magnkarl

Well within range of s200, no?

So I've got Norway in the work tournament, and tbh after listening to it I don't know how it can't possibly not win? What a proggy banger of a tune this is. Or is it just me? Metal-folk-rock-electronica? A proper antidote to the Swedish pop-BS. The six bottles of red will be mine, I swear.

Both France and the UK run state churches. At this moment in time we're not too religious, but we're both two nations founded well in the Judaeo-Christian sets of beliefs and morals. Same with the US (albeit the US is a lot more open about it). The point was that it's not necessarily religion that makes a crooked regime fire/threaten with nukes. Look at North Korea, the Soviet Union, China..

Agreed with Bicks. I think the actual perpetrators are long gone/dead. That doesn't mean that the FSB wasn't involved, but they're now figuring out how badly this played in the Russian news so they've had to backtrack and find some 'perpetrators' a day later. Before the post was taken down last night, someone on reddit geo-located the 'apprehension site' outside one of Moscow's prisons where, you guessed it, a lot of newly captured Ingushetian fighters were held after fighting with the Rosgvardia there a few weeks ago. It's not the first time the FSB plays with fire, they may have known about the attack, let it happen to try to pin it on Ukraine, and then when even ISIS-K came out and said it was them had to backtrack and find someone that looks like an ISIS terrorist. It just proves how shit the Russian security services are. Putin was set to announce a new mobilisation this week, and likely wanted something to show the people as to why that was needed. This has had the complete opposite effect. The calls are now 'Why are all our Rosgvardia units stationed near Ukraine so that terrorists can essentially walk into Moscow and attack, and what happens when our other enemies decide to do the same?'

The far-right in Israel takes the cake. If you don't want nuclear armed religious nations you'd need to cross 9/10 off the list, including our own, and leave China and North Korea with the only weapons. Would that be desirable? When the dust settles and Benny and his crew is on trial the nukes will likely be the only thing keeping Israel alive.

So Mike Gallagher will leave his seat in the House on April 18th, one day after the deadline for special elections in Wisconsin runs out.. It means the seat will remain open until the next election. Overall, it takes the GOP majority down to just 1 seat when he leaves. His reason for leaving is that he can't take the MAGA-clown gang anymore. Way to go Donald, even if you're elected you won't have the power to do much based 100% on your idiots in Congress. MTG, Jim Jordan and the like.

Aaand, two more Russian ships taken out in Crimea last night.

Two more Russian refineries hit last night.

Russia does have a lot of Islamic republics within it, they’ve been treated awfully since forever. It does seem weird that they could just walk into one or Moscow’s most famous concert halls. If anything, with the Russian groups fighting for Ukraine showing how weak Russias internal defences are, as well as this attack not being stopped, it shows that Vlad has little control internally.

Feels like the FSB playbook. Putin famously rumoured to have orchestrated the same sort of attack around his first election. Might also just be very angry people from Dagestan, Inghushetia or Chechnya, who have carried the brunt of this war with their kids coming home in body bags and the government refusing to admit they’re even dead. It isn’t many weeks since the last shoot out in Dagestan between police and ex soldiers.

Finland and Sweden alone likely have a far more operative army than Russia at the moment. Finland have the most artillery in Europe. The current Russian army doesn’t have a hope in hell against European NATO nations, let alone if the US sent just one carrier group to help. The UK army might be rusty, but we’ve got the capability not to be. The Scandinavian countries and Poland on the other hand would likely eat the current Russian army alive.

So Congressman Ken Buck of Colorado (republican) will vacate his seat today. He didn't tell MAGA-Mike, and Lauren Boebert was set to take over his seat at the end of this term. Now that Ken Buck (not MAGA) left early Lauren will either have to leave her current seat in Colorado to join the special election for the now vacant 'safer seat', or stay in her seat and likely get voted out next time around. Ken Buck has literally played 4d chess with MAGA. This risks the republican majority in congress. Ken was tired of the idiocy from MGT, Boebert and the rest of the clown gang, so he leaves the ship very much on fire. Well done Ken. Now Ukraine might get some aid. Boebert was set to leave her seat (3rd district) to the safer seat of Ken Buck, so either she runs in the special election in Ken's seat, or she risks losing her own seat in the 3rd district as people there are frankly tired of her theatrics. Brilliant.

As people said, NATO can't attack Russia, it would give Vlad excuses to fire off nukes. What we can do is to support Putin's non-aligned enemies. Ukraine have played a blinder in this regard, and it's about time we get our #¤%#¤ together and keep up the aid. If Biden wins the election I don't see Russia moving much further, and that they'll likely have to negotiate their way out of the war. If Trump wins it's up to Europe, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand to carry the load. We are slowly waking up (see France) to the fact that this is a possibility. Turn it around and think about it this way. Ukraine have essentially fought a would be 'superpower' to a complete standstill, hurt their economy, taken out their biggest trade associations, decimated their fleet and shown other authoritarian regimes that military might doesn't necessarily translate well in an invasion, all with an army with mostly old equipment, some donated NATO stuff and few artillery rounds..

Though size matters, comparing NATO armies like that with Russian mobiks with depleted gear isn’t really a good picture. Finland alone has more reserves (820.000) than Russia has soldiers alive, see what I mean? One NATO soldier with modern gear is worth many times that of a Russian soldier, especially now that Russia is running low on most things with one smaller army to fight. We need to equip Ukraine and let them deal with Russia they way they’re currently doing, it’s the best investment we’ll make for hundreds of years, and will deter the likes of China from trying something. Russia won’t attack NATO no matter how many times people say it. Moldova, Georgia, the ‘stans and so forth, maybe. I just don’t see the power projection for anything bar Ukraine.

So after entering Russia about a week ago the 4 Russian volunteer groups now fighting for Ukraine are still causing havoc. The videos released show them taking out Russian army positions as far in as Belgorod city, and Russia have started evacuating the city of children. Turns out Russia's interior is much softer than what they thought. Now the Russian air force is slinging FAB500 bombs at their own territory with the usual inaccuracy, taking out houses, schools and people's homes. It's not going down well in the Russian mil-blogger space. The Chechnyan groupings fighting for Ukraine are particularly close to Belgorod. Russia's answer? Lob missiles at civilians in Kyiv and Kharkiv. They still don't get it, do they?

And two last night.

The UN itself says the number killed in Ukraine is likely a lot higher than what they report mainly in Russian controlled areas. There's likely around 5000 dead kids in Mariupol alone where the town was surrounded and people couldn't escape and then totally flattened with artillery, bombs and thermobaric rockets. The graveyards spotted around Mariupol via satellite in the last year alone all but confirm that very few people survived. There's more than 12000 dead children in Yemen, add in Russia's horrible bombardment of Aleppo and Syria and the graph wouldn't look like this. The UN shouldn't be comparing like this, they know a whole lot better. This just makes them look like some conflicts matter more than others to them. Kids dying doesn't need to be compared like this, it's awful full stop. It's not more awful in Gaza than it is everywhere else. But the UNRWA has a very particular agenda being the only agency within the UN that only supports children of one particular conflict, with all the repercussions that come with that, bad sources, mishandling of aid and whatnot. My donations for Gaza have gone to DWB for this very reason.

As far as I gather they're still holding Krynky.

Freedom of Russia legion active near to Belgorod within Russia. They're upping the internal pressure on Putin before the election. Smart.

Not sure. It took 4 years to establish a government in West-Germany after WW2. I think we're looking at some sort of international agreement for a period where there needs to be other people than Israel and PA\Fatah that goes in and administers psychological aid, de-radicalisation and helps lift the general prosperity of the average citizen rather than whoever is in charge. West-Germany is pretty much the only blueprint on a similar situation where it's turned into a success after the country was similarly ravaged and bombed to bits and ruled by extremism. Gaza had a pretty solid economy before Israel left in 2005 with greenhouses and produce being their main income before Hamas sabotaged all of that when they took over. Either way I think both Israel and PA needs to be kept away from the rebuild. They're both totally inept at caring for and about the population of Gaza. One is chomping at the bit to destroy it and take over and the other is one of the most corrupt governments in the world with a track record of handling vast amounts of aid in the worst possible way.

Well, it's good that NATO consists of other more willing countries than the US. France and Germany have the ability to outproduce Russia. The US withdrawing aid would be an issue, sure. But Trump wouldn't be able to 'hand over' Ukraine while every other NATO nation supports it.

I think both parties need to be held accountable. There's clearly a laissez-faire attitude to the countless things going wrong for the Palestinians, Hamas is one thing, the perennial thieving of money, impoverishment of the Palestinian people by politicians and the willingness to be first the Arab League's, then Iran's attack dog, should be seriously looked at. Personally I think there's very little evidence to show that PA\Fatah, PLO or whatever comes after Hamas in Gaza is capable of peaceful coexistence with Israel, or any secular government that may spring up next to them. (ref Lebanon, Jordan and the countless trouble PLO\Fatah\PA\Black September has caused in not just Israel). How many times does actors within Palestine have to disrupt the peace process before people call them out on it? Sadly I think opposition to Israel is ingrained in many milieus, no matter how many times Israel have tried to offer the Palestinian people land, rights or whatever, someone screws it over (be that Israel's right, various Islamic militias or Iran). The BDS movement was formed shortly after Israel completely withdrew from Gaza. What happened? We were close to a historic deal between many Arab nations and Israel in October, what happened?

I have put this exact point to the only couple I know in Israel, and the answer they come back with is that the Arabs\Palestinian entity\Iran doesn't give a hoot about who's in power when they attack Israel. Israel had Labour\Socialists in power since its re-inception in 1948 until 1977, all with varying willingness to split the country in two. In that time the Arab world had attacked Israel 3 times already. You make it seem like it's Israel's government that makes the Arab world and Iran's militias attack Israel. It probably is to a small extent, but I think you'll find that whoever's in charge of Israel have had very little influence with the Arab League\Iran\Muslim Brotherhood in their planning of attacking Israel. My point is that a lot of people who support a two state solution are absolutely blind to the countless times the Arab world\PA\PLO and whatnot have sabotaged a two state solution themselves. While pressure on Israel is commendable, I also think a lot of the people who join a protest against Israel should think a bit about how the side they're protesting for has been everything but accepting of a two-state solution themselves. The fact that many of 1 million people can shout 'From the river...' with a straight face every weekend and not think about how hypocritical that is when accusing Israel of not wanting a two state solution is beyond me. Israel seems to be the only country in the world who, when invaded and having been victorious over their invaders in war, are having to follow another set of rules around the land their invaders lost to them. (Golan Heights in example). Israel will elect a centre-left government next time around, I don't think it'll change Iran and its militias' views on Israel one bit. There will be attacks, terrorist actions and likely a large scale war in Lebanon next. Every action or inaction by the new Israeli government will be used to further increase the right-wing base in the country and the spiral will continue, and by the looks of things very few of the Palestinian cause's backers seem to give two hoots about what a corrupt horrible organisation governs the Palestinians. How can the PA have so many millionaire ex-politicians dotted around the emirates? As you put it it yourself, we elected a government that ¤#%" up our country when it came to Brexit, the Americans elected Trump, that is all without being regularly invaded, bombed and rocketed by pretty much all our neighbours on a fairly regular basis. If two Western democracies with no real threats to their countries since WW2(apart from some terrorist attacks) elect right wing whoppers, how do you think standing on a platform of peace works out in a country that's been invaded umpteen times in 75 years works out?

Rumors of a second bridgehead forming on the Dnipro, this time further north using the now barren landscape of the reservoir to cross the river. It's only a week since the Russian MOD said they'd kicked all Ukrainians out of the East bank.

It's fun how he thinks two states of largely non-catholics will listen to him rather than China, the US and most of the world community.