Althouse: "It’s a pity, it’s a tragedy, but for today Bakhmut is only in our hearts," said Volodymyr Zelensky, in a remark that a spokesman "later clarified."

May 21, 2023

"It’s a pity, it’s a tragedy, but for today Bakhmut is only in our hearts," said Volodymyr Zelensky, in a remark that a spokesman "later clarified."

Reported in "Russia-Ukraine War/Live Updates: Biden Pledges Commitment to Ukraine; Zelensky Denies Bakhmut Has Fallen At the G7 summit in Japan, President Biden said world powers 'will not waver' in supporting Ukraine. The Ukrainian leader, Volodymyr Zelensky, rejected Russia’s claim it captured Bakhmut and said Kyiv’s forces were still fighting for the eastern city" (NYT).

31 comments:

Narayanan said...: May be Time will do cover story on Putin horse riding wheat field in Ukraine; 5/21/23, 7:33 AM
RideSpaceMountain said...: Help me! I'm winning!; 5/21/23, 7:49 AM
tim in vermont said...: Joe Biden could have picked up the phone and made a deal for a non-aligned and mostly intact Ukraine. Hundreds of thousands of dead and maimed? Small price to pay in Ukrainians for a chance to break up the Russian Federation and divvy up her $72 T in resources. It should be clear to everyone that Russia is no threat to Europe and that we provoked this war because, on the contrary, we believed Russia to be weak.

What do Iraq, Syria, Libya, all attacked by the “defensive alliance,” NATO, have in common, all former Soviet clients. NATO has been expanding towards Russia, against our own promises, since the fall of the Soviet Union, and Ukraine had the second largest army in Europe, which we have been arming ever since we backed the coup that ousted the elected government of Ukraine.

What’s happened to Bakhmut is the horrific cost of Joe Biden’s Cold War fixation. We could be enjoying an era of peace right now, but the lure of world domination was too much to resist.

Biden keeps escalating his way to a wider war that could easily go nuclear.; 5/21/23, 7:50 AM
Bob Boyd said...: Mariupol and Bakhmut fell on the same day, May 20th.; 5/21/23, 8:04 AM
Bob Boyd said...: The Battle of Bakhmut was Wagner Group against the UA. Have we ever seen a private army defeat a state military before in a major battle?; 5/21/23, 8:12 AM
gilbar said...: TiV said...
should be clear.. Russia is no threat to Europe.. we provoked this war because.. we believed Russia to be weak

On Mother's day my baby boomer brother inlaw was telling me about how
a) Russia was stupid to have invaded the Ukraine, because russia is So weak
b) How IMPORTANT it is, that we westerners STOP russia, before they TAKE OVER ALL OF EUROPE!!!

If we're watching 'two movies', the left is watching ALICE IN WONDERLAND
When they use a word: it means just what they choose it to mean — neither more nor less.
And They are able to believe SIX contradictory thoughts before breakfast; 5/21/23, 8:13 AM
narciso said...: biden was brezkhnev's poodle, he is doing a fine job burying us, how do people not see this,

Russians unlike us, remember their history as if it was yesterday, the crushing of the Bulovin rebellion is of note,; 5/21/23, 8:13 AM
Tank said...: That dope Trump thinks it might be a good idea to stop them from killing each other.; 5/21/23, 8:25 AM
Gene said...: As someone who understands and reads Russian, it is fascinating to read comments about this war on English language blogs and other forums. The understanding of the situation lacks any nuance or detail. Everything is seen from the point of view of American politics. Many seem to actually believe this war is the result of the corruption of Hunter Biden. It's particularly sad that people on the right can't understand the vast geopolitical consequences of this war.; 5/21/23, 8:34 AM
RideSpaceMountain said...: "The Battle of Bakhmut was Wagner Group against the UA. Have we ever seen a private army defeat a state military before in a major battle?"

Many times. Going far back too. Look up the fighting retreat of Xenophon's 10,000 Greek mercenaries in Anabasis, or the rise and prominence of Swiss mercenary halberdiers against Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy.

Just because states are historically the only ones who can usually afford an army doesn't always mean they do a good job of using one.; 5/21/23, 8:34 AM
Tom T. said...: Putin's insistence on putting his own army through a meat grinder to win these cities ought to put an end to the notion that he's reluctant about this invasion and just sitting by the phone waiting for the American president to offer a deal. The idea that the Ukrainians are trying to break up Russia - by resisting an invasion of their own country - is a whole new level of absurdity.

Putin's conduct of the invasion also shows why the Ukrainians don't want to lay down and be conquered. The suggestion that he would rule Ukraine gently and peacefully is a fantasy.; 5/21/23, 8:55 AM
Humperdink said...: His streak remains in tact. What streak is that? Biden has yet to be correct on any foreign issue since he was first elected to the swamp.; 5/21/23, 8:58 AM
Winston said...: Just after the collapse of the USSR, I hosted a group of senior Czech military officers. Their number one concern was a certainty that the Russians would be back, with a boot looking for a neck(s) in eastern Europe to stand on, and that the US would forget that certainty and move on. So, now the question no one is asking is what are Russia's plans beyond Ukraine, assuming they prevail. The unstated presumption by the idiot Biden regime is that they have plans for more eastern European countries, NATO nations.

Putin has long held the dissolution of the USSR to be an epic catastrophe. The Poles, furiously building their armed forces, and the surprising new applicants for NATO membership, Sweden and Finland, all seem to be seeing the same future--an attempt by Russia to reestablish or expand its security buffer zone in eastern Europe and return to its Cold War glory with control of those populations and resources.

Why would Putin attempt this now? Russia is looking at a major demographic collapse and it's now or never. Their population will shrink to the point they can't defend their fronteirs in the not too distant future, so now is the time in spite of their weakness. Secondarily, the perception of US economic/military/political decline.

The point: this doesn't end with a forced Ukraine cease fire, doesn't end if Russia entirely wins in Ukraine, doesn't end without a desperation play against, at least, the Baltic states and Poland, maybe more.; 5/21/23, 9:12 AM
Wince said...: How soon before Biden blames his latest failure on his political opponents?; 5/21/23, 9:31 AM
Winston said...: Puzzled as to why some here think Putin's fun and games end with Ukraine. The Poles, furiously expanding their armed forces, don't seem to think so. The Swedes and Fins, surprising new NATO applicants, don't seem to think so.

Given this, why does anyone here think that they are wrong to arm up? And why does anyone think that having the outlying NATO members next on Putin's menu doesn't just create a greater risk of direct conflict with the Russians.

Here's the fact: The eastern Europeans, since the 1990s, have feared the Russians would return and here they are. What do we do? Something, nothing, or the Biden plan, a bit of both?; 5/21/23, 9:40 AM
Bob Boyd said...: @ RideSpaceMountain

Very interesting. I just ordered Anabasis.; 5/21/23, 9:53 AM
JaimeRoberto said...: The name Bakhmut sounds Turkish. Maybe this should be nobody's business but the Turks'.; 5/21/23, 9:56 AM
Luke Lea said...: Let's suppose the Biden administration is successful in driving Putin from power: what might come next? One possibility is that Russia becomes a failed state. And then what happens after that? China takes over huge hunks of what used to be Russia? Is that a desirable outcome? I dunno.; 5/21/23, 10:03 AM
n.n said...: Obama/Biden's world ethnic wars ("Springs").; 5/21/23, 10:15 AM
Maynard said...: Have we ever seen a private army defeat a state military before in a major battle?

Mercenary armies were used extensively in English dynastic wars.; 5/21/23, 10:22 AM
Maynard said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/21/23, 10:22 AM
Drago said...: Luke Lea: "Let's suppose the Biden administration is successful in driving Putin from power: what might come next? One possibility is that Russia becomes a failed state. And then what happens after that? China takes over huge hunks of what used to be Russia? Is that a desirable outcome? I dunno."

The dems/neocons/GOPe/globalists have explicitly stated their objective is the removal of Putin, the breakup of Russia into 15 or 20 small, weak but resource rich entities that can be dominated and exploited by the establishment powers in the west.

These architects and fake/failed/moron self-anointed "Elites" of Vietnam fame, and Iraq, Libya. Syria, Afghanistan and a hundred other failures are playing god...and failing miserably at it as reality cannot be suspended in the real world.

But these idiots will hollow out our nation completely and sell the US out to their globalist pals if thats what it takes for them to keep their personal, unearned, gravy train rolling.; 5/21/23, 11:47 AM
Drago said...: JaimeRoberto: "The name Bakhmut sounds Turkish. Maybe this should be nobody's business but the Turks'."

I once had a date in Constantinople....but she was waiting in Istanbul.; 5/21/23, 11:49 AM
n.n said...: China takes over huge hunks of what used to be Russia? Is that a desirable outcome?

Tibet was once a cause celebre, now assimilated through immigration reform.; 5/21/23, 11:49 AM
Drago said...: "...if Bakhmut was...lost today.....or whatever....."--Joe Biden, 5/21/2023

Says it all, really.; 5/21/23, 12:51 PM
Free Manure While You Wait! said...: "Many seem to actually believe this war is the result of the corruption of Hunter Biden."

Many?; 5/21/23, 1:20 PM
Joe Smith said...: Stop giving them our money.

If we got something for it; like grain for the next thousand years, maybe it would make sense.

But just handing over billions of dollars for nothing is stupid.

The only thing that could explain it is a vast money laundering operation.

Oh, wait...; 5/21/23, 1:53 PM
The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...: “Here's the fact: The eastern Europeans, since the 1990s, have feared the Russians would return and here they are.”

Where are they? In the 19th-Century Russian Empire? Get real. It’s like the United States attacking New Mexico 30 years after the reconquista. Not great but not terribly surprising either. Perhaps Argentina will send arms to Mexico…

OK, some simplistic absurdity there, but the Deep Cold Warrior hysterics are far more absurd. Whatever Putin dreams about when tucked up in his jammies at night, it doesn’t include Poland or Hungary. The world has changed. Unless some senile moron insists on exploiting them for a proxy war with Russia.; 5/21/23, 7:35 PM
Drago said...: Winston: "Puzzled as to why some here think Putin's fun and games end with Ukraine."

Because thats all Russia can barely handle without unacceptably large scale mobilisation.

The russkis have almost no ability to project force at a distance as was demonstrated in Syria.

You know what could cause a large scale mobilisation? Shoving NATO borders right to the edge of Russias western frontier, NATO putting advanced missile systems directly at Russias border, the US continuing it's Color Revolution strategy across the russian southern and asian frontiers while simultaneously demanding russian leaders be dragged before the ICC...a court for which the US is not a signatory. Oh yeah, and calling for russia to be broken up into little globalist pieces.

Winston: "The Poles, furiously expanding their armed forces, don't seem to think so. The Swedes and Fins, surprising new NATO applicants, don't seem to think so."

LOL

Yes indeed, all those nations have learned well the lesson that the US neocon globalists are just dying to give away as much cash and weaponry as possible before the American people wise up. Who doesnt want billions and billions in free stuff with the option for those leaders to stuff their swiss bank accounts? Sign me up!

What a surprise: you get more of what you subsidize.

Winston: "And why does anyone think that having the outlying NATO members next on Putin's menu doesn't just create a greater risk of direct conflict with the Russians."

Wake me up when Putin attacks a NATO member. There are about a hundred other higher likelihood threats, including cartel violence on our border.

You remember our border, dont you Winston? Its easy to find on a map but seemingly impossible for some people to focus on as a priority....and unfortunately we do not have unlimited resources.

Certainly not enough to pay Ukrainian govt salaries AND Ukrainian govt employees retirement plans!; 5/21/23, 8:39 PM
rcocean said...: who cares what Zelenksy SAYS. Did they capture the city or not? Yes or NO? Its not up for interpetation. We're not going to vote on it.; 5/21/23, 9:00 PM
rcocean said...: Biden is willing to fight to the last Ukrainian. Thousands have died because this Senile ol' fool loves war and wants to "Weaken" Russia.; 5/21/23, 9:04 PM