Current Affairs Ukraine

[davids]

The Ukrainians? They aren't likely to run out of people, and if the flow of materiel is balanced in their favor then they win in the long run. The whole thing looks a great deal like the Civil War in the United States. The Russians had better equipment initially, rather than the better generals the Confederates had, so they made rapid territorial gains. In the end, the North was better at making stuff with which to prosecute the war, so they threw the Confederates back and won a war of attrition. It took the Union a bit to put generals in place that understood this was how to win the war, but they muddled into it eventually.

Long-term stalemates like World War I are rare in the annals of history, when both sides fully commit to a war. Technology (and terrain) have to set up just right, both in terms of offensive weaponry and defensive answers. Putin's only pathway to victory, for some time now, has been to destabilize the Western alliance faster than he runs out of ability to prosecute a war with inferior armaments.

It looks to me like Prigozhin made a call on just how likely he thought that one was.

So you don't believe the US military experts who predict that the Ukraine can't win and that the war will be a long drawn out stalemate?
The western media is all over the Wagner story in the last 24 hours and the information they are putting forward is pretty different to the narrative not too long ago.

Everyone is talking about Wagner. Who are Russia's other mercenaries?

Russia's Wagner mercenary group often hits the headlines. But who are the country's other guns for hire? And what are they doing?

www.euronews.com

Mercenary armies tend to go where the money is.Can Prigozhin pay their wages? Or will they take a better offer... maybe from Putin?

 

[Tipp blue]

Head onto the main forum mate, you`ve got experts in finance, investment and accountancy. Then we have the experts in architecture and structural engineering and then moving on, we have legions of experts in bio mechanics, fitness and conditioning, physiotherapy and psychology.

And some like me are experts in all of the above.

 

[Mutzo Nutzo]

Erm wtf!!!

 

[Lapeno77]

From the BBC:

A video posted this morning on a Telegram channel linked to the Wagner Group shows its leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin, meeting with Russia's Deputy Defence Minister Yunus-Bek Yevkurov. BBC Verify has used biometric facial comparison tools to confirm, with a high degree of confidence, the identity of Yevkurov.

Also present at the meeting with Prigozhin, according to the Telegram post, was Vladimir Stepanovich Alekseev, the deputy chief of Russia's military intelligence service. However, the image said to show him was too dark to confirm using biometric technology. The meeting is said to have taken place at the headquarters of the Russian military’s Southern Military district in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don.

An image comparing three different images to show they took place in the same location in Rostov-on-Don. The video shows the three men meeting underneath trees in a courtyard, but satellite imagery could not be used to confirm the location. However, photos previously taken at a religious ceremony at the headquarters, and posted on a Russian military website, confirm that the meeting did indeed take place at the building.

We have tried to verify the timing of the meeting – claimed to have taken place on Saturday morning – but this has not yet been possible from the video.

That's a very interesting pair of people to meet. Those are people that are among those with the most to gain, and best positioned to deliver. Can't say anything on just this report about whether this was a government-sanctioned meeting, or a meeting of co-conspirators, but it is a touch suspicious in context.

The interesting bit about that, slightly off topic, was that when it was shown on BBC news at 9.30am this morning, the meeting was described as an argument between the 3 men.
Kind of stomach turning stuff really, even after all, I expected better from the BBC

 

[Bohemian Toffee]

They just glue each others pubic hairs to their chins.

We call that Thursday night round my way.

 

[stipe]

From pictures of Wagner convoys posted on Telegram, tanks and armored vehicles are just loaded on trucks and traveling toward Moscow unobstructed, they are not even in combat positions. Thats some leisurely coup.

Everything look so easy so far, seems to me Prigozhin got a lot of sympathizers in the army high command.
If i'm Shoigu and Gerasimov i would start preparing my exit.

 

[maccavennie]

Erm wtf!!!

View attachment 215163

Whose plane is it mate?

 

[Martin Alvito]

So you don't believe the US military experts who predict that the Ukraine can't win and that the war will be a long drawn out stalemate?
The western media is all over the Wagner story in the last 24 hours and the information they are putting forward is pretty different to the narrative not too long ago.

Everyone is talking about Wagner. Who are Russia's other mercenaries?

Russia's Wagner mercenary group often hits the headlines. But who are the country's other guns for hire? And what are they doing?

www.euronews.com

Mercenary armies tend to go where the money is.Can Prigozhin pay their wages? Or will they take a better offer... maybe from Putin?

I have spent enough time around other experts to know that if you look hard enough, you will find someone with some degree of credibility taking almost any position you care to name when it comes to prognostication. The military assessments I have seen are micro-level. They may be right.

I assess it at a macro level. The way I see it, so long as NATO keeps shipping enough toys to the Ukrainians, they win in the end. The interesting question, to me, is whether the political will exists in the West to keep up the shipments given the cost. I don't know the answer to that question any more than your experts do, but everything I know tells me that answer will prove the decisive factor.

If Prigozhin knocks over Moscow, he can pay their wages. He doesn't have many endgames, from here. He can win fast. He can bargain something out with Putin, which will be difficult given Putin's stance but feasible so long as shots aren't fired in quantity. He can lose or have his men turn on him, and be executed for treason. That's about it.

 

[Cecil]

From pictures of Wagner convoys posted on Telegram, tanks and armored vehicles are just loaded on trucks and traveling toward Moscow unobstructed, they are not even in combat positions. Thats some leisurely coup.

Everything look so easy so far, seems to me Prigozhin got a lot of sympathizers in the army high command.
If i'm Shoigu and Gerasimov i would start preparing my exist.

They’re about 4 hours away from Moscow apparently. Could be knocking on the door tonight.

 

[Cecil]

Whose plane is it mate?

Kenwrights hopefully.

 

[Mutzo Nutzo]

Whose plane is it mate?

Russian ministry for emergency situations - it’s bimbling about at 34000 ft unmolested in Ukranian controlled airspace!!!

 

[Tramps_mate]

From pictures of Wagner convoys posted on Telegram, tanks and armored vehicles are just loaded on trucks and traveling toward Moscow unobstructed, they are not even in combat positions. Thats some leisurely coup.

Everything look so easy so far, seems to me Prigozhin got a lot of sympathizers in the army high command.
If i'm Shoigu and Gerasimov i would start preparing my exist.

Maybe a military coup to over throw Putin?

 

[Martin Alvito]

The interesting bit about that, slightly off topic, was that when it was shown on BBC news at 9.30am this morning, the meeting was described as an argument between the 3 men.
Kind of stomach turning stuff really, even after all, I expected better from the BBC

That's a hard detail to read. They may have backed off of the position after failing to confirm, or they may be suppressing that detail. It does weigh in on the side of the 'Prigozhin acted alone' hypothesis.

 

[Yarrgh]

Erm wtf!!!

View attachment 215163

Transfer deadline day?

 

[The binman chronicles]

There could always be the possibility that they've cooked up this situation to allow Russia to withdraw from Ukraine whilst saving some face. They'll claim their army was victorious in beating the coup, they'll have parades and new celebration day added to the calendar hopefully distracting the fact they've run from Ukraine with their tails between their legs.

Prigozhin will be given a sack load of cash (then probably the bullet)