Image is of the drying Canelon Grande Reservoir in Uruguay as the country battles three consecutive years of drought, its worst in nearly a century.

Quoting every country and region that is currently suffering under unprecedented climatic conditions and posting every graph showing extremely concerning things happening would make this preamble way too long, so I'm gonna keep it short and merely say that, holy shit, the consequences of fossil fuel executives' actions are looking real fucking bad.

Hundreds of millions of people, if not billions, are currently enduring higher than average temperatures sometimes reaching up 48 degrees Celsius or 120 degrees Fahrenheit or even beyond. Drought is putting pressure on water supplies basically everywhere around the world. And El Nino is activating, which will only do further damage.

Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Here is the archive of important pieces of analysis from throughout the war that we've collected.

This week's first update is here in the comments.

This week's second and third update have done the Dragonball Z fusion dance and created this long-ass thing that took me... a while to get done.

Links and Stuff

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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 decent analysis. Avoid the comment section.

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 relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.

On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent journalist reporting in the warzone.

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 ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist (but still quite reactionary in terms of gender and sexuality and race, so beware). If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.

https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.

https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.

https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ Another big Russian commentator.

https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia's army.

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

Almost every Western media outlet.

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.

  • Teekeeus [comrade/them]
    ·
    1 year ago

    US Pressuring Ukraine to Push Harder in Counteroffensive

    The Washington Post reported Tuesday that US officials believe Ukraine should be launching large-scale assaults against Russia’s defensive lines despite the risk of major losses and are blaming Ukraine’s tactics for the struggling counteroffensive.

    The report said that the pace of Ukraine’s counteroffensive “has generated concerns in the West that the government of President Volodymyr Zelensky may not deliver as powerful a blow as it could.”

    The main complaint from the US and other Western countries is that Ukraine is not using “combined arms” tactics, which integrate infantry, armored vehicles, and artillery. Instead, Ukraine is relying on artillery and sending small teams of engineers to clear minefields, which Ukrainian officials say they are doing to prevent unnecessary losses.

    The New York Times also reported that the US was frustrated by Ukraine’s caution. The report reads: “Senior US officials in recent weeks had privately expressed frustration that some Ukrainian commanders, exasperated at the slow pace of the initial assault and fearing increased casualties among their ranks, had reverted to old habits — decades of Soviet-style training in artillery barrages — rather than sticking with the Western tactics and pressing harder to breach the Russian defenses.”

    Ukrainian troops received combined arms training in NATO countries ahead of the counteroffensive, and the Biden administration wants them to use it. But Ukrainian forces did launch large armored assaults in the first weeks of the counteroffensive, which resulted in heavy losses. According to Times, 20% of all of Ukraine’s weaponry deployed to the battlefield was damaged or destroyed during the first two weeks of the counteroffensive.

    Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, the commander-in-chief of Ukraine’s armed forces, has hit back at Western criticism of the counteroffensive, saying NATO would never launch such an assault without air superiority. He’s been demanding that the US and NATO provide US-made F-16 fighter jets, which aren’t expected to arrive until next year.

    According to the Post, US officials are privately saying that Western jets won’t make much of a difference due to Russia’s exstensive air defenses. John Kirchhofer, the chief of staff for the US Defense Intelligence Agency, offered a bleak assessment of Ukraine’s prospects at a conference last week, saying that no weapon will be the “holy grail” to help Ukraine “break through.”

    Despite the situation on the ground for Ukrainian soldiers, the Biden administration is still pushing for more fighting and shows no interest in a ceasefire or diplomacy. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley insisted on Tuesday that the counteroffensive is not a failure.

    “It is far from a failure, in my view. I think that it’s way too early to make that kind of call. I think there’s a lot of fighting left to go,” Milley said. “And I’ll stay with what we’ve said before, this is going to be long, it’s going to be hard, it’s going to be bloody.”

    • Tervell [he/him]
      ·
      1 year ago

      Ukrainian commanders ... had reverted to old habits — decades of Soviet-style training in artillery barrages — rather than sticking with the Western tactics

      I love how the implication here is that they're sticking with Soviet tactics because of "habit", as if the Slavic brainpan in just too dumb to grasp the 5D chess of NATO, rather than, you know, Soviet tactics being superior.

      The bit about "not using combined arms tactics" also adds to this - there was similar cope about the Turkish military losing a bunch of Leopards in Syria, "well they just weren't using the right tactics!". Every time Westerners are met with some evidence that their shit just isn't as good as they think it is, their retort is that it just wasn't used correctly.

      Well, have you ever considered that maybe, just maybe, your stuff being used "wrong" over and over again might indicate something about the "right" way? That maybe, fancy combined arms operations are actually really fucking difficult, and assuming that your military is just going to manage to successfully pull them off because your training is totally so much better is, in fact, delusional? That maybe the Soviet style of fighting is informed by their actual experience of fighting in some of the largest and bloodiest mechanized actions ever, and thus knowing the difficulty in executing such plans, in coordinating hundreds of thousands of troops, in managing all the infantry and tanks and air assets and ammunition and the huge amounts of fuel needed to keep all that equipment going?

      Nah, it must just be that all those other militaries are too dumb to execute our genius plans! Unlike us, who've never made any massive military blunders. It's like... did you learn nothing from this little obscure event called World War fucking Two? Are the Russians the only ones who even remember that happening? There's memory-holing, and then there's this shit.

      • Redcat [he/him]
        ·
        1 year ago

        there was similar cope about the Turkish military losing a bunch of Leopards in Syria, "well they just weren't using the right tactics!"

        I mean, in that case they really weren't. From what I understand, a lot of those early losses really were down to unsupported armor. Which was inexcusable given the urban environment. Russia and Ukraine are using carriers and armor across steppe fields and forest lines, to move at all is to recognize that there will be losses.

    • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]M
      ·
      1 year ago

      The main complaint from the US and other Western countries is that Ukraine is not using “combined arms” tactics, which integrate infantry, armored vehicles, and artillery. Instead, Ukraine is relying on artillery and sending small teams of engineers to clear minefields, which Ukrainian officials say they are doing to prevent unnecessary losses.

      My brother in christ, the West isn't providing them the equipment nor training for combined arms tactics. You're asking Ukraine to run a marathon with a broken leg. The NATO battalions were completely fucking mauled and died horrifically in minefields while being shot at by Russian helicopters who only temporarily stopped, not because they were shot down or pressured in any way, but to refuel and re-arm to begin round #14 of that night's slaughter. The Soviet-style ones are the ones surviving long enough to put any pressure on the Russians.

      • daisy
        ·
        1 year ago

        We live in a world where American military strategists treat Futurama as a how-to manual. God help us all.

    • PosadistInevitablity [he/him]
      ·
      1 year ago

      This actually is great news.

      If the West is blaming Ukraine, it signals they want this conflict to end. Obviously there will be a struggle behind closed doors, but it’s an encouraging sign this won’t escalate much further.

      • SoyViking [he/him]
        ·
        1 year ago

        I really hope you're right, way too many lives have been lost. However, one could fear that this is not as much a face-saving way of distancing themselves from the Kiev regime as it is a symptom of western delusions of invincibility that will lead them to micromanage Ukraine even more detailed (those Soviet Slavs have no idea what they're doing, let's put real aryans in command), leading to more destruction and more death.

        • FortifiedAttack [he/him]
          ·
          1 year ago

          Given that Western military strategists appear to be utterly clueless, I think that would result in a swifter end to the war as well.

        • daisy
          ·
          1 year ago

          It would be darkly hilarious if NATO pulls a "stabbed in the back" narrative on Ukraine's government, before Ukraine's government can do it to their internal opposition.

    • kleeon [he/him, he/him]
      ·
      1 year ago

      Ukrainian troops received combined arms training in NATO countries ahead of the counteroffensive, and the Biden administration wants them to use it.

      why does nato presume they can teach ukrainians how to fight? nato has basically no combat experience outside of counter-insurgency operations. It's ukrainians that should be teaching nato, not the other way around

    • MoreAmphibians [none/use name]
      ·
      1 year ago

      Jesus Christ, NATO is literally trying to get every single Ukrainian killed. If these guys think they can do it better now's their chance to prove it, Ukraine is still accepting foreign fighters.

    • Gamer_time [he/him]
      ·
      1 year ago

      These dinguses just want fucking Kursk 2: Slobo Ukrobo boogaloo. "Just send more armor against them, simply rush more tanks and men into the enemy fortifications while under heavy fire. We gave you whatever we had lying around cause it was too shitty to use for ourselves, now go kill the Ruskies! :think-mark:"

      • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]M
        ·
        1 year ago

        It's literally fucking gamerbrain! "Hm well, I've played my fair share of military strategy games so I personally don't understand why Ukraine didn't put 20 turns of production into tanks, then another 20 into ranged units, and then another 20 into siege, and finally 20 into infantry over the winter and spring, and then click them towards the battlefield using their railroads which allow them to move at 4x the rate as on a normal road, and then use the 25% extra promotion experience card to quickly boost the army."

        • FortifiedAttack [he/him]
          ·
          1 year ago

          Ukraine didn't win because they failed to research +3 infantry attack and defense upgrades.

    • FortifiedAttack [he/him]
      ·
      1 year ago

      This makes a lot of sense.

      If you check Suriyakmaps, you'll notice that Ukraine has been making a lot of small gains over the past few days, bit by bit, much like you used to see from Russia.

      My thought is that they are now employing the same strategy as Russia, using the supplies they got from the West.

      In other words, the West is mad that Ukraine isn't using the strategy that would lead to its swift collapse and total defeat.

      • RonJonGuaido [none/use name]
        ·
        1 year ago

        In other words, the West is mad that Ukraine isn't using the strategy that would lead to its swift collapse and total defeat.

        My thought is that the West would much prefer a clarifying outcome than to be committed for an indefinite amount of time to a losing proposition (and one which has a chance to really escalate). So I would figure that a Big O, which has at least a small chance of actually changing the trajectory of the conflict, is preferred, and is viewed as having little downside (or maybe even all upside).

      • TreadOnMe [none/use name]
        ·
        1 year ago

        The big issue is that they are still at a massive artillery disadvantage. They may be able to make small pushes along the mine fields (which is the smart play and much better for them), but it will be interesting to see what happens when they actually reach the first, second, and third lines of defense. Will things slow down even more, or will Russia just keep abandoning areas of their line and mining the retreat?

    • volcel_olive_oil [he/him]
      ·
      1 year ago

      Jegus Crikes

      biden-point "fight harder, idiots. walk into the flames. if you were american none of this would have happened"