Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Definitely looks like either a stroke or parkinson's ( or similar) it will be interesting if more videos get leaked showing more physical issues

He's well worth following on Twitter. He's near Kherson so his updates from there are on point.

Any updates from further afield he is basically relaying from internal Ukrainian sources. So one or two things he's relayed has never backed up by other sources. Doesn't mean they're untrue but you like to see the verification. The majority of the time though it's been bang on the money.

One or two come to mind alright 😄.

But i think he tries to post in good faith as best he can. Updating Twitter and warring at the same time makes it difficult to follow up all those sources.

Did Putin not say sometime in late Feb that Russian and Ukrainian people are all the one family /the one people and that there is no need for the two countries to exist separately or words to that effect. - we are all brothers except for the few natzis that exist in Ukraine.

So has your typical Russian seriously deviated from the Masters position?

Yeah I don't think he's being intentionally dishonest; he's just repeating what he reads or hears without really verifying it. Also I believe the account is being shared between several volunteers which can make things a bit harder to judge.

Could be a false flag as a prelude to declaring war proper and recruiting from the east parts of Russia.

Putin's date of birth, and therefore his age, is a matter of public record: 7th of October, 1952. He's 69. Speculation about his health aside, he's not particlarly old by head-of-state standards. The ten older current heads of State range from 96 (Queen Elisabeth II) to 83 (Iran's Khamenei). And there's a load of world leaders in their 70s. Putin's only a year older than China's Xi Jinping. So unless he does have some serious health issue, his age in itself isn't necessarily going to bring a swift end to this barbarity.

Soviet Records from an Ex-KGB agent?

Prob legit alright. 👍️

Just had a thought on the tranistria thing there. Supposedly there is 20 thousand tons of military arms in warehouses in the region stockpiled during the 90s . Assume the Russians would absolutely love to get hold of it on to the battlefield considering the rate they are going through stuff at. Has to be some element of this thinking in it .

Someone more knowledgeable on these matters may comment, but I would imagine mothballed munitions would have a best by date, and cold war era hardware unless it's regularly serviced may be mostly junk now.

It's very hard to say what might be going on frankly.

We also have to remember there are at least two additional factions in play when thinking about Transnistria: the Transnistrian separatists and Moldovan nationalists. There could also be anti-Russian elements within the separatists too.

And this morning there are reports of an "attack" at a military base just 2km from the Ukrainian border.

They have been slowly gaining ground since they began their "2nd phase" unfortunately. How long they can sustain the advance will be the question; but the Sievierodonetsk area in particular is starting to look bad.

But how long can the Russians endure the attrition? Attack is more costly than defense.

This is the most comprehensive analysis of the whole situation I've read to date. Long, but well worth it

A snippet:

"In the early hours of 24 February, Ukrainian air-defence radar began to experience severe jamming across all frequency bands.6 Radar further inside Ukraine meanwhile began to be harassed by E95M Target UAVs simulating Russian aircraft.7 When the air defences lit up to engage, they came under attack. ‘We thought we were going to be denied the entire electromagnetic spectrum around Kyiv’, noted a Ukrainian electronic warfare (EW) specialist.8 The initial wave of cruise and ballistic missile strikes and electronic attacks caused enough disruption for an airborne raid to penetrate the Ukrainian defences north of the capital and land at Hostomel airfield, where Russian paratroopers hoped to establish an airhead to rapidly move forces into Kyiv."

...

"The VDV – Russia’s airborne forces – spearheaded the invasion. In December, specialist units of the VDV had wargamed out their role in the repression of Ukrainian civil society alongside the 9th Directorate of the Fifth Service of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB).9 The VDV assault units received the plan three days before the invasion and started excitedly talking in anticipation of their daring operation. VDV commanders started discussing their primary objective at Hostomel in clear. When they landed, therefore, they were met with Ukrainian artillery and a coordinated counterattack, quickly being driven from the airport. Meanwhile, to the north, Ukrainian units fought a delaying action with considerable success. The Russian motor rifle and Rosgvardia troops had received their orders less than 24 hours before the invasion. As a consequence, they did not fight a methodical campaign of breakthrough and exploitation by successive echelons as their doctrine dictated, nor were they supported by sufficient artillery as is considered essential. Instead, they were pushed forwards along two main resupply routes (MSRs) towards distant objectives without reconnaissance or screening to their flanks.10 The Rosgvardia, intended to provide rear-area security,11 sometimes ended up advancing ahead of combat units.12 The speed of some armoured units allowed them to drive into Kyiv’s suburbs only 48 hours into the war, but, as they were miles ahead of the main body of Russian ground forces, all this achieved was their isolation and destruction.13 With little opportunity to prepare, psychologically or practically, many Russian units broke when they met serious resistance. "