Russian lawmakers authorize Putin to use military force outside the country, Part II

[hazard]

Nukes are not like normal explosives; actually getting a full blast out of them is hard and requires a lot of things going right, rather than just a single fuse igniting the whole lot. A nuclear missile cooking off in its silo is more likely to cause a devastating explosion because of the fuel than the nuclear bomb itself, although that would no doubt create a nice cloud of uranium dust.

Said cloud is not likely to be dangerous because of the radioactivity, mind you. It's the heavy metal toxicity that would be the real problem, even if some of the fissile material did fission.

[Dartz]

The only thing worse than Zelensky looking out his window at an iuncredibly bright light for a microsecond, is Zelensky looking out his window to see a small, scorched metal cone half-buried in the grass outside the presidential residence.

I mean, the only thing worse than launching a nuclear strike is launching a failed nuclear strike.

Because, y;know, now you have to push the button again to prove something will actually go

[classicdrogn]

I think that discovering the conventional explosive for the initiator stage was stolen out of them would be more likely than an accidental detonation, but we'd likely never hear about that, barring the "scorched metal cone" scenario. The actual radioactive material would be much harder to extract or transport, and if any had gone through the black market that would have raised a lot of sound and fury on all sides.

I ave to agre that a failed nuclear strike is probably the worst scenario, though, because if there's anything that would push other nations into actively going operational instead of just supplying Ukraine, that would be it, and once that party ball pops open there's no stopping the confetti from flying every which way.

[Labster]

🎊

[classicdrogn]

I'm going to have to request some clarification there, because unless something just hit the news and isn't on searchable text pages yet as I just rather hurriedly checked, the only failed Rusian missile incident I know of was (believed to be, obviously Putin & co. weren't talking) a test in their own territory in 2019.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/russi...t-n1041721

[robkelk]

We're currently discussing a possible occurrence, not an actual occurrence. What if Putin pushes the nuclear button... and the missiles fail to explode?

[classicdrogn]

That was what I thought, and then suddenly a post of nothing but an emoji of the ... euphamism? metaphor? whatever ... I'd used in the previous post. I don't mind saying that my eyes bugged out and I went to check the news feeds right sharpish. Bit of a shock, to be quite frank.

[Labster]

That reaction, more than anything else, convinces me that the Cold War really has restarted.

[classicdrogn]

Yes well

to you too

[Labster]

When I last posted an update about a week ago, we were anxiously awaiting updates from Ukraine's assault of the Kherson region.  Ukraine had effectively telegraphed their intent to assault the Kherson area in the weeks leading up to this offensive, which had been expected as early as August 15.  The offensive started nearly a couple of weeks after that date, which has meant that Russia had sent more reinforcements to the area.  This has made the fighting a good bit slower, but progress has been made.

Zooming out a bit, there are three main fronts in the war.  The central one, and current main effort for the Russians, is to capture the boundaries of the Donetsk oblast.  Putin has decreed that it shall happen by September 15 (it's definitely not happening), but this means that effectively no resources could be transferred from this front to the southern area in Kherson.  Given Russia's near full commitment of its army, this essentially meant that they had to transfer some units from the northern front, near Kharkiv and outside the Luhansk oblast.

On the other hand, the new recruits have just finished training in Ukraine, so it has a lot of options to both reinforce and to retake territory.  Having started the assault in to retake Kherson, the forces around Kharkiv were looking pretty thin.  And thus the second assault happened, and Ukraine has been able to retake territory quite fast here.  The Russian military bloggers are openly freaking out that this was all an evil Ukrainian ruse, and Russia took the bait, blyat, and everything is going to go south.  Meanwhile, nothing but silence from official Russian military channels.

It's hard to say if this is true or if it's just opportunistic attacks, but it's certainly the case that Russia has a lot of forces committed in the south, behind destroyed bridges with little hope of reinforcement, thin forces in the north, and a slowly grinding offensive in the east.  The war is pretty brutal, and people are dying on both sides, but it is looking bad for the Russians.  In the last 3 months Russia gained about 612 km², but it only took 8 days for Ukraine to retake 1000 km².  We just need to pray that as many people are possible are liberated before winter sets in.

Kherson front, September 7
Kharkiv front, September 7

-- Ukraine captured a Russian lieutenant general... or did they?  At the very least, that guy could be a stunt double for the general.  It could be him, though.
-- Russians to buy arms from North Korea.  This is not a joke; arms export are one of the major industries of the People's Republic of Best Korea (ok that part is a joke), because it's an industry where most buyers are trying to evade sanctions anyway. 
-- Video: Russians explain to IAEA nuclear scientists how Ukrainian rockets make a U-turn mid-flight, so it just looks like they came from the Russian side.
-- Russian troubles continue in the Transnistria puppet regime.  Since the invasion, popular support for the Russian "peacekeepers" in this "breakaway" "republic" within Moldovia has fallen away.  Not only can they not recruit from the local population, there are rumors that the Russians may be evicted by the local "government".
-- Russians move their version of the Kharkiv region capital from Kupyansk to Volchansk, on the northern border.
-- Kupyansk is a prime target for Ukraine, as it is a major crossroads and rail depot.  Taking it would effectively take another major pocket of little to no reinforcements from Russia.
-- Ukraine continues to attack where Russia is doing the worst: Supplies!
-- Video: the Ghost of Kyiv greets a fan on the ground very quickly
-- Ukrainians have sufficient air control over the south that they are launching attacks with jets and bayraktars.
-- Russians bombed after sharing their location with beautiful women on a dating site.  Catfishing at its finest.
-- I don't think I posted this photo when it happened last month, so let's do it now: Ukrainian law enforcement captures a pair of Russian assassins, sent to kill the defense minister.  Ukrainians: look at that supermarket bag, how did they get such good advertising?  Tied up orcs and tractors?
-- We tell stories about Russian spies, but how bad are they?  Here's a twitter thread about a woman sent to spy on Americans in Italy.  She was discovered because the FSB issues passports to spies in consecutive numbers, so if you catch a couple of them, you can check for more!  Fun fact: her cover story's entire exclusive jewelry line was ordered from AliExpress.
-- Dozens of Russian propaganda channels post the same message: “no, there’s no panic”.
-- The surest indication on how well this is going for Ukraine is how much Russia is lying about it.
-- Referenda to join the great Mother Russia are being rescheduled to November 4, because the people running them don't want to make themselves a target
-- Russia Local provisional governments and independent republics to nationalize all property in occupied territories by October 1 unless the owners come back to claim it by then.
-- Speaking of theft, appliances are being found on the roadside as orcs rush to abandon their posts
-- It's long been known that Russians are imperialist thugs, committing genocide across Eurasia.  But Germany has finally found out how terrible they really are:  they are bad business partners.
-- Russia cuts off gas supply via Nord Stream 1 indefinitely (until morale improves).  Russia somehow thought this would cause Germany to cave, because they don't understand Germans apparently.  Instead, the government seems to have written them off completely.
-- Ordnung Muß sein!

[hazard]

Russia's only remaining tool to influence Europe (that is not attacking EU/NATO members) is fucking with the fuel supply.

Europe has figured Russia cannot be trusted not to fuck with the fuel supply under any circumstances, so why bother buying from them?

[Dartz]

It looks like Izyum's imploding. Russia tried to defend Kherson - since it was obviously where Ukraine was going to fight - Ukraine poked both and is now following through hard on the succesful one.

[hazard]

The situation is very confused right now, but it looks like a general route like when the Kyiv front collapsed. Ukraine reports advances of 50+ kilometers per day, and that they have so many POWs that they don't know what to do with them. It's uncertain when the Russians stop running but liberation of a large chunk of the Luhansk oblast looks likely.

Further south in Donetsk oblast there's reports of the Donetsk airport once more being the site of combat, with Ukrainian forces presumed to be probing the front for weaknesses down to the Dnepr. Russian forces reportedly shelling along the line of contact.

Kherson oblast is likewise seeing shelling along the line of contact. No reports of advances or retreats.

[Dartz]

The leader of the Donbas has just resigned and fled to Russia with his tail between his legs.

[classicdrogn]

Wonder if Putin's deep enough in Cartoonishly Evil character to You Have Failed Me For The Last Time him?

[Labster]

"Moscow is silent."

When the Berlin Wall started to come down, that's what a young KGB officer named Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin found himself faced with, as the great Soviet Union began to crumble apart around him. And he vowed himself to undo the tragedy of the end of empire, "the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century," as he called it.

So it is that we find ourselves at the end of the massive rout of Russian armies by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, where essentially the whole of the Kharkiv oblast was liberated. There are of course still pockets of resistance, but by and large the people seem quite happy to be liberated based on every video I've seen. And Kharkiv had a decent percentage of Russians too.

The Russian reaction to this has been telling. Moscow is silent. The vatniks have gone from praising the special operation to lamenting it in mere days. And the only one nominally in authority commenting on the war at all is Ramzan Kadyrov, who never met a camera he didn't like, and he's talking about the changes that need to be made so Russia can start winning. But Putin is walking in Gorbachev's footsteps. Putin has canceled all meetings with the Ministry of Defense and with defense contractors, and is avoiding everyone.

How could this happen? Come on, with that Zelensky? How could this common politician lie so effectively about where the main operation would be? How could an actor come up with a plan to deceive? If only these questions had obvious answers to Russians, they would definitely be mad at their leaders.

Zelensky played the big man, ordered his army in public to take Kherson. Russians just didn't understand how that could possibly be a ruse. He even sent most of the HIMARS there, playing his trump card. Russia's president ordered the takeover of the remainder of Donetsk, and they are damn well going to do it, because it's an order! Could you imagine embarrassing the fearless leader by not doing what he said? Russian army can't.

Until they saw a whole ton of them coming, and they ran faster than Sir Robin. Apparently there was nothing solid behind the front lines. No second defenses, no fallback trenches, no reserves. There are so many POWs that the Ukrainian army doesn't know what to do with them. Zelensky doesn't need ammo right now, he needs a ride! Or lots of buses.

Notably the Russian army is still trapped near Kherson. The offensive at Kherson looks like it is also real, though perhaps not the main focus of the past week. The situation is still precarious for the Russian army, and they'll be demoralized by news of losses in the North.

Russia is apparently still committed to assaulting Bakhmut and Avdiivka, as part of the original plan to capture all of Donetsk by, uh, Thursday. Given that Izium has already been lost, that objective cannot be achieved. Their lines are falling apart, but eh, gotta take these small towns, because that's what the orders are.

To get an idea of the scale of the retreat, here's an image of the current front, and here's an animation from the last week. Both are from the ISW, who tends to be conservative about reported advances -- they wait until OSint videos can be geotagged. Anyway, it's a huge victory.

-- Ukraine retakes at least 3000 km²
-- Ukraine government, after the fun of last week, has now asked people to kindly go back to not sharing videos about troop movements, because that worked well last time.
-- Not looking forward to new reports of war crimes around Kharkiv and in Izyum.
-- Russians are regrouping on the other side of the Oskil River in the northern axis.
-- There was a report of Ukraine retaking Donetsk Airport. It's not as critical as it sounds, since no one has air superiority, but it does means that Ukraine has now retaken some territory lost in 2014.
-- Thanks to the rapid unplanned backward advance of the Russians, Russia has now "donated" more artillery and armor to Ukraine than France and Germany.
-- A lot of this is in working order. I saw a video of a mobile radar truck where it the equipment looked in pristine condition, abandoned on the battlefield. I'm sure USA wants a looksie inside.
-- Old news: is Ukraine using black magic and sorcerers to win
-- Russians holding on in Lyman, though Ukrainians have crossed the Lyman alpha line.
-- Russians fleeing Svatove in Luhansk, too.

-- Video: Ukrainian soldiers tear down a Russian propaganda billboard. Before it comes down, it says "We and Russia are one people." Right underneath the top level, they uncover this poem:

And glory, mountains blue, to you,
In ageless ice encased!
And glory, freedom’s knights, to you,
Whom God will not forsake.
Keep fighting — you are sure to win!
God helps you in your fight!
For fame and freedom march with you,
And right is on your side!

-- I'm pretty sure this scene will be in the movie of the war.
-- Like everything, Russia just puts a coat of nationalism on top and claims it was theirs all along.
-- Here, have a bit of Zelensky today:

Do you still think we are one people? Do you still think you can scare us, break us, force us to make concessions? Don't you really get it? Don't you understand who we are? What we stand for? What we are all about?

Read my lips: Without gas or without you? Without you. Without light or without you? Without you. Without water or without you? Without you. Without food or without you? Without you.

Cold, hunger, darkness, and thirst are not as frightening and deadly for us as your friendship and brotherhood. But history will put everything in its place. And we will be with gas, light, water, and food... and WITHOUT you!

-- Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant lost its external power supply, but then regained it. -- Afterward, it has taken its last of six reactors from startup mode (low power) to all the way off.
-- This does not mean it is safe. It is in fact very hot still -- on-site diesel engines and grid power supply must cool the plant until it cools down, operating water pumps. If both electricity and fuel supply become unavailable, it might be safer to turn it back on.
-- Meanwhile, Russians use missiles to shut off power delivery to Kharkiv because they're giant jerkfaces.
-- Just to the north of Kharkiv and across the border, anxiety continues to increase in Belgorod. Power delivery seems to be having some problems there, too.
-- Annexation referenda have been indefinitely posponed this time. Russians have trouble sticking to dates, offending Germans even more.
-- Belarus will assist Russia any day now...
-- But seriously, Lukashenko looks pretty smart now. At least, nominally having his own country, he has some outside perspective and can tell Putin, if not "no", then "not yet".
-- And by now, the frontline of the war is far from Belarusian territory.
-- Russian TV starts looking for non-Putin people to blame.
-- Denis Pushlin, head of Donetsk People's Republic, has gone missing. Some reports said he resigned? Maybe he fell out a window?
-- Chinese people start making fun of Russian military online.
-- Crimean Tatars dream of their homeland's liberation
-- I'm not them, but if I were India I would really be looking into alternate arrangements for a defensive alliance right now. (And keep buying cheap gas right now.)
-- Russia considers peace talks; one Ukr security council official calls for unconditional surrender and demilitarization of Russia. Hey, why does this seem familiar?
-- Stupid democracies value weakness and diversity. Russia values strength. But what happens when the government starts showing weakness? We're about to find out.
-- Deputies in 18 districts of Moscow and St Petersburg have signed a statement demanding that Putin resign.
-- Before the war, Putin went to Greece, visited Delphi. He asked the oracle if his war would be successful. Pythia said, "If you go to war now, you will be renowned as the man who rent a great empire asunder." Time to break up the USA, right?

[robkelk]

Both are from the ISW,

I'm pretty sure I'm not the only person here who thinks of Traveller when seeing that particular initialism.

Institute for the Study of War (Wikipedia page - the actual site isn't loading for me)

[Bob Schroeck]

Ukrainian forces, outnumbering Russian forces 8-to-1, push all the way to Russian border. Meanwhile, the Kremlin insists nothing of the sort is happening and they're going to demand total surrender by Ukraine.

[Labster]

Yeah, ISW's main site understandingwar.org was down yesterday, but their backup iswresearch.org was available, since it's a Blogger (Google).  My favorite phrase from yesterday's report:

Supporting Effort #1- Kharkiv City (Russian objective: Prevent Ukrainian forces from reaching the Russian border)

Note: The successful Ukrainian counter-offensive in Kharkiv Oblast has rendered this section unnecessary. It will not appear in future updates

Most of the "news" today has been highly unconfirmed, and I would not be surprised if a lot of it was Ukraine psy-ops.  A quick sample of these questionable takes:
-- Kherson army leaders begin negotiations to surrender
-- Russia has decided not to send any additional units into Ukraine, even those fully formed (according to UAF)
-- Russians have run so far from Kharkiv that they ran back into Russia
-- Mass surrender of Russians on front lines near Kherson
-- Ukraine has captured more than one Russian general

Now, any or all of those might be true, but they might all be false rumors as well.  Rumors intended to further break Russian morale.  Historically, wars aren't won by killing the enemy, but by crushing the morale of the opposing army.  Suffice to say that Russian morale is low, and with untrained recruits being sent in with no bonds of brotherhood with their units, morale has a pretty low upper bound here.  If I was going to start rumors to drain morale, ones that suggest your country has abandoned you and everyone else is surrendering are the kinds of things I'd say.  But I'm no Dnipro Rose.

-- A month or less until mud season starts.  Hopefully gains will continue for Ukraine until then.
-- New Rector of Kherson State University is hospitalized after a bomb explodes in her house.  Students opposed to collaborative learning.  All as foretold by Alice Cooper.
-- Interviews with POWs have been interesting:
-- -- Russian seaman got a week of tank training, sent to the field.
-- -- Russian tanker explains how some of the tanks could move but not shoot, while other tanks could shoot but not move.  Is this how combined arms works?
-- Ukraine has regained 6000 km² of territory in the past two weeks.
-- Ukraine finds stockpiles of ammunition and equipment in Kharkiv oblast.  We assume the high tech stuff is heading back to NATO-land to be analyzed, while the older, common stuff will be fixed and used.  And the soviet shells will go in the soviet artillery.

When this war ends, the old Eastern Bloc war equipment will be essentially worn out.  Eastern Europe gave it to Ukraine as a way of getting rid of it while helping those who trained on the equipment.  They are already upgrading to new and NATO-standard equipment; Ukraine will upgrade after the war.  For now, it's nice to get free ammunition from Russians, but it would be even better to rely on American logistics to deliver massive stockpiles in the same time it takes to get an order from Amazon Prime.  NATO membership and EU membership will absolutely come after this war, barring the low, low chance of nuclear winter.

It's hard to say what outcome I really want from the war.  Ukraine should go back to its pre-2014 boundaries, that's for sure.  Russia should return all citizens of Ukraine, including the ones "filtered" into the ground.  I don't much believe in war reparations, doubly so because the only way Russia could pay for them is fossil fuels. Of course the Kurils should return to Japan.  I wouldn't mind Karelia being returned to Finland, but I doubt they want all of the Russians who live there now.  Oh, and of course, war crimes trials in The Hague.

As a person, I'd like to see the Russian Empire broken up.  It's not a monolithic evil empire.  And not just obvious places like Chechnya.  There are Bashkir, Nogai, Circassians, Tatars, Ainu, Tuvans... there are over a hundred ethnicities in Russia, and you can tell from this war how they are still subjugated by the Muscovites.  Imagine if these peoples could have their own country back after so long?  It would be nice... but also open things up to Chinese influence.  Europe has survived with smaller states, but these are developed and densely populated, and now unified.  Could it work out there as a confederation rather than a Muscovite-controlled empire?  I suppose these arguments against are much like pro-colonialist arguments -- better to decolonize Asia and see what happens.

[Jinx999]

Odd aside.

I'm rather annoyed by the title of this thread every time I open it.

It implies that Russian politicians are concerned with such things as "laws" or have the ability to authorise or prevent Putin from doing something.

Referring to the Russian army as a "military" or a "force" is also dubious.

[Bob Schroeck]

"Putin's Puppets Rubberstamp His Plan to Zerg-Rush Ukraine With an Ill-trained Mob"?

[Labster]

Russian ruler rouses risky reconquest against republic of the Rus'

Also the name Kievan Rus' is another example of Russian theft. The Rus' were a a people centered around Kyiv. Muscovites took the name for themselves, just like they co-opt everything Slavic today. This is also why Belarusian only has one letter "S".

Also while I think Putin does see it as a reconquest war, it is in fact a nationalist war, redefining Ukraine as part of the Russian nation. This is one reason why things are different from 2014 -- the world no longer recognizes nationalism as a valid reason for war, but Crimea was in some sense a reconquest. (The other reason, of course, is that it was a fait accompli the first time.)

I was going to rename the thread when the last one ended, then Bob created the new one, and I was like "oh well".

-- Russian government has decided to admit defeat in Kharkiv, and it is entirely because the Ministry of Defense let Putin down. Poor guy, having to deal with such incompetent generals. Heads will roll.
-- Rumor is that Ukraine is heading to southern Zaporizhzhia next; collaborators are already fleeing Melitopol towards Crimea.
-- Best Reddit comment: They're stuck in Kherson. They cannae go forwards, and they cannae go back across the river.
-- Tankies at Amnesty International still can't read the room
-- The collection of evidence about war crimes in Kharkiv has already begun.
-- Izyum kids tell how the blew up a Ruzzian truck. Guessing the age, the ten year old goes on to describe how he killed some Russians with a grenade.

[Bob Schroeck]

I was going to rename the thread when the last one ended, then Bob created the new one, and I was like "oh well".

It's pretty easy to rename a thread. I'll be happy to change it, if you like.

[Dartz]

A British Pig (No Really) explains how Moskva sunk

It rambles around a bit. But watch to the end.

[Labster]

That flag on the Moskva cause me to do a double-take as an American.  It's a Russian naval jack

The original plan back in 2014 was that once Russia liberated Luhansk and Donetsk, other oblasts in the south of Ukraine would join up in a new march buffer state confederation called Novorossiya, or "New Russia".  This confederacy of southern rebel oblasts would have had this flag, which is just a little on the nose for me.

The TL;DW is basically that nothing worked on the Moskva.  Only one gun of three different air defense systems worked, radar and internal comms strongly interfered with each other, engines were at the end of their operating life, fire bulkheads didn't seal, and firefighting equipment was locked down by the admiral because people kept stealing it.  The maintenance report included all this, and still passed the ship with flying colors.  TL;DR of that: just Russia stuff.

-- Kessler syndrome fans excited by news that Russia considers SpaceX satellites valid targets in this war
-- 1000 dead bodies found in Izyum so far
-- Russian cruise missiles damage the dam at Kryvyi Rih, causing enough damage to force authorities to drain the water.  Flooding is damaging the city.
-- Zelensky's motorcade was in a traffic accident
-- Russian lawmakers start using the "war" word on TV, suggest bombing Kyiv while Ursula von der Leyen is visiting would be a good way to convince Ukrainians how much they want to liberate them.
-- Russia will see confrontation between military and politicians, says expert
-- Luhansk Peoples Republic leader says "no need to panic"
-- Occupied Luhansk shuts down mobile internet, as a way to preserve op-sec for special looting operation