Althouse: "Russian Telegram channels published video of triumphant troops waving the Russian tricolour flag over shattered buildings in Vuhledar."

October 2, 2024

"Russian Telegram channels published video of triumphant troops waving the Russian tricolour flag over shattered buildings in Vuhledar."

"In one clip, four soldiers stood inside a gutted highrise flat and placed a flag outside. 'Everything will be Russia. Victory will be ours,' an officer declared. The communist hammer and sickle was also raised. Vuhledar was originally built around a mine in the mid-1960s when it was within the Soviet Union. Before the war it had a population of about 14,000. It is now a sprawling ruin, with apartment buildings smashed apart and scarred...."

From "Ukraine says its forces have withdrawn from defensive bastion of Vuhledar/Eastern city had resisted repeated attacks but Russian troops are close to ‘encircling’ it in Donetsk advance" (The Guardian).

25 comments:

Kevin said...: No one at CBS thought to bring up Ukraine last night. But we did get the usual bullshit about national abortion laws, climate change, and the government's role in providing affordable childcare.; 10/2/24, 12:43 PM
RideSpaceMountain said...: Many Russian decisions at the operational level can be explained as transitioning from high-speed, mobile warfare to low-speed, positional war, and this is a situation that follows that rubric. In other words, the Russians will launch an offensive to rout the AFU after its back is broken in positional war, rather than an attack seeking to change the game and defeat the Ukrainians in mobile war. Like it or not, this game heavily favors the Russians. They’re not in any rush to change it.

This scenario can be seen by comparing two very successful offensives: Operation Bagration in 1944 and the 1975 Ho Chi Minh Offensive. Bagration routed the once-mighty Army Group Center – at the cost of 180,000 killed in action. I’m sure the Russians would much prefer the 8,000 man butcher’s bill of North Vietnam’s war-ending 1975 operation, and they have the insight to see that modern Ukraine - as a corrupt and deeply dysfunctional garrison state propped up by endless foreign aid - is far more akin to South Vietnam than Nazi Germany.

Vuhledar is what it looks like in practice. The Russians are going to keep poking and prodding in their usual methodical way until part of the line collapses “in depth,” and then all hell is going to break loose. The Ukrainian offensive to the North was a public relations stunt, because everyone knows that without massive further assistance, Ukraine has already lost the war.

You can expect more Vuhledars, but new Ukrainian PR offensives will be few, ineffectual, or none at all.; 10/2/24, 12:52 PM
Gusty Winds said...: I'm sure another $100 Billion check written to Zelensky will take care of the problem.; 10/2/24, 12:58 PM
Inga said...: It’s been smashed to smithereens, but it’s ours, all ours, says the Russian. Victory to Russia, eh Tim in Vermont?; 10/2/24, 1:09 PM
doctrev said...: Ugledar back under Russian control. Maybe it will go the same way as Lyman, but I doubt it. The bitterness of the NPC brigade comes from their knowledge that the end draws closer- and perhaps soon enough to devastate their pre-election narrative. It won't matter. When wars are lost, narratives are the first to die. Well, second, after the ideologues who made the war happen.; 10/2/24, 1:25 PM
Original Mike said...: "No one at CBS thought to bring up Ukraine last night."

I doubt it was an oversight. I wonder why they avoided it.; 10/2/24, 1:36 PM
RideSpaceMountain said...: The federal government is overwhelmingly populated with public affairs/public relations professionals - people who believe that if you say the right something enough times from the right mouthpieces it becomes true. Fleishman-Hillardians and Weber-Shandwickians are narrative hustlers and propagandists, and anybody can see how true it is when you see the fees they charge.

Believing something really really hard does not in fact make it true. This is why the PR profession is dominated by women.; 10/2/24, 1:43 PM
Josephbleau said...: The Russian celebration reminds me that some would rather rule in hell than serve in heaven. Russia is the destroyer of worlds and dreams, they glory in a field of waste as long as it is theirs. Will they get western investment to reopen the mine?

Like China v Taiwan they are angry that someone else has something they want. Ukraine leadership may be no better, but is no worse.; 10/2/24, 2:07 PM
narciso said...: it has been a perfect vizzini exercise 'inconceivable'; 10/2/24, 2:24 PM
The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...: It was always going to end this way. The marvel is it took so long. But perhaps that was so the Democrats could keep hoovering that defense industry graft. Adult international leadership would have negotiated a cease-fire within a month of the war beginning.; 10/2/24, 2:37 PM
doctrev said...: It never would have started with anyone else. Even Bill Clinton would have yanked the leash hard, concerned that idiot policy was going to end the Yelstin era with nuclear brinkmanship instead of a peace dividend. And yet Russia would have done much worse in a war set in 1998 or 2014. Vicki Nuland would be hailed as a genius stateswoman instead of a peon for whom dual loyalty would be an improvement.

Now Russia and China have serious reason to maintain unrestricted warfare against NATO at vulnerable points, including and especially Israel.; 10/2/24, 2:48 PM
Dr Weevil said...: In what sense is Ukraine a "garrison state"? The volunteers of the International Legion are a tiny proportion of the military forces defending Ukraine. That phrase looks like a bald-faced lie.

In what sense is Ukraine propped up by "endless foreign aid"? The US has provided 31 M-1 tanks for a war with a 600-mile-long front line. One tank for every 20 miles! Not exactly "endless". We could easily provide hundreds more, but haven't. More than half of all the armored vehicles Ukraine has acquired since the second Russian invasion were not provided by NATO countries, but captured from the Russians. The US has provided zero F-16s, our NATO allies 10 F-16s so far, with 20-30 on the way, delayed two years by US foot-dragging. Again, we have hundreds that could be sent to Ukraine for less than the cost of recycling them to EPA standards. It would literally save money to send them to Ukraine, but Jake Sullivan won't allow it.

As for the comparison to South Vietnam, Russia lost tens of thousands of soldiers capturing Vuhledar, and hundreds of armored vehicles. The comparison is idiotic.

Finally, it is utterly false that "everyone knows . . . Ukraine has already lost the war". Everyone who's actually paying attention knows that Russia is in fact losing. They haven't even been able to meet Putin's October 1st deadline to recapture Kursk, and he's had to reschedule it for the 15th. They won't make that one either. And they can only capture territory by throwing away tens of thousands of lives in 'meat assaults' and destroying every building with artillery first. What they capture is utterly worthless, and they're runnning out of troops.; 10/2/24, 4:40 PM
Dr Weevil said...: Any cease-fire negotiated with Putin would have been violated by Putin by sunset on the day it was signed.; 10/2/24, 4:43 PM
Narayanan said...: is there Putin derangement syndrome PDS to parallel TDS
could never figure out love for UkroNazis; 10/2/24, 6:00 PM
RideSpaceMountain said...: Dr. W, Ukraine cannot stand on it's own. Let's not bicker over semantics here. As a nation they would cease to exist tomorrow without the help they're receiving. Estimates of the number of people who have left the country are as high as 1/4 and that doesn't include the next generation getting maimed and killed on the battlefield. Their civil infrastructure will take years, maybe a decade, to rebuild doubtless with resources someone else will have to provide. In many ways they're less of a nation than S. Vietnam, which at least managed to lurch along for another 2 years after 73'. Ukraine wouldn't last months before having to relinquish all of their current demands at the peace table.

I am not a Putin supporter. I do not think what Russia did was legal. I also don't think Ukraine and NATO are blameless either, and I am really peeved that this money laundering operation masquerading as a country is receiving more help, and with higher priority, than Americans whose money it is and who need it more. Right fucking now.; 10/2/24, 7:20 PM
Dr Weevil said...: Anyone who uses the word "Ukronazis" is in no position to call anyone else 'deranged'. The fact is that the Russians are acting like Nazis, murdering prisoners (16 in a bunch just this week), drafting Ukrainians in occupied territories to fight their relatives, bombing hospitals, schools, and apartment buildings every night, using 'double taps' to kill rescue workers, poisoning rivers that flow from Russia into Ukraine, using drones to hunt civilians walking on the sidewalk in Kherson, . . . I've asked before if anyone can name a single war crime the Russians have not committed in Ukraine, and no one has even tried to answer that. Can you, Narayanan?

As for RideSpaceMountain, "Let's not bicker over semantics here"? Pointing out that Ukraine is not in any sense a "garrison state" isn't a matter of semantics, it's a matter of gross misrepresentation (to put it as kindly as possible) on your part. Again, they don't have foreign troops and are not asking for foreign troops, they're asking for weapons and ammunition. South Vietnam would have lasted a lot longer if Democrats in the US congress hadn't cut off supplies of fuel and ammunition. And Russia is a lot closer to collapse than Ukraine is, if you follow the news from the front.

Finally, Ukraine is in fact a country, and all the "money laundering" there was done under the previous regime, the one they voted out in favor of non-politician Zelenskyy. There is little or no evidence of any money laundering going on since he was elected.; 10/2/24, 7:42 PM
RideSpaceMountain said...: "Again, they don't have foreign troops and are not asking for foreign troops"

They have an entire foreign legion and thousands of foreign military trainers are in country, several hundred of which have been documented casualties, and without whose training and experience their conscript army would have even lower morale than it already does.

We're done here.; 10/2/24, 7:53 PM
Dr Weevil said...: Really, "several hundred . . . documented casualties"? Link, please. I don't believe you.; 10/2/24, 7:56 PM
Dr Weevil said...: I DuckDuckGoed "western advisers killed in Ukraine" and all the stories that came up were obvious Russian propaganda or refutations therefore. It appears that RideSpaceMountain's "We're done here" was an evasion and a refusal to defend obvious bullshit. Par for the course for Ukraine-haters: they're all either gullible or dishonest, or both.; 10/2/24, 10:35 PM
Dr Weevil said...: I Googled (well, DuckDuckWent) "western advisers killed in Ukraine" and all the stories that came up were obvious Russian lies or refutations thereof. It appears that RideSpaceMountain's "We're done here" was strategic: he won't defend his statements because he can't. Why are so many Ukraine-haters so gullible, or dishonest, or both?; 10/2/24, 10:38 PM
Achilles said...: Not one inch east...; 10/3/24, 6:32 AM
gilbar said...: there are people here that KEEP Saying, that "Russia is LOSING!" and "Russia is A LOT closer to collapse that the Ukraine is!!!!!!!"
please all keep that in mind, in the coming months..
Of course; it won't matter, once the Ukraine loses those people will just quit posting here. But still.. keep it all in mind.; 10/3/24, 8:04 AM
wishfulthinking said...: I just don't understand how anyone can believe that Ukraine can win agaisnt Russia. This is a war of attrition for Ukraine in which a very large number of Ukranians have been killed or displaced. It's actually a globalist warmongers war against Russia. They've figured that they cannot implement their NWO as long as Russia is not under their control. This is not what I think through my tinfoil hat. This is what is happening in front of our eyes. Too bad 50% of the population refuses to open them.; 10/3/24, 8:51 AM
Dr Weevil said...: I've been commenting here for at least 15 years, and will not "just quit posting here" until I die. gilbar lies again.; 10/3/24, 11:06 AM
Dr Weevil said...: Russia has 3 or 3.5 times the population of Ukraine. So what? All Ukraine has to do is kill 4 or 6 or 8 times as many Russian soldiers as they lose themselves, and they appear to be doing just that. If you wrote "I just don't understand" how Alexander the Great could have conquered Persia, or how Israel could have won every war it's fought since independence, given that they were even more heavily outnumbered, you would look like a historical illiterate. The more numerous side does not always win. Duh!

Of course, it is not a "globalist warmongers['] war against Russia": it's a Russian invasion of Ukraine inspired by Putin's wish to rebuild the Soviet Union. (Notice his troops raised a Soviet flag over the ruins?) The idea that supporters of Ukraine are trying to control Russia, instead of trying to prevent Russia from controlling Ukraine, is ridiculous.; 10/3/24, 11:12 AM