No update today.
Links and Stuff
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Add to the above list if you can, thank you.
Resources For Understanding The War Beyond The Bulletins
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map, who is an independent youtuber with a mostly neutral viewpoint.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have good analysis (though also a couple bad takes here and there)
Understanding War and the Saker: neo-conservative sources but their reporting of the war (so far) seems to line up with reality better than most liberal sources.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict and, unlike most western analysts, has some degree of understanding on how war works. He is a reactionary, however.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent journalist reporting in the Ukrainian warzones.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Telegram Channels
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
Pro-Russian
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ Gleb Bazov, banned from Twitter, referenced pretty heavily in what remains of pro-Russian Twitter.
https://t.me/asbmil ~ ASB Military News, banned from Twitter.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday Patrick Lancaster - crowd-funded U.S journalist, mostly pro-Russian, works on the ground near warzones to report news and talk to locals.
https://t.me/riafan_everywhere ~ Think it's a government news org or Federal News Agency? Russian language.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ Front news coverage. Russian langauge.
https://t.me/rybar ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine
With the entire western media sphere being overwhelming pro-Ukraine already, you shouldn't really need more, but:
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Yesterday's discussion post.
They've sent a significant amount of their stockpile of Javelins and Stingers, which, as you say, isn't very new stuff, but they are usually reliably good if the people using them have been properly trained and they're fully charged and such. And they're clearly important enough that the US feels the need to build more of them to replenish them, though they say that it'll take over a year to build them back up due to the relative lack of US industry.
Right now, as I say, I don't think it's a significant factor as to whether they invade Iran - but I could imagine a situation where the US tries to even half-way meet Ukraine's needs of like 1000 howitzers and MLRS systems and so on, and maybe even eventually planes and higher-grade stuff, and Russia decides it really will annex all of Ukraine and we're here a year from now and that operation is still underway and America is still sending arms, then I think you could see the US's stockpiles being depleted enough that a plan to invade Iran in early 2024 to boost Biden's ratings could actually become infeasible. That, combined with the shortages of microchips and the metals needed to build weaponry.
The main determining factors for me is a) to what extent the US actually wants to make this Russia's Afghanistan vs if they're just about ready to throw in the towel right now, and b) how far Russia truly intends to go. Only the Donbass? Odessa and Mykolaiv? Central Ukraine? All of Ukraine? Another, non-NATO country that gets wrapped up somehow (e.g. supporting Tranistria?) If Russia says "Fuck it, we're taking all of Ukraine" and then America decides that invading Iran isn't really an option for whatever reason (including if they get a nuke) and so decide to go all-in on defending Ukraine, then I think that Ukraine could become a junkyard for American weaponry, vehicles, and perhaps planes. If the war is over in a month then it won't matter either way, as @BynarsAreOk says in the other comment in this thread. Right now, it looks like the US is edging towards desiring a peaceful solution in the near-to-medium term, but if Kiev and Zelensky are actually under threat, does Biden go "Okay, we're doing it, we're sending you a bunch of planes"?