Ukraine has turned off the Druzbha oil pipeline that connects Russia and Hungary. Hungary had an exception from EU sanctions on Russian oil, but will no longer get that oil via Ukrainian pipelines. Ukraine has blocked the transit of Russian oil to Hungary through the Druzhba oil pipeline, - the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Hungary SijartoThe Hungarian energy company MOL and the Russian company Lukoil, which supplies oil from Russia to Hungary, are now… pic.twitter.com/DssNjPn0dD— Mila.Alien 🇺🇦 (@mila__alien) July 17, 2024
As an example of how trustworthy Trump is on negotations. He met with Victor Orban last week and promised to cut-off the US's support to Ukraine in order to force them to the peace table. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán: Donald Trump will not be giving "a single penny" to fight Russian aggression in Ukraine. That is his idea on how to end the war. pic.twitter.com/twB2EFI3Xc— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) March 11, 2024 Within a few days of meeting with Orban, he met with Boris Johnson and promised that he would continue the US's support of Ukraine. Great to meet President Trump who is on top form after the shameful attempt on his life. We discussed Ukraine and I have no doubt that he will be strong and decisive in supporting that country and defending democracy. pic.twitter.com/OEVZPZsRE1— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) July 16, 2024
The article is about why Russian red lines are useless and why the West should ignore them in supporting Ukraine, but one important bit of news.. Russia has withdrawn its last warship from occupied Crimea. The ships are now acting as reefs below the surface, free floating in the Black Sea east and southeast of Crimea, or in port on mainland Russia. https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blo...akes-a-mockery-of-the-wests-escalation-fears/
Houthis are enforcing the West's embargo on Russian oil again. 🤯 Liberian-flagged Greek tanker Chios Lion, which Yemen's Houthis attacked yesterday with naval drones in the Red Sea, was transporting Russian oil (!) to China, - US Central Command pic.twitter.com/tKuoywVBXL— MAKS 24 🇺🇦👀 (@Maks_NAFO_FELLA) July 17, 2024
This guy has made a life of telling people what they want to hear as long as it gets him something. There's now a strong pro-Ukraine sentiment among evangelicals because they are starting to hear about Russia's anti-evangelical actions. But I'm pretty sure Trump's lampreys know enough to make sure they are the last people Trump talks to before actually signing stuff. And that's not good for Ukraine.
Not sure how accurate this take is. No matter whether you find logistics in war interesting or boring, it is one of the decisive - if not the decisive - element in war, next to dedication, morale and political wit. Russia severely lacks in all of those components and tries to balance this out with pure Russian… pic.twitter.com/MQa0Nz5ZOs— (((Tendar))) (@Tendar) July 18, 2024
One of the fears of the dark fleet of oil tankers has taken place. What looks like an attempted ship-to-ship transfer not far from Singapore ended up in a collision and a fire on both ships. One was the Hafnia Nile, a properly registered and operated ship of the Hafnia company, but the other one was the Ceres I, a dark VLCC ship known to carry oil from Russia and Iran. It isn't clear how much oil spilled yet, but it is certainly a insurance nightmare in addition to possibly being an environmental one. https://www.lloydslist.com/LL114995...s-on-Hafnia-tanker-and-sanctions-busting-VLCC
There is a Russian airfield near Millerovo, about 10 miles from the Ukrainian border northeast from Luhansk. Going by Google and Bing satellite images it hosts fighter-bombers of the kind that repeatedly bomb Ukraine's front lines. And tonight it hosts something new - a bunch of massive fires. Reportedly an immense swarm of drones was sent to attack it.
There's a number of warbloggers saying that there is now a single street remaining before this happens. And while Ukraine doesn't physically occupy that avenue, they can easily fire into it making it exceedingly dangerous to use.
The latest from Covert Cabal delivers some interesting information on the status of the unsung workhorse of the Russian ground forces, the MT-LB (lightly) armored tractor. It is widely used to ferry artillery, ammunition, supplies, troops, and wounded in proximity to the front. It can traverse terrain that would even bog down a tank, making it vital for fall and spring in Ukraine, and is armored against near hits by artillery (although not much more). It is so ubiquitous that it never entered my mind they might run out, but it looks like they have nearly disappeared from the many storage yards that used to hold them. This doesn't mean they are gone - most of them are probably still working along the front. But it means their numbers are going to start going down inevitably and forever.
Interesting Bloomberg article about how Russia's invasion of Ukraine propelled a dying Norwegian fishing town into a global king crab powerhouse THE KING CRAB KINGS https://archive.md/2FR65 Stalin, Putin and climate change inadvertently turned Norway’s most desperate fishing spot into a global seafood capital.
From initial reports, the targets were the aviation fuel storage, ammunition bunkers, and other logistics.
Some EU countries are moving towards conscription https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/21/europe/europe-conscription-war-russia-intl/index.html
Most of the countries mentioned already have it. Latvia has reintroduced it, Lithuania should. Poland has registration but no service Germany should consider some sort of voluntary registration. UK Conservatives have been talking about reintroducing National Service since it was abolished in 1960.
They didn't make it out of the group in the Euros, all 4 teams tied in points, but they placed 4th due to tie breakers.
Should've been more clear. How has Ukraine been doing within the last few weeks/months? Have they made any big advances? I haven't been following the conflict too much for awhile.
Once the ground hardened in winter Russia started a broad offensive that is still going on. Avdiivka fell in February, and since then Russia is continuing to gain land but very, very slowly and at great cost with Russia losing over 1000 soldiers a day. Much of the problems were because of a months-long halt of American weapon deliveries due to the Republicans. Russia tried to open a new front north of Kharkiv but that went very badly. The main weapon that allows the current Russian successes (such as they are) are the massive use of glide bombs from fighters that drop them from a safe distance, from airports that can't be attacked with Western weapons for political reasons. Ukraine has been attacking Russia's oil and military industrial structures with drones and Russia has been attacking Ukraine's energy infrastructure as well as terror bombing residences, shops, schools, and hospitals.
There are power problems all over southern Russia due to multiple reasons including a problem at a nuclear reactor that resulted in a release of some radioactive gas to the environment. Many communities have not had power for 24 hours, and that includes large cities like Krasnodar. There are even some protests going on.
Depends what you mean. Russia has been making slow and steady advances across the eastern and southern fronts and still hold a vestige of Ukraine following their failed Kharkiv offensive. However, they are paying a huge price to do it. Western analysis believes they have been losing over 1,000 troops a day and dozens of vehicles. That being said, Ukraine is also paying a high price. Russia is dropping several dozen glide bombs a day on Ukrainian positions and while the drops aren’t very accurate they are large enough that even a miss will obliterate a Ukrainian position. Ukraine is also having a mobilization issue. They waited to long to start mobilization and now that they’ve picked it up, they are falling behind in targets. They are still cranking out troops, but not enough to make any large scale offensives and not really enough to stop Russia’s advances. All in all.. this war is in an attritional phase with Russia losing somewhere between 4 and 7 soldiers for every Ukrainian. There aren’t any indication that Russia or Ukraine are interested in ending the war, so….
A recent BBC interview with Zelenskyy showed some willingness to go to the negotiating table. I was watching an interview with a Ukrainian soldier, and I gather there is an understanding from many Ukrainians that the parts of the country that have been occupied for almost a decade now are pretty much Russified, whether from repeated propaganda, material promises in the post war order, ethnic cleansing, or whatever, and that there can be a successful, integral Ukraine without them. Ukraine is very carefully vague about what they are willing to negotiate. As the Zelenskyy interview hints and common negotiating sense says, it's really important not to look weak going in. That's why Russia made that preposterous proposal a month back which was basically "half of Ukraine is Russified now, half later" - they feel like they are in the driver's seat in the war and can dictate terms like that. Ukraine needs something on the battlefield to start turning their way before they can even start. For now it looks like they are waiting for Russia's hammer to break on Ukraine's anvil. If that takes too long, maybe a counteroffensive. So that's the Western philosophy of war negotiations and how Zelenskyy is playing it. And I believe it's not going to work. The problem is that any peace that Ukraine is willing to stomach is unbearable to Putin. The whole war was about Putin's abhorrence at having a relatively successful and liberal state near him (or anywhere really, but especially near him) and Putin isn't going to stand for something now he couldn't stand before but with EU and NATO membership and a new war-born nationalism tacked on. Putin is going to make this war last 10 years if he has to. Putin will use up every man, woman, child, tank, truck, and go-cart in Russia if he has to. This is life and death to him. To his thinking Russia would have been destroyed by the Western world order anyway so it doesn't matter if it is destroyed in the fight for its survival. Russia is going to continue acting this way as long as Putin is in power.
This is why selectorate theory is useful. Putin isn't the only person in Russia who gets to make that decision, any many in the top sphere of the Russian elite will run out of will to fight the war before he does. At some point, they will turn on him -- particularly if Kyiv stands and there is no hope of its capture.
Ukraine is back to attacking refineries, this time one in Tuapse not far from Krasnodar. This particular refinery has been attacked twice before.