Russian invasion of Ukraine

More on Vuhledar and the current state of the Russian army:

https://youtu.be/hwuRpYw7vyw

International Criminal Court to start two war crimes proceedings against Russia
https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/03/13/7393206/

This is the best description of the PMC I have seen so far. Interesting.

Ukraine adjacent - https://spotify.link/8bmmCyt4cyb

The Bunker speaking to Bill Browder.

Kinda impressed that the ICC has had the gumption to go straight ahead and issue a war crimes warrant for Putin - assumed they'd fudge things and 'symbolically' go for some smaller cogs in his thresher.

Haven’t had a chance to read up on this yet. What’s the essence of their case?

Stealing children bad.

Unsurprisingly the creep Putin put in charge of it has zero fucks to give about her own warrant:

"It's great that the international community has appreciated this work to help the children of our country. That we don't leave them in war zones, that we take them out, that we create good conditions for them, that we surround them with loving, caring people."

Same.

I wonder - does that mean he will no longer visit any civilised country? If so - this is amazing.

I doubt it changes anything while he is still head of state.

The ones in green have an obligation to facilitate an arrest if he visits them but unlikely while he is head of state as Russia would like view it as kidnap
Maybe it will persuade Ukraine to ratify

Biden - warns that Russia is in danger of increasing conscription into illegal genocidal war.

Also Biden - deporting back to Russia anti-war Russians fleeing being drafted into illegal genocidal war.

Also Biden welcoming the ICC arrest warrant while not recognising the authority of the ICC

This says Ukraine is running out of soldiers. Too many deaths. It sounds hopeless. Very different from the official line taken by Ukraine and the West. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/03/13/ukraine-casualties-pessimism-ammunition-shortage/?utm_campaign=wp_must_reads&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_mustreads&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F396f241%2F6415b6a0e7f5585f19d2cd70%2F5977294aade4e26514bfd207%2F44%2F61%2F6415b6a0e7f5585f19d2cd70&wp_cu=39a42c855fd0a31aca45c56ecaabaeb3%7C8E782F538C9E7229E0530100007F7098

A rather speculative article

Time-tested Russian war strategy: to win a battle, sacrifice men until the enemy runs out of bullets; to win a war, sacrifice men until the enemy runs out of men.

Glad I’m not Russian, the poor sods (at least the ones who aren’t brainwashed Putinphiles).

There was an interview with former wagnerites who claimed they were told the battles for Kherson and Kharkiv were meant to bleed the Ukrainian army dry of experienced soldiers. At the rate they’re losing men, Zelenskyy deciding to double down on the defence of those cities may prove to be a grave mistake.

Putin popping up in Crimea and Mariupol, guess showing he can still travel freely, plenty of speculation online it isn't him and is a double in a rubber mask lol

Fellow war criminal Girkin explaining how you know when it is really Putin in the footage
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1637421039436038146

Wandering around Sevastapol and the claim is both arms swinging and gait suggests it isn't him
https://twitter.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1637091202813030402

The ludicrously small entourage, the difficulty of travelling safely to and from Sevastopol/Mariupol, plus the greatly increased risk of a coup occurring in his absence mean it almost certainly isn't him.

With the amount of alleged doubles Loro Piana will remain profitable for a good while yet. How many of those damn $10k jackets do they make?!?

Putin sits as far away as he can when he has meeting with Shoigu and Gerasimov or Kadyrov…but now he is chatting up close with strangers in a war zone.
Hard to believe.

strangers

Fwiw they’re never randoms. In the West they’re sometimes vetted; in Russia they’re on the payroll (in one way or another). Still don’t think it was actually him.

Ukrainians have celebrated the PutinBot's recent visit with a free fireworks display in Dzhankoi, Crimea. The source of the fireworks was a cruise missile dump.

https://twitter.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1637926667019591680/mediaViewer?currentTweet=1637926667019591680&currentTweetUser=Gerashchenko_en

Great speech by Italian PM Giorgia Meloni in response to criticism of Italy's support for Ukraine.

https://youtu.be/fnelcl72lZ8

There’s a lot things she stands for that I can’t agree with but here she’s spot on. Great speech.

Also couldn’t be more Italian if she tried.

Funny how's she's backing Ukraine now when she wanted a closer relationship between Italy and Russia and was in favour of lifting sanctions in 2014.

Things are whole lot different now than what they were in 2014. Lots of people had a very different view of things back then. What matters is the view now. Bringing up old shit like that serves no purpose other than tooting your own horn.