Crimean completely, Russia, can simply refuse to cease hostilities, thereby preventing Ukraine becoming a NATO member. Conversely, were Russia to agree to a peace treaty then Ukraine could join NATO. Putin is going to keep this war going forever, for the rest of his life.
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  1881. Funny how no one talks about Ukrainian casualties on this channel. It's obviously considered irrelevant because Ukraine is so much more populous than Russia.
    1
  1882. Trump is buttering Putin up because Trump is a con man, and maybe that is what is needed to get Putin to order a halt to the Russian ADVANCE (they are inexorably advancing you know). Objectively, the men in the Kremlin will need to be duped to get a good peace deal for Ukraine, and Trump might be able to do it.
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  1883.  @aidanwalsh3930  Well Russians have died in their tens of thousands to take that land in Ukraine that Russia currently occupies. Its not like a fraud where he can repay the money. He cannot withdraw any more than he can bring back the dead even if he wanted to, and so he won't enter negotiations (have a ceasefire) while without that being accepted.
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  1884. No discussion of the history. Historically, China (not Africa) had a huge proportion of the world's productive capacity.
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  1885. Cro Magnons only had to outrun Neanderthals. Moreover the Neanderthals seem to have been restricted to living in caves and hunting in forests. Venturing out onto the icy windblown steppe tundra to prey on the huge herds of very mobile reindeer was something that only modern humans eventually had the technology to do (tents , tailored clothing, spear throwers).
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  1886. Ukraine is like the Free French in WW2.
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  1887. But why is Russia not making serious offers? In my opinion it is because Russia does not think it is losing; fantastic as it seems, the knuckle dragging Russians think they know more about the war they are fighting than a thinker like Anders does.
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  1888. When he was younger and just attained supreme power he was very awkward. Lots of people who do sports accumulate injuries and knees hurt in the average person at almost 70. Aging and the stress of taking the decision to invade and seeing it all go so wrong would be expected to show.
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  1889. When did Wagner's lifers released to die in Ukraine after 20 days training become elite? Ukraine has not taken territory since the Russian mobilisation, so the current 'course of the war' is stalemate.
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  1890. The best and most determined VDV troops were decimated in the opening battles around Kiev because they and their commanders lacked combat experience. The non elite Russian units are full of mobilsed men who ight have been mediocre at first but now they have gained extensive combat experience. The Russian's solders (as opposed to the endless swarms of Zconvicts used for drawing fire), are getting harder to kill and more numerous. And they are not running away. Russia casualties are meaningless unless they are related to Ukrainian casualties. AndRussians are attacking with artilary and drones as well as infantry; elite units on both sides are taking heavy causalities. Whatever they ought to do, my impression is the Ukrainians are not willingly withdrawing
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  1891. And the South Korean birthrate is?
    1
  1892.  @omegaz3393  In 2023 the birth rate in South Korea was 0.72 . That is the lowest of any country in the world.
    1
  1893.  @stephengraham1153 Maybe a slap, I don't think it was really a punch
    1
  1894. After that Cassie video everyone wanted to see law enforcement railroading him. And that is exactly what is happening; can't beat a case from inside jail.
    1
  1895. PremMusk Twitter single issue activist retweet cancel culture took over the Dems and doomed them.
    1
  1896. If he was an opportunist Putin would have quit the SMO by now.
    1
  1897.  @Xylene.T The Special Military Operation Putin mounted in early 2022 led tp the slaughter of many of the ResFed's best units. At present Putin is in a full scale industrial war that is calling into question the existence of his regime. Its is silly to assert Putin is trying to remake the world order just because he is fighting a war against a country on his own border.
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  1898. Like others I have family who need medical care re, and there is no way around the fact the government money in Britain as in other Western democracies has to be shared out, it does not increase just because we want. And what has been achieved in the last two years fighting that is if worth continuing on for another ten, or however long it takes for Russia to run out of wherewithal, which is what Shea seems to be proposing? Let the Ukrainians vote in a referendum on a peace plan based on the front lines?
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  1899. Sounds very like the Soviet criterion for 'Creeping Schizophrenia. And Kallmans's "bullheaded oafs , malicious tyrants , queer cranks , over- pedantic schemers , prudish " model children " and daydreamers out of all touch with reality "
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  1900. Look it isn't Ukrainian drones. American satellite and other high tech surveillance means the US intelligence given to Ukraine on what the Russia army's movements makes the Ukrainians near-omniscient.
    1
  1901. 2:20 Putin asked if Russia could join Nato, rebuffed he knew it was a anti Russian alliance. 3:50 So Ukraine, a country led by a PR genius who is not so hot at fateful diplomacy, is going to be given a blank check.
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  1902. Globalist who lost the Brexit debate. All technocrat Carney knows how to do is pump up the housing market.
    1
  1903. This was a fateful decision he thought long and hard over. He knows the kind of victory he wanted is no longer possible and is showing the effects of a very stressful year in which he made up his mind war was necessary. He is not great for his age, but neither is he so bad that an alteration in his mindset is likely to have happened.
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  1904. The aim of a strategic offensive is to destroy the enemy's army. They have to defend the ostensible objective, hence the German military professionals' insistences that Moscow ought to be the object of a concentrated attack. Unfortunately for the German army. Hitler disagreed. As Von Bock complained in his diary he did not want to ' Capture Moscow' he wanted to destroy the enemy army.
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  1905. Not in Manchester. And they don't like scrutiny there either.
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  1906. If that deal was achievable it would be a solution. But it involves Russia handing back territory that it already controls.
    1
  1907. It's attacking trenches they are practicing in this video. They always want to cut a dash.
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  1908. What the retired Winston Churchill said about Britain's Suez debacle “I would never have dared; and if I had dared, I would certainly never have dared stop". After pulling out of Suez Britain ceased to be thought of as an Independent Great Power by anyone, even British establishment insiders. Putin surely understands he made a profound miscalculation in launching the SMO, but he that does not alter the fact that he or any successor cannot withdraw from Ukraine
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  1909.  @davecuddahy7872  That is small unit tactics, but the Russians are all about mass effect artillery. Transposing the usual pin with fires then maneuver, Russia is maneuvering with disposable excons (Wagner) to find the enemy then destroying them with artillery. Well dug in and increasingly wary as the Ukrainians are in that area, it is a slow process..
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  1910.  @chrissmith7669  Bakhmut human waves would be prisoners released from life sentences to fight for Wagner surely.
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  1911.  @chrissmith7669  Lets assume that it is as you say; those positions are held, so what casualties have the Ukrainians been taking while resisting the Russians? Nothing about Ukrainian casualties is being revealed and you cannot judge casualties on one side to be heavy without knowing what the other side is suffering. Russia casualties can be heavy in absolute terms yet light relative to Ukrainian ones (and do not forget that Wagner stormtroopers are hardly irreplaceable professional soldiers such as training cadres or technical specialists, but rather a 'legion of the dammed' released from life sentences in the Gulag). Is it really credible that the Russians are trying for territory at any cost and persisting for months after Surovikin has been given a free hand to disengage and even withdraw where a local situation is deleterious to the overall effort, or is this a battle of attrition advantageous to Russia as the Russian head of Wagner has said it is?
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  1912. I think there is reason to think Ukraine is suffering some casualties that they can ill afford. In terms of arms and money, there are some bottlenecks in production and reluctance to give the deep strike missiles at present, but Ukraine has a long term inexhaustible supply. Troops are the one thing the West is not going to send Ukraine, so its losses are irreplaceable and as you said the Russian losses are of a very different caliber to their precious trained professionals.
    1
  1913.  @chrissmith7669  I think there is reason to think Ukraine is suffering some casualties that they can ill afford. In terms of arms and money, there are some bottlenecks in production and reluctance to give the longer range missiles at present, but Ukraine has a long term inexhaustible supply of money and arms ECT. Troops are the one thing the West is not going to send Ukraine, so its losses are irreplaceable and as you said the Russian losses in Bakhmut are of a very different caliber to their precious trained professionals.
    1
  1914.  @andreasfjellborg1810  "Listening to foreign people who have been in Ukraine fighting, they pretty much all said that Ukraine is suffering high casualties and need way more help from the EU/US." The Russian can destroy the Ukrainians' machines and the West will replace that with better ones. Men is the thing the Russians would be better concentrating on attriting, and they seem to be doing that. I think there is an unspoken agreement in the West to not say anything that can be interpreted as encouraging to Russia. Nevertheless, General Milley said Russia and Ukraine have taken 100,000 casualties each.
    1
  1915.  @nerdyali4154  Those between 16 and 60 who have been forbidden from leaving the country constitute a reserve army of manpower. Yet is Russia substantially different apart from having three times the population. Men not machinery are the best target for Russia, and overall commander Surovikin seems to approve or he would have terminated the Bakhmut operation
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  1916. Getting closer to a nuking
    1
  1917. Russia might think that worth it if pushed too hard.
    1
  1918. Lets get out of the realm of ethics for a moment. Are you saying the Russians are bluffing?
    1
  1919. Yes and an hour past it.
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  1920. I think we ought to remember that Zelensky won election with a platform that gave Putin hope he could attain all his objectives. Zelensky seemed about to give the Donbass a veto over whether Ukraine could join NATO. Then he did a U turn, got and used more advanced weapons, then ordered the arrest of a Ukrainian oligarch who was a major Russian language media magnate in Ukraine and who Putin was a personal friend of Putin. Yet Zelensky did not realise Putin was serious about the invasion: up until a week or so before it he was telling the US to stop warning about it because it was affecting tourism.
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  1921. Yes that is simply a mistake by him. The failed emergency calls the day they disappeared were on their cell phones but may not have been by them. Indeed there is good reason to think it was not them. First it was Kris's phone that called initially and only once then there was a gap of twelve minutes and Lisanne's cellphone tried to call the emergency number. Lisanne was a lot more nervous than Kris; it might be credible that Lisanne called the emergency number and Kris told her not to be so silly so she gave up immediately, but but not the other way about. Kris would have kept redialing the emergency number. If she saw Kris calling the emergency number, Lissane would have been terrified and started calling too. So those calls were a trick by the killer.
    1
  1922.  @juliaelrod2154  Vodka makes your passing easier.
    1
  1923.  @noahgray543  I would disagree with that. The Soviets could never possibly hope to win a conventional war against the economic and industrial might of the US, so was never really a peer. The Soviet threat truly started with Brezhnev, who as a reaction against the weakness of Khrushchev's USSR at the time of Cuba' poured resources into ICBM production and prioritised that over everything else. Andropov chilled cultural innovation by having those espousing thoughts out of the approved mainstream confined in a psychiatrics institution and chemically lobotomised.
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  1924. Seagal was notorious for injuring stuntmen's family jewels to extent they had to go to hospital. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Frt0X2ojDQ Ego, and they could not hit him back. I think Vad is actually saying in his latest article what many Western strategist are thinking: that Russia is unlikely to be a good sport about becoming a global joke though being beaten in conventional war by a medium sized power like Ukraine. Can't have it both ways, if and when Russia is trounced and forced to retreat from all Ukraine (as Vad is now predicting), Putin will have a range of thermonuclear options against Ukraine. By that time the totally humiliated Russian generals will be ready to obey such an order. I'd love someone to explain why the endgame whereby Russia just swallows it is so obvious.
    1
  1925.  @xTerminatorAndy  With the the important statistical probability evidence now being established to have been misleading, it is likely there were other corners cut by the prosecution.
    1
  1926.  @Flash-sr8hm  The Professor is an authority and a reputable one.
    1
  1927. Van Dam married a female bodybuilder and was into sharing her with his manager. Seagal wins that comparison hands down.
    1
  1928. You have to look and the evolution of tactics and how the battle changed. It seems clear to me that the Russians were being bled at first but they adapted. And they did get their first victory in over a year even though Ukraine was willing to take significant losses defending it throughout.
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  1929.  @barbaros99  No plan survives contact with the enemy. Well it ought not to anyway.
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  1930.  @barbaros99  As it is apparently a point so tangential that you object to my response pertinent to Anders's one perhaps you ought to consider whether to start your own channel and not allow comments on it. The only point Anders made about timeline in the context of his discussion about whether Ukraine fell into a Russian trap was he noted that the Russian convicts were finishing their contracts by the time Wagner entered the Bakhmut battle. I simply picked up on your mention of timeline in a comment and assumed it was in the aforementioned context, and as this is Anders's YT where he decides to allow comments and has allowed mine so far even though I often disagree with him, I replied to comments on his YT reaction to Kofman without worrying about whether I exactly grasped what the commenter meant. Pardon me for not realising we were not on the same page and you had some abstruse musing you wanted to do here.
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  1931.  @barbaros99  My comments are pertinent to the argument of the YT video they appear below. Anders said Kofman was wrong, but I said its not that simple; Russia was was forced into urbanised offensive and bled in Bakhmut initially but it tried to turn the tables and thrugh accepting the high kill ratio while altering it to be of disposable auxiliaries recruited from prisons for trained soldiers valuable to Ukraine. One has to look at how the Russians responded during Bakhmut to create and use the assemblage of expendable convicts and professional soldiers that Wagner had became by the time of the heaviest fighting for Bakhmut. Only then is it possible to judge whether in hindsight Ukraine ought to have persisted with the same operational concept it started with, or disengaged due to an evolution in Russian tactics over time altering the terms of the battle to Ukraine's disadvantage
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  1932. Nuclear weapons are a deterrent to nuclear war because they are mutually deterring first use. However, Ukraine does not have nuclear weapons so there is no deterrent against Russia using nuclear weapons on Ukraine.
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  1933. But would Russia accept that? Is Washington looking to find out?
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  1934. Journalists understand morale and haw important perceptions are.
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  1935. Yes, bloody Poles taking our jobs. Nice women though.
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  1936. Lets say they did, do you think the Russians would only retaliate against Ukraine?
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  1937. It can't be both foolish and cowardly. They are scared to do it.
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  1938. 11:26 That is a powerful take. One the other hand Mulvaney likes attention and happens to have a family background in showbiz PR. So he is very good at playing the game. Success as failure ...
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  1939. The Attorney General of NYC ran for that office on a platform of prosecuting Trump and won.
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  1940. Swearing and gesticulating is breach of the peace.
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  1941. Which will result in Putin quitting?; he may see himself as reacting to the Wests aggressive moves/ So he may feel he cannot be cowed or he will be destroyed.
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  1942. Yes, reconnaissance in force to activate the enemy defence plan is the Russian way. They are not used to facing an opponent with substantial heavy artillery and far more sophisticated targeting technology
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  1943. Washington wants stability. They are not looking to find out what Russia would do if faced with a clear defeat.
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  1944. Why assume Putin launched the 2022 invasion because he expected to work perfectly? He could have had grave doubts but saw no other way and understood he had to act as if he was confident in order to get the military fully on board. Maybe Putin invaded Ukraine because he thought it might work and so was was worth a try while doing nothing would certainly result in a declining strategic position for Russia. What makes all the difference now is Ukraine is omniscient, it has the benefit of US surveillance and so Russia cannot concentrate major forces and achieve surprise for a mobile offensive tank drive. The Russian defences worked much much better than expected because they are static /don't rely on surprise, and so can't be nullified by real time intel from the Americans
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  1945. He is a small man. But in the real world some little guys will start a fight if they are not getting the respect they see as their due.
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  1946.  @americanpatriot4227  Ukraine is not in nato, Russia would not dare use nukes against a Nato country, but if Ukraine was nuked America would not go nuclear. Why? America would inevitably win any conventional war, so they would keep it conventional. Europe are not going to follow the US into a battlefield thermonuclear war fought in Europe
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  1947. Putin himself does not know what he would do if pushed bacK to the 1991 borders with Ukraine. One thing 2022 has taught us : Putin is less cautious and more impulsive than has been assumed. It ill behooves anyone to say what Putin would do. But that does not stop Hodges apparently.
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  1948. Well meaning British individuals who stood surety for him to be bailed were lied to; he absconded and did not care that they would loose their life saving and homes. Everything that happened to him he brought on himself.
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  1949.  @tuberroot1112  One surety was wealthy, the others were not, they put up their only assets to get Assange released and he abused their trust.
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  1950.  @tuberroot1112  He assured them he would not abscond; none of them even the wealthy one would have become a surety unless he promised to not to do what he did. And those people were then faced with loss of their life savings/ pension and homes.
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  1951. Seems to be quite a lot of French swearing in these stories.
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  1952. This is a different type of war that anyone, including the West , has experience in. Bakhmut is being taken by infantry working with artillery and tanks. That sounds like combined arms to me. Pauses may be for logistical reasons as the artillery ammunition is dispersed as a precaution against HIMARS strikes now, and surveillance would be turned to tracing the effect on Ukrainian logistics. Nor do the predictions of Russia running out of missiles and shells seem to be correct as scores are being fired in a single attack. Many targets must have been destroyed by now. The Supreme Military Commander of Ukraine has been giving a quite different account of how the Russians are doing than CVR does (General Zaluzihiny opines the Russians are coping much better since the mobilisation).
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  1953.  @seanbryan4833  Alternate days sounds like someone is controlling everything and is being methodical. His methods may not be the same that Western armies would use but it must not be forgotten that the Russians (and Ukraine) have recent relevant combat experience in a type of warfare that no one in the strictly armchair Western militaries has. The Ukrainian supreme military commander said the other day that the Russians are now presenting problems and he thinks that that RusFed forces will put in a major offensive. The missile strikes on Kharkiv the other day make the idea Russia is running out (as CVR appears to think) most unlikely, and left the city without water power or heating; the shelling of Kerson is making the reoccupation of it another headache. I think Russia is now doing fairly well, although not a great progress in territory gained admittedly. They now understand the danger of going too fast and not clearing the territory gained, enabling counter attacks though hit and run tactics.
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  1954. Each side amps up it's efforts in response to supplementary efforts by the other so Western support can hurt Russia but not turn the tide against a country of such resources. It is short term thinking by Russia; nevertheless the end result will be a very pyrrhic victory for Russia, albeit one that leaves it fatally weakened. Yet that will not help Ukraine, will it?
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  1955. So they are mass murdering evil paranoiacs ... but will not use a nuclear weapon?
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  1956. What is the effect of Putin's reluctance to mobilise? Fewer casualties; the Russian generals cannot attack when starved of troops, and attack is when the real casualties are suffered.
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  1957. Obama vetoed Blinken and others' urging to send weapons to Ukraine because he said Russia had "escalatory dominance'. His belief has not been falsified by events, because Russia has escalated to an astounding degree, which perhaps indicates a perception that they faced an existential threat. To feel compelled to fight is not necessarily motivated by a belief that one will win. We don't know whether Putin ordered the invasion in a state of exultation or desperation. America is not terribly worried about Ukraine being decimated and Russia may not have anything more to throw at Ukraine, but the menacing statements are not aimed at Ukraine they are aimed at the US, which seems to be taking them seriously judging by how Ukraine have been denied ATACMS. Russia cannot be defeated in the sense that Saddam's Iraq or Hitler's Germany was, so it would not be existential for the leadership to withdraw and sign a peace treaty with guarantees of no future repetition of the invasion. But whether they could domestically survive a failure in Ukraine is dubious. Full mobilization or even more drastic measures such as clear warnings of a very big bang would be tried before Russia accepted being pushed back. There could also be some kind of attack on US surveillance satellites planes or bases, possible bey electronic warfare or laser to begin with. If forced to accept a defeat in the field against medium sized technologically middling country like Ukraine the RF might as well disarm because they cannot beat anyone. A common scenario wargamed by Nato has been coming to the aid of Russia invaded by China; maybe Russia will lose (you have made a good case), but in the global strategic context any such Ukraine/NATO/ US victory will prove to be a pyrrhically costly one in the long term I suspect. So the assumptions may not just be bad in the Kremlin
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  1958. Putin's major mistake was in thinking he had got anything with Minsk and halting instead of going all out in 2015. Now as then, Ukraine benefits more from a pause than Russia is the obvious lesson the Kremlin will take. I cannot see the Russian army going on the defensive. Also. being on the defensive or making slow advances makes it especially easy and safe for Ukraine to bring forward its artillery and hammer the Russians very deep behind the front line with the 200 heavy howitzers and 30 HIMARS the West has supplied. It would be a massacre. The cost of it has been so incredibly high, yet Russia line and HQ officers have gained combat experience relevant to what is to come, which is already a reset. The Russian army 2.0 is what any fighting in winter will be against. The Wagner regiment is building fortifications? That indicates Russia will be on the defensive where the fortifications are built. Surely no one expects Russian commanders to be obtuse as to think that only their troops will benefit from training during a pause. It terms of the re-equiping of the Ukrainian armed forces with Western arms that gun for gun enable Ukraine to win artillery duels, Russian can expect its advantage in materiale to decline with every week. .
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  1959. 8:14 LOL
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  1960. The reason Ukraine's fortification are falling and they cannot counter attack is they have not drafted 19-25 year olds. So worse is better for Zelensky when it comes to US aid. And the best thing that could happen for Zelensky is the US entering the conflict. Please don't try and tell me he has not thought of how to get the US directedly involved; or he is not capable of walking the US into it. Zelensky is a very clever man, and he is loving all this exchanging of thinly veiled threats
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  1961.  @LordMondegrene  The bulk of the Ukrainian army's best equipped and most determined units are not in Ukraine, they are in Russia, where they are relatively safe. Meanwhile middle aged men not fit even for static defence in well prepared fortifications are being left to hold key defence lines. I do not think it unlikely that the invasion of Kursk was seen in Kyiv as a path to getting the US to allow and facilitate ATACMS use deep into Russia proper. Now Zelensky will seek to expand it.
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  1962. Well, Robin Williams said if he wasn't getting laughs he told a dick joke.
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  1963. Yes that is true, but south Korean cities are a lot different to provincial Russia
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  1964.  @SilverStarHeggisist  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqz5dbs5zmo
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  1965. Yeltsin acted in the 'normal' way Johnny wants Putin to act, and where did that get Russia? Putin was Yeltin's vengeance on Nato for expanding into Eastern Europe over his protests. I think Putin is about to use military force
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  1966. You cannot give up what you do not actually posses. But let the Ukrainian people decide in a referendum if there is any point in endlessly continuing trying to get the lost territories back.
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  1967. Since his earliest days as a businessman Trump's signature move was to get what he wants by an agreement then (once the 'mark' is committed) pretend he cannot deliver his end of the deal so the whole thing will collapse unless the other parties are satisfied with less than they bargained for. He seems willing to make concessions to Putin but it is a ploy: Russia cannot trust him.
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  1968.  @davidbates3057  He is talking about trends that will take a generation to work out. Yes, the anti populists have won every battle but the war keeps going on. By the way, Netherlands and Germany are now the only net contributors to the EU.
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  1969.  @Liam98789  Britain is not Britain any more.
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  1970.  @davidkottman3440  Fired from drones, by AGI. The Russia methods are inhuman.
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  1971. The Russian losses now are in absolute numbers very high, as high now as they were in the initial assault on Kiev at the begining of the war, which were unsustainable because they were from the high quality professional core of the army. However, the casualties now are mainly convict volunteers, not mobilized or contract soldiers. Ukraine failed to follow up the successes of last year with a concentration of all available forces on a single axis of advance, and as a result Russia laid unexpectedly deep minefield, figured out workable tactics, and organised a new sources of expendable manpower. Now the industrial scale production of arms including sime like drones that Ukraine pioneered, the war has become a very sustainable enterprise for Russia. It is dubious that Russia's current operations are nothing more that some kind of political PR campaign because they are advancing though the gains are slow and costing them plenty. All indications are that Russia is going to continue to fight stubbornly and not quit whatever the West does and not matter now long it does it for. Ukrainian partisan pundits such as General (Ret.) Hodges's recommendations are a recipe for escalation over a matter that Russia is most unlikely to back down over.
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  1972. In 2008 Nato announced Ukraine and Georgia would would become members at some point.--Georgia was invaded by Russia a few months later. I believe the gist of what Mearsheimer said is that whether it wins or loses, Ukraine will be progressively devastated while trying to defeat the Russian invasion, and so because the invasion is a very bad thing for Ukraine, it would have done well to think very carefully about how to prevent that invasion, and would do well to consider its position now.
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  1973.  @pppLT19  Russia has a Russian government, The CIA's current boss, Burns, said in his book that he had never met a Russian who thought Ukraine in Nato was anything but unacceptable. Ukraine was not officially in Nato but it was being integrated to fight with Nato and in 2020 ii started to participate in Nato's partner enhanced interoperability program That the Russians were incensed was not a surprise to the US government, what did come as a shock is Putin had the nerve to mount a full on invasion. The professor T&P is putting shade on says that all states act in the same way externally, and the domestic differences such as whether they are run on democratic or authoritarian lines does not affect their foreign policy.
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  1974. Rising distrust of Washington and all its works explains it better than incompetence. America has managed to become the the enemy of Russia. That is great thinking because the real enemy of America will be China and Russia is never going to ally with America now.
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  1975. The probability of the all the excess deaths in that unit being due to bad practice by all the staff in that unit is orders of magnitude greater than the jury was told.
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  1976. The worse things look for Russia and/or China the closer they will get. Shouldn't the West be trying to drive them apart?
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  1977.  @JonySmith-bb4gx  The one that the others are freeloading on for defence.
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  1978. Half the excess death she could not have been responsible for, the ones while she was in the unit were classified as' unexpected ' while the death when she was out of the unit were classified differently. It is not clear that there was any reliable way of determining a difference.
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  1979.  @divaqueen7898  Some things that are very difficult indeed to explain for a believer in Letby's complete innocence; the doctor who testified of a baby with the breathing tube disconnected and the alarm for it not sounding when Letby standing there doing nothing and the baby was close to dying. He went to the unit managers with that; would he have dared to make up such an episode, it was really accusing her, the most experienced nurse on the unit despite her youth, of trying to kill a baby. That could not be good for his career unless they believed him and in fact they didn't .
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  1980.  @divaqueen7898  Half the families whose babies died in the excess death spike in that unit had them killed by the slapdash junior and senior doctors . Not Letby. Her trial was also slapdash including her defence. Lets get the hospitals and courts following accepted procedure, not run to make the lawyers' and doctors' jobs easier.
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  1981. Not really, a quarter of Russian men die of alcohol related problems before they reach 55 years. Those guys are the ones joining up
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  1982. LOL. Something very unpleasant will happen to Zelensky the instant Putin is assassinated. There will be standing instructions in the Kremlin to that effect.
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  1983. Sean Carroll: Many Worldser. Sabine Hossenfelder: Superdeterminist. Both from a background of ordinary people. . Both could not fit in. Are they right about physics? God knows!
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  1984. The tactics were all wrong, but they were state of the art for the time. When the British came back they had better tactics, and proper trousers.
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  1985. ​ @eventhorizon3117  They retreated whenever enemy were spotted on a flank. Subsequent tactics were to stay put and fight in an all round defensive position with assigned fields of fire, and on no account fall back ..
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  1986. ​ @eventhorizon3117  The infantry engagements were appallingly handled. They could have made the Japs pay dearly, but whenever they tried it resulted in panicky retreats down the road, because when encountering resistance the Japs swung a hook into the jungle or plantations and the British saw that i as being outflanked and about to be surrounded. This shortcoming (in silly short trousers) was remedied by new standing orders about forming all round positions with assigned fields of fire. In sensible trousers.
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  1987.  @eventhorizon3117  A few good points there I think.
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  1988. Well he reminded us that Trump is saying strange things about Russia too.
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  1989. All you have said merely shows that Putin is representative of Russians.
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  1990. Both countries have very heavy losses, but both seem to think it is worth it
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  1991. This is intended to pressurise America because it it is going to make the Russians take some of the safeties off their ICBM launch procedures.
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  1992. Pre agriculture, harvesting shellfish along the shore was the best mode of existence for growing the population. Not being in trees.
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  1993.  @AccBas-u3i Not all fruit is low hanging, and even in the tropical rainforest orangutans are burning stored fat many months of the year
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  1994. 8:50. Ukraine existing as an independent country is not the problem for Russia , it is Ukraine existing as Western ally. Ukraine was free, but not to join Nato and live happy ever after while presenting Russia with a security problem.
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  1995.  @catparka7698  It was not an unqualified agreement on Russia's part. It was another ten years before the former Soviet Baltic countries joined Nato, which was something undreamt of in 1994. Ukraine took money to renounce nuclear weapons', then (without cherter 5 of Nato protection) it provoked Russia with all too predictable results.
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  1996.  @catparka7698  Russia abuts Ukraine and Russia is a nuclear superpower with a large conventional army. Moral for Russia (about Nato expansion) and Ukraine (about Russian aggression): do not accept equivocal assurances from America.
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  1997.  @catparka7698  Let me ask you this : who would Ukraine be using nuclear weapons against? Russia obviously. Of course Russia were going to agree because it made them more secure. Ukraine was less secure but did it because they got bribed with US money to renounce nuclear weapons to defend themselves (against Russia). Russia was bribed with German money to allow the first lot of Nato expansion. Both Ukraine and Russia ought to have been less 'modern' , and had leadership less concerned with their personal Swiss bank accounts. An agreement that committed Russia to allow Ukraine to join Nato would not have been signed by Russia. Ukraine did not have a carte blanche.
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  1998.  @catparka7698 Well Ukraine wanted to be as close as possible to Nato ASAP, so Russia would ot invade Ukraine; how is that working out for Ukraine? Ukraine was invaded because it was said to be joining Nato by Nato and Ukraine put in its constitution that is would join Nato. All this was done despite many years of warnings by Russia that it would not stand for it . After more that a decade of warnings were ignored, Russia acted . It acted as a sovereign country that can decide for itself what is a threat to it.
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  1999.  @catparka7698  Sovereign means recognising no higher authority, and the right of self defence existed long prior to and does not depend on any niceties of international law. A right is something that one can enforce and between sovereign states no such rights exist. It has been announced every year since 2008 by Nato that Ukraine will at some point be joining Nato. The last such anouncement was in June 2021. The Ukrainian constitution says Ukraine is going to join Nato.
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  2000. ​ @catparka7698  Where is the mutual recognition in Ukraine trying to join an anti Russia military alliance? In 1991, sixteen percent of all financial reserves including gold, cash and diamonds, but not liability for repayment of the USSR's debts to foreign bank is what Ukraine left with. Also Crimea. And it was a democracy not communist state they broke away from. If Russia's attitude to Ukraine altered was that nothing to do with the way Ukraine acted?
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  2001. But extending it to Russia disadvantage. Eventually Russia will have to choose how to end it
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  2002. How 'liberated'? They are not going to get permission to use Western missiles to strike into Russia for this so can't hold it.
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  2003. British troops quite often opened fire on Thunderbolts who approached because their pilots had the reputation of being trigger happy around any easy target. They and other allied ground attack planes were not used against the very well protected Nebelwerfers despite demands that they be from the allied ground armies. Fly boys!
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  2004. The Pentagon doesn't fear it?
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  2005. Just a decade ago peace was an option for Ukraine, but to be aligned with America was something they wanted more, so they ignored the warnings from Russians and many Western diplomats who knew Russia, preferring to listen to resentful Poland. Why Denmark was so keen to bring Ukraine into the Western camp is a mystery.
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  2006.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Denmark was foremost in pushing Ukrainian participation on UN peacekeeping missions in order to to promote their Nato application. As President, Yanukovych agreed on an EU deal that cut out Russia and forced Putin to alter the deal in Ukraine's favour, by buying massive amounts of bonds from Ukraine, and provide heavily discounted gas; a much better deal that he originally had offered Yanuckovych. It was for taking the much improved deal he forced Putin to make that Yanukovych was overthrown (for the 2nd time) . Timoshencko of the silly hairstyle also did a deal with Putin over gas but not suspected being pro-Russian because she wasn't an ethnic Russian, eh?
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  2007.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Ukraine wanted to be wealthy happy and with things getting better all the time like modern Poland acting like the 51st state. Now that dream has come half true, because they are just like Poland ... in WW2
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  2008.  @andrzejbarcelonafrlk6416  Ukraine is an anti authoritarian and anti imperialist country that chose freedom. Ukrainians have have got to be their enlightened selves just as benighted Russians have to be 'dark' and mainly support Putin. Both countries had their chance and made their choice.
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  2009. Too much anti-Prigozhin propaganda
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  2010. Published in Feb 2022 is different to written then. I think we ought to remember that Zelensky won election with a platform that gave Putin hope he could attain all his objectives. Zelensky seemed about to give the Donbass a veto over whether Ukraine could join NATO. Then he did a U turn, got and used more advanced weapons, then ordered the arrest of a Ukrainian oligarch who was a major Russian language media magnate in Ukraine and who Putin was a personal friend of . Yet even Zelesnsky did not relies Putin was serious about the invasion up until a week or so before it he was telling the US to stop warning about it because it was affecting tourism. Mearsheimer has been right about the trouble Russia would have invading Ukraine. What neither Zelensky or Mearsheimer or those who for the last two years thought Putin might order a withdrawal failed to understand is how intent Putin is on wrecking Ukraine irrespective of the cost. People say the Ukrainians care more than the Russians about the war. I think they both, in a great many cases, care enough to die.
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  2011. The thing is Putin is following through with his initial decision. Russia is going to go right on to the bitter end, come what may. So what does Anders think is the explanation for the war having lasted getting on for thee years and Russia still showing no signs of stopping?
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  2012.  @MN092krjsj  Yes. And getting on for three years later Russia is still fighting harder and herder in Ukraine despite hundreds of thousands of casualties. Why?
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  2013.  @ericp1139  Anders is a member of the Danish Armed Forces, not the RusFed's.
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  2014. Compared to Ukraine: pretty good!
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  2015.  @robertroot3790  "Russians used a nuke, NATO/EU would annihilate the Russian military". But in this scenario the Russians would have already crossed the thermonuclear weapon Rubicon in Ukraine, and so it would hardly be surprising if they used another one to defend their conventional forces against Nato.
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  2016. But if it came to some kind of actual fighting Russia would be quickly be in a desperate situation, which is exactly the sort of dire straights in which they toy with the idea of doing something silly with nukes (and their arsenal of nuke is essentially equivalent to the US's) . So the fact tRussia are so weak conventionally gives much less leeway to Nato for a conventional attack against them, because they'd be much closer to using a nuke than would be comfortable for the US.
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  2017. It was her barrister's responsability to call witnesses to explain that.
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  2018. Nah, you can't get the COs in a high profile unit to bring anything in, the inmates are there because they are snitches on their own bros. In general population you can anything.
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  2019. James Hewitt is prolly Harry's father. But Dianna's biological father was quite likely to have been Sir James Goldsmith. The resemblance to Diana in Goldsmith's children especially Zack is close. That looking up from under the brows habit that both Diana and James Goldsmith had convinced me. (see the Adam Curtis documentary The Mayfair Set for Goldsmith doing this in interviews). So I would say Diana was a bit smarter that Ed is giving her credit for.
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  2020. I gotta admit the explanation of Ukraine 's attritional withdrawal tactic is pretty good. But why can't Russians around Bakhnut have their own non urban version of it: pre register their positions with artillery then blast hell out of those positions when Ukraine attacks and occupies them? By the same token, why could the Ukrainians not reoccupy the positions after springing their tactical trap? Hmmm.
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  2021. Conceding is not yielding. If you are not in possession of territory you may cease to claim it and and concede that it is gone forever, but you cannot hand it over, give it up or yield it.
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  2022. We will just have to see if it is bluff, eh? But why would it be not a real option for Putin, and why would he not actually do it it. Unless the West is willing to accepts what may actually be a pre taken decision in the Kremlin and likelihood of getting into nuclear , it for tat, Putin's forces could not be conventionally attacked by the West in retaliation for a tactical nuclear weapon use against the Ukrainian army .No one explains why in the final analysis Putin may be assumed to prefer swallowing a humiliating defeat than using a small specimen of his weapons of last resort as a hard either/ or reality therapy for the West. You cannot fight nuclear weapons conventionally. We have a handle on what Putin will or will not dare do in the events of Feb 2022 have made clear that the current leadership in the Kremlin is very far from being risk averse when things begin to go against them.
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  2023.  @thabzmad7265  By standing aside as a weakling?
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  2024.  @thabzmad7265  This is the Special Forces supersoldier myth. But Ukraine has shown that real war is about how many souls each side is willing to sacrifice. 'You have to bring some to get some'.
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  2025. Get back to deterring Russia from Ukraine? But Russia invaded Ukraine under Obama and then under Biden. And in Biden's first interview as President, Biden called Putin a killer. Biden also had intel on the full invasion three years ago and warned Putin not to go ahead, Putin's actions in Ukraine were overdetermined, not amenable to Western warnings. from Obama and Biden, nor is "encouragement" from Trump going to make a difference. Putin knows that if it emerges from this war sovereign and independent Ukraine will ally with the west, and he is not having it.
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  2026. LOL
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  2027.  @AnthonyGisme  Okay but who should pay for all this. The vulnerable people of the West such as the sick and elderly having their services cut? Its all very well having a broad strategic conceptions but there is not that kind of spare money available.
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  2028.  @robertagren9360  Something pretty unpleasant will have happened to Germany and France by the time the UK gets 'picked off'.
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  2029. Russia fights better in defence, which plays to its artillery strength. Offensives are costly in infantry casualties. Indeed it has been suggested that the Russians are refexively pulling back a bit and drawing the Ukrainians out trenches and into the open when they can be attrited by fires.
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  2030.  @1djbecker  The Western (actually US) military industrial complex and the retired generals it employs had their own reasons for exaggerating the capabilities of Russia. Now they have went to the opposite extreme, where Russia can be pushed back. The Ukrainian units in this offensive understand it is a different kind of war to the first few weeks with 15 year old drone oprotors destroying 40 mile lone convoys with the aid of a few guys on dirt bikes because the Russians rolled onto the abundant Ukrainian artillery's kill zone . When Ukraine attack the shoe is on the other foot. The Ukrainian survivors of the first echelon will not be gung ho the next time because they saw what happened to those who pressed on.
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  2031. They have tactical thermonuclear weapons' and using them on the Ukrainian army is not impermissible by the laws and usages of war.
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  2032. Vendramini does not say the Neanderthals were knuckle walkers or not bipeds, so the foramen magnum point is not a relevant argument against his reconstruction. The Neaderthal skulls are not as distinct from modern humans in their skeleton and in their skulls as great apes are, but they are very different indeed. It's woke science to portray a different species as if it would attract no attention in a business suit on a city street.
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  2033.  @Soul-Clutch-Man  Neanderthal brains in Europe were big but shaped much more strangely that reconstruction in the mainstream illustrations on this video, which are are every bit as misleading as the worst of Vendramini. 8:55 shows a man that would not attract undue attention in a modern city in a business suit; completely impossible that Neanderthals were just stocky with heavy features within the modern range of some humans living today, and no hairier that Freddie Mercury . He is wearing skin garments that are clearly not one piece so the would have required sewing , but Neanderthals had no needles. Or tents. Which is why they could not go out on the steppe tundra, where they are misleadingly shown. And even if they had they could not hunt reindeer and other animals because they did not throw spears they stabbed with them and at a low level too. All the evidence is that they were highly specialized in their anatomy for hunting in forests and living in caves. Not social networking in fur lined hoodies with globular skulls like they are at 8:55. The man with a spear even seems to be on guard. The cheekbones are totally modern human with no trace of the slope down to the jugging midface, and back in because of the lack of a chin.
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  2034. They raped her and they shot her, like so may others.
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  2035. Funny. True.
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  2036.  @connormycyk1835  The Europeans are going to have to pony up.
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  2037. @ Ha
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  2038.  @connormycyk1835  But keep paying?
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  2039. Trump was explicitly facing facts that Europeans are aware of but not publicly talking about. European countries could carry on keeping Ukraine in the war but they would have to be willing to find the extra money for Ukraine by hurting their own voters. Winning the war with Russia over Ukraine is not obviously what it would have to be: a supreme priority objective of European governments or the US. And is winning the war against Ukraine a supreme priority for Putin? No one knows how much Russia still can draw on, or whether China would be willing to seriously help Russia if it was losing. Committing to continuing with 'however long it takes' would be an unlimited liability exercise for the West. We honorably did the best we could, and now it is time to talk with Russia.
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  2040.  @Steve_Coates  Lieutenant Generals are at the level where they can influence policy, so sending umpteen Storm Shadows to unalive one is going to lead to the surviving ones drawing a certain conclusion about their own safety. That could be a good thing or a bad thing for Britain and America.
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  2041. If there was a sneak all out nuclear attack by a superpower on another superpower it would start with a single very high altitude thermonuclear detonation to blind early warning radar. Of course the Russians did not want their launch to be mistaken for that (v unlikely) or end the convention that ICBM launches must with prior notification
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  2042. If so that would make it advantageous to keep it going as a battle of attrition.
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  2043.  @briseboy  Russia was outnumbered in Donbass, until very recently. Clearly there was an economy of force/ attrition operation there. Now the Ukrainians are facing Russians equal in numbers to themselves, who are determined advancing for territory they are saying they face 'human wave' attacks.
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  2044. Ukraine says the KIA ratio is between seven and ten Russians for every Ukrainian. So where are all the Russian prisoners in Ukrainian captivity then?
    1
  2045. Like Glock, not a gun company, uses elements from other designs, Just very good manufacturers.
    1
  2046. He is supposed to be willing to die to protect a member of the public. He wasn't even prepared to try.
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  2047.  @Tribrid-zv3nq  Plenty of men hunt animals merely for sport. The mating was likely with Neanderthals kept as pets after being captured as infants
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  2048. About Ukrainians being willing to fight; I thought that too but have heard different from refugees; a mother and grandmother contradicted me about a young relative who'd been KIA having been a teen volunteer. The ones I know may be untypical (from Russian speaking city of Kerson) but they were adamant that young men often have had main force used on them until they agreed to join up.
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  2049. With his record 18 months was a result.
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  2050. There were Nato members holding military exercises in Ukraine (and even in Crimea) in 2001. Obviously the West and Ukraine thought Russia would be intimidated, and so Ukraine would be safer ... @gulnarabracken4189 
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  2051. There were warnings by the US diplomats since 1995 that Russia would become belligerent if Nato kept expanding. It sounds like Putin did not realise what Ukrainians felt about Russia, but by the same token Ukraine and the West seemed to have some funny ideas about what the Kremlin would stand for. Perhaps those 2002 Putin statements misled Ukraine and the West into thinking that the anti Russian (it is) military alliance known as the Washington Treaty organisation or Nato had permanently intimidated Russia. I nowhere see that even in 2002 when Russia was afflicted with low energy prices, and was conciliatory, Putin ever said that Ukraine trying to become a full _member- of Nato would be something that Russia would consider none of its business. By 2007 in a speech at Munich he was openly saying that Nato had already gone too far, and Russia was not a country that could be treated as if it was of no account. Washington's top diplomat in Moscow told the President in a 2008 memo that Russians in general (not just Putin and his minions) would consider it unacceptable for Ukraine to try and join Nato.  @davidhowse884 
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  2052. Georgia was invaded in 2008 within months of it (and Ukraine) starting the process to join Nato.  @gulnarabracken4189 
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  2053. Dude, it was done by the US Navy, the London Times reports that one of the US Navy's surveillance planes switched off its radar beacon for hours on a mission in the Black Sea just before the sinking. Russia is pretending not to notice because they are scared and don't know what to do. Biden ought to have vetoed this escapade.
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  2054. Is denmark going to agree to directly fight Russia /: NO IT WANTS OTHER COUNTRIES TO DO THAT! Same policy as in the Korean war.. Denmark has a gold plated welfare state; what does it know about where to find that money?
    1
  2055.  @Ikkeligeglad  American taxpayers foot the bill for European defence. That makes Denmark and others like Poland recklessly push Ukraine association with Nato in the belief that the US would be picking up the tab forever more.
    1
  2056.  @Ikkeligeglad  F35s are not available on the open market, they are 'sold' to US allies. Denmark and Poland especially have been the tail wagging the dog over Ukraine.
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  2057. Unlike Donbass Crimea was not on the table for the 2019 deal Zelensky did a u turn on. The Russians (not without reason) regard it as inherently Russian, and are not going to accept its loss, and they have a capability to stop the Ukrainian army, if they choose to use it. I speak of a promise to use thermonuclear weapons if Crimea is being attacked, and not a vague one an explicit message to US diplomats. America will tell Ukraine to stop before Crimea. The sooner Ukraine tries to isolate Crimea, the sooner the war will end with them being denied HIMARS rockets and targeting information for them. I think they'll try Donbass first
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  2058. All true, but is Ukraine any different? How could it be; there is a war on
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  2059. Kris and Lisanne's phones. like almost all good phones even back then in 2014 had a standard feature whereby they did not need any pin code to entered to make an EMERGENCY call.
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  2060. Everyone is willing to be a drone operator. No one willingly joins the infantry in Ukraine: its a one way ticket to the front line without rotation until becoming a casualty. Ukraine has the men to draft but the capable energetic people perceive being a footsoldier as something only those completely without resources do. If they forced young men into the infantry there would be an exodus abroad.
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  2061. Only if the US wants Russia to be irrevocably alienated from the West, and become China's sidekick forevermore.
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  2062. Trump has not won a single election. He has won two.
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  2063. Yes, Trump is a slick negotiator.
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  2064.  @TheBanana93  The life of a petty criminal wagering against the odds can be as tragic and any ancient Greek story. But that is them as individuals,; I was talking while pulling back from looking at individuals to focus on the wider significance for the struggle between countries.
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  2065. 10:56 Is Russia trying for encirclements like Mariupol, or are they wary of repeating that kind of urbanised last stand by hard core Ukrainian battalions? I think Russian military strategists perceive the casualty ratio in Bakhmut ECT (whatever it may be) is the best Russia can get anywhere in Ukraine; and so the fighting there is thought by the Russian military to be to Russia's advantage
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  2066.  @harmless6813  There is no argument about the Russian casualties being at least 50% convicts. Or that Russia is bigger in population than Ukraine.
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  2067.  @thomasherrin6798  The Russian forces have done the opposite of shrink in number since the begining of the war according to testimony by Gen Cavoli the other week, and he estimates they can fight on for a year. In a very recent interview General Milley said that neither side is likely to achieve their objectives. Those two figures have access to the very best intel (better than the Ukrainians have) How is the war going? It is going to go on without any decisive result.
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  2068.  @ihavenoidea4727  There is no threat of a nuclear attack on American bases, but the day after the first ATACAMS strike into Russia Putin clearly threatened a non nuclear missile attack on an American base if the ATACMS strikes deep into Russia continue.
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  2069. Not the most persuasive evidence that Russia is suffering unsustainable losses.
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  2070. When a group feels it is being animadverted it becomes more cohesive. When you actually attack a group it become a collective survival machine. Ukraine went through this process, now Russia is. The raid on Belgorod was a bad move because it is in Russia proper. Tens of thousands of young Russian men are volunteering for the Russian army as a result
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  2071.  @rogerphelps9939  I understand the Ukrainians' motivation but Russians can feel patriotism just as much as other peoples. The Kremlin strike was was one thing but appearing to hit ordinary Russians in their own country is handing Putin a powerful force multiplier.
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  2072. Except Ukraine will not agree to any deal except one in which Russia agrees to recognize Ukraine's original borders, and if Russia did that Ukraine would in all likelihood join NATO, which would be a disaster for Russia.
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  2073. Assuming everything you are saying is true, eventually Russia is going to run out of conventional options. Russia has a ready to hand solution. And so it is actually an American problem thet Russia is heading for the final option and incalculable consequences. By ploughing on and getting his forces severely attrited, Putin is actually putting pressure on Washington, because the more Russian dead the closer they are getting to using a theatre thermonucear weapon to clear the battlefield of Ukrainian forces including drone operators,
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  2074. I wish Britain had half Germany's 'trouble'. Germans live well.
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  2075. The elite units are glad that they are in Kursk and are not being used in Pokrovsk.
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  2076. The Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin, did ten years in prison and is a minion of Putin; Prigozhin fascinates the intel and deception machine of the west that is looking to cause trouble in the kremlin because the battlefield is not looking too good, but in all truth his current prominent position could not possibly survive Putin leaving office, and the idea of him being a successor is very far from credible. Wagner's convicts ( 20,000 of which 10% have been KIA to date) are not skilled but they are advancing in a very rigid way quite possibly as sitting ducks for locating Ukrainian positions (per drones that are always overhead of Wagner assaults bands) when the Ukrainian open fire. The convict Wagerites' lack of skills is a feature, not a bug. They are not there to take territory and are expected to die in the process of not taking it. Russia is not going to run out od robbers and murders they have a 100,000 srill incarcerated. They are not there to take territory and are expected to die in the process of _not_taking it. Russian men against American machines, It's only the convicts who are being killed, and it seems they are being used to locate Ukrainian artillery when it fires on Wagner's constant reconnaissance in force. Wager has 20,000 convicts, the planners of Wagner operation just get more convict to replace the ones dying, The bombardments after Wagner operation are greater thAT THE ONES THAT WERE TO SUPPORT THE OP. These ops always take place in daylight, all the better for Russian drones to see the Ukrainian artillery's firing. And sorry, but it is working for Russia be it ever so ugly. If is really is good for Ukraine why do they keep telling the world that the Russian tactics in Bakhmut are stupid? RusFed individuals being lost there are almost entirely convicts and them being KIA is a saving to the Russian taxpayer. Bakhmut is where they have the firepower and Ukrainians standing and fighting and these are some of the best and most determined units in the Ukrainian being pinned or 'fixed' in Bakhmut where they are immobile and easy to bombard instead of being free for surprise offensives. Meanwhile the VDV (professional core of the Russian army) has been resting and refitting after being withdrawn from West bank Kherson months ago. I think Surovikin has the wherewithal for an offensive using his mst capable and now freed troops while putting the hundreds of thousands of mobilised reservists into the fortified defensive positions .It must be remembered that the Wagner convicts are there to die., A well planned defensive battle is to the Russian army's taste. It is in over extending itsele by advancing too far too fast and distant from logistic infrastructure that Russia has come unstuck. I think Surovikin would be happy to let Ukraine come to him, now he has a consolidated, fortified and fully manned front line plus in the VDV a large mobile force being held further back to be thrown in to a critical battle that will be on ground where Russia has the logistic advantage. And Surovikin can cut the bridges across the Dnipro when that will have maximum disruptive effect. If one was going to chose a place to fight Russia , south east Ukraine would not be top of the list. I think Russia giving up in a war against a medium size country on its doorstep would be very surprising, and it is not necessary to attribute their continuation of this war against Ukraine to anything but standard nation state geopolitical interests. When all is said and done Russia has propinquity and resources, while Ukraine does not have a monopoly on nationalism and people supporting their country when it is up against it. I would not bet on Russia settling for less than a draw, or the US /Ukraine assemblage being able to get an outright victory.
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  2077. So Western combined arms boils down to complete command of the air, (thats what air superiority is) . Far from clear how air support would have been have been useful against Wagner's highly urbanised light infantry attack, which used expendable convicts to clear mines and draw fire, and could have been used to soak up airstrikes by extremely valuable planes braving the Russians AA missile festooned ground forces
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  2078.  @kevintewey1157  Intelligent people have what is called cognitive reserve. They can have brain problems without symptoms, but once the disease does begin to show through things deteriorate very quickly.
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  2079. Let us be honest about what the US has been doing. Every ATACMS (and Storm Shadow) strike needs a different set of terrain recognition images laded into the missile before launch. Only the US has the image library. So it is not just identifying the target's location; the US us is complicit in actually carrying out every strike and the missiles could not fly to the target without the US.
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  2080. The Russians think they are the good guys, and they take Ukraine very seriously as a threat. Ukraine has united behind their leader,, that is what countries (not just democratic ones) do in war. A country is a survival machine.
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  2081. Or using a tactical nuclear weapon against the Ukrainian army.
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  2082. Judging by warnings from America it is running low on the shorter range HIMARS rockets Ukraine is currently restricted to, but because of the advances now able to hit critical Russian lines of communication in the south, the US is getting concerned that Ukraine is doing to well too quickly and likely to produce a formidable Russian response. America has never said it wants Ukraine to win, let alone "winning" as Ukraine is now defining it, and so there are limits to what Ukraine is going to get , unless the Russians start doing well in which case America will be far more generous. But only with arms. not fighting men. Professionals never forget that the number of troops fielded is usually decisive. One side in this war has the capability to call up and equip millions. Not top notch formations but the net effect will not so easilly be negated.
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  2083. @Spots Corner The Russians won't ask them to. So how does Ukraine end the war?
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  2084. @Spots Corner Putin might like that. Biden would not.
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  2085. The military industrial complex needed Russia to be a peer competitor. Did anyone in the US army really believe that they were?
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  2086.  @baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714  Russia has always been more of an artillery army than a tank one.
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  2087.  @baha3alshamari152  That is a theory the fly boys of every country will be supporting.
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  2088. "Russia is headung for defeat" . No, Bakhmut .
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  2089.  @mariaf.6601  Does America want Ukraine to get the kind of victory that Zelensky is saying is what he would settle for? I don't think the US has ever said that or supplied Ukraine with the advanced long range missiles to do it.
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  2090.  @mariaf.6601  The early gains were headlong drives by columns of vehicles along roads; not methodical and accompanied by fortification and mine laying. The current Russian offensive is more ratchet than pendulum.
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  2091.  @shuathe2nd  Why all this now? Because the West knows Ukraine is about to need it. Newsflash: Russia is advancing on multiple fronts
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  2092. Anders talks about war as the continuation of politics but what is lacking in his analysis is an understanding of politics in war. Ukraine to keep fighting no matter what and Nato countries populations will have to take the financial pain is is a purely military perspective. It's just not politically feasible to continue forever. We did the best we could.
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  2093. No. Beyond reasonable doubt does not mean there is no chance of a mistake.
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  2094.  @ExmoorPony Tough getting a school nurse on your side. My experience and from what I have heard is people in subordinate positions won't go feel obliged to tell the truth if it means going against their boss in any kind of hierarchy. The thing would not be injuries but that you had reported them, which would be unlikely in the case of someone who had inflicted them. But your kid has to say what is happening, they often don't. And bullying can be subtle. But I am glad you brought these characters to book.
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  2095. Biden knew all about the Russian invasion well before it happened, but he could not stop Russia from invading. Getting on for three years Biden (a Ukraine hawk when he was VP) has had to give Ukraine war winning aid, but he has not done it. The Biden administration is not even using the principal of Russian funds held in the west to help Ukraine. Only the interest is being used. Here is some reality therapy: Washington has never intended to have Ukraine trounce Russia.
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  2096.  @HanithSVK  So Gerasimov will rule nothing out to get the result Putin demands
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  2097.  @toober1066  There is an octave of Russia's capabilities that has not been used yet. If Ukraine is clearly winning conventionally, then Gerasimov is still safe as long as he gives Putin a way to avoid losing, and obeys any resultant order from Putin.
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  2098.  @malcolmchalmers9231  Once the war is won for Russia, yes.
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  2099. The Russian steamroller is gathering pace (gist of what Oberst Reisner says about the Kharkiv offensive), but Anders is buoyed that Putin will be embarrassed as if he is a high school girl.
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  2100. But what crashed the Pound was the Bank Of England selling UK bonds to get rid of Liz Truss and Kwasi Krawteng (who were ex lovers).
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  2101. NK is a Chinese sockpuppet. Once Trump left the White House, KIm was put back in his box.
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  2102. They have always been economically weak, That is nothing new for them.
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  2103. What is Ukraine's strategy for ending the war? House prices in Kiev are rising.
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  2104. 'No one is going to end up happy' even is if Western support is maintained' does sound like the way things end up in the real world. Lord Richard Dannatt shows himself to be a very clever fellow.. I hope the current leaders of the British army are similarly clear sighted. I am not sure any serving Ukrainian general would give such advice though. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5tyJggQrsw&t=50s
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  2105. Zelensky was invited to the meeting on the basis he had dropped his insistence that Ukraine gets a "security guarantee" from Trump (thereby giving Ukraine the ability to bring Russia and America into direct conflict) as part of any deal to end the war. But when he arrived it was clear Zelensky's position had been misrepresented by Ukrainian diplomats and he was still demanding the security guarantee.
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  2106. By the UN definition: none. And the Gaza situation is actually the Palestinian situation,
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  2107. The Bank Of England deliberately crashed the economy by selling UK bonds to get rid of Truss. Starmer is incorrect that Truss did that. It has become obvious that his allegations against her were not just election rough 'n tumble, and he is not going to ever stop saying it .
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  2108. Unless the Russians are dim, the mobilised reservists are for replacing the remaining contract professional soldiers currently stationed at cushy bases inside the current borders of the RusFed. The freed up young tough professional soldiers will be sent to Ukraine. Not clear what Putin is going to do with them, but I think he understands Ukraine aided by America is holding almost all the cards in a long war, and further Ukrainian advances are likely. Invading the Russian Motherland is something that Ukraine must not and won't willingly do, because it would give Putin a theoretical justification (under long standing Russian rationales for first use) to detonate a theatre thermonuclear weapon on the Ukrainian army. What Putin is up to with the proposed rapid incorporation of the occupied territories is getting Ukraine on the horns of a dilemma whereby trying to liberate their own territory they will be moving into what is in Kremlin eyes as Russian as Siberia. Please note: I do not think Russia will demand Ukraine withdraw from what they have liberated in Donbass ECT just because of some law that Russia has passed saying all Donbass is Russian, but I do think that once Russia passes such a law the Ukrainians will be put on notice that if they advance any further their force will be treated as if they are a conventionally unstoppable aggressor at the gates of Moscow.. The meaning of Putin's "this is not a bluff" remark is clear. It is much cleverer than a demand to 'surrender or we drop the Bomb'. because it puts the ball in the Ukrainian American court. My feeling is the US behind the scenes will tell Ukraine to advance as quickly a possible before the occupied Ukrainian territories can be incorporated into Russia proper under Russian law. Once that happens America will choke down the supply of HIMARs ammunition, and the war will effectively end. America is not going to get into a nuclear war with Russia, and a US force (including air force) conventionally fighting with Russia would have much too easy a path to nuclear war, because there are tactical anti aircraft missiles that Russia commander would in 15 minutes ask for permission to use when they were being clobbered as they would be.
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  2109.  @krpi7685  Holding the referendums and doing the annexations now does not fool anyone outside Russia, but it must be for a purpose and I think he is preparing the ground for the contingency of having to issue a credible theatre thermonuclear strike when and if 'Paddington' puts his paw across whatever front line exists at the time. Putin is readying a backstop in case the Russian army gets routed again, wants the West to understand that the personnel of the state including the military commanders in Russia are going to be given a order consistent with the long established decision protocols for an apparent proper rationale for the use of a theatre thermonuclear weapon on the rear area of an Ukrainian army driving into what by that time in Russian law ' 'is' as Russian as Vladivostok. In a situation where America is retaliating for a Russian battlefield thermonuclear strike on Ukraine's advancing army with a direct military attack of some kind on Russian forces in and around Russia, Russia would have has already crossed the Rubicon of first use, although not against any member of Nato. None of such complicating factors have been well worked out in all their implications in the way a Warsaw Pact NATO conflict had been over decades, so there can be little certainty. Nonetheless, I venture to say it is barely plausible that after detonating one theatre thermonuclear weapon on a Ukrainian army, the Russians are going to accept that their nuclear deterrent to conventional attack is so risible to America that it can for example, brazenly send swarms of F35s to sink the Black Sea Fleet with impunity, while Russia is paralyzed with fear. Two things are thing is for certain Russia would be pathetically vulnerable to any conventional raid America launched on it, and another is that in the thermonuclear weapons' realm Russia can look the USA in the eye; so what would the Kremlin do in retaliation? 'Nothing' seems an unlikely response from Putin in view of his track record.
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  2110. All Ukraine must be free; or what?
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  2111. The key to modern war is adaptability. And of course the Koreans have it, even the Russians do.
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  2112. If you listen to Peter Zeihan.
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  2113. "Given time and steady support Ukraine will win." How are they going to convince Russia to agree to end the war? As long as the war continues Russia has not lost.
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  2114. The US is deterred from deterring the RusFed. America hates that.
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  2115.  @UNIVERSAL-UR If we look forward, I suppose neither side will be able to attain their current objectives.
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  2116. Were Crimea to become untenable for Russia it would only be out of conventional options (General Hodges as a Nato commander would have, in line with official Nato doctrine, requested use of nukes rather than allow the Soviets to roll into Western Europe). And it might not be a nuclear weapon, there could be a multi strike with one for every elite Ukrainian brigade being held dispersed behind the front line. Ukraine would fight on with what? Taiwan is not recognized by the US as a sovereign state, and has not declared independence so China has no motive to try and invade it. If China had a veto over Russian actions then Russia would never have invaded
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  2117. Yes the Russians are avoiding complete envelopments; too easy to get the tables turned on you.
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  2118. People once felt that way about their religion being special and a higher value and many thinkers suggested religion was the cause of wars. The average man in every country is much more individualistic in every way and considers having the opportunity to develop his personal potentialities to be the meaning of life. A man who goes off to war and leaves his wife and children might not do it reluctantly but because he is bored with family life, and that is a betrayal.
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  2119. 5:30 Russia once was willing to be like one of those thirty countries, because Russia tried to join Nato and not just under Yeltsin, but under Putin too. And they did not get a pre-emptive acceptance like Georgia and Ukraine did in 2008, which was supposedly a dead letter but officially reiterated for Ukraine in a Nato announcement of er, June 2021 (hmmm), Russia was fobbed off instead. Now was exclusion from a formerly anti Soviet alliance designed to help Russia develop into something very different to the USSR? Russia would surely not dare attack Nato, but Ukraine was announced to be joining Nato at an undetermined point in the future, whereupon a military option for Russia to deal with Ukraine would cease to exist in effect. Yet until Ukraine did actually join Nato then Russia would still have an invasion option. So why would anyone not think Russia was going to invade while it could? Rather that different attitudes to international rules, I think the belief that Russia was only up to clandestine hybrid war rather that a promethean endeavor such as an all out invasion of Ukraine is the key to what went wrong.
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  2120. The leader of the free world supporting an ally against worked in Vietnam?
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  2121. Army Group Centre was not making a scheduled halt for rest and refitting, that would taken a fortnight. Germans stopped in front of Smolensk for almost two months
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  2122. The Ukrainians have more precise targeting and counter battery artillery. The Russian use mass effect in artillery (as all else). So Wagner, which unlike the rest of Russian forces in Ukraine is actually advancing, might well need to fire an awful lot of ammunition. The Russian army is begining to use the assault group methods pioneered by Prigozhin ( also originated the troll farm that maybe tipped the balance preventing Clinton becoming president), so I can't see criticism by Prigozhin backfiring on him because he gets things done. Criticism of the army by Prigozhin is likely articulating what Putin feels, so the Wagner chief is quite possibly Putin's sockpuppet rather than a loose cannon. Anyway the army has traditionally had and been kept having zero influence in the highest political circles as far as I am aware. Progozhin is safe as long as he sticks to criticism of military figures. The evidence so far in Ukraine strongly suggests that combined arms mobile warfare just does not work very well any more. Wagner's methods are a refinement of the Russian army long favoured 'reconnaissance in force' tactic that 'soaks up firepower' by drawing it--with often incredibly bloody results. Progozhin's lifer expendables are tailor made for employing in such a manner. Add a second echelon of agile professionals using stealth and bazookas, and the tactics make excellent sense.
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  2123. American taxpayers never wanted to foot the bill for European defence (and indirectly social spending). Europeans still want Americans to though. Germans live better, but who picks up the tab? Not them! When Trump says ' Free ride is over" Europe does not appreciate it. But occupants of the White House since Eisenhower have been trying to unshoulder the financial burden of defending Europe.
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  2124. Everyone in the media has always hated Steven Seagal. It has been going on for four decades.
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  2125.  @Interglacial_optimist  And Trump wants them for the West!
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  2126.  @giovanni-ed7zq  That is like the street value. Ukraine would need massive US investment and technology transfers to realise one percent of that in profit. Ditto Russia.
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  2127.  @giovanni-ed7zq  What they want and what they get will be two different things. Aid from to US includes much are not available on the open market at any price, including intel and the separate target navigation program for each ATACMS and Storm Shadow. Ukraine ought to be glad Trump is not asking more of them. They still have not drafted under 25 year olds.
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  2128.  @giovanni-ed7zq  You think the ATACMS strikes into Russia which are 100% US targeted are not a non trivial risk for of a nuclear exchange for America? Ukraine is ingrate; thinks it is doing the West a favour.
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  2129. "Street value" BS. Without US technology and capital Ukraone could not make a dime out them.
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  2130.  @giovanni-ed7zq  Newsflash! Ukraine is in a bad situation so no good deal will be offered. Tha US cannot make Russia offer one.. If Ukraine holds out for justice it will get no peace. The war will go on as long as Russia can keep advancing then. But that will mean another year at least. And what better deal is Ukraine going to be offered then? Apart from the lost territory there will be a lot of men in their graves, and with nothing to show for it.
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  2131.  @NerickovaNoha  Well the economic growth is in America and China. America also where Europe will have to get is energy now. Europe cannot meat its welfare and military commitments. Something has got to give.
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  2132. Russia and Ukraine both made a serious mistake getting themselves into the sticky situation they are currently in. They are well and truly in the soup together.
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  2133. No. It was not going to happen if they said it was, but I think the Ukrainians' switched to saying big attack is not going ahead because the Russians were ceasing to believe in an advance announcement by Ukraine of what should be a military secret. Yet in a way they are saying it is going ahead by saying it won't. So it still isn't
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  2134. Ukraine is going to be in a real mess by the time Russia is out of time.
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  2135. If their moral is poor and getting worse, where are all the Russian prisoners? The Russian army could be defeated but it would be extremely risky and only terminate the conventional war.
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  2136.  @rejectwokeness1314  Plain women who are not heiresses assume really good looking guys will not be interested in them.
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  2137. The Nixon--Khrushchev 'debate' was actually much more of a shouting match than this one was. And they were far more experienced politicians with less personal history than Zelensky and Trump. Then came détente. What Ukraine wants and what they get are two different things. Ukraine has not even drafted its under 25 year olds (the average age of a US soldier in Vietnam was 19!).
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  2138.  @billB101  Behind the scenes the Treasury pushed the previous government hard to maintain high levels of immigration.
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  2139. Haring is implying that the US is currently trying to help Ukraine win. But that is clearly untrue because for example the US could give Ukraine hundreds of Abrams tanks and it only gave 30.Washington is helping Ukraine get by and wants Russia to become so discouraged it quits. Russia is going to be needed to help with a future enemy megapower (China), and that will be a non starter if Russia is trounced in Ukraine by a blizzard of ATACMS hitting command and control and supply hubs, It will be like the Abrams: not supplied in enough quantity to turn the tide. The Ukrainians are completely dependent on the US for targeting data. America will slow the temp of the strikes down, by for example not supply the coordinates saying the targets are being very well hidden and only a few can be located.
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  2140. It is an adversarial system in which the responsibility to counter prosecution evidence lies with the defence. The defence seems to have been so satisfied with how his cross examination of prosecution witnesses went that he decided there was nothing more to be gained by calling expert witnesses for the defence. Very unusual courtroom tactics.
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  2141. I think Russia would as likely as not use nuclear weapons on Ukraine to stop Ukraine if it was about to win. There definitely would not be a nuclear war because years into the conflict the West has not got directly involved in fighting Russia even conventionally over Ukraine. Fortunately, Ukraine is further away from winning than ever. Does not mean Ukraine is going to lose, just that a meaningful win is beyond them. Or rather that the West does not dare push Russia into a corner by supplying Ukraine with everything it needs. It's called a nuclear DETERRENT, not "blackmail".
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  2142. Ritchie was a great baddie. Seagal knocked the actor playing Richie's front tooth out. William Forsythe talked about in an interview. On a movie he was director of, Seagal was notoriously injuring multiple stuntmen's' family jewels to the extent they had to go to hospital. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Frt0X2ojDQ Further proof that Steven actually likes hurting people: he broke Sean Connery's wrist.
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  2143. I don't think the conclusions you reach are consistent with the fascinating info you provide about cancelation of the lease on Crimea precipitating Putin into annexing. The value Putin places on Ukraine implied by his 2014 invasion to keep it hardly suggests he, or maybe any, Russian leadership will accept losing it. It tends to be assumed in this and a lot of other similar things on YT that after Ukraine (hypothetically) gets its lost territories back Russia will just throw up its hands and quit, but that is very unlikely. Crimea is basically Russian and given all the Russian speakers who have been moved there from Kherson and other places the Ukrainians have taken it is extremely doubtful that Ukraine could win any kind of referendum there. In summary, Ukraine has not thought it through; they can win a hundred battles, but the war will keep going on
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  2144. Ukraine has lots of territory; it does not have lots of reliable troops so it will run out of good units defending territory the way they are now. Put it another way Kiev has not got the men to continue slowing down the Russian advance by fighting it all the way to the Western border because Ukraine will run out of men long before then. I don't believe the Ukrainian military want to stand and fight to the extent they are doing; Zelensky is ordering them to for political reasons. @jonlee2217 
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  2145. Better watch what you are smoking  @Comm.DavidPorter 
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  2146. If he was willing to sacrifice a million men then he certainly would not balk at using nuclear weapons after losing 600,000. Anyway, the losses of Russia must be related to the losses of Ukraine, and although Russia mat be losing more, their casualties are of lower quality and a feature not a bug.  @Comm.DavidPorter 
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  2147. Shouldn't parts of the front under pressure be reinforced by fresh units held in rear areas as a reserve rather that taken from another part of the front line?
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  2148. The calculus of nuclear stand offs as they existed in the Cold War between equal superpowers was understood. The Russian (Warsaw Pact) conventional superiority was deterred by Nato's nuclear weapons doctrine of going nuclear if a Soviet conventional attack was succeeding. Anders's assurances of nuclear weapons use against the Ukrainian army being a counter productive non starter for Putin in any conceivable circumstances is an entirely novel hypothesis. Washington does not appear to be at all confident that Putin can not use tactical nukes without being overthrown, judging by the grudging provision of the really effective weapons to Kiev.
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  2149. The cost to Russia of continuing with the war is being spelled out, but the cost of quitting is not being given mention of, as if only Putin's pride will be affected. That Russia has been unable to take Kharkiv only 20 miles from the Russian border is bad enough. Its status as a country of consequence would not survive and it might as well give up its armed forces including its nuclear weapons if it lacks the will to go to the bitter end and attain its objectives against a medium sized country right beside it like Ukraine. No one would ever take it seriously again, not potential enemies nor prospective friends; would China consider Russia a worthwhile ally if it quit? So the war is from the standpoint of the Kremlin really believed to be sort of existential for Russia. If Ukraine is going to be supported open endedly by the West the largesse is without strings such as a say on whether Ukraine will negotiate, the Russo Ukraine war will go on for a very long time. I think that selfless attitude being sustained is possible, but not particularly plausible in democracies.
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  2150.  @macki-1  Wagner as it fought in Bakhmut (apart from the early advance attempting to encircle it), was was using a very specialised l method of advancing spearheaded by convict groups sequentially sent along the same routes and suffering extremely high casualties. As the US said Wagner's tactics in Bakhmut were not ones that the Russian would chose to use if there were other options. Bakhmut had to be denied to Ukraine at whatever cost in the Russian command's opinion
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  2151. You join the army to defend the country, whatever its values. The British Empire at the time of WW2 was far from a democracy
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  2152. This seems to confirm there are lot of foreign volunteers in Ukrainian uniforms being thrown into the high risk fighting around Bakhmut.
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  2153. Russia's strong point is mass effect, not precision. America surveillance is omniscient.
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  2154. Yes the soldiers of NK are from a backward country, but their determination, as all who have fought against them allow, is unmatched because of their medieval society. Internationally, North Korea is a Chinese sockpuppet, it was told to stand down by Xi after import tariffing Trump left the White House. During his campaign Biden publicly said that China is no economic threat to the US (Biden represented Wilmington, Delaware, the cooperate capital of most Fortune 500 outsourcers, sorry, companies). The practical real world consequences of Ukraine' theoretical freedom as a sovereign nation state to ally with NATO is losing Crimea (that Ukrainians soldiers would not fight for), and war without end. By 2022 Russia was through asking and it still isn't asking; this is a fighting question. These retarded economic development countries produce ineffective equipment yet soldiers willing to die. As with the vid CVR showed the other day, they are told that they are going to their deaths, but buoyed by the knowledge that their country will honor their memory. And this is a war of attrition.
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  2155. 'Inside the UK economy' sounds like it is discussing a closed system. Immigration has no bearing on joblessness? Jacob Rees--Mogg has said the Treasury was pushing immigration really hard. There ought to be training in skills attractive to employers, yes. Yet there is a problem with disability payments to people who are depressed and or suffering from substance abuse problems, and I am afraid more than afew are adept at finding any weak point of a system.
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  2156. Nah, just no man of the status she is looking for.
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  2157. Bakhmut may not be perfect for the Russians but it is where they have the firepower and Ukrainians standing and fighting . We do not know how many causalities Russian fires are inflicting , yet given the Russian artillery advantage in Bakhmut Ukraine is taking significant casualties is certain. Some of the best and most determined units in the Ukrainian army units are being pinned or 'fixed' in Bakhmut where they are immobile and easy to bombard instead of being free for surprise offensives. The Russian version of an economy of force operation is how I would describe Bakhmut and if is really is good for Ukraine why do they keep telling the world that the Russian tactics in Bakhmut are stupid? Even is those tactics are silly the troops being lost there are almost entirely convicts and them being KIA is a saving to the Russian taxpayer.
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  2158.  @jimbodimbo981  The Russians are not going to believe that Ukraine and those supporting it are genuinely explaining to the Russian army where they are going wrong. Ukraine is mounting an offensive in Donbass, which is telling evidence for the ratio of casualties in Bakhmut not favouring Ukraine. Russia has more firepower in Donbass and their supply line is shorter there. Moreover, a well plaanned defensive battle is to the Russian army's taste. It is in over extending itsele by advancing too far too fast and distant from logistic infrastructure that Russia has come unstuck. I think Surovikin would be happy to let Ukraine come to him, now he has a consolidated, fortified and fully manned front line plus in the VDV a large mobile force being held further back to be thrown in to a critical battle that will be on ground where Russia has the logistic advantage. And Surovikin can cut the bridges across the Dnipro when that will have maximum disruptive effect
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  2159. They were not Nato members because the Russian threatened to invade were they to become members. Petraeus said he visited that Ukrainian base on the border that got hit the other day and it was a massive facility where Nato members trained the Ukrainians. Since 2020 when it was admitted to the enhanced partner interoperability program, Ukraine was being integrated into Nato command structures and getting sophisticated weapons. But they were not under Chapter five protection, so they had the worst of both worlds. Nice going Zelinsky.
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  2160.  @shawnotoole1421  For Latvia, joining Nato was the right decision, but Latvia and Ukraine are different counties with different governments for a reason. Do you think Zelinsky, who six weeks ago publicly asked Biden to stop talking about an invasion, pursued the best policy for keeping his country from being invaded? I think he ought to have fulfilled the terms of the Misk accords that Ukraine agreed to in 2015 and gave the breakaway Donbass republic autonomy, and not intensified the process of integrating de facto with Nato command structures while still lacking Chapter 5 protection. Ukraine is the Timothy Treadwell of countries; with no one going to come to their aid, they ought to have been more careful around their ravenous 1800 pound neighbour.
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  2161.  @shawnotoole1421  If the US dared it would overthrow Putin., but it hasn't and Russia has not attacked America either. Both countries have armed forces. As Professor Mearsheimer write in his 'The Tragedy Of Great Power Politics' "it is difficult for a state to increase its chance of survival without threatening the survival of other states". There is a American missile base in Poland that is going to become operation later this year; it is 300 seconds hypersonic flight time from the Kremlin. The trouble is the American diplomats have done too good a job, and they did so because as Perry, Clinton's defence secretary, said, there was contempt for Russia as a 'third class state" and the attitude was "who cares what they think".
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  2162.  @shawnotoole1421  "Putin's war against Ukraine is not for the sake of his people as individuals.". Correct. it is for the Russian state which has existed in one form or another for half a millennium. You say Russia ought not to do it, but the fact is the US would and has in Cuba and Central America under Reagan and Kennedy. You say those things are unnecessary but were that the case bot Russia and America (and all other states in history) have completely misunderstood the way the world works. This seems unlikely.
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  2163. @Pho-King Soup They say he calls Putin 'Papa'.
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  2164. Trump lost an election, by a very narrow margin. He may, or may not, win one soon. Putin may be bad, but he is genuinely popular in Russia.
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  2165. Putin does seem to have greatly underestimated Ukrainian resistance in 2022, but Zelensky greatly underestimated the degree to which Putin was serious about an invasion. Anyway we are now in 2024 and it is clear Putin ain't bouncin' cause he's a GANGSTA
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  2166. Ukraine has agency and is fighting for its life; well it is becoming critically short of infantry yet still will not draft its young men. You cannot blame Trump for that
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  2167. No one knows which country has the advantage in this kind of a war because Ukraine gets more support the worse it does. It seems clear that the US wants to supply Ukraine with, not what would be needed to drive Russia back such as 100 plus HIMARS., but to impose attrition on Russian forces as they make make an extremely slow progress that will eventually amount to a Pyrrhic campaign, yet never confront Putin with the immediate prospect of defeat. The price of weakening Russia will be paid by Ukraine, Hence what is bad for Russia in this was is not necessarily good for Ukraine.
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  2168. If you are willing to pay for Europe's defence (while they spend the money on welfare states) you are the Goodies.
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  2169. Wagner's Legion Of The Dammed are given a few weeks training an ecounrged forward by Chechen battle police. Wagner's Legion Of The Dammed human wave are blasted by Ukrainian artillery, thereby revealing their location. The previously located Ukrainian howitzers ECT are then destroyed by Russia suicide drones ECT, following which there is another Wagner 'human wave'. There are 20,000 Zombies in the Wagner penal battalions so they can afford to treat units like light bulbs: burnt out ones are immediately replaced. The small unit tactics taught to the Ukrainians are all well and good for popping up in the rear of Wagner but the Steampunk Superpower inexorably advances.
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  2170. Up until this point Russia has been very vague and not really gone beyond obscure menaces by saying it can retaliate in kind, and then some.. But Putin could make an explicit threat of starting to use small theatre thermonuclear weapons on the battlefield against the Ukrainian army it stops advancing with its comparatively unlimited supply of Western equipment. That is a threat everyone would have to take seriously.
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  2171. That outdoor intro at the begining where he was talking animatedly to the camera was insanely dangerous.
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  2172.  @ABR04D  I think they already knew there is a Russian bunker there but Patrick's arrival drew attention to it and made them think it was the center of something. The guys he was talking to seemed surprised that the fake bunker entrance attack was such a near miss. That is for sure the closest he has ever been to an enemy drone and its detonation, and likely the nearest to any kind of exploding ordinance in ten years.
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  2173. In Britain the judge is no longer allowed to use the phrase 'beyond reasonable doubt" when instructing the jury. The judge just tells them they must be "sure". Interesting that Professor Richard Gill says that in practice that means 95% sure.
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  2174. It's not that simple because Russia is a strange place in regards to demographics (for example the age of mothers at first birth of a child has fallen in Russia even as it has inexorably increased everywhere else in Europe and America). Moreover, like the insecticide paradox with roaches, your effort to get them all can result in them actually increasing in number. The thinking in Russia is that the effort to detach Ukraine from the West or at least stop it ever joining NATO is far from being contingent on any Western lack of resolve to continue arms supply or weakness in making the weapons provision open ended; the war must be won for Russian and by any means necessary; it is not just the genuinely popular Putin who believes that. It was a fundamental misunderstanding for Ukraine to think NATO links would deter Russia, and casualties would dissuade it from continuing. Russia sees no option but to continue the war indefinitely, except dropping to their knees, and that is 'not who they are' any more that it is who Ukrainians are. So it will go on and on and on.
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  2175. Russia's fragility is their ace in the hole. If Putin goes all in to win the SMO then beating Russia in Ukraine will entail breaking Russia as a great power, which Washington does not want to do.
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  2176. The first guy freed out of that jail's high profile unit is going to make a million with the stories for the media. The Christmas group photo alone will bring five figures.
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  2177. Infantry clearing mines can be surreptitious. Mine clearing by armour is a give away. I don't know how it will work in the defence lines proper though. And how to rotate?
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  2178. Long before the war everyone was saying Russian was in terminal decline. Seems Putin believed them and decided with no improvement in his position to look forward to he might as well have the showdown now.
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  2179.  @Aaqe  I am glad you understand the opinion of Russians is the crucial factor.
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  2180. Can't have it both ways.
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  2181. Sorry but saying you think Trump might literally declare war on Britain makes me think I am listening to someone who is not to be taken seriously.
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  2182. Phase one; You amass an advantage in fires and manpower, then attack an objective that the enemy must defend and bring the bulk of his army to battle, where under the stress of facing an unfavourable correlation of forces, its will to resist against the odds can be destroyed. Phase two: the war changes from a positional one to one of movement. (eg WW1 in 1918).
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  2183. If by 'Nato' you mean Europeans continuing to not pay for their own defence and freeload on the American taxpayer: yes. However, the US taxpayer would have to pick up the bill if Ukraine was to lose, so Trump could not let Ukraine lose. What he would do is threaten both Russia and Ukraine with dire conequences unless they stop fighting , which is largely futile anyway in the current stalemate.. But lets be real, Putin knows what the Trump police booking photo on very serious criminal charges in addition to various civil ones means for Trump's chances. In 2014 and 2022 Putin attacked Ukraine while Trump was not president and that is not significant. Putin isn't scared of or relying on any particular occupant of the White House. Fantastic though it may seem, not everything Russia does depends on domestic US politics
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  2184. Yes, yet he is still at it and amping ever more up to fight it. Maybe he thinks it is worth any price.
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  2185. If it did go nuclear Xi would have to fight on Russia's side.
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  2186. They had problems with the union representative at Grangemouth and when they tried to cut back on the things that the company were having to pay for (I think it was union guy given an office and paid by the company who was active is selection of the local Labour candidate) these apparently minor troubles turned into a full blown official strike (ostensibly for unrelated reasons), which led to a decision to close the plant down. The union called off the strike but after that (this was in 2013)there was unresoved problems about investment in the plant while it continued to have such high operating costs. The Chinese were particularly disgusted with what their large investment bought them having almost disappeared, and decided against similar investments in future. So unfortunately the workforce at Grangemouth were very expensive, especially in the realm of pension benefits, and also prone to threatening strikes. The last straw was the workers being split on whether to agree in a reduction in their pay and conditions in return for an investment to secure the future of the Grangemouth complex.
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  2187. Putin is very unusual among Russians in not drinking.
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  2188. The law's a coming for your money? Just go out of business. Slick!
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  2189. Bullsh*t!
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  2190.  @BengalCatChilli  The girls' holiday was over and their stint working with children was not going to start for a week later than they had anticipated. They were watching their money to buy toys for the children. F says the girls had booked day guided tours with him for Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. The Wednesday one was for the Pianista trail, which is the same one they did on Tuesday and went missing on after they went on the rough trail that goes down the other side of continental divide. F said he raised the alarm on Wednesday because Kris and Lissane did not turn up at the Pianista trailhead at 8am as agreed. But even if they had returned safely on Tuesday evening they would not have been there the next morning, because they would hardly had paid for a guide to walk the same trail on Wednesday that they had walked the day before without a guide. Kris and Lisanne were well brought up, educated and properly behaving young women. They would have cancelled the arrangement for Wednesday well beforehand, and as soon as they knew they were not going to fullfill their end of the agreement for the Wednesday guided walk on the Pianista. They would have cancelled Monday evening or Tuesday morning at the latest. So draw your own conclusions.
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  2191. No helicopters were flying at night.. Their screams could have been heard miles away at night and they were never more that a few miles from people.
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  2192. What Shirreff's recommendation seems to be based on is a belief that Russia would necessarily cut its losses after a series of comprehensive defeats/total retreat from all of Ukraine, and so the Kremlin need not be offered anything to end the war, which they will do of their own accord once no longer occupying any internationally recognised Ukrainian land. Wargraphics did a good job of explaining the likelihood of separatist conflicts by restive republics within the RusFed would follow a the Kremlin conceding victory to Ukraine. Conceding victory to Ukraine by agreeing to a ceasefire can't be a viable option for any Russian leader even if his army is forced back into Russia proper. Widespread although the unspoken assumption of the Kremlin's only course of action being to eschew levying war from within the borders of RusFed once pushed back inside their own country is, in my opinion this is precisely the opposite of reality: the Kremlin would get into cataclysmic trouble for the integrity of their state by doing so. While it might be able to get the Russian army out of all Ukrainian territory including Crimea, Ukraine cannot thusly impose an end to this war in the way that a true victor would be able to once its objectives were attained. They can win a hundred battles, but the war will keep going on. Hence, it is Ukraine that is bogged down in this war, and they are getting deeper into the mire all the time.
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  2193. Can you shoot it natty?
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  2194.  @johnricercato740  If Russians think they are winning they are getting stronger on the psychological level. To keep giving ground while inflicting casualties might be advantageous in material and manpower terms, yet it would give Russia a very real morale boost from advancing. What you suggest would seem to be a dubious strategy for Ukraine IMO.
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  2195.  @johnricercato740  Putin may be behind the pessimistic tone on state TV, because he wants to create a patriotic fervor that he can mount a more complete mobilisation on the back of. Prigozhin is prolly acting as a cat's paw for Putin to pressure the army, which would be unseemly for him to do directly as head of state. Prigozhin is said to call Putin 'Papa'. I think that really is how close they are.
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  2196.  @anEyePhil  Russia's last defeat was in November. They just won the biggest battle of the war so far.
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  2197. What happens then?
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  2198.  @lunatigannie8860  Well, if she saw babies dying because the staff (including doctors) in the unit were not doing their jobs properly top to bottom she could quite easily have seen an opportunity to get away with murdering some. And if she did that then it was going to be rather difficult to convict her at a fair trial. So maybe they decided to downplay the babies dying because the unit was not run properly, in order to nail her for the murders. But they are not supposed to do that, are they?
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  2199. ​ @janeknight3434  So what caused the half of the excess over normal mortality in the unit that occurred when she was not working a shift? The court never heard about those. And they police were not investigating suspicious deaths and found Letby was there, they were told Letby had been killing and so investigated the deaths that occurred when she was on a shift. And she worked so many shift that she was going to be there for half the deaths at rando. (statisticians have been clear about thatt_. Moreover the re is a lot of doubt over the criteria by which the deaths when lLtby was on a shift were deemed odd, but the other half of the unusual number of deaths in the time she was there that she could not have been responsible for were thought not even worth mentioning to the jury. the spike in deaths caused a great doel of attention and resources to begiven to the unit and all the excess deaths stopped not just the half Letby supposedly did.
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  2200.  @janeknight3434  I don't think that was difficult to explain, but her lawyer didn't even try.
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  2201.  @janeknight3434  If she is a killer who kept doing it over and over again, to the point she was removed from the unit, why would she say in therapy notes she thought she was evil / The writing down of those feeling to rid herself of them was therapy technique she was advised to use As a killer she'd know there were murders she'd done so why write those notes and keep them in her house to be found. Like a lot of things in the case I don't think those notes are as clearly pointing to guilt when you really look at them. But there are things that are difficult to explain if she is completely innocent, such as what the doctor saw. I don't think he would dare make that up.
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  2202.  @thehoodfab1  Not 15 deaths. She faced 3 separate charges on one baby who is still alive etc. And it's emerged there were 6 deaths on her days off, which the court was not told about. Moreover the strange mobile rash on the skin of a baby that died's skin was not mentioned in the case notes note or at the inquest by the doctor. Not saying the evidence all has to all be perfect, or she is probably completely innocent, but there is room for doubt.
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  2203.  @thehoodfab1  In a unit for the sickest and most premature babies between 8th and 21st of June 2015, Lucy Letby was the only nurse present for four early hours baby collapses, three ending in death and two with strange rashes. Senior Doctor Brearey mentioned this link to other doctors. By October2016 there have been an additional three unusual deaths in the early hours during Letby shifts and Brearey is discussing with some colleagues his suspicions. By mid Feb 2016 a review by an outside consultant had identified Letby had been on shift for each one of of a total of nine unusual deaths since the previous June. She is still working in the unit however. In April 2016 within days of Letby being moved to day shifts there is a baby collapse in the day. In May a doctor tells the hospital manager she is enabling a murderer. On 23-24 June two premature babies from a triplet birth die .Brearey then tells the hospital manager Letby should be off the unit permanently, and there starts to be a move by four doctors to get the police called in.
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  2204. Okay, Basil Liddell Hart
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  2205.  @crazestyle83  Mearsheimer wrote a book about Liddell Hart and his 'indirect approach'. Long ago (30 years) Mearsheimer told Ukraine not to renounce nuclear weapons in order to be able to stand alone against Russian bullying. Then he advised Ukraine not to enter into association with NATO. No member of the Washington alliance, especially not America was going to get into a war with Russia over Ukraine, when it came down to it. So the Ukrainian strategy after the full on invasion was and still is posited on Putin having the social sensitivities of a high school girl, and quitting the war through suffering all this unbearable 'embarrassment' and 'humiliation' we keep hearing about on this channel. I understand such loss of face considerations are an aspect of the correlation of forces, but it really is over the top the way it is monopolizing the analysis.
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  2206.  @jack-arthursmith7345 Crimea was transferred to Ukraine by a Russian leader who was from what is now Ukraine: Khrushchev. His protégée Brezhnev was 100% Russian but also from what is now Ukraine.
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  2207. She is trusting that Trump means what he says. Putin won't.
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  2208.  @1963listo  The biggest losers from low skill immigration are the previous immigrants who are in direct competition and can't get a raise do to there never being a scarcity of labour. That is why Caesar Chavez was so down on illegal immigration. As for skilled jobs, business want and get H1B Indians, and it is perfectly legal.
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  2209. 24:42 lets get this straight, if Nato wanted to back up Ukraine it could. Likewise Finland . There is no obligation to either one.
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  2210. The odds of those circumstances arising innocently in Letby's case may well be very long indeed. However, there are an awful lot of nurses in Britain, so the chance of one of them being innocent of wrongdoing yet having a that many babies suddenly dying when they were looking after them is real. That is the problem with a highly circumstantial .case.
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  2211.  @jackwalker5266  Yes the diary was evidence that makes the prosecution case more plausible.
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  2212.  @jackwalker5266  Are you saying she should not be allowed an appeal?
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  2213.  @jackwalker5266  Beyond reasonable doubt does not mean there is no chance of a mistake. So appeals are not for 'only' anything.
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  2214. Horrendous as it may be, it is perfectly rational; Russia has 100 million more people than Ukraine so if Putin keeps feeding new troops in he is merely leading with his strength. Which is mass effect brute force.
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  2215. The knowledge that Putin will go down to defeat and his country become Westernised is presumably going to be available to the man himself at a certain point well before it happens and while he still has his hands on the levers of power. It seems to me that this moment of truth for the Kremlin leadership is one we are getting closer to and will be terribly dangerous. Unless he has a nervous breakdown and become suddenly lacking in agency, Putin would have time to react to the impending loss of everything he holds dear, whether by trying to save himself and his system, or doing something that ensured it was a very pyrrhic and bitter outcome for his current state opponents.
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  2216. Nato has lots of nukes too, so here would be a nuclear Mexican Standoff in a conflict between Russia and Nato. Russia does fear conventional attack by Nato because Russia would be defeated in any such war.
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  2217. North Korea is a Chinese sockpuppet that is dusted off whenever Donald Trump is pres and waging trade war on China. You will be hearing a lot more about North Korea in Ukraine once Trump takes office, also alleged NK progress on thermoduclear warheads for Kim's ICBM's which are 100% Chinese tech, just like Pakistan's. Trump wlll have to ask China for help with NKlKim pay's no attention to anyone else but Xi.
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  2218. That sentencing is harsher for black or brown people who are convicted of drug offences means there is a disparate impact on racial minorities but does not necessarily mean the sentencing is evincing bias. It may if all other things were equal, but that would mean taking an awful lot of such things into consideration The quality of legal representation might not be the same for black and brown defendants because they are less willing or able to spend money to get a good lawyer, they may not be in regular employment, they may not be supporting families that could be broken up if they went to prison, they may be less crafty about creating a good general impression in court by taking responsibility and expressing remorse, they may plead guilty less often, or at a later stage in the proceedings. They may have crimes of violence on their records more often, they might have been given more leniency for their previous drug convictions. They may be in major cities and making more money from their offending and attracting more attention from more competent police. They may be pleading guilty to more serious offences than they have to. They may be secretly giving information to the police less. And of course they may violate their bail conditions more often. It is not only dubious that all factors have been taken into account but that it is possible to do so.
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  2219.  @lat1419  Ethnic minorities are in cities where there is more money to be made in dealing and the prosecutors are perhaps different. The full time professional dealers with no legit job get treated differently.
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  2220. What we have here is a WW1 style of artillery war where the surprise loser will be in possession of a genuine superpower arsenal of nuclear weapons ( including the world's largest collection of tactical ones) when suffering the crowning humiliation. Anyone who thinks they know what will happen is kidding themselves.
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  2221. It may be objectively irrational, but that does not mean the Russians don't believe in and are motivated by it.
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  2222. Failing against battle hardened troops on the front line? Try a PR strike against hapless reservists, or convicts
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  2223.  @focusjonathan5233  Death loves a crowd.
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  2224.  @Taczy2023  Yes their original plan was silly and their bold offensive failed, but does Putin still have the same objective of 'taking Ukraine' I think the current tactics of the Russian army suggest Putin is happy to keep on the defensive.
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  2225. Zelensky wants Russia to go to war with America and Britain; of course he does. Wouldn't surprise me if he asked for the ATACMS strikes into Russia hoping this would happen.
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  2226. Yes but he of all people must have known what it was going to be like.
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  2227. The further Ukraine advances to Kherson the more compressed the Russian forces on the West bank will become and the more in the range of the (abundantly supplied) Russian artillery on the East bank the Ukrainians will be. Ukrainian forces' available manpower will be decimated if they press on. And Kherson is a very long way from the Ukrainian military infrastructure necessary for maintaining equipment and supplying an offensive. Because they Ukrainian do not have overwhelming numbers, have given up all surprise, and would have to go rush to complete the operation before the weather becomes unfavorable, it is most unlikely that this will be sustained as a full fledged offensive.
    1
  2228.  @enriqueperezarce5485  That pinpointing of Russian forces' artillery position is being done by American intel, even specific Russian generals have been targeted by Ukraine acting on such information. Now, Obama vetoed Blinken and others' urging to send weapons to Ukraine because he said Russia had "escalatory dominance'. Since then Russia has escalated to an astounding degree. America is not terribly worried about Ukraine being decimated and Russia may not have anything more of the same to throw at Ukraine, yet the US, seems to be taking the prospects of further escalation seriously judging by how Ukraine have been denied ATACMS. What the Americans are worried about is some kind of attack on US surveillance satellites, and planes , possible by electronic warfare or laser to begin with. If forced to accept a defeat in the Kheron theatre against a medium sized technologically middling country like Ukraine the RF might as well disarm because they cannot beat anyone.
    1
  2229. Merchan had to say he would NOT sentence Trump to prison or other penalty, before the hearing, otherwise Merchan would be instantly stopped by the rest of the legal system.
    1
  2230. He is in for a fun time unless he quickly learns to be compliant and silent.
    1
  2231. Times Radio needed this guest to retain credibility.
    1
  2232.  @RichardPhillips1066  Martin Nowak wrote about visiting the Island in his book, so I don't believe anything improper happened with the academic guests. But even the most scientifically rigorous Germans can be very trusting people, Sabine ought to bear it in mind. Always.
    1
  2233. Not very glorious to do what they are doing. They won't win that way. just create hate and thirst for revenge. The people involved in this Ukrainian program need to swap their comfy chair for body armour and be sent to the front instead of gloating at the bereaved families of Russian KIA by Ukrainians with guts. Doesn't Ukraine realize that such mean spirited phone calls by rear echelon 'heroes' are playing into Putin's hands?
    1
  2234. The most dangerous thing to the Russian military effort is order being disputed instead of executed, but as the Ukraine's top general said, the Russian troops are not gung ho yet neither are they refusing to fight. Soldiers complain non stop and in combat they have a lot to complain about. You can call that learned helplessness if you want. In WW1 British soldiers were given what were to us today very surprising amounts of booze before going on an attack.
    1
  2235. Under Obama. Then under Biden. Not Trump's war dude, he is just here to clear up the mess.
    1
  2236.  @Ikkeligeglad I do think Trump has got the blame for things that were not his fault. Like the pandemic, which many people now are willing to admit was a Chinese lab escape.
    1
  2237. Ukraine is telling us they are going to go on the offensive, which is a pretty strong indication that Ukraine will not. Prigozhin says Russia ought to go on the defensive; you can bet that is a triple bluff.
    1
  2238. Sorry but much of the critical aid the US supplied to Ukraine HIMARS ATACMS/ Patriots is not available on the open market like food is. You cannot therefor put a domestic military budget accounting price on the key weapons given to Ukraine let alone the ongoing behind the scenes support including intel and a different target specific terrain recognition plan loaded into each missile fired by Ukraine. There is not enough money in the world to pay for that it was a huge gift. The US has also protected Ukraine by quiet deterrence any temptation for the Kremlin to toy with resorting to nuclear strike (facing this down was an unlimited liability enterprise for the US if it went wrong), which is invaluable. It is all very well Ukraine having these strategic objectives of total independence and ownership of their land and any profits from exploiting its resources, but they cannot pay for a war to hold onto it. American taxpayers are not willing to foot the bill, and that is why most of them voted for Trump. At least if the US was getting a cut of the Donbass rare earth minerals it would have a motive to make the Russians withdraw from there. As for just frontloading Ukraine enough to clean Russia's clock back in 2022, no US government has the right to take that kind of chance of a shooting war with Russia without the US being directly threatened. The Pentagon would not obey such irresponsible orders; we know this because it was the Pentagon who vetoed the frontloading option and objected to deeper than artillery capability for Ukraine right down the line. They understand what the reaction might well have been.
    1
  2239. Striking had a comeback against grappling in MMA. The drones are only up against traditional EW designed for other things and sub optimal countering drones. Once there is electronic warfare specifically designed for neutralizing drones being fielded by Russia those NLAWs that Britain gave (because Ukraine said they were effective and asked for more of them), might be needed. In Kyiv.
    1
  2240. Germany has always been part of the West, no matter who was leading it. Britain and France were making plans to attack Russia in the Russo Finnish war even though Britain and France were officially at war with Germany It was the Nazo Soviet pact that cause Britain to declare war on Germany.
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  2241.  @sulev111  Biden will be busy pardoning his son
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  2242. In principle. Ukraine can win if Russia is willing to cut its losses and quit at the conventional level; but nobody knows if it will. They will always have an option to take it to the next level,
    1
  2243.  @fredfred2363  I don't think the Russians will quit, at the current level of intensity the losses for Russians are at most barely more unsustainable that Ukraine's are. Were the Russian losses to be understood to be unsustainable, then there'd be the very best pf incentives for ascend to a plane of conflict where Ukraine cannot follow and the West dares not go. I speak of theatre thermonuclear weapons. We keep being told that Russians do not care about Crimea, or regard it their national territory worth defending as much as Moscow, but the evidence of the last few years is that they are set on retaining at whatever cost, not just Crimea but also the territory gained since 2022.
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  2244. Given Robinson's insalubrious reputation, I do not think it unlikely that a the consequences of finding in his favour were salient in the judge's mind.
    1
  2245. 18:00 Absolutely, no one has.
    1
  2246. Become less nerdy. Try affecting a Russian accent, blowing things up, and murdering your partner
    1
  2247. America never gave Ukraine a security guarantee. It is all very well for Ukraine to demand concessions as the injured party, but it simply does not have the resources to get them. So the West including the US ought to let Ukraine decide what it is owed in a completely open ended way. No, the West tried the best it could for three years and the obligation simply does not exist now.
    1
  2248. General Kean is right. European defence free riders have no right to demand the US taxpayer foots the bill for their social welfare. Trump is holding all the cards nonetheless. Putin would be wise to come to the table and make concessions because the American President is a vengeful man.
    1
  2249. More expulsions than evacuation. They'll do the North of Gaza and then repeat the process on the South of Gaza. Too big an operation to justify if it might have to be repeated . The Palestinians are going to be pushed out of all Gaza and will not be allowed to return.
    1
  2250. Of all Europeans, Danes have the least in common with Russians. In the realm of warfighting Anders has knowledge, but he is not the person to listen to if you want to know what is going on in Putin's mind. Anders talks as if there is no danger of a direct Russia attack on the West in order to defeat Ukraine. It certainly is unlikely but it is much more likely to happen down the line that he implies, if he is right about the long term prospects of Russia in Ukraine.
    1
  2251. Biden is obviously doing this because he lost to Trump.
    1
  2252.  @CKwoi  That's what the US foreign policy elite think or at least say, but the same sort of people insisted the US were winning in Vietnam. Anyway the American taxpayer/ voters think Trump is right.
    1
  2253. ​ @PJ-qx5yt  How about comparing Trump to Eisenhower, who tried to get the Germans to accept responsibility for defending themselves? As did JFK and every subsequent president--unsuccessfully.. It is just not the US taxpayers' job to unendingly financially support the defence of countries in NATO. Europe has been lulled into a dependency on the US that is unsustainable. The US did as much as it could but the will of the American people is quite clearly to end support for the war in Ukraine and look to the East where China poses a serious challenge. Free ride is over Europeans!
    1
  2254. ​ @SimondeMontfortSenior  There had not been a general election in Britain since 1935 because if the danger Hitler presented, but the people approved of what Chamberlain did, so going to war with Germany at that time would have been so extremely unpopular it is questioable if it could have been done (Chamberlain was counting on the Soviets to fight Hitler while Britain sat it out). Anyway, why does WW3 have to start like WW2 because someone's aggression was not stopped. World War Three could just as easily start the same way as WW1 did with a big power giving an ally a blank cheque. Zelensky is insisting Ukraine gets a "security guarantee" from Trump. thereby giving Ukraine the ability to bring Russia and America into direct conflict.
    1
  2255.  @TorianTammas  Well okay there were advantages for the US in stetting up Nato as it was originally envisioned by Washington But as it has actually developed, Nato is a way for European countries especially Germany to get the US taxpayer to do the heavy lifting and they are fed up with it. Hence Trump.
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  2256. Anders is right that Ukraine would win if only the West gave them proper backing but the strategists in Washington are not trying to really defeat Russia in Ukraine, They want the Kremlin to become discouraged and quit Ukraine. Russia has to stand alone after this war ends because it is going to be needed as part of a US led alliance of Germany Britain Japan India over against a future mega power China as predicted by Mearsheimer. Russia getting trounced in Ukraine might make it permanently alienated from the West.
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  2257. There never was any chance of America helping Ukraine WIN. Not saying they want Russia to win win.
    1
  2258. America will stop a Ukrainian offensive if it looks like breaking the Russian command and control and turning into a rout. General Bernard Rogers the US Nato commander in Europe said in the 80 he would have requested use of nuclear weapons with hours of a Warsaw Pact attack. Hodges would have too. Ditto Russian generals; Russia is not going to accept the kind of victory Ukraine is aspiring to relegating Russia to a third rate power. There would be rage and what would the US do after the Ukrainian army got vaporized. Surely no one really thinks the US would risk retaliation even by conventional attack on a country that had already crossed the nuclear Rubicon. I think use of a nuclear weapon would concentrate minds in the West.
    1
  2259.  @enshk79  Armies were still expecting soldiers fighting from the back of horses with swords to have a role well into WW1, so actual combat showing up the ineffectiveness of tanks a hundred years later is par for the course. And it is not just tanks, there seems to be an assumption that F16 would shoot down Russian ground attack aircraft and then do airstrikes on the Russians defenders at critical points, but that is most unlikely. The smarms of drones are profoundly altering the usefulness of airpower, which also has to cope with manpads among ordinary infantry; given the Russian heritage of an extensive variety of long range anti aircraft missiles to fight against a strong airforce. modern air superiority planes almost a generation in advance of the F16 would be protecting the Russian ground attack aircraft. The survivability of F16s doing ground attack missions on a Ukrainian battlefield is very dubious The Ukrainians are not even at the first line of fortifications yet, and already went from fanfaronade to fiasco. Russia had a series of fiascos from trying to advance swiftly, and while they made mistakes in execution I think evidence for the effectiveness of combined (tanks, artillery infantry, and airstikes) arms to breach defences and exploit the breakthrough in a sustainable way is noticeably lacking considering now long the war has went on . Mines laid by artillery and drone observation of where to shoot the mines has wreaked havoc on both sides offensives in Ukraine and what can F16s or even F35s do about that?
    1
  2260.  @fatdaddy1996  Full on war between Russia and America is really most unlikely, although they both act as if fighting each other might be a serious an option the reality is the Ukraine conflict is as full on as it will ever get. There is now a lot of electronic warfare hamstringing US surveillance and even the best intel cannot create weak points on the line. There just aren't any inadequately held parts if the line and behind it without reserves like there were last year for Ukraine to exploit in Kharkov
    1
  2261. Is our much vaunted democracy so feeble a system that Putin being allowed to talk for 2 hours without constant interruption is going to brainwash the population into supporting him.
    1
  2262.  @victorhopper6774  A quarter of Russians don't have an inside toilet, and a similar proportion of Russian men die before they reach 55. Russians are remarkably careless with themselves, not anxious. I would not bet a lot of money on them over dramatizing their difficulties, or correctly characterizing them. They are most likely going to blunder on the same pyrrhic fashion, and wreck Ukraine in the process.
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  2263.  @aaronbaker2186  True, but who thought it necessary to forbid men under 60 from leaving the country? Russia has stopped trying to ape US methods had has gone back to blind artillery sledgehammering of everything within reach, this does not require much quality in infantry. We are talking about two countries with low birthrates, one much larger than the other and the larger one is recruiting the dregs while the smaller country has the best men in the country on the front line. Moreover, Russians do not have a diaspora in the West (refugees) exerting a powerful draw to a life of peace , no military service, and relatively high wages.
    1
  2264.  @cv990a4  One wonders why Russian has not pulled back again, if it has culminated for the second time.
    1
  2265.  @kimpedersen4746  Inviting death is something that in real life gets less attractive over months. I think that Ukraine is going to give up on maximal objectives. and end up with what is far short of Minsk, which they could have had for the asking a year ago.
    1
  2266. Mearsheimer is getting on for eighty years old, and his theories are about states and as he himself always cautions are simplifications of reality, yet I think he has been remarkably prescient about the geopolitical realities. He predicted over thirty years ago, that Russia would bully Ukraine unless Ukraine had an independent nuclear deterrent (to any invasion by Russia obviously).No one not even Putin could have predicted in 1994 what Russia would be doing 30 years later but Mearsheimer did. He also assumed in 2022 that Putin would not invade Ukraine because surely Putin understood his forces would incur very heavy losses trying to hold Ukraine down. The 2022 invasion was a failure of comprehension by Mearsheimer about another individual's assessment of the feasibility of conquering and holding down Ukraine, yet his analysis of the Russian state's policy toward Ukraine was not wrong. The current amped up Russia offensive in Ukraine is being done despite the heavy cost being understood. So the Russian effort in 2024 is not just a mistaken personal belief by Putin that Ukraine is low hanging fruit. The Kremlin now understand the cost is huge and still climbing but thinks it is worth it for Russia's strategic security. The Kaiser vetoed an attack on Russia in 1905, which Mearsheimer admits is out f line with his theory.
    1
  2267. They cut off Crimea and that is it the Russians will have to pull out and the Putin regime will fall? But will they accept that> (Nato in the Cold War would not have they would have used theatre thermonuclear weapons), why would the Russians in the final extremity not use their non conventional arms on Ukraine? It is very irresponsible to imply that Putin and his generals will capitulate, withdraw, and stand for what they will see as being begining of a process for disarming and then dismantling their country. Kremlin and the Russian armed forces' decisions in the case of Crimea being made untenable would be something that these superannuated pundits in the West have zero insight into, and Western governments would have no control over at all.
    1
  2268. Even with a give round and make the enemy advance a pyrrhic on strategy, there has to be some counter attacking to stop the enemy gaining crucial areas and momentum. Azov does not like being thrown as formed up concentrated units into those counter attacks, which the Russians can use massed artillery on.
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  2269. During WW1, British soldiers were giver coffee with Navy Rum (highly alcoholic) in it before going ' over the top'.
    1
  2270. General Patton was mediocre when using mediocre divisions rather than the crack Big Red One ECT. Ukraine is prolly using elite forces in its successful Bakhmut counter attack. Is that wise?
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  2271. You cannot train to do one thing, then effectively do another.
    1
  2272. Its like all women and their noses; we are worried it's too big.
    1
  2273. That is a little harsh, but only a little.
    1
  2274. @ Well there is quite a bit in that of course but it is completely unclear (apart from a couple of high profile and influential individuals) whether the buk of tech sector's overarching interest is not with the rest of the business class and Biden. He is the politician most associated with Wilmington Delaware in which most Fortune 500 companies are based. He had to stop saying it due to massive pushback, but he does not think China is a future competitor to the US. Largely because in a considerable contrast to the US's, Chinas population is actually declining.
    1
  2275. There is only one totality of evidence but she got many life terms. Don't they have to prove their case on every specific charge?
    1
  2276. Yes HIMARS is hurting the Russian army badly, but then the Kremlin regard military assets like lightbulbs inasmuch when thir first wave (straight outta the Gulag) are burnt out, they get replaced as a matter of course. Russians chose Z as their symbol because they are like Zombies, slow and stupid, yet there are a hell of a lot of them and they will win in the end. My Mum and Dad are pushing ninety living in Britain and cold yet they are scared to turn the heating on. The land beyond the Diepner is ...
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  2277. He is a hacker who got convicted of that in his home country and learned nothing. He was in London for the lifestyle
    1
  2278. British commentators are living in the past and think Americans ought to feel honored paying for the privilege of defending Europe, as if the world still revolved around it. Well they don't, and that is why Trump was elected for the second time. Also get off you high horse, the British Empire in WW2 was not a democracy, and there were terrible famines in it during that conflict. Russia is backward morally but China is a greater threat to the West. We'd face a Russia China alliance if these Col Blimps had their way.
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  2279. Kursk was a mistake for Ukraine.
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  2280. Lets say for the sake of argument, Putin got Trump elected. Biden defeated him, and Trump was then prosecuted and convicted on a felony. Now Trump has now been elected again and he won the majority of the vote this time. You can't say that was Putin or Russia; it was due to Trump as a tribune of the people. Like Roosevelt, after he was elected the second time the dying consensus's obstuctionalists had to accept the will of the people of the country they were sitting in: the US of A. You are not a bad guy CVR (quite accomplished actually), but you might benefit from standing with the democratic majority of the country you live in. Congress can vote the money or not, but if they do vote it for some purpose, the President does not have to spend it .
    1
  2281.  @jamesthomaspaulJTP  It's not well meant advice, believe me!
    1
  2282. Expect him to be rational in the way that a liberal would be rational? Nope.
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  2283. Mike martin's book says we fight for belonging and status. Crying uncle would make Russia not longer a major league country. And the deaths of Russians in Ukraine are a 'sunk cost'. So how are the Russians going to be made to quit? It is my impression that they are preparing for a 'war without end, not a blitz strategy.
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  2284. Yup, spotter's badge mate.
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  2285. A third possibility occurs to me. The story being printed and then being quickly taken down seems very like a ploy Goebbels once used to mislead the allies. I suspect the Kremlin want Ukraine to go all in on the bridgehead and advance so as to free Russian artillery from counter battery fire and let then knock seven bells out elite Ukrainian formations crowded into the bridgehead.
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  2286. But there is a continuity in Russian policy toward Ukraine going back to the Tsarist regieme. The Kremlin was shocked at the losses initially but persisted and currently is not being put off by huge and mounting casualties beyond anything they dreamt of at the start of the invasion. There is an ineluctable logic behind Russian policy that surely stems from geostrategic considerations rather than Putin's particular psychology. Germany fought two world wars against almost exactly the same opponents, even though in WW2 the systems were totally different in both Germany and Russia that they had been in WW1. Hitler single handedly ordered WW1, but the Kaiser was hardly informed of the decision to go to war in 1914. Ukraine is a bit like the FinnoRussia war in which Britain and French were aiding the Finns and nearly directly fighting, Russia. But the real war was to come and Russia was needed to win it. Russia will be needed to deal with China down the road.
    1
  2287.  @farnarkleboy  They were getting worse off. Trump is the reaction. It is perfectly rational from their point of view.
    1
  2288. Russia is in a hurry?
    1
  2289. If you were not on screen I'd think you were frothing at the mouth there is such urgency in your utterances. In the name of the wee man, stop talking so much old mate. Use an automated voice for everything except the into and wind up at the end. Everyone will understand.
    1
  2290. Hmmm, better leaving the little stoat where it is as mother may well be hidden nearby watching
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  2291.  @RobertEFuller  Who disturbed them though? The one providing 'help' perhaps?
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  2292. Mass effect rather than quality is the Russian way. The Ukrainians have just captured one of those cheap Iranian pattern long range drones that the Russians had added a 40KG thermobaric warhead to.  @boink800 
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  2293.  @TyllerBoom  Aggressive fit young men are needed for key offensive operations , but the Ukraine war seems to suggest that there is a big role for older men at the front.
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  2294.  @pomg6512  Russia has already lost of course. But do they realise that? A disastrous bull headed commitment to victory by Russia, is hardy good news for Ukraine
    1
  2295.  @MrHaighahatta  Mass effect is the key to military science.
    1
  2296.  @TyllerBoom  No, the elite units of fit young men have to be preserved, and being in static positions at the front with enemy artillery zeroed in on them is where EXPENDIBLE troops of advanced age ought to be. Both sides need to preserve their best units. The old guys are dying because the old guys are being sent to parts of the front line where the positions are most static and artillery etc is most intense.
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  2297.  @TyllerBoom  Correct me if I am wrong, but Washington is a lot further frim Vietnam than Moscow is from Ukraine.
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  2298.  @TyllerBoom  Infantry is needed to hold the line and units doing that are not being preserved they are heavily attrited. Elite units are not left in the line to be atritted until the second rate units are all gone.
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  2299.  @TyllerBoom  I definitely agree that young troops in excellent physical condition are necessary for successful (high tempo) exploitation of breakthroughs. But that is not the Russian style, their attacks are snails pace and the rate of advance is dependent how quickly their artillery and its ammunition can be moved forward, The elite units of the Ukrainian army with their Western equipment and training are involved in the Kursk incursion into Russia. The bulk of the most determined ideological/ volunteerist formations are well back from the front line and although called in to stem enemy advances that threaten breakthrough, and are just as quickly rotated out not used to occupy trenches in the main defence lines of Donbass which the Russians are concentrating on. So the older men are fighting from fixed positions where their lack of mobility is not a problem. Donbass front line positions are extremely dangerous places to be 'mobile' in, for Russians because there are FPV drones night and day and zeroed in artillery. If you are Ukrainian, marking off the calendar until a half ton FAB bomb lands in your vicinity. Russian use of their elite formations in the early part of the war was profligate and took 18 months to recover from, but they have figured out how to preserve them by using expendable troops. Are the Russians feeding replacements in their 50s into the front lines where they'll become rotting corpses like their predecessors? Yes, the worst troops are sent to certain death, but that is how attrition with a view to the quality of different units works.
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  2300.  @johntowers1213  Finlandisation (ie foreign policy subordination to Russia per agreeing to not enter into any alliances with the West in return for being left in peace and domestic freedom) would have been an excellent model for Ukraine to prevent war. Finland conceded at apoint in the war that was quite late. And they had in Mannerheim a military professional as leader, one that understood statecraft and Russia's eternal strategic aims very well. Zelensky is the most inexperienced person ever to lead a country such as Ukraine, maybe any country. His election platform mas not spelled out but seemed to be return of Donbass to Ukraine in return for granting the electors of Donbass an effective veto over Ukraine joining Nato. The mistake he made was failure to subordinate domestic political considerations to foreign policy. Yet it was not just nationalists that prevented a deal being done between Zelensky and Putin in Paris the people of Ukraine as a whole had unrealistic expectations of what they would get out of trying to emulate Poland and behaving as if they were the 51st state of the US. Slow on the uptake Ukraine had to have the facts of real world statecraft explained to it through a war.
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  2301.  @TyllerBoom  Sure, Russia is undauntedly (foolhardily) weakening itself far more than is wise by pressing on with the war against Ukraine . Yet all the men and materiele and even nukes in the world is not going to be any use if you are not taken seriously because you've proved you will quit when the going gets tough. The war in Ukraine may be a watershed after which Russia goes into a precipitous decline, but that does not help Ukraine, does it? What seems to be being implied is Russia is already getting close to the point where it will be forced to quit and withdraw by the economic strain and casualties, something that could be brought about quickly by supplementary indirect assistance from the US and its minions, but I think Russia could maybe win no matter what the West does, if Russia was willing to run itself into the ground in order to win. Anyway, it seems clear from the relatively very limited assistance given since Feb 2022 that Washington does not want to push the Russians into scorched earth burning Moscow type straits. The probable rationale for US restraint is that an non alienated Russia will be needed for dealing with a future megapower China.
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  2302. Alan was targeted because of his rather disheveled appearance the guy was obviously identified by Tanner as a little dysfunctional, but the easily confused are the type of person who is likely to overreact and in that state they may well have a legal gun on them.
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  2303. Looks like the old Comner van with sliding front doors and front wheels narrower track than back ones. Used by GPO and local council.
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  2304. The US have good intel so I doubt that they are misreading Putin.
    1
  2305. The US is Godzilla, but has no experience of fighting anyone but Bambi. The Russians are all about mass effect, but have used one fifth of their army in Ukraine.Ukrainians trained by British or Americans have complained that they have been taught small unit tactics suitable for counter insurgency rather than full on battles against a regular army with a imprecise yet nonetheless overwhelming firepower advantage.
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  2306. Yes, but that does not make him any less dangerous.
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  2307. Elon is fighting World War Trans because he lost his son to it, not anything Putin did.
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  2308. Going by the undersized army he first went into Ukraine with, Putin seems to banked on Kiev asking for terms once the invasion reached the capital rather than fight it out. Putin is desperate to end the war on terms he stipulates. Putin withdrawing without what he could present as a victory would be tantamount to admitting the war was a huge mistake in the first place and loosen his grip on power. Too late for Putin to compromise, he must go on until the bitter end to (sort of) win or lose it all. Russia loses some fighter planes. Mariinka has been transformed into a 'hellscape' . Planes can be pulled out of service to preserve them, cities are there for the taking. Ukraine will run out of cities before Russia runs out of planes
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  2309. So Ukraine is a way to isolate China from Russia??
    1
  2310.  @Rob_F8F Most people think Xi ihas been helping Russia (and I think the direct NK help was approved by Xi). It is barely plausible that if the US backed Ukraine all the way, Xi would let Russia be ran into the ground. What seems not unlikely is there would be a Russo--Chinese alliance.
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  2311. While his analysis is excellent as it has been from the very begining, I don't follow General Hodges on why Ukraine winning and Putin being overthrown within a few months into next year is not going to come as such a surprise to Putin that he will not have time to get Russia's tactical nukes into a state of readiness, perhaps with the initial rationale of sending a signal to stop advancing from such a signal there would be a clear path to battlefield use. It seems Hodges has an unspoken assumption that any such signal would not be an honest one because Putin would not be able to get an order to detonate a nuke on the Ukrainian army executed by his subordinates, Right now that may, or may not, be true; yet if the Russians are driven back over the next several months and tens more thousands of Russian soldiers are killed plus a few more generals, there will be a desire in the surviving and humiliated Russian armed forces for vengeance, and a believe that Russia would not merely change leadership but break up if it outright lost the war would not be entirely ridiculous.
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  2312. I think people tend to go to extremes and advocate giving Ukraine enough to defeat Russia, which is not risk free any more than letting Ukraine get completely conquered by Russia would be. None can say what the Kremlin's response in either case might be but one could see in both extremes a clear path to direct conflict between NATO and Russia. The current policy seems designed to make Russians including Putin and those around him think the war is unprofitable and ought to be ran down, rather than Russia is facing outright defeat in Ukraine, which would constitute a mortal threat to Russia's great power status, and so what the West is doing for Ukraine seems about right.
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  2313. China needs Russia. Otherwise the US will be able to do what it likes.
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  2314. He has a wife that needs monee
    1
  2315. Like the US armed forces would advise any US president that the Russia reaction to doing what Gen Hodges advocates would be what he keeps saying it probably would be (meekly withdrawing and signing a peace treaty)
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  2316. The LGM were not resisted at all in Crimea, which is certainly not going to happen in Latvia ECT, the Russian army were already in bases on Crimea, and Ukraine was never a full member of Nato, so 2014 is zero precedent for any kind of operation against Nato members not being reacted to by Nato as a whole in accordance with the rules of the organisation. Furthermore. Nato as a whole has went well beyond its treaty obligations to help non member Ukraine; no one expected that the countries of Nato would give as much help as they did. Putin thought he could do another 2014 in 2022 and got a debacle because Nato was pro active. He will plan his next move with the experience of 2022 in mind. I don't think who is in the White House is a big factor in Putin's thinking because Biden and Obama being pres did not stop him. Trump is a such a loose cannon with reckless rhetoric that the the Kremlin would surely have no reasonable expectation that he would do what he said and not respond to a attack on a Nato country not spending 2% on defence; that was surely just yet another Trump complaint about European Nato members freeloading on the US taxpayer (while pushing the expansion of Nato so as to cocoon them inside Chapter 5 members on every border). @BosonCollider 
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  2317. 33:46 "The number one reason is he thought it would be easy". There is much more to the decision to fight than a perception that it will be a easy win. Indeed it is often the case that a easiy beatable opponent need not be fought. Putin knew Ukraine was de facto a member of a huge anti Russia (both Yelsin and Putin asked to join and were fobbed off) military alliance led by the world's most powerful country. In 2015 Obama had vetoed subordinates Biden and Blinken's desire to give arms to Ukraine, which had decrepit and unprepared armed forces, but by 2021 they were in power and Ukraine had got several years of military reorganization by western experts under its belt. "If [Putin] had known how things would go he would not have done this". To feel compelled to fight is not the same as truly being convinced that one will win. To be a great power it is merely necessary to be able to give a good account of oneself against all enemies, and be willing to do that rather that see the position of the country eroded. While as a leader must, he seemed confident to his subordinates and was superficially sanguine, I think Putin subliminally knew that the invasion was taking on the rest of Christendom, but saw the situation of Russia as so deteriorated in relation to Ukraine and its de facto allies that Russia had at all costs to do something to be taken seriously.
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