Denial

Putin is now in denial about his continuing failures in Ukraine. His speech today claimed that Russia will conquer new territories and prepare intercontinental missiles for use. He is very obviously losing ground, and by his threat with missiles he admitted that they are currently not ready for use.

He also claimed that his army has gained valuable battle experience and that Nato is using most of its resources to hold Russia back. The reality is that the Russian army has lost a significant part of its soldiers without learning anything at all, and that Ukraine is quite successful at pushing them back with nothing but weapons support from Nato. If actual Nato forces were to be employed against Russia, they would outnumber the Russians ten to one, have immeasurably better training and equipment, and obliterate the broken remains of the Russian army.

By his statement that peace talks between Russia and Ukraine are now impossible after President Zelenskyy visited President Biden, Putin is definitively burning his bridges with the international community and openly claiming Russia to be an enemy of the United States. His actions seem erratic, badly planned, even irrational, and his tower of lies might not be far from a complete collapse, leaving him buried under the rubble.

Spent

Contrary to Putin's illusions of grandeur, Russia is not a major player in the world economy. Official numbers indicate that his insane war in Ukraine is costing him 30 percent of the Russian state budget, and there is good reason to assume that the actual numbers are even higher. Add to that the rapid depletion of weapons and ammunition which have been amassed in storage for decades, and the alarming rate of casualties and desertions in the Russian army, and it becomes clear that Putin is throwing Russia's future away on the battlefield. Regardless of how the war ends, it will leave Russia drained on resources, with a decimated army and the economy in tatters.

When World War II ended, Germany was in shambles. The parts occupied by the Allies received enormous support and managed to rebuild, while East Germany suffered under Soviet rule. They started to recover after Germany was reunited, but much of the former DDR region is still struggling. Whenever, and however, Russia's war on its alleged "brother" Ukraine ends, Russia will be treated as pariah by most of the world, and will not receive help to rebuild from anywhere in the West. Putin's only ally that is strong enough to provide economic support is China. It's doubtful whether they are willing to further taint their reputation by helping Russia rebuild, and if they do they will most certainly make sure that Russia is beholden to China and more or less loses its sovereignty.

Add to this the fact that Russia has now lost all credibility as an international trade partner, and the outlook for the country and its citizens looks very bleak indeed.

Russia is spent. Its budding economy was pillaged by greedy oligarchs, drained by rampant corruption, and finally bled dry by a war that set the country back decades and left them with no future. By trying to restore a former glory that never was, Russia has essentially ceased to exist.

It's cruel to say it, but: Good riddance. Russia never learned to play nice, and they need to face the truth. Sadly, this goes not only for their evil and deeply corrupt leaders, but for a frighteningly large portion of the population as well. Russians are in deep and wilful denial about the state of their country and need to see the truth, once and for all. If it takes a kick to their faces for that to happen, so be it.

Legacy

Vladimir Putin will go down in international history as a madman, a cruel despot responsible for the death of tens of thousands of Ukrainians and most likely just as many of his own troops, in a criminal war of terror fought with gross incompetence for no reason.

However, Putin is no longer aiming for international respect. He lost that the minute he marched on Ukraine, and he knows that. He is now desperately trying to cling to power and remain relevant within Russia. The question is whether he can keep his own population from seeing through his ever more transparent and desperate lies. For decades, the Russian army has been dismantled by neglect, incompetence and rampant corruption, to the point where it has serious trouble with performing its intended function. It was utterly foolish of Putin to order such an ineffective and broken army to invade a neighboring country which has strong connections to the democratic world and a significant capacity to defend itself.

Even in Russian history books, Putin may well be remembered as a lunatic, the person who set Russia's international relations back to the Cold War era, one who wasted the sorry remains of the Russian army on a war doomed to failure, and all for his own selfish purposes.

It's beyond me to make a guess whether Putin's efforts to save face within Russia  will pay off, but I'm hoping they fail miserably for everyone to see.

No Proof

There is no proof that Iran has supplied Russia with attack drones of the model Shaheed-136. This is the official word from the Iranian government, and we should definitely trust a regime that has a history of lying through their teeth, killing their own people and sponsoring international terrorism.

Russia has trouble producing enough conventional weapons, as indicated by Putin's recent order that the Russian war industry must strengthen their efforts and increase production, but they obviously made thousands of drones themselves. The drones are identical in design to the Iranian Shaheed-136, down to the last nut and bolt, but Russia has obviously made a huge effort to copy them rather than simply buy them from a country that has voiced its support for Russia's illegal aggression towards a friendly neighbour.

I mean, the drones have Cyrillic letters on them, right? It's not as if they could have been repainted or anything. A paint job is far beyond the capabilities of the Iranians or Russians. No, these are Russian made, through and through, produced by magical means by a Russian industry that struggles to produce weapons even of their own 1970's design, and the Iranians had absolutely nothing to do with these drones. Because they said so.

Own goal

A Russian fighter jet crashed into a residential building in the Russian city of Jejsk, killing more than a dozen civilians, some of which were children.

With this single accident, Russia killed about as many of their own as the number of Ukrainians they killed with their entire drone attack on Ukraine yesterday.

It's disrespectful to use a sports metaphor to describe what is happening in a war, but it's hard not to call this an "own goal" for Russia. Putin's supposedly mighty army is not in any shape to fight, and their mistakes are getting ever more serious, and more obvious for everyone to see. Let's hope people in Russia are watching as well.

Stand-off

In that corner, we have Russia, with support from Iran, Belarus, Syria and... sorry, what? Nicaragua and North Korea, hmmm, okay, whatever. And in this other corner we have... pretty much the rest of the world. China and India seem to be a little uneasy about choosing sides, but they're definitely not eager to chum up in Russia's corner, that's for sure. Now, this is going to be a... no, who am I kidding, it's not going to be an interesting fight. This is just stupid.

Putin is using a badly trained, outdated, mismanaged, corrupt and looted army to take on the rest of the world. It can only end in ruin for him. The question is how many people have to die for his impossible dream of restoring the Soviet Union before he is stopped.

London V2

The morning news brought reports of drone attacks on Kyiv, the day after Putin said that there is "currenly no reason" for any further attacks on the city. I suppose "currently" meant "this very second".

The drones have been reliably identified as Iranian Shaheed-137 "kamikaze drones", even though the Iranian government, another oppressive regime on its last legs, categorically denies supplying Russia with weapons, all the while continuing to do so.

These drone attacks are frightening, but ineffective. They can be compared to the V-1 and V-2 strikes at London during WW2: a last ditch attempt by a failing war machine to make any kind of impact at all by random attacks on civilians far behind the frontlines. Any human lives lost are a tragedy, but just as the Brits were only strengthened in their resolve by Hitler's terror bombings, the Ukrainians will be as well.

Flailing, and failing

Russia's attack in the past couple of days, targeting civilians in Ukraine, is reported to have used more than 80 missiles. Long range missiles are a scarce resource for Russia, and using them to attack civilians in terror bombings is extremely wasteful for an army that is already running low on pretty much everything.

Add to this the meager outcome: reports say that about half of the missiles were shot down by air defense, and the official count from the Ukrainian government is that 19 people were killed in the attacks. That number could increase in the aftermath, and of course even the death of "only" 19 people is absolutely awful, but the fact remains that attacks like this are absolute failures. If we do some horrible math involving human lives, it took an average of four missiles to kill one random civilian.

Putin is throwing away his last resources to try to scare people by random acts of terror. It is not working.

Bottom of the Barrel

Yesterday, Russian forces aimed anti-aircraft missiles into a residential area in Mykolaiv. Now, these terror attacks on civilians are of course horrible and indefensible, but air defense charges are expensive weapons that have very little effect on buildings, and the attack is basically nothing more than a desperate last ditch attempt to make any use at all of whatever ammunition they have left.

Wasting air defense missiles on an attack like this is a clear sign of combat units being close to just imploding from a lack of supplies and a dysfunctional command structure. Russia's army is basically being run over by the Ukrainian counterattack, and because of their commanders' refusal to fall back, their troops end up fleeing in panic while taking heavy losses. The only response they have is to kill more civilians in random, ineffective terror bombings.

What little is left of Putin's neglected, depleted, exhausted and unmotivated fighting force appears to be precariously close to the point where it just stops working altogether, and they may in fact be in for a total breakdown and a humiliating defeat before any reinforcements arrive.

Unhappy Birthday

Today, Vladimir Putin turns 70. He was congratulated only by two world leaders from outside of his small and shrinking circle of direct influence: Kim Jong-Un of North Korea and Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega. That is not exactly the best and largest circle of international friends someone could wish for.

While Putin sits in his gilded Kremlin without friends, his stupid war on Ukraine is going wrong on all fronts. His depleted and exhausted army is failing to hold the line pretty much everywhere in the illegally annexed regions, and Ukrainian forces are cutting through them and sending them fleeing while retaking their territory at an encouraging speed.

On the home front, Putin's panic move to start a "partial" mobilisation of hundreds of thousands of people has been met with heavy criticism and sent Russian men fleeing the country in droves. Russian Forbes makes a credible estimate that as many as 700,000 people may have left Russia since the mobilisation was announced, and the exodus continues.

Here's wishing you a truly unhappy birthday, Putin. You deserve every bad thing coming your way.

In Tatters

Putin's move to enlist allegedly hundreds of thousands of former soldiers into active duty, to reinforce his heavily depleted forces in Ukraine, is an act of desperation. Russians do not want to fight in Putin's failing war against their brothers and sisters in Ukraine, and it is highly doubtful if he can even muster any significant amount of battle ready troops in the near future. Many of the men who are now receiving draft orders have no military experience, and the Russian army will face severe problems and long delays when trying to train them, outfit them and organize them into functioning units. They had problems keeping even their standing army equipped with reasonably modern and functional gear, and adding hundreds of thousands of new recruits to the mix will spell disaster.

Putin will see his reinforcements arrive in much smaller numbers than he needs, and they will be too late to stop Ukraine's pushback against his aggression. When he finally manages to send some troops, they will be badly trained, badly equipped and badly motivated, sent into battle only to die by the thousands for a lost cause in a war that has gone horribly wrong from the beginning.

What we are seeing is the desperate act of a madman who is out of options but refuses to admit defeat.

Russophobia

In his predictably lie-filled and deranged address at the UN headquarters yesterday, Sergei Lavrov accused the Western world of russophobia. That might have been the only thing he got at least almost right.

Now, the term "phobia" usually refers to an unfounded fear of something, either due to a psychological disorder, like claustrophobia, or a misinformed opinion, like xenophobia. However, the word is Greek and literally means "fear", plain and simple.

The world is right to fear Russia. Not only is the Russian leadership to be feared, because Putin is not the only madman with crazy delusions about reclaiming the former territory of the Soviet Union to create "Novorossija", New Russia.

Strictly speaking, the Russian population at large is complicit in all this, because they have allowed a madman to remain in power for the past twenty years. So, yes, Russia and the Russians are to be feared, and loathed. They cannot be trusted as a group and as a country, and far too many of them are murderous thugs who are actively involved in torturing and killing innocent people by the thousands in Ukraine.

Russophobia is not wrong. It is a very wise and perfectly sane reaction to what Russia is doing, and it will take a very long time for decent Russians to restore normal relations with the rest of the world. When you look at it, Russia has actually never had normal relations with other countries, so it will be an uphill struggle indeed.

Therefore, Mr. Lavrov, until Russia changes dramatically for the better, I will stick with my russophobia.

Quote

Today, the UK Ministry of Defence released a statement that is worth quoting verbatim. Essentially, what it says is that the Russian air force sucks ("pilots' situational awareness is often low")and is taking such heavy losses that it is largely ineffective ("attempts to provide close air support", "continued lack of air superiority"). Here's the full quote:

Russia has highly likely lost at least four combat jets in Ukraine within the last 10 days, taking its attrition to approximately 55 since the start of the invasion.

There is a realistic possibility that this uptick in losses is partially a result of the Russian Air Force accepting greater risk as it attempts to provide close air support to Russian ground forces under pressure from Ukrainian advances.

Russian pilots’ situational awareness is often poor; there is a realistic possibility that some aircraft have strayed over enemy territory and into denser air defence zones as the front lines have moved rapidly.

Russia’s continued lack of air superiority remains one of the most important factors underpinning the fragility of its operational design in Ukraine.

 
The Russian operational design is fragile. Let's hope it shatters, along with any hope they have of ever going back to ruling the region that was once the Soviet Union. The world is moving on, while Russia is looking backwards to try to find relevance. They will not succeed.

Denial

The Russian "counterinformation" strategy has now deteriorated to the point where they just deny everything. Anything being reported from Ukraine that is unfavorable for the Russian side is simply dismissed as "lies".

In short, journalists from the entire world are fabricating stories of Russian war crimes, with extensive photo and video documentation, to make them look bad, and only the Russians are telling the truth.

Yeah, right. Are even the most gullible people inside Russia buying this?

What? Who?

As Russian forces flee large swaths of previously held territory in northern Ukraine, we see the horrendous pattern from north of Kyiv repeat itself. Torture chambers. Mass graves filled with unnamed victims, most of them bearing signs of torture and abuse. Reports about deportations, disappearances and random arrests without reason. Terror and threats by Russian forces to keep the "liberated" Ukrainians in the "denazified" regions in check. People in recaptured cities greeting Ukrainian forces with cheers and flowers.

So, President Putin, please remind us: Who are the Nazis in this conflict?

Recipe for disaster

Evil people across the world have found a way to destroy democracies from within: pander to stupid people. Tell stupid people lies that provide simple but wrong answers to complicated questions, and tell stupid people that whatever they wrongly believe without evidence, just because it makes them feel good about themselves, is a valid opinion even though it contradicts what an overwhelming majority of intelligent people have concluded is right.

Yes, I am saying that intelligent people generally know better than stupid people how to run a country, just like they know pretty much anything  better than stupid people. That's what intelligence is, per definition: the ability to think hard about complicated matters, learn the facts and understand how things actually work, instead of jumping to conclusions based on nothing but a gut feeling, or something their equally uninformed friends are saying, or prejudice, or envy, or hate.

The only saving grace is that the parties start out as a small group of evil people with a dastardly plan to attract stupid voters to gain power, but when they succeed, they need to find candidates for all the political representation they get, and as these parties grow they tend to get an increasing amount of stupid people as candidates. They end up building a house of cards, because in the long run a party of stupid people will not even succeed in making other stupid people happy with their incompetent rule.

Fortunately, evil people with a brain seem to be a small minority, and they can't even find enough of their own kind to run their political party if it grows to become a major player in national politics. Unfortunately, before these parties fail miserably and are destroyed by their own incompetence, they can do a lot of damage to a country, to its people, to people in other countries, and to the planet. In some cases, that damage is irreparable.

Ruling a country is a difficult task, perhaps the most difficult one there is. It is a job that requires at least a reasonable level of intelligence, and demonstrably stupid people are simply not fit for it. Those who cannot be bothered to seek information, to think, and to find actual working solutions, should not be in charge of anything, least of all an entire country. History is full of examples of stupid leaders, and their reigns always end in disaster.

I hope for the influence of the SD party in Sweden to be short and disastrous. Disastrous to them, not to the country.

Defanged

Without diminishing the suffering Russia is causing in Ukraine since they invaded in February, it is obvious that the once feared Russian army is now incapable of waging war in an effective manner. The troops are badly trained, badly equipped, badly motivated and badly led. Add to this a deeply dysfunctional organization with rampant corruption, internal struggles for power and a fundamental disregard for the lives of their soldiers, and what we see is not an army, but a ragtag gang of murderous thugs with no leadership and no plan.

Russia has been fighting with everything they've got for months, attacking what they thought was an easy target. The result? They are bleeding resources, barely holding on to territory at the edges of Ukraine, and as the counterattack is picking up speed, Ukraine is slowly but steadily taking back territory, causing heavy losses for Russia to equipment and personnel.

To put ot simply: the war is going badly for Russia, and their army comes across as outdated, outsmarted and way too easily outmanouvered.

Cracking Under Pressure

The ongoing counter-offensive by Ukraine, wisely focusing on Cherson, has caught Russian forces by surprise and appears to be quite effective. Russian troops seem unprepared, under-equipped, badly trained and unmotivated, and the pinpoint strikes against Russian ammunition depots and support lines have rendered Putin's machinery of terror severely crippled.

Our support for Ukraine must not falter. Russia is getting their ass kicked, and defeating the aggressor is paramount to stopping Russia from going on a mad killing spree to conquer more territory. The world needs to say "no" with as much force as we can possibly muster.

Political commentators are saying that Russia must not be humiliated, because it would make them vengeful. To the contrary, I think Russia must be beaten to humiliation and beyond, have their teeth pulled out and never again be trusted. The monster that has been ravaging Ukraine must not be allowed to continue its killing spree. Hurting the feelings of a murderer should not be a concern. The current regime in Russia has shown its true nature, and it does not deserve our respect.

Something is Rotten in the State of Russia

In fact, the headline is an understatement. Pretty much everything is rotten in Russia, from the highest level of their totalitarian government down to the attitude and behaviour of a large portion of the Russian population. Russians are not cut off from news from the outside world -- they actively choose not to believe it. In their willful delusion they believe that Putin is not a criminal butcher of tens of thousands of innocent people and that Russia is a great country. In fact, Russia is a country in shambles, and they are going further downhill at an alarming speed.

While ordinary Russians ignore reality, their murderous dictator continues his pointless slaughter of Ukrainians, sacrificing tens of thousands of his own troops in the process while gaining close to nothing of value.

If the Russian people wanted him gone and took action, Putin would be dead and his war would be over in no time. Instead, the atrocities continue. This is not the work of one man, or of a small group of totalitarian rulers in the Russian government. The general population is definitely to blame as well, and unless Russians wake up to reality, they will be hated for generations to come. For good reason.

Running on Fumes

Russia has severe problems recruiting for their army, even for safe, well paid and ordinarily attractive non-combat positions. Fighting morale in the Russian army is so low that they now have to assign Chechnyan soldiers to police their own people, to make them obey orders and stop them from deserting. Ukraine is hitting military air fields and ammunition depots in Crimea, scaring Russian civilians in the illegally annexed region and making them leave by the thousands.

Russian units are exhausted, both in terms of being worn down from non-stop combat without relief, and in terms of their numbers dwindling due to heavy losses. Wherever the Russian army attempts to gain ground, it is met with fierce and unrelenting resistance from Ukrainian forces. Russia is blaming successful Ukrainian strikes against military targets on accidents caused by their own incompetence, rather than admitting that Ukraine is now fighting back and hitting them hard where it hurts.

Ukraine has the moral and economic support of the entire Western world. Russia stands increasingly alone, keeping only a token amount of allies like Syria, Chechnnya, Belarus, Iran and North Korea.

We are getting closer to the end of this war, and it's looking to be a total and devastating loss for Russia and Putin.

Belarus Bizarre

A journalist in Belarus has been arrested for speaking the wrong language in a public place. The language was Belarusian.

Let that sink in: the oppressive regime of Alexander Lukasjenko is now arresting people for speaking Belarusian in Belarus.

It is abundantly clear that Belarus is now back to the Soviet era, run by a Kremlin-appointed puppet government which is trying to erase Belarus and Belarusian culture from history. Seventy years of Soviet rule failed to do that. Lukasjenko and Putin will fail as well.

Demonization

Russian propaganda is desperately trying to push the lie that Russia is being "demonized" by Western countries. Reality check: you are not demonizing a demon by calling it what it is. Russian leadership is indeed a demon, evil through and through. It is far beyond change and needs to be exorcised. Making deals with the devil is not going to work -- all that can be done is to slay the beast before it consumes us all.

Go Home

In the G20 meeting, the Russian representative Sergey Lavrov left the room on several occasions when people spoke negatively about Russia's despicable actions in Ukraine, and he left early, right after his own speech which was nothing but transparent lies and propaganda. It's as if Russia stomped their feet and said "if you don't play nice with us, we will take our toys and go home".

Fine. We don't want to play with you, Russia, and we don't care for your toys. Nobody likes you, nobody believes your lies, and nobody wants to be your friend, because you are a bully, hiding your insecurity behind a pile of nuclear weapons. Yes, it's scary that you have them and that you resort to threats to use them so easily, but apart from those, you have nothing, and it shows. Most of your nuclear weapons are probably not even in working condition after the corrupt neglect that seems to have been standard procedure at all levels in the Russian army for the past three decades. It would be horrible to see that put to the test, but if even a single Russian nuclear weapon detonated on foreign soil, Russia would not even be a country for much longer.

The only problem here is you, Russia. You invaded Ukraine. Go home, and stay there. You will not be missed.

 

Monster

Despite its oppressive, totalitarian rule and its imperialistic plans for world domination, the Soviet Union was governed by rational people. Misguided, for certain, and evil, but rational. Current Russia, however, is not.

Russia is now the monster we used to be afraid that the Soviet Union could be, but never quite was. Russia is committing horrendous crimes against humanity, and denying it in the face of irrefutable evidence. An entire world is watching in horror while a mindless, ravaging beast is running amok in the middle of Europe, murdering people by the thousands without hesitation or remorse, with no consideration to anything but its own delusional plans for ruling the world by fear and aggression.

We are still in shock, paralyzed by a nagging feeling of disbelief. Surely this can't be happening?

Well, it is. And if we don't act now to kill the monster, it will eat us too. There is no reasoning with it, because it is driven by rage and fueled by hate, leaving all rational thought behind. For the sake of humanity,  the monster must be put down.

Exhaustion

Russia is throwing everything they have into the war with Ukraine. The Russian army is severely decimated, with units only half populated. Personnel is being reassigned from depleted units, and what little reinforcements are being deployed are untrained reserves. Ammunition is spent like it's their last stand, and Russian lives are lost in droves. While Russia can still rely on their advantage in numbers to overwhelm the Ukrainian forces, it is a losing game for them. Putin is unwilling to formally declare war and mobilise his conscript army, and with his contract soldiers now being used as cannon fodder, he is on his last legs in the fight.

Taking Sievjerodonetsk, a city of limited strategic value but symbolic importance to taking all of the Luhansk region, took a ridiculously disproportionate amount of time, effort and resources for Russia, and they are unlikely to make any significant further territorial gains. Ukraine, on the other hand, is ramping up their resistance with new weapons, and are successfully pushing back on every other front. Russia simply lacks the numbers to defend and keep the territory they have occupied, and they are vulnerable.

It will take a lot of suffering yet before he is forced to admit it, but Putin is finished.

Unintended Legacy

Although his ambitions were probably very different, the actions of Vladimir Putin have had repercussions on the world that are actually not that bad.

In the aftermath of his machinations to install an inept buffoon as the president of the United States, the US population seems to have awakened to the fact that democracy needs to be defended against fascists plotting to overthrow the legally elected government, that more people need to vote for their system to be less vulnerable to manipulation, and that their age-old system, designed in the 18th century, just might not be optimal for a modern democracy.

Putin's invasion of Ukraine has made the world come together against Russia. The EU has sent loads of weapons to aid Ukraine, and imposed sanctions on Russia despite the negative effects it will have on many EU countries as well. The UN has made multiple statements against Russia, even though their Security Council is paralyzed by Russia somehow having inherited the veto power that was once granted to the USSR. And, last but not least, NATO has been strengthened a lot by the renewed threat of a common enemy.

All in all, this would count as a huge loss for Putin and a win for democracy and peace. It came at the cost of Russia losing whatever trust it had managed to build internationally since the fall of the Soviet Union, but the Russian people are not blameless in this. They need to be yanked out of their dream of returning to former glory and start electing leaders that can show some humility and play by the same rules as others in the international arena. Yes, they have been lied to, but they swallowed the lies much too eagerly, and continue to do so. Perhaps reality will now finally knock on their door hard enough for them to notice.

 

Bibliophobia

Bibliophobia (n.)

A fear of reading and/or writing, esp. pertaining to "longer" texts (more than one short paragraph).

I just did a Google search for instructions on how to connect one device to another using two wires. The information would have been adequately conveyed by one still image accompanied by a couple of sentences of text. Sadly, no such document turned up in the search.

Instead, I found several competing video "tutorials" on YouTube, each taking several minutes of slow exposition to "show and tell" the process of wiring up the connection as they did it in real time. Some were unable to speak intelligibly, or showed video footage of schematics that were too blurred to be legible. Others spoke a language I did not understand, and some were either doing it wrong, using different hardware than mine, or explaining something else entirely.

What the flying fuck is happening to people? Do they no longer know how to read and write? And do they no longer look for existing documentation before they make their own bad version of it?

Instead of taking one glance at written and illustrated documentation from a reliable source, and then doing the work myself in seconds, I am expected to hope for a random person on YouTube to know how to do it right, spend fifteen minutes watching that person do it slowly, taking notes or screenshots from key moments in the video, and then do it myself? This is a waste of my time and an insult to my intelligence. If this is the way we are heading with the "information society", we are in for a dark age. Functional illiteracy breeds ignorance, stifles creativity and puts a strong damper on dissemination of ideas.

Learn to read. Write things down. Yes, some things are better explained by a video, but please, please, keep in mind that an "old school" document (with schematic illustrations and/or photos) is faster to produce, faster to consume, much less data intensive, indexable and in most respects more accessible than a video.

This goes not only for instructions on how to build things IRL, but for programming and other computer related tasks. Yes, people try to explain programming, or editing a single line in a text file, by posting a blurry video of a screen capture instead of just writing the information down.

The written word is the foundation of our civilization. If we abandon it, our civilization goes out the window with it, and we are in for an era with millions of ignorant me-too vloggers who never rise above the level of beginners but proudly publish nearly identical, badly produced videos to display their ability to copy someone else's work.

Sigh.

Teetotalitarian

Vladimir Putin just openly compared himself to Czar Peter the Great of the old time Russian Empire, as if that was an ideal to strive for. Anyone aspiring to emulate a totalitarian, brutal emperor from centuries ago has no place in modern society. Russia is a sick country that still yearns for a strong man to lead them to glory. The fact that Putin is leading them into isolation, poverty and disrespect seems to be totally lost on them.

The population of Russia has had plenty of chances to come to terms with the modern politics, where countries can't just murder and steal from their neighbors to improve their standing and wealth. Unfortunately for them and for Ukraine, they still fail to play by the rules, and they deserve to be punished for it.

This is no longer a problem with Putin. It is a problem with Russia, and they need to get their heads into the 21st century before their economy is thrown back to the 19th century.

Trade-off

Russian attacks against the small region of Luhansk that remains under Ukrainian control appear to be "successful", in some twisted meaning of that word. What Russia is doing is nothing less than a total demolition of the city of Sievjerodonetsk. Russian invasion forces are now in control of most of the city, but the city has no water or electricity, and ninety percent of the buildings are destroyed. Russia is not getting anything of any value - they are just mowing down the opposition by using insane amounts of artillery before moving in and claiming the city as "liberated".

The focus on Donbass is costing Russia on other fronts. They are losing ground near Cherson, a still functioning city with considerable strategic and economic value. The Russian grasp of the local government and the citizens of Cherson is tenuous and slipping, and Ukraine might actually be able to reclaim the city within the next few weeks.

Trade a major city for a pile of rubble with nothing but symbolic value, at the cost of thousands of casualties. Nice move, President Putin.

Fool's Errand

The invasion of Ukraine is a massive failure for Russia. Ukrainian forces are pushing back in the north and near Odessa, and they are facing weak opposition from Russian forces that choose to retreat from badly fortified positions. In the Donbass region where Russia is trying to mount an offense, their advances are slow at best, nonexistent for the most part, and sometimes counterproductive, forcing them to retreat and surrender territory due to losses and insufficient defence capabilities rather than make further advances.

Ukraine is on their home turf, defending their freedom and pushing back against a hostile invasion. Russia is forcing battle-weary and unmotivated troops to die for various small pieces of land that they don't even have enough resources to hold. Even their scaled-down goal of taking the city of Severodonetsk now seems out of reach for the depleted Russian army, and Ukraine is now seriously considering taking back not only the Donbass region, but Crimea as well. Whether that will happen is more of a political decision than a military one.

Ukraine now has the initiative in the conflict, and they will keep it.

Wunderwaffen

In the final desperate phase of WWII, the Nazis kept boasting about their secret weapons that were being developed. These weapons allegedly had mythical power and were going to turn the tide in the war they were clearly losing.

Of course, the "wonder weapons" were nothing but myths. The rumors were lies, intended to keep the German troops from losing hope in the face of overwhelming opposition.

Now, we hear that Russia is about to employ laser-based superweapons in the war in Ukraine. One is supposed to be able to blind surveillance satellites, and another is supposed to be able to take out drones by burning them. Both are most likely fabrications sprung from wishful thinking, and the choice of lies shows where Russia has most problems: they can't make any move without being spotted by satellites, and their operations are being severely hampered by low cost Ukrainian drones that are a bigger problem that what Russia will admit.

Russia has thrown pretty much everything they had into this conflict, and it wasn't enough. They are desperate.

The Truth Will Out

Last night, former Russian Colonel Mikhail Khodaryonok was seen telling some inconvenient truths on Russian state television. The host looked absolutely horrified, but did not interrupt him, which leads to the conclusion that this was a statement which was sanctioned by the government, rather than a surprise coup from a supposed propagandist gone rogue.

The message was clear, and twofold: Russia is steadily doing worse on the battlefield as time passes, and the rest of the world stands united against a geopolitically isolated Russia. For a statement like this to reach the general public through Russian state television is nothing short of sensational, and it is a marked departure from the hitherto blatant lies of Putin's propaganda machine.

There is undoubtedly more to come on this. The question is whether Putin is still in control and trying to change the narrative for some reason, or if this is the beginning of a move by others to sidestep Putin and try to save at least some of Russia's ass while they still have a chance.

However, it may be too late for that. Even a complete withdrawal and an unconditional surrender at this point will leave Russia responsible for countless war crimes and insane amounts of destruction in Ukraine, and it is going to cost them dearly for a long time ahead.

Largely Ineffective

Recent Russian attempts at advancing further into Eastern Ukraine are reported as being "largely ineffective". The phrase is deceptively undramatic, but it means that Russia has all but lost the war.

An ineffective attack causes losses. Lots of ineffective attacks cause plenty of losses. We should also keep in mind that the forces Russia are using in Ukraine at the moment are their best equipped, best trained, and most experienced troops. Any reinforcements they could send at this point would be nothing but cannon fodder when pitted against the experienced Ukrainian defenders.

Russia is running on empty. They still have people to throw at the front, but those people are badly motivated, exhausted, unskilled, put under incompetent command and suffering greatly from damaged equipment and dwindling supplies. What's left is a slow war of attrition that Russia is going to lose.

When, or if, Putin is going to realise this is anybody's guess, and it's impossible to know how he will react.

Epic Fail

Imagine if Adolf Hitler, after he decided to invade Poland, had lined up most of his standing army on the Polish border and marched in, only to be met with fierce resistance - so fierce that he ended up losing one third of his forces to achieve only a fraction of his strategic goals with the campaign.

This is what Vladimir Putin has done in Ukraine. He has a delusional wet dream of restoring the Soviet empire, but he is going to be remembered as the leader who single-handedly brought Russia shame, ruin and humiliation.

The world stands with Ukraine, and practically nobody stands with Russia. North Korea has voiced its sympathy, which amounts to nothing but words, but China and even Belarus see where this is going and try to avoid aligning with Russia.

Putin's self-defeating "special operation" with invading Ukraine is going down in military history as one of the most stupid campaigns ever.

DDT and US politics

DDT is an insecticide, now outlawed in most parts of the world, that has had an unforeseen and sometimes catastrophic effect on the ecosystem. While DDT is toxic to all animals, its expected concentration in water and plants was deemed never to become high enough to cause concern. However, DDT is both quite metabolically stable and fat-soluble, which means it accumulates in the fatty tissue of animals over their lifetime. As we move up the food chain to higher predators, the concentration of DDT increases to levels where it causes direct harm, like making seals sterile or preventing eagles from laying viable eggs.

This is a devious poisoning indeed, for its causes are hidden below several levels of seemingly healthy animals in the food chain. Only at the top of the pyramid is it a real problem, but there it is fatal.

In US politics, there appears to be a similar effect responsible for a similar disaster. Some people are entering into lower levels of politics for the wrong reasons: fame, fortune, power, compensation, sometimes outright malice. At lower levels, the proportion of these bad apples to the good ones might seem tolerable. Most low level politicians are reasonable people with sound motivations for seeking office.

However, there is an accumulation and amplification effect as we move up the food chain. The bad apples are rewarded and encouraged to seek ever higher offices, while the hard working, honest people tend to stay at the lower ranks and often regard politics as a temporary service rather than a lifetime career.

This means that as we move up the food chain, to state-wide or national politics, the rotten fruit becomes a lot more concentrated. The Republican party seems to attract the most human scum, and promote it more willingly, which leaves us in the current situation: top level Republican politicians are scumbags - with very few exceptions.

To set this straight, we cannot tolerate even a small amount of the bad kind of people at the bottom. They must be rooted out, purged from the system before they can rise in rank and do more damage. The Democratic party seems to have this under control. They are not completely unaffected by the problem, but they seem to function in the same system as the Republicans without suffering from the same strong accumulation of garbage at the top.

The proverbial Republican asshole is a toxic ingredient in the US political system, and it is a threat to its very foundation, on the verge of making it cease to function as intended.

I have no idea how to solve this. The Democrats seem to have it more or less right, but perhaps the Republicans are beyond help and can't learn from the example of others. It is, however, a very real problem that needs to be recognized for what it is: a threat to democracy.

Small Peepee, Big Dreams

Pardon the somewhat juvenile headline, but Putin's goal, his dream of a Russia "restored" to Soviet era glory, is way too big for his military resources. His army organization is thoroughly corrupt and barely works at all, and his huge spending on advanced weapons has resulted only in a small number of tanks, missiles and fighter jets with modern capabilites. He is fighting with equipment that is outdated, badly maintained, built significantly below specification and plagued with teething problems, or even nonexistent.

As an extra bonus, Ukraine released a video today that shows a Russian T-90M, the most modern tank in their arsenal, being blown to pieces in the signature "hats off" fashion (explosive separation of the turret from the body) by an armor piercing projectile from a Swedish "Carl Gustaf" grenade launcher. This is a low cost, hand-held weapon that costs a few thousand Euros. A T-90M is orders of magnitude more expensive, and having it taken out by such a low cost weapon is a huge failure for Russia, much like the sinking of the missile cruiser Moskva.

Russia is clearly not playing with a full deck in this war.

Fascism

Russia is attacking civilian targets in Odessa with cruise missiles. A shopping mall and two hotels can't possibly have any military significance. This is nothing more than random acts of terror.

Ukrainians are being deported by the millions to remote parts of Russia, to camps that are discomfortingly similar to WWII concentration camps.

The official Russian news outlets have been reduced to spreading nothing but propaganda and brain-washing lies. Dissidents and protesters are being labeled as enemies of the state and arrested. Strong and heavy-handed censorship laws are in effect.

Putin is actively and openly seeking to expand the Russian "empire" to include any regions that can be claimed to have Russian heritage, whether from the Soviet era or in distant history.

The Russian leadership is a cult around one person with totalitarian power, and nobody dares tell him when he is very obviously wrong. No lie seems to be too big and too incredible for him to make it his official world view.

A theme of extreme and chauvinistic nationalism is getting ever stronger in the rhetoric from the Kremlin, with Putin now stopping just barely short of claiming that Russians are a "master race" superior to other people. The Russian orthodox church claims to be the "only true Christianity", and its patriarch actively supports the regime and its aggression against Ukraine.

Military parades seem to be a fetish for the Russian president.

Who are the fascists, again?

Beyond Help

Astonishingly, the Russian population in general appears to believe the "Big Lie" that Ukraine is ruled by neo-Nazis and that the invasion was necessary to prevent a NATO-led attack on Russia with Ukraine as the willing pawn. They also believe that the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine was being oppressed, even subject to genocide, and that all the evidence that we are witnessing about massive civilian casualties and war crimes by the Russian forces are either staged and fake, or false flag attacks by Ukraine against their own population in order to put the blame on Russia.

It is hard to believe that millions of people can be so easily and completely deceived. Even if the Russian state-controlled media is forcing this propaganda on Russian citizens, there are alternative sources of information even in Russia. You just need to make an effort to find them, and you need to be open minded enough to consider the possibility that maybe, just maybe, the reason that the picture painted by the Kremlin differs from the reports from everyone else in the rest of the world could be that the Kremlin is lying, rather than the rest of the world.

We get a constant stream of heart-breaking stories of people in Ukraine calling relatives in Russia to inform them of deaths in the family due to the constant and indiscriminate attacks on civilians, only to be met with disbelief. People on the other end of the line choose to believe Vladimir Putin's lies over first hand reports from their own kin.

Now, in 2022, information is available to counter the propaganda, and to make it crystal clear to anyone that cares enough to listen that everything Putin says is a lie. The problem is that they don't want to know. They hide behind the propaganda and choose to remain ignorant of what everyone else in the world watches in horror.

The Russian people is no longer without blame. They are supporting their dictator for life even when he goes berserk, invades a peaceful neighboring country and murders thousands upon thousands of innocent people. Their continued refusal to see through the easily disproven and increasingly preposterous lies shames not only Putin, or Russia as a nation, but every Russian who still won't listen to reason.

Relations

With the reports and images of Jill Biden visiting Olena Zelenskyy in Ukraine, it is apparent that the presidents of Ukraine and the United States have one important human trait in common: they are in a warm and loving relationship with a life partner who is their equal, their best friend, who gives them strength, good advice and a sound perspective on life.

It is equally apparent that the monster in the Kremlin, president Vladimir Putin, lacks a companion of that kind. He is divorced, but he never made any public appearances with his former wife even while they were married. He never even mentioned her. There are strong and credible rumors that he has a mistress, a former elite gymnast, or at least he had one, and that they have children together. Instead of being open with this, he hides her away and uses his power to suppress information about her and their relation, as if it were a state secret. Some pictures from twenty years back seem to show Putin being genuinely smitten by her, even smiling, but it seems that they almost never meet these days.

Putin lives a life devoid of love. He neither gives love, nor gets any. He thrives on people's adulation and fear, but that doesn't work as a replacement. Without love, the soul withers and dies, and Putin is indeed soulless.

He might be incapable of love, because full-fledged psychopaths do not have emotions like other people. Perhaps he once had a sliver of humanity inside him, a faint flicker of what others experience as a hot flame that defines them as human beings, but now it's definitely gone. Putin loves nobody but himself, and he is not loved by anyone. Not really. Not in the way love is supposed to work.

I do not pity him. I pity the world for having to put up with him, and for our inability to deal with truly evil people.

Dealing With the Devil

It is the constant curse of good people that they fail to understand the actions and motivations of evil people. We cannot fathom how a mind works that is completely devoid of morale, empathy and kindness, and is incapable of feeling guilt, remorse -- or love. I can imagine that for a person such as Vladimir Putin, there is nothing but anger and hate inside him, but I can't imagine what that would do to a person. We can safely assume that there is nothing good inside him waiting to reveal itself, but the lack of a good side makes him alien to us. He knows this, and he has learned to exploit it.

The United Nations is a wonderful thought, but like most organizations built by good people, it is open to exploit and abuse by evil people. Russia's permanent position in the Security Council makes them untouchable. The Constitution of the United States did a better job with safeguarding against evildoers, but the pox on the nation that was Trump showed that there are loopholes, many of which are still wide open. Correspondence from Thomas Jefferson in the Federalist Papers discuss the possibility of someone ruthless, corrupt and thoroughly evil being elected to office, but he didn't imagine that an entire party of evildoers would emerge and try to seize power by deception and skullduggery, and by gradually chipping away at fundamental human rights in the name of self-defence against imaginary threats, using blatant lies to fool uneducated people to believe they would be best served by voting for the fascists.

Yes. Fascists. Many Republicans are fascists. The Republican party promotes a largely fascist world view. Putin is a fascist. Many parties on the rise in Europe have either an openly or covertly fascist agenda, using democracy only as a means to rise to power by deception, never to relinquish that power again if they attain it.

The National Socialist party in 1930's Germany rose to power by democratic means - more or less - but rapidly used their majority to impose totalitarian rule and brand political opponents as criminals and traitors. It appears we learned nothing.

But then again, we don't understand evil. Evil, however, has us figured out, and they are walking all over us, mocking us for our gullibility and our failure to stand up to them. We must not allow this to continue. Here, I could say that we must find a way to get into the heads of evil people and find what makes them stop doing their evil deeds, but I am convinced that they will stop at nothing except their own death. Sadly, good people can't really bring themselves to calling for the murder of another human being, not even a thoroughly and unspeakably evil person, because we can't seeem to come to terms with the fact that such people exist.

This is our curse, and it will be our undoing, time and time again, unless we find a way to lift it.

Lost

Reasonable and credible estimates of Russian losses so far in the attack on Ukraine are that more than one fourth of their ground forces are lost either to casualties, wounded soldiers, capture or desertion.

Combined with estimates that around two thirds of the total amount of ground forces in the Russian army were lined up for the attack, the losses are mind-boggling. Putin has wasted almost one fifth of his entire army on taking a tenuous grasp of only a small part of Ukraine -- in regions that were supposedly at least somewhat friendly to Russia when his invasion started. His initial attempt to take Kyiv is now a lost cause.

Tens of thousands of Russian soldiers have been lost. Putin appears lost, as he insists that the operation is going well and keeps sending his troops to die. With that kind of leadership, Russia's war is lost.

Out of everything

The Russian offensive in eastern Ukraine appears to be losing momentum. Their massive losses require reorganization, and decimated units are now merged on the fly to remain capable of combat. This situation is a commander's nightmare, and it is a desperate tactic.

The Russian invaders of Ukraine are out of reserves and out of supplies. They are mostly out of modern weapons and are now reduced to fighting with out of date Soviet era equipment, while Ukraine is getting significant help with more recent weapons systems being sent from abroad. The Russian troops are out of their depth, out of their wits, out of breath, out of options, and out of hope to turn this in their favor. They are running out of gas, both figuratively and literally.

Putin, meanwhile, appears to be not only out of ideas, but literally out of his mind. He is refusing to face reality, and it might not be a facade any longer. If he keeps sending his troops to slaughter against the unrelenting and highly motivated Ukrainian defence, he might soon be out of an army.

It is a horrible thing to say, but if Russia depletes its army on the battlefield to the point where it no longer is a force to be reckoned with, it might be for the best. Russia must be forced to stop its expansive aggression, and if they don't have an army to send, they can't invade their neighbors and meddle in conflicts abroad.

There will come a day when Russia is finally out of Ukraine, and it just might come sooner than we expect.

 

Culture Cancel

It's clear that Putin is determined not only to wipe out Ukraine from the map as a nation, but also to destroy Ukrainian traditions and culture. Ukraine is being painted as a country of Nazis and traitors to their heritage. Russian invaders leave the conquered territory in ruins. The Ukraine civilian population is being murdered and displaced, and occupied territories are being forcibly "russified". However, these actions are more likely to wipe out Russian culture.

Russia is now shunned by most of the world, and their reputation will not recover for a generation. Their lies will soon crumble, and their crimes will be exposed and punished. No other countries will want to take an interest in Russian culture, and there will be a stigma inside Russia for many years to come for taking pride in anything that is uniquely Russian. A generation of people growing up will want to distance themselves from the atrocities that are being committed by the current leadership, and as people shed off the bad things, a lot of the good things will be lost as well.

In his attempt to cancel Ukraine, Putin is actually cancelling Russia.

Scorched Earth

A famous Russian tactic in war is "scorched earth", where the battleground is razed as they move past. This prevents the opponent from using the territory for shelter and resupply, and it is a tactic that proved successful for the Russian army both against Napoleon and Hitler.

Unfortunately for the Russian troops, Putin seems to have it all ass-backwards. The tactic is supposed to be employed during retreat, not when you advance. In the attack in eastern Ukraine, Russian forces are shelling the ground with artillery before their advance, which leaves them nothing but rubble to plant their flag on. This is devastating for them. Even though they are slowly gaining ground, it comes at a great cost, and it is a burden for them to move forward through crumbling ruins on destroyed roads. The Ukrainians, on their side, can retreat while staying in shelter in friendly territory. Of course, bombardment and constant fire causes heavy losses on the Ukrainian side, but the Russian losses are massive, reportedly several times larger, and their progress is slow.

Russia has entered a nightmare of their own making: a war of attrition where they are sending their troops to die by the hundreds or thousands for taking a worthless patch of dirt that used to have a village on it. Their resources were dwindling already, and now they are rapidly running out of cannon fodder. Ukraine has millions of brave people who are prepared to fight to defend their sovereignty, while Russia has less than 50,000 soldiers left, most of whom are exhausted, badly trained and unmotivated. This war might come to an end because Russia runs out of soldiers, and from the look of it, that moment might not be very far off.

Tipping the Scales

"Your governor is stupid."
"Meh."
"He is evil."
"Don't care."
"He is taking bribes, and his donors are shady."
"All politicians are crooked."
"His party is a bunch of racist scum, with no other goal than to stay in power and dismantle American democracy."
"So?"
"His utter ineptness at governing makes his petty fight with Disney cost the state a billion dollars, and the tax payers will foot the bill."
"Wait, he's costing me money? Maybe I should vote for the other guy."

THAT is what is tipping the scales? Seriously?

Insecurity council

Russia's permanent membership of the UN security council, being one of the members with veto power over all decisions, is an affront to everything that the UN is supposed to be. Russia was given the seat that was previously held by the Soviet Union. This was a decision made on unclear grounds, and it needs to be reconsidered.

After Russia has repeatedly used their veto power to block any resolution condemning their invasion of Ukraine, they went completely over the top yesterday, when they sent several cruise missiles to hit Kyiv while the UN Secretary General, Antonio Gutierres, was visiting the city to meet with president Zelenskyy.

Let this sink in for a moment. A member of the UN security council is now not only involved in an aggression against a friendly neighboring country, but they literally dropped bombs that could have killed the Secretary General of the UN. The security council would be well advised to dissolve and have the UN form a new council for the same purpose, but this time without Russia. They have no place among civilised nations, and they have no business deciding anything concerning international security.

"The first item on our agenda is to strongly condemn Russia for its unprovoked aggression against Ukraine. What say you?"

"Russia says no."

"Duly noted. No action. Next item: investigate numerous credible allegations of systematic war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine. What say you?"

"Russia says no."

"Check. Item three, condemn Russia for sending special forces to attempt an overthrow of the democratically elected leadership of Ukraine by assassination of president Zelenskyy in the initial hours of the attack. What..."

"Russia says no."

"Got it. And finally, a joint motion from all but one of our permanent members to expel Russia from their privileged seat on this council, the reason being blatant abuse of their veto power to get away with murder. Wh..."

"Russia says no."

"All right, that concludes today's agenda. Good meeting, everyone."

Absurd. But, sadly, completely true.

(Illegible signature)

The text in the headline refers to a piece of "evidence" collected and flaunted by the FSB in a video today, where they claim to have arrested a group of assassins plotting to murder a Russian news anchor.

The video is very poorly made and contains lots of indications that it's a staged propaganda piece rather than actual footage from the arrest, but to some extent that can be explained by this being a reenactment. I can certainly understand it if they want to provide live action for the news channels even though no camera was present during the actual raid. However, there are things that point to this entire story being fake. In a short video clip, we get to see a hand-written dedication in a book, purportedly a copy of "Mein Kampf", although the title of the book is never shown in the video. 

Phonetically, the Cyrillic text at the bottom, "подпись неразборчива" reads "podpis' nerazborchiva", and it means -- this is hilarious -- "illegible signature" (literally "signature is illegible"). Yes. This actually happened. And it was published by Russian state television, not by some hoax parody site trying to discredit FSB. They did that all by themselves. From the look of it, someone was instructed to fabricate evidence by writing a dedication in a book and sign it with an illegible signature, supposedly by being handed a script that said "(illegible signature)" at the end, but they ended up copying the script exactly as it was written.

Now, this might be "malicious compliance" from some rogue FSB agent to sabotage the story by feigning incompetence, but the level of ineptitude in the Russian government has been running rampant lately, with Putin firing tons of people seemingly at random and purely out of paranoia. In any case, this book dedication is a piece of exquisite unintended comedy in the midst of a horrendous tragedy.

Because Cyrillic handwriting has notably and awkwardly different character shapes from printed Cyrillic text, and Google Translate is useless if you can't even transcribe the letters, the full text of the dedication reads:

Timokha,
Thank you for your unrelenting support in the most difficult times.
Fight (lit. "beat", "hit") to live. Live to fight.
Signature illegible
NS/WP crew Moscow (last part written in English, for some reason)

Below is the original Russian, but transcribed from the cursive Cyrillic writing. I show it in both regular and italic, because the italic lower case characters look more like the cursive writing:

(Edit: I can't get the italic text to safely render in a serif typeface with actual italics using the "mobile" style. Sometimes you get the fake slanted letters of Arial and its ilks, and they don't look any different from the upright versions.)

Тимохе
Спасидо за неоженимуро поддержку в самые тяжелые зоды.
Чбивай, итобы жить.
Жити, итобы чбивать.
Подпись Неразборчива 

Тимохе
Спасидо за неоженимуро поддержку в самые тяжелые зоды.
Чбивай, итобы жить.
Жити, итобы чбивать.
Подпись Неразборчива

Prediction

Here's a guess based on the latest reports: Putin will huff and puff and threaten with a nuclear attack to "stop Ukraine's genocide on Russians", the few countries that are still undecided will turn against him, he will fold and withdraw from Ukraine, spin it as him "taking responsibility to avoid a third world war despite all the Western provocations", hold a bleak celebrational parade on May 9, and then forever disappear from the political scene.

Vladimir Putin is clearly ill. Even the official footage from his latest staged appearances, despite heavy editing, clearly shows him suffering from tics, tremor and tardive dyskinesia. These are not merely signs of stress, but definitely signs of physical neurological disorder, be it due to an advancing case of something like Parkinson's, or a secondary effect of medication against something else.

More than one hundred thousand people died, and Russia lost all hope of becoming a trusted international partner for trade and treaties for a long time ahead, just to prop up the last remnants of a sick and fading man's inflated ego.

Genocide

There is no longer any doubt that what the Russian attackers are doing in Ukraine amounts to genocide. Civilians are "filtered", sorted on weak grounds and classified as friend or foe to the invaders. Being on the side of their own country gets them summarily executed and buried in mass graves. Of those that manage to avoid execution, many are abducted, taken to remote locations in Russia and not heard from again, implying that they are either incarcerated or killed. This is a deliberate attempt at erasing the national identity of Ukraine by means of mass murder -- by definition, genocide.

Russia must not be allowed to gain any territory from this war. They deserve to instead have rather a lot taken away from them. A country that commits such unbelievable acts of terror and war crimes should not be allowed to have an army.

Gulag Revisited

Ukraine official sources now claim that around 500,000 Ukrainian nationals have been forcibly displaced to Russia, among them over 100,000 children. The destination for these abductions are, purportedly, northern Russia and the Sakhalin island, and the detainees are being given papers that prevent them from leaving Russia for the next two years.

This is nothing short of kidnapping, and it might be a lot worse than that. Parallels to Soviet prison labor camps and Chinese reeducation camps are painfully easy to draw.

Even though Ukraine is at war and naturally chooses to present information that is beneficial for receiving help from other countries, there is no obvious reason for them to inflate these numbers, or make up a story like this one. Ukraine is, contrary to Russia, an open society with a free press, and foreign observers are free to roam the country as they please. Thus, any "Big Lies", like the ones being spouted daily by Russia, would soon be exposed and generate a lot of pushback. The alternative, that this is essentially a true story, is almost too ugly to fathom, but it seems very likely.

Russia needs to go. Twice over in the past century they have failed to build a society that has any chance of existing peacefully alongside other countries, and instead chosen a path of totalitarian rule and expansionistic imperialism, asserting dominance over their neighbors through invasion and intimidation. Russia is a threat to peace, to democracy, to decency and honesty, to diversity, tolerance and freedom, and to virtually everything else that is good in the world.

It deserves repeating: Russia needs to go. They have lost their right to govern themselves as an independent country, and need to be put under some kind of supervision from the international community. Until they can demonstrate at least a basic respect of human rights and international law, they are a danger to us all.

Into Darkness

The 64th mechanised brigade of the Russian army was posted in Bucha during the Russian occupation of the region northwest of Kyiv. Soldiers from that unit were directly responsible for murder and rape of civilians. Several hundred bodies have been found in the wake of the withdrawal of the Russian forces, and the world is aghast.

What is Vladimir Putin's response to this? He gives them all a medal and names them "Watchers of the Nation", praising their "courage, vigilance and endurance". This is sickening. Nothing can redeem this monster of a man, and soon the entire country is beyond redemption.

The Face of Lies

To us watching from the outside, it's clear that the performances from official Russian spokespeople are rapidly becoming more terse and strictly scripted, and the people talking often come across as uneasy. The Russian propaganda machine has been lying to people for ages, but the lies seem to be getting too big and too ugly for comfort for the propaganda workers. They did not sign up to hide war crimes against Ukrainian civilians, many of which are Russian-speaking and used to have strong pro-Russian opinions.

Russia is starting to look eerily like North Korea: a country cut off from the international arena, living in its own bubble of badly crafted lies, with a population that is being kept in the dark and punished for even trying to learn the truth, much less spread it to others.

The difference between Russia and North Korea is that the Russian population is generally well educated, and has seen enough of the world around them to know that what is now happening is a throwback to the totalitarian rule of the Soviet era. When asked, not everyone in Russia is opposed to returning to the Soviet days, but they will soon find out that their rosy view of that dark time in history is a false one, a product of selective memory and propaganda.

It is far from over yet, but Vladimir Putin is finished.

Moscow Obliterated

Yes, clickbait headline, sorry. The city of Moscow has not been attacked. However, the missile cruiser "Moskva", or "MOCKBA" in Cyrillic, named after the Russian capital as it is actually called in Russian, has been sunk. "Moskva" was the capital ship of the Russian navy in the Black Sea region, and its loss is a major setback for Russia. This is also a major symbolic achievement for Ukraine in their retaliations against Russia's unprovoked attack and invasion that started on February 24.

The official Russian propaganda machine is not denying that "Moskva" has sunk, but they are hilariously not admitting that the cause is a missile attack. Instead, they are claiming a "fire that caused an ammunition explosion" and that "the cause of the fire is being investigated". Well, duh. A good lead for those investigations would be to consider the Ukrainian naval target missile of the Neptune type that struck the ship right as the fire started.

The lies from the Russian propaganda machine are not even making them look good. If a capital ship was sunk by a fire that broke out by accident and caused a major detonation in ammunition storage, it would be a sign of gross incompetence from Russia. They were clearly scrambling for an approach that would avoid admitting success for an attack by Ukraine, and in that process they decided to figuratively admit to shooting themselves in the foot.

The "Moskva" was a Soviet era vessel, but it had been recently modernised and returned to active service only last year. It served as the command center for Russia's Black Sea navy, and its anti-aircraft and anti-missile weaponry was providing air defense for the rest of their naval forces. The fact that it failed to defend itself against a small scale air attack from a few missiles is remarkable, not to say astounding, and paints a clear picture of Russia continuing to underestimate the capabilites and the resolve to fight of the Ukrainian army, be it out of arrogance, ineptitude or bad management, and take a bad beating for it.

The war in Ukraine is horrible, and the aggressor is very far from defeated, but I can't help but smile right now.

Re: Problems

Russian armed forces are trying to REorganise, REbuild and REdeploy in eastern Ukraine. However, REports tell a story of an army in complete disarray, with problems in three essential areas: REcruitment, REplenishing and REtention. Nobody wants to join the army to fight Putin's insane war. There are no REplacements or REpairs available for lost or damaged equipment. REsupply chains are strained, insufficient, even depleted. REserves for troops are nonexistent. Professional soldiers who REalise what they are ordered to do tend their REsignations and wish to REturn home. REcruits who are forced to fight in Ukraine show REmorse and REact with REpulsion when REality hits them: they are REpeating history in a very ugly manner, working for the side that is REviled globally.

On top of this, Ukraine is now REsponding with REtaliations of REnewed intensity.

This war is REally not going well for Putin, and there will be a REckoning.

(Yes, I'm sick of all this. What is there to say? Bad is bad, good is good. Go good. Boo bad.)

And then what?

Russia has been forced to a radical change of plans in Ukraine. Now that they failed to take Kiev and overthrow the legally elected government, their battered forces are being reorganised and redeployed to the eastern part of Ukraine, in an attempt to take the Donbass region, which was partly occupied by Russian separatists after Russia's "annexion" (theft) of Crimea in 2014.

However, even in that supposedly Russian-friendly part of the country, the Ukrainian army and the Ukrainian population are putting up a fight. It's not a given that Putin will succeed in reaching even this smaller goal.

Just as a thought experiment, let's assume that Russia is successful and manages to take Donbass, and possibly a small land strip along the coast to get their supposedly much coveted land bridge to Crimea. Then what?

Russian forces have committed horrendous war crimes in all the regions they have "liberated", and Putin's goal is very openly to erase any remnants of Ukrainian culture wherever he plants his flag. As a result, his forces ravage the land wherever they go, burning and demolishing entire cities, murdering civilians, plundering and raping, and the result is obvious: Russia is now a deeply hated country that will never be forgiven for the cruelties committed in the territory of a friendly, democratic neighboring country.

What is Putin's plan for the future? From the look of it, it's possible that he has no plan. Rumors are circulating that he is terminally ill and just wants to have a victory parade on the anniversary of the end of World War II before he dies. These are just rumors, but it would explain a lot.

An entire country is burning because of the delusions of one sick, old man. Putin has stopped trying to look respectable to the rest of the world, and he will now be remembered as a blood-thirsty dictator.

When this war is over, the international community needs to take away Russia's right to have an army, and make them pay for the rebuilding of Ukraine. Putin is no better than Hitler, and he has taken his country with him into the abyss. Russia is not going to be treated as a normal country for a very long time to come.

What Goes Around

It is ironic that a large portion of the weapons that are now being sent to help Ukraine defend itself are old Soviet era equipment that was left in the various satellite states when the Soviet Union collapsed. Czechia has already sent some T-72 tanks, and Poland has announced that they have hundreds of those that are in good condition but not in active service.

These are old weapons, but they are of the same type that the Ukrainian army already has, meaning that they can be deployed very quickly. Russian troops have access to more modern tanks, but many were lost in their failed battle to take Kyiv. The reserves are older systems, mainly variants of the T-72. Some of those are in fact older than the ones that are now sent to Ukraine, because at the fall of the Soviet Union, their most modern tanks were deployed in countries close to the Iron Curtain rather than in Russia proper.

Thus, the Soviet aggression in placing armed forces in forward positions in countries that used to be under their control now comes back to bite Vladimir Putin when he tries to return to the old times of Soviet domination over Eastern Europe. Time has passed Russia by, and there is no longer any way back.

Thankfully.

Vladimir Potemkin

Grigory Potemkin, lover of late 18th century Russian Empress Ekaterina II ("Katarina" in normalised euro-spell, and "Catherine" in anglo-speak) has a place in history for his action to hide the misery in rural Russia from the Empress on a journey to Crimea, by erecting empty façades of a seemingly prosperous village along her path, disassembling it and then erecting it again at another location further along their route. The act of painting a false and pretty picture to hide some ugly fact, or to create a false impression of something that doesn't exist, is now referred to as "erecting a Potemkin village" or "painting a Potemkin façade".

We see this tactic being used by Vladimir Putin in at least three ways right now. First, he pretends his army is strong and well equipped, and that his murderous "special operation" in Ukraine is going entirely according to plan. Obviously, none of this is true.

Second, he is claiming that the Russian economy is standing strong on its own, unfazed by the sanctions from practically every other country except China. This is clearly false. In actuality, the Russian economy is bleeding out, and the country is precariously close to defaulting on its foreign debt.

Third, and most shamefully, the Russian leadership is telling easily disproven bald-faced lies about their actions in Ukraine, claiming that they are not attacking civilian targets, that life proceeds as normal in the territories they have "liberated", and that Ukraine is faking the massive evidence of atrocious war crimes committed by Russian troops, or even that Russia is being blamed for acts of terror that Ukraine is somehow supposed to have committed against their own population.

Not even Potemkin himself tried to take his stunt this far, and we can safely assume that he did a better job with fabricating his lies. Why? Because doing worse would be impossible.

The propaganda coming from the Kremlin is demonstrably and obviously false, a complete fabrication, seemingly put together without even the slightest effort at making it believable. Vladimir Putin is desperate as his Potemkin village is now being viewed close up by the entire world. It wasn't well enough made to fool anyone even from far away, and the façades are largely not even there -- he just says they are, and expects people to take his word for it rather than believe their own eyes.

If it weren't so utterly horrible, it would be laughable. In any case, it's pathetic.

Outspent Again

The Soviet Union lost the Cold War and collapsed from within largely because they could not afford to keep up with the huge military spendings of USA and the collective Western forces.

In Ukraine, we are seeing the same pattern. Russia stands more or less alone, while most of the world stands with Ukraine. The Russian army was in a sorry state of neglect, corruption and disrepair before the attack on Ukraine, and over the course of a drawn-out conflict, something that Russia clearly did not expect, we have seen a gradual depletion of modern weapons like cruise missiles and smart bombs, causing an increased reliance on older, less effective weapons such as rocket artillery. On top of that, the Ukrainian resistance has caused substantial losses not only to Russian troops, but also to Russian equipment. Hundreds of Russian tanks have been destroyed, captured or abandoned by their crew after they simply broke down.

While Russia now has to resort to deep dives into their stockpiles of old and outdated equipment, some of which is not even in serviceable condition, Ukraine receives a substantial supply of modern weaponry from their allies in the EU and US. As the horrendous war crimes committed by Russia come into light, the support for Ukraine is increasing, and what few friends Russia had at the start of their failing campaign are withdrawing their support, even coming out against them.

Russia is now deploying desillusioned and weary troops using what basically constitutes Cold War era equipment against a modern, well equipped and highly motivated Ukrainian army. The war will not be an easy win for Ukraine, and it will be ugly, but Russia is losing.

Human Kind, and Others

A common observation among authors, philosophers, psychologists and thinking people in general is that human beings are a mix of good and bad. This is true in terms of proportions of the population, but also on the individual level: almost every person has in them the inherent ability to do good, but also to do bad. With a silly pun, "human kind" is a collection of people who are generally human, and kind, with the inhuman acts and evil deeds being the exception rather that the rule, usually by a comfortably and reassuringly wide margin.

Circumstances and upbringing contribute greatly to what actions each individual chooses to perform, and people who commit evil deeds might under different conditions have been productive and peaceful members of society. Likewise, kind and compassionate people might under very different circumstances have become callous and taken to inflict pain and suffering on others. Our constant struggle with this duality has been the subject of most religions and life philosophies. Both as a species and as individuals, we are not likely to altogether shake off our bad traits any time soon. In fact, it can be argued that the struggle between good and bad, between human and inhuman, between kind and cruel, is something that fundentally defines us and cannot be taken away.

However, there are limits to what we can tolerate. Some people commit acts so atrocious, so alien to the rest of us, that we must denounce them as thoroughly and irredeemably evil. There is no good side to these people that could possibly make up for their unspeakable crimes. It takes only one of these people to destroy the life of countless others, and therefore we must not allow them to even be in the minority. They must be stopped and taken out of the large and complicated equation that is human society. Their continued existence among us does nothing but harm, and they are never going to change in a manner that can make up for their catastrophic failures to behave as humans.

I am not speaking only of dictators like Vladimir Putin, who are directly responsible for the death of thousands and the suffering of millions. Seeing the ugly aftermath of the Russian troops withdrawing from "liberated" parts of northern Ukraine, I am also speaking of men who are so thoroughly confused that they assert sexual dominance under threat of death to their victims, or even murder them after they have forced themselves on them. Men who rape, and especially men who rape systematically under the pretense of fighting a righteous war against imaginary threats, do not deserve to be part of the human race. So-called soldiers who rape children have forfeited their right to live. Men who take and even actively seek such opportunities, who can somehow maintain an erection under such sick circumstances, and in some unspeakably perverted manner enjoy the act, have nothing inside them that is of any use to others. They deserve death, plain and simple. I do not call for their suffering, or seek retribution in any other way than that we just rid ourselves of them. While it can be argued that we should treat them humanely, because that is who we are, I beg to differ. There is a limit, and crossing the line to commit such unspeakably evil acts as rape against other humans, even against children, means that there is something fundamentally wrong deep inside the perpetrator. There is nothing that could redeem a person who crossed that line. They are no longer human, and there is no way to make them right again. They might not have been beyond saving before they chose to give in to their dark side, but once they consciously turned away from the light, they forfeited their right to be judged as humans. They are animals, beasts, monsters, the stuff of our worst nighmares, and they simply have no place among us -- among the overwhelmingly human, kind, human kind.

I am literally prepared to die for other people's right to exist, but rapists of children are not people.

No Way Back

The lies from Kremlin spokespeople are now preposterously obvious. When Russian forces withdraw from occupied territory, horrendous war crimes are being revealed. Russian soldiers have committed murder, rape and kidnapping, they have pillaged and destroyed the villages and towns they were supposed to "liberate", and the shocking images that we see, with corpses of civilians littering the streets of ruined cities, hundreds of innocent non-combatants in shallow mass graves, and the nightmare stories from survivors, are impossible to forget.

Russia is no longer a nation worthy of any respect. Russia is no longer a nation that deserves a place in the international community. They can no longer be trusted with a military. The world will remember, and there is no way for Russia to save face. A government that sanctions war crimes of this magnitude, and tries to pretend they never happened even in the face of indisputable evidence, is thoroughly and irredeemably evil, and needs not only be removed from power, but prevented from having any kind of further interaction with humanity. A lot of change and a lot of time will be required before Russia can once again be treated as equals in the international arena.

Russia is now sullied, shamed, outcast, a nation I will henceforth despise and mistrust for its inability to rein in a madman with delusions of restoring a former glory of the Soviet era which is nothing but a mirage, a falsehood based on revisionist views that have no connection to reality. The blame rests not only with Vladimir Putin, but with his entire chain of command, and to a considerable extent with a large part of the Russian people, who have been wilfully deluded into believing his lies.

We will not forget.

Animals

There are far too many first hand eyewitness reports to ignore them: the situation for the Russian troops on the ground in Ukraine is absolutely horrific. Many are young, only 18 or 19 years old, which definitely debunks Putin's claim that he is not using conscripts for his murderous "special operation". These soldiers are stranded in enemy territory with insufficient equipment, no access to medical evacuation, not enough ammunition, even without food. Reports from Ukrainean combatants tell stories of soldiers without body armor who lack even the most basic combat training, who stand around in the open even when fired upon and offer no meaningful resistance when Ukraine pushes back on the invasion. Defections are rampant, morale is nonexistent, and the Russian troops are freezing and starving.

They are treated worse than animals, because animals are usually regarded as a resource and not something expendable and unimportant. Putin is the animal here, treating his soldiers like dirt. President Zelenskyy said it in his recent interview with Russian journalists: this is how Putin treats his own people. Imagine, then, how little he cares about Ukraineans, and how he is likely to treat them if he gets his way and is allowed to keep any of the territory he has grabbed and is now barely holding on to.

We should have learned the lesson from Neville Chamberlain's leniency with Hitler: when a dictator invades a friendly neighboring country under the pretense of trying to "liberate" a minority of supposedly mistreated people of "his" nationality, we must not give him anything, because he will never stop.

A Tale of Two Vladimirs

There are currently two Vladimirs front and center on the international political stage.

One is Vladimir Putin, dictator of Russia: a greedy, power hungry, lying, murderous psychopath who appears to have no sense of humor, and stops at absolutely nothing in his struggle to get what he wants.

Another is Volodymyr Zelenskyy, choosing to spell his name with the Ukrainean transcription even though his native language is Russian. He is the democratically elected president of Ukraine, he is brave, upstanding, empathic, kind and honest, and he very clearly has a sense of humor, even though it's hard to show it in the current circumstances.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy is worthy of admiration for his handling of a crisis. Vladimir Putin deserves nothing but scorn for his act of creating the crisis, for being directly responsible for the death of thousands and the displacement of millions, for his continuing acts of cruelty against the people of Ukraine and, in his desperate attempts to defend his preposterous lies against scrutiny, his escalating oppression of own population.

One of these Vladimirs has had firm support in recent years from the Republican party and their representatives, and continues to be given a free pass by them no matter what he does.

Now, which Vladimir is it that these Republicans are supporting? Hint: it's not the nice one.

Kick Ass

It may be inappropriate to say it in these exact words, given that the cost to Ukraine is huge in terms of material losses, human suffering and death, but there is no better phrase for it: The resistance in Ukraine is kicking Russia's ass. We are watching it with mixed feelings, wishing none of this were happening while cheering for the Ukrainean courage and persistence. Russia's losses are staggering, their advance has stalled on all fronts, and they do not appear to have any replenishments available, neither in terms of weapons, ammunition or personnel.

Morale is low and sinking on the Russian side, but high and rising on the Ukrainean side. Despite Russia's dominance in theory over the smaller Ukrainean army, practice seems to tell a very different story.

This is not a cause for celebration, but it is a cause for optimism about the outcome of this ugly, dishonest, deranged, unnecessary and criminal attack by Russia on its friendly neighbor Ukraine.

Ratings

Amidst all the tragedy with Ukraine, it feels petty to report on credit ratings for Russia, but any bad news for the aggressor is a light in the darkness. Their national credit rating from the strangely named institute "Standard and Poor's", S&P for short, was just reduced from CCC- to CC. The scale is rather weird with ten steps from best to worst: AAA, AA, A, BBB, BB, B, CCC, CC, C and D. D means "bankrupt, dysfunctional economy, expect no return on investments", basically a gravestone, while C means "bankruptcy virtually certain", a mark of death and a rating nobody is expected to be able to improve. Russia is now just one step above that, and foreign investors are jumping ship as fast as they can - with the notable exception that Chinese companies have been "encouraged" by the Chinese government to increase their presence in Russia, to "take opportunity of the many business opportunities that are now opening up". It remains to be seen whether the Chinese government means to help Russia, or aims to exploit their weakness in the wake of the sanctions and the huge cost of the failed war. In either case, China can't prop up the failing Russian economy all by itself, and Russia has some very rough times ahead.

A country who recently had illusions of getting back into the illustrious group of the world's largest economies called G8 (now G7 with Russia out) is on the verge of bankruptcy, all because of one man's greed and lust for power. If the situation in Ukraine wasn't so horrific because of Russia's invasion, I would call for a celebration. Now, let's just try to find some small comfort in the fact that war crimes don't seem to pay.

Numbers

The numbers are starting to leak out. Putin's aggression against Ukraine is of course devastating to the country being invaded and its population, but the Russian forces are being slaughtered in the process. The Ukrainean army has more people, better support, and above all better motivation. Ill prepared Russian soldiers who are increasingly starting to question the utility in dying for a lost cause are up against well trained and well equipped locals with a relentless determination to defend their homeland.

The Russians have been stopped, they are cut off from their supply lines, and they may soon find themselves not only outnumbered, but surrounded. Russia appears to be losing. Who would have thought that? Definitely not Vladimir Putin.

A Grave Mistake

Russia is losing the war they started in Ukraine. Russian forces are holding less territory than a few days ago, and they are fighting on empty stomachs and with nothing to gain, with failing support and dwindling reserves, while suffering catastrophic losses. A fight that was planned to be over in a few days is now running into its fourth week without any end in sight.

Putin has made a grave mistake, and he must know it. His attempts at saving face even in front of his own people are failing, even though he tries to make his own propaganda the only source of information. If Russians are ever going to be allowed more or less open access to the Internet again, his lies will be exposed even to his most fervent supporters. He has no way out of this except through what for him is an unthinkable and intolerable humiliation: to admit defeat and stand down. However, a malignant narcissisist is mentally unable to do that, no matter what the alternative might be. It's hard to see an end to this war unless Putin is somehow taken out of the equation by force.

Hoping for that to happen might be futile, but it's really the only hope I can find right now.

Consolidation

Against the background of the tightening totalitarian situation in Russia, there is a dsicussion about how Putin has "consolidated his position of absolute power" in the past 20 years and is therefore untouchable. To a certain degree, that is certainly true. Nobody in Putin's inner circle is likely to turn against him.

However, the people who are left in the upper levels of Russian leadership are either people who are in it for their own gain, or yes-men who actually believe the official Russian propaganda. Neither of those two kinds of people are useful when you want to run a country.

Unless, of course, you want to run the country into the ground. Then both those kinds of people are extremely efficient as leaders.

When this is over, and it looks as if that is going to happen sooner rather than later, Russia is not likely to return as a player in the international arena. Not politically, not economically, not socially, not in sports, not in any relevant manner whatsoever. Russia stands alone, and those who fall alone fall hard.

Hunger

We are getting credible reports about China sending food to Russian troops. Food. Analysts talk about this as a way of "providing aid to the military without providing military aid", but what we should focus on is the sad fact that such aid is even needed. Putin's miscalculations and his lack of connection to reality has now gone so far that his regime is unable to provide even the most basic support for the army he sent into Ukraine, and it should be rather obvious that the Russian soldiers are not welcomed as liberators if they can't even find food.

Successful military leaders know that an army needs to be fed to march and to fight. A starving army is a losing army. Putin's hunger for power means little to his soldiers, and even less when real hunger sets in. The news that Putin needs help from China to feed his own troops in a campaign of his own planning and execution is a sign of weakness, a sign of incompetence, a sign of disrespect for his troops and disregard for the fundamental requirements of warfare.

Asking China for help with weapons and settling for help with food is also a sign of desperation. Putin is out of friends, out of options, and out of time. Judgment may be imminent, and it will be harsh.