December 26th's update is here on the site and here in the comments.
December 27th's update is here on the site and here in the comments.
December 28th's update is here on the site and here in the comments.
December 30th's update is here on the site and here in the comments.
Going out with friends today and tomorrow! Next week and onwards things should return to normal and we can continue drudging through in the second year of this war.
Links and Stuff
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
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. I recommend their map more than the channel at this point, as an increasing subscriber count has greatly diminished their quality.
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. Beware of chuddery.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are fairly brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. The Duran, of which he co-hosts, is where the chuddery really begins to spill out.
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 ~ Now rebranded as Battlefield Insights, they do infrequent posts on the conflict.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
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 ~ One of the really big pro-Russian (except when they're being pessismistic, which is often) telegram channels focussing on the war. 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. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine
Any Western media outlet that is even vaguely liberal (and quite a few conservative ones too).
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.
Last week's discussion post.
Did… did they not really realize embargoing Russian energy was a serious challenge?
Or did they expect this to blow over quickly until the Nordstream was blown up?
Why are they so fucking cocky???
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The Italy GDP thing is just so, so funny to me. They forgot about material reality because Russia doesn’t do as many funny number tricks with financial capitalism to make the number go up.
:barx:
:porky-happy: "Hmmmmm, yes, I am very smart and capable. The market has rewarded me with a cushy banking job where I sell my services and products to people who super dooper need them. These are real things, and definitely not just relationships of ownership/rent seeking behavior! If it wasn't valuable, why would people pay for it? Yes, I truly am the center of economic production in the modern era.
:porky-scared-flipped: "WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY DON'T NEED MY BANKING SERVICES? B-B-BUT HOW ARE THEY SUPPOSED TO MAKE THEIR FACTORIES WORK OR EXTRACT RESOURCES FROM THE EARTH WITHOUT PERMISSION FROM OUR SHAREHOLDERS AND MY FRCTIONALIZED DERIVATIVE FINANCIAL PRODUCTS THAT CRASH THE ECONOMY ONCE A DECADE? HOW DO THEY KEEP BUILDING SO MANY FUCKING MISSILES? MY WAR SUPPLIERS CHARGE 10x THAT RATE!?!"
Exactly. Who tf cares that Italy makes more sports cars or trades stupid digital pieces of paper around in a financial center somewhere? Russia supplies raw goddamn resources. The very same resources that are the fundamental building blocks of most modern material goods. These people are genuinely brain-damaged.
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TFW you forget you are the most wealthy due to exploitation and not inherent superiority :brainworms:
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It is a challenge but they always had options. The problem is every step of the way they choose to escalate and dismiss the reality that things are not going according to plan. They had multiple opportunities to work some energy deal with Russia while still keeping the war going, Russia literaly wouldn't care. Look at the stupid gas turbine that was stuck in Canada for months.
It was one thing to misrepresent Russia as just some third world gas station, as bad as it is this is no WW3 and neoliberalism could just go on without problems. But they keep making stupid decisions like the Russian price cap.
I think you can also look at the Merkel fiasco as an indication of how the west was always in emperor's new clothes mode. The fact that moron is so highly regarded and yet couldn't help herself but say the quiet part out loud. The liberal reaction to it is pretty much proof of what we've been saying here. Most of western leaders and a large part of the liberal population realy buy into their own bullshit, they are no better than right wingers when it comes to their own propensity for dismissing reality for their own narratives.
The second world died in the 90s. The third world was smothered in its cradle even before that. Do we really need to keep using this language? Today the way these terms are used is drained of all the pride and optimism once expressed by the builders of the second and third worlds. I'm not trying to pick a fight, it's just that every time I hear the concept of numbered worlds invoked I get triggered a little bit.
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War Of The Worlds Begins In Your Neighborhood “Because — German Chancellor Merkel Has Just Declared — Russia Was Never Pacified”
Her stupid admission was a big deal 2 weeks ago.