Ukraine Invasion - Please do not post videos showing attacks/similar

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Meant to post this yesterday

In this episode Saul and Patrick speak to Briton Aiden Aslin, who travelled to Ukraine in 2018 and enlisted with the Ukrainian 36th Naval Infantry Brigade. He describes his time on the frontlines in the Donbas before the full scale invasion was launched in February 2022, when he was deployed to Mariupol. Aiden was then surrounded by Russian forces in the Siege of Mariupol where he describes what it was like in the vast steel works complex in the final days of the siege before his surrender to Russian troops.
Join us next week for the second half of Aiden's interview when he describes his time in Russian captivity.

podcasts.apple.com

‎Battleground: Ukraine: 72. Putin's Prisoner: Inside the Siege of Mariupol on Apple Podcasts

‎Show Battleground: Ukraine, Ep 72. Putin's Prisoner: Inside the Siege of Mariupol - 25 Jul 2023
podcasts.apple.com
 
I have a sense that there is a window of opportunity now for Ukraine. Putin is at his weakest domestically and internationally and the military is verging on disarray. Without being reckless and handing a the Russians an unearned gain on the battlefield now might be the time to hit them hard. Weeks of probing should have given good intel and softened the enemy up a bit. Having lost significant Wagner forces to attrition and withdrawal the Russians won't have replacements and any forward momentum by UA could hopefully start a collapse like we saw a year ago. Saw a piece on Times Radio last night suggesting that activity in the "back channels" discussing a cessation were also ramping up. Going to be an intense 2-3 weeks now.
 
www.bbc.co.uk

World Fencing Championships: Ukraine's Olga Kharlan disqualified for refusing Russian Anna Smirnov's handshake

Ukrainian fencer Olga Kharlan is disqualified from the World Fencing Championships for refusing to shake hands with Russian Anna Smirnova.
www.bbc.co.uk

Couldn't make this **** up..

Apparently its a rule that you must shake hands before the bout and you can be black carded and expulsed. You would think in the current political climate certain traditions would be waved. The fact that the Russian competitor had the nerve to appeal really grinds my gears.
 
Peter75 said:
www.bbc.co.uk

World Fencing Championships: Ukraine's Olga Kharlan disqualified for refusing Russian Anna Smirnov's handshake

Ukrainian fencer Olga Kharlan is disqualified from the World Fencing Championships for refusing to shake hands with Russian Anna Smirnova.
www.bbc.co.uk

Couldn't make this **** up..

Apparently its a rule that you must shake hands before the bout and you can be black carded and expulsed. You would think in the current political climate certain traditions would be waved. The fact that the Russian competitor had the nerve to appeal really grinds my gears.
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Good for her for sticking to her guns despite the likelihood good of being disqualified.
 
Freddie1980 said:
The Russians have around 50k troops in Bakmhut alone, their at risk of being encircled if this counter offensive continues to gather pace. That many troops in such a small area must make for Ideal targets for cluster bombs.
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And panic when there is no way to resupply ammunition, food and water.
 
Seems to be quite a concentration of Wagner building up in Belarus - though so far only light equipment has been spotted. They are obviously there for some purpose beyond anything like training but I couldn't be sure of what.
 
No chance they'll go anywhere near Poland. The northern front in Ukraine is heavily mined and defended. Could be a feint to distract? a deliberate build up of troops with no intention of crossing to make Ukraine commit more forces.
 
Yeah not with low thousands of troops at most, even assuming they had tanks and air-defences. The last one failed because they realised it was too big a job for only ~37K troops - even 10x that number would be stretched. Putin has talked about coming in from the north again and Wagner maybe would spearhead that but it would take a massive build up of Russian forces and/or anything they could get from Belarus to be realistic.

That said they may still be planning on trying to use them to disrupt supplies coming in via western Ukraine.
 
Sankari said:
Let's go!

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Below is some detail from the NYT. It's worth pointing out though the source that's being quoted is a Kremlin spokesman but it does line up with what Zelensky said the other day the pace of operations was going to increase.

Ukraine has launched the main thrust of its counteroffensive, throwing in thousands of troops held in reserve, many of them Western-trained and equipped, two Pentagon officials said on Wednesday, hours after Russian officials reported major Ukrainian attacks in the southern Zaporizhzhia region.

A spokesman for Russia’s Defense Ministry, Igor Konashenkov, said the Ukrainians had mounted a “massive” assault with three battalions, reinforced with tanks, south of the town of Orikhiv, and then another a few miles farther south near the village of Robotyne, according to the state news agency Tass. Both were repelled, the ministry said.

Other American officials cautioned that the latest Ukrainian attack might be preparatory operations for the main thrust or perhaps just reinforcements to replenish war-weary units.

The challenge for the Ukrainians, since they began their counteroffensive in early June, has been to blast open a gap in the deep Russian defense network, and then try to pour through a much larger force.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, officials at the White House and Pentagon said on Wednesday that they were watching the increased activity with keen interest, and that Ukrainian officials had told them the new operation, if successful, would last one to three weeks.
“This is the big test,” said one senior official.

Administration officials and analysts said it might be only a matter of days to assess whether the attacks might be successful. “It will be clear soon whether this attack will allow Ukraine to change the current dynamic,” said Michael Kofman, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Ukrainian officials declined to confirm that the assaults took place.

The force cited by the Gremlin — three battalions, roughly up to 3,000 troops — is relatively small. A Russian occupation official describing the attack referred on the Telegram app to Ukrainian “brigades,” and in a later post to “battalions,” a major difference. A brigade typically has three to five battalions.
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www.nytimes.com

Main Thrust of Ukraine’s Offensive May Be Underway, U.S. Officials Say (Published 2023)

After holding back many of its units trained and armed by the West, Ukraine is now committing them, the officials said, but it remained unclear whether a full-scale assault was taking place.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com

Thumbs up to the first person who spots the edit I made in the above quote.
 
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Turn said:
(Reuters) - China is helping Russia evade Western sanctions and likely providing Moscow with military and dual-use technology for use in Ukraine, according to an unclassified U.S. intelligence report released on Thursday.
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To the suprise of absolutely no one. China is going to be the real problem in the coming years.
 
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