[Beren]

re suicide of this russian colonel

But i somehow thought that e.g. "bribe-taking after joining the customs service in a senior role" in Russia would be the accepted normal behaviour in Russia's cleptocracy?

Who knows why he was facing criminal investigation for it and why he felt like committing suicide because of it actually. I guess he was meant to be finished off for some reason anyway.

[Drlee]

There are two breaking points in NATO's recent history. First, alienation of Turkey by digging its sovereignty. America clearly wanted a civil war in Turkey. This is something which is never to forget. Second, putting Britain over France. Old hostilities revived. America wants us to fight each other to keep us weaker for ever.

Turkey is a failing dictatorship with little to offer to the EU or NATO except disloyalty and disunity.

Turkey is the enemy of all EU states and the US. One day it will be dealt with harshly. Perhaps if Erdogan was gone and the Turkish people had a generation or two of democracy under their belts, it could be returned to the company of civilized nations.

[Rancid]

Russia continues to be humiliated in Ukraine.

[noemon]

Well I know German politics more than any other in Europe. Germany does more business with Russia and is generally more "pacifist", but this invasion changed things drastically. Your "Germany-Russia axis prevented by America" theory seems to be some weird Eastern European/Russian fetish .

No, you re over reaching.

There has been a German(including Switzerland)-Russian axis that has gone beyond merely doing business with Russia.

The German reliance on Russian fossil fuels has been a strategic decision for a while. This has translated on entire German-Russian ecosystems having been created and has also made Germany reluctant to support alternative energy solutions like East Med gas. There are apparently more German companies operating in Russia than in the rest of the EU countries combined. Obviously outside of Germany.

The Baltics and Eastern Europe have traditionally a pro-German fetish but their world has collapsed with Germany having been overt on her lack of support for Ukraine.

You particularly have a traditional issue in here empathizing with the feelings of people who are genuinely threatened. When people feel insecure they become upset. You presume that people either have no right to be insecure or to be upset about it.

You have dismissed Greek concerns about Turkish aggression, not recently from what I recall but several times in the past. Dismissed Eastern European concerns about Russian aggression. You take a rather distant view of the matter of national insecurity due to an overtly & explicitly aggressive neighbour.

[Wels]

Moldovia applies for EU membership

Moldova’s President Maia Sandu said in a statement on Thursday that the country had signed “a request to join the European Union”.

“We want to live in peace, prosperity, be part of the free world,” she said. “While some decisions take time, others must be made quickly and decisively, and taking advantage of the opportunities that come with a changing world.”

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/3 ... membership

[Wels]

Russians have been repelled

"The encirclement of Lysychansk and Sievierodonetsk will happen, only if it will take weeks or days is hard to say. Ukrainian defenders stopped an offensive in the direction of the southern outskirts of Lysychansk, inflicted losses on the enemy and forced them to retreat.
Russian forces want it done by Sunday (capture of Sievierodonetsk), but today they are out of luck."

[Wels]

June 23, 2022
"Ukraine forces destroy 11 Russian military vehicles including tanks"

[Wels]

Contract killers of "Wagner". He is also lying.

Russia has still not understood the level of.. concern.. it has unleashed with this invasion.
Russia's people are still living in peacetime conditions. This will change.

[Rancid]

Russia said about 2 weeks ago, that they would have Slovinask (sp?) in 1 week.

Didn't happen.

[Igor Antunov]

No the western media said, speculated, bleated.



Every time Russia surrounds another 2,000 kievan minions, and takes more territory, we start getting these 'but russia said' copes. There is no expiry date, there are no deadlines. This war continues until puppet ukraine loses its entire coastline, its wheat growing regions, its industrial heartlands, and is turned into a non factor.

The biggest cope right now is that 'ukraine managed to pull its forces out of the pocket'. No it didn't. I'm watching footage of ukrainians surrendering and dying by the hundreds. And now Lisichansk is blockaded in a new pocket and Russians are firing on entire ukrainian columns as they attempt to break out.

It's over.

[Politics_Observer]

@Igor Antunov

It's not over till it's over. I wouldn't count your chicks before they were hatched if I were you. There is a good chance this could be a very long war.

[Igor Antunov]

It's unironically over. Russia is there to stay, it is not going anywhere. And it can keep this small scale offensive up permanently. Whether it takes 2 years or 20, doesn't matter. Therefore it's over. 1+1 = over. Russia will gain land, populace, resources, fighting experience, a permanent military exercise training ground, the benefits are endless. And it will continue gaining these benefits as it hasn't even had to mobilize it's military or civilian populace for war. Puppet Ukraine has, it will therefore break in time. And the sanctions are a meme, now hurting the west more than Russia - proven.

[Rugoz]

@Igor Antunov

It's not over till it's over. I wouldn't count your chicks before they were hatched if I were you. There is a good chance this could be a very long war.

Igor has been living in a parallel universe for a while now, posting the absurdest claims. Complete denial of reality.

[Rancid]

Apparently to Russian BTGs were shelling and shooting at each other.

[Szabo]

Igor is a nut case and a troll. I’m pretty sure he’s spent time in a psychiatric hospital. That’s why I think he does us a favor by making Russia look even more like an insane asylum.

Apparently to Russian BTGs were shelling and shooting at each other.

Russia and their separatist allies like to bomb their civilians all the time and blame it on Ukrainians.

Here’s a typical video of Russian separatists in the Donbas bombing themselves in the city of Alchevsk in one of their quasi republics with rockets:

There’s your great Russia that’s going to conquer all of Europe right there baby.

[Beren]

So Ukraine's an EU candidate finally, although I wonder if how it actually happened. Last time I heard him Zelensky said they wouldn't give up any land in the south to Russia, but he said nothing about East Ukrainian territories, so I guess that was the deal - the EU softened up Ukraine's position in exchange for EU candidate status, of which Putin approved, it doesn't necessarily mean all that much anyway he might think, especially in the short or even the medium term.

[Szabo]

So Ukraine's an EU candidate finally, although I wonder if how it actually happened. Last time I heard him Zelensky said they wouldn't give up any land in the south to Russia, but he said nothing about East Ukrainian territories, so I guess that was the deal - the EU softened up Ukraine's position in exchange for EU candidate status, of which Putin approved, it doesn't necessarily mean all that much anyway he might think, especially in the short or even the middle term.

I think this candidate status is politics aimed at Ukrainians themselves. It’s to soften the blow if Ukraine eventually has to concede some territory, especially in the Donbass. The Ukrainian people want to feel like they’re getting something after the huge sacrifices they’ve endured.

Also, this is long-term thinking. Ukrainians who are living under Russian occupied territories including Crimea have been worse off than the people living in Ukraine proper. When the war ends and things start getting better for Ukraine, all those Ukrainians living on the Russian occupied territories, most of which has been flattened, will start getting more and more disillusioned, hopefully eventually leading to their eventual reunification with Ukraine. Under sanctions, Russia will never be able to rebuild the flattened conquered territories. In the few cities that they’ve conquered, people need to wait in lines to take showers outdoors, and the Russians have already stated that they will not be rebuilding any of the industrial sectors or districts, because they simply can’t.

[Igor Antunov]

The Armed Force of Ukraine will attempt another victorious retreat today


How will Russia ever recover?

To sum up the month as june is coming to a close;

This month's Great Ukrainian Victories are sinking a tugboat, bombing an empty island, flying a $5,000 alibaba drone with 20kg of explosives strapped to it (yes look it up) into an oil refinery, and murdering a volleyball coach, who was one of their countrymen.

Clearly Russia stands no chance. The cities and towns they captured, the thousands of casualties and captured they inflicted on UA, this is all for naught in the face of these winning Ukrainian achievements.

[Szabo]

I like how Igor thinks that the largest country in the world occupying bits and pieces of the poorest country in Europe is an accomplishment, especially after flattening it...

Typical Russian caveman...

Is Kiev surrounded yet?

[Beren]

I think this candidate status is politics aimed at Ukrainians themselves. It’s to soften the blow if Ukraine eventually has to concede some territory, especially in the Donbass. The Ukrainian people want to feel like they’re getting something after the huge sacrifices they’ve endured.

Behind the scenes they've already conceded some territory in Eastern Ukraine in exchange for EU candidate status, to which Putin must have consented, that's why it could go so smoothly and not even Orbán opposed it at all.


See?