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

[Labster]

In the "hearts and minds" column, BBC reports that Ukraine has moved Christmas Day in a snub to Russia.

One might call this move... unorthodox.

Also seen in the same story, Motherland Monument is getting its arms replaced. No, not the person's arms, the heraldic arms on the shield that it carries.

Nice pun, but most of the autocephalous Orthodox churches have also moved to the Revised Julian calendar -- and honestly so should everyone else because it's slightly better.

The Motherland Monument faces towards Moscow, so it presents an entirely different message with the tryzub on the shield, doesn't it?  Russia could decide to bomb it... which would be great, because it's one less bomb killing civilians or even soldiers.

Day 522 out of 3 of the special operation: African edition:

-- Iraqi protesters light Swedish embassy on fire.  How it pertains to this thread: Russia invades Ukraine -> Nordics decide to join NATO -> Erdogan wants to win reelection -> blocks Swedish entry into NATO because some Dane burned a Koran -> Other countries now know about this Koran burning and start getting upset.
-- Niger has a military coup.  This one is more directly connected, since the supporters of the coup were waving Russian flags in the street (and burning French flags).
-- It's looking like there's been something of a detente with Wagner PMC, where Prigozhin is allowed to run all of the deniable ops in Africa.  Prighozhin himself was at a summit for Russia/Africa relations in St. Petersburg.
-- Wagners also setting up camp in Belarus near the Polish border.  Poles continue to have finger over Article Five button.
-- BRICS summit in South Africa suffers complication, because as a signatory to the International Criminal Court, they would have to arrest Putin if he attended.  SA asked for an exemption, the court said "lol nope", and Putin took the hint and announced that he wasn't going to the summit.
-- As usual, Africans are most at risk with the collapse of the Black Sea grain deal.
-- African peace plan in Ukraine starts with a cease-fire, which is a non-starter for both sides.
-- The recent bombings in Odesa hit grain bound for China, and a Chinese consulate, along with a bunch of civilians.  British Military Intelligence notes that " [Russia] is attempting to strike targets in Odesa because it believes Ukraine is storing military assets in these areas. Since the start of the war, Russia's strike campaign has been characterized by poor intelligence and a dysfunctional targeting process."
-- Transfiguration Cathedral of Odesa (Russian Orthodox) bombed by Russians.  It was destroyed by Russian communists and rebuilt before.
-- Ukrainian fencer Olga Kharlan asks if she can skip the handshake at the end of the match, the official say sure.  Then she wins the match, and only offers her a sword tap as a sign of respect.  The Russian opponent stands on the piste pouting for a solid 45 minutes until the Ukrainian is disqualified.
-- IOC offers her a qualification at the Olympics despite any points lost.  Such nice IOC people; I'm sure they will offer all Russians qualifications too based on this example.
-- In actual war going on, Ukraine bombs a big vehicle depot in Crimea, which was supposed to be safe.  Ukraine can't bomb here, maybe it was an Ivan smoking?
-- Ukrainian drones hit office towers in Moscow.
-- According to Russia, due to air defense the drones missed their target of terrorizing the residential area, and instead were forced to crash into a building housing Russian ministry offices at 3 in the morning.
-- What air defense doing?
-- Moldova to limit Russian embassy staff to 25, down from the current 80+.
-- Russia raises conscription age to 30 (but it doesn't apply to you if you live in Moscow of course)
-- ZNPP Unit 4 moved from cold shutdown to hot shutdown mode
-- In the war itself, it's looking like Ukrainian hopes for an easy rout of Russian positions like last year did not happen, and caused the early offensive to stall.  More experience troops are leading now, instead of saving them for the breakthrough.
-- Russia is making gains on the Luhansk front, but not much.  Ukraine is holding on the Donetsk (Bahkmut) front, and making larger gains on the southern Zaporizhzhia front.
-- Everything is mined.  Mines are mined -- in particular protecting anti-tank mines with anti-personnel mines.  Russians dug trenches just to mine them, to lure Ukrainian advances into taking booby-trapped positions. This is most of the slowness in advancing.