Quote from: Cassia on April 11, 2022, 02:03:46 PMThere's a lot of that going around with the sweeping rise in nationalism and disinformation peddling.

If the global climate reaches borderline disaster mode and countries start fighting to the death for resources to survive; it may become very difficult to have a good day. Perhaps we are seeing glimpses of that now.

Yeah, I've been thinking of that some lately.  At my age, I don't think I have to be too concerned about that--but then, I think of the changes I've seen (and felt) within the last few years, and maybe I do have more to be concerned with than I think.  Reminds me of an old Twilight Zone episode that shows how a woman deals with the rising heat level in New York City as Earth hurdles toward the sun.  Are we there yet?

I'm sure you all know now that Russia used a chemical weapon in Mariupol.  WMDs.

This escalation merits an appropriate escalation in sanctions against Russia and military aid to Ukraine by the West.

In happier news:

Russian convoy destroyed near Izium thanks to video by pro-Putin propagandist.  Keep up the good work!

MIGs underway:  Slovakia is transferring MIG-29s to Ukraine

Poland "accidentally" "loses" 100 T-72 tanks.  Unrelated:  about 100 T-72 tanks mysteriously find their way into Ukrainian control.  It's a mystery to everybody.

Putin says Bucha massacre is fake, his ally-with-benefits Lukashenko says it was done by the UK.
Putin says Russia will not be isolated from the West, then says it doesn't need the West.

What sort of idiot is supposed to believe these mutually contradictory ideas?!  I've seen more competent propaganda from North Korea.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian messaging:

Some of you guys may know i´m a social worker, here in Belgium. I've mentioned it a few times.

I don´t feel like I have a right to actually complain. We are not the suffering country, we are a host country. But it´s been getting though at work.
Ukrainians have been coming to ask for and at our public center of societal welfare. And they are in their right to so. Luckily they´ve been granted the statute of ´temporarily displaced´. Something we haven´t had to use since Kosovo.
But the city i work at has, I fear, overreached. Local politicians promised to build an emergency Town with room for 600 people. That´s as many as antwerp has pledged and they are a far bigger city, wit thus more personel in their public center of societal welfare. We've also opened a hotel to 200 Ukrainians for emergency housing and there are many more being housed by well-meaning people who I fear have not  correctly estimated how long this crisis will last and what such hosting actually demands. (Surely not all, but some have already kicked out families after a week because they didn't think it through and had acted and engaged themselves before thinking it through.) All in all they are estimating 2000 people to be hosted in our city alone. (For reference, there's less than 87.000 people living in the city.)
We´re basically drowning in work. We don't have enough people to handle the added requests for financial aid and get everything sorted and official in time. Let alone to give proper guidance, coaching and non-financial aid in adapting to society. Hell, there are fewer than 10 offical translators versed in Ukrainian in the entirety of Flanders alone. You can imagine the way this impedes progress; burdening these new people in dire need and the pre-existing cliënts all the same. I see the people in my team rushing to burn-outs if this is not handled soon.
We´ve been given extra resources, but the jobmarket for social workers has dried up for over a year and a half now. No-one can find staff. We are allowed to hire more people, but we can't find anyone to fill the positions. Not to say I can prove this objectively, but working at a public center of societal welfare in a city is one of the hardest places to work with the diploma as social worker. And it doesn't pay more than other government positions with the same diploma-qualifications. Nor can our employer just choose to use the non-utilized funds for three extra positions that we can't fill, to incentivize the rest of us with a bonus or a pay-raise.
Things ain´t going well.

...this is always the case when people allow themselves to be ruled by dictators. Any dictator from the gods and popes to hitler to pol pot to putin. misery is all that awaits. a giant swath of people crave to have a "strongman-in-charge". fuck that.

US announces $800 million more in military aid to Ukraine

QuoteThe new security assistance package, according to the Defense Department, includes 11 Mi-17 helicopters that had been earmarked for Afghanistan before the U.S.-backed government collapsed and 18 155mm howitzers, along with counter-artillery radars and 200 armored personnel carriers.

This was the first time howitzers have been provided to Ukraine by the United States.

Quote from: Hydra009 on April 13, 2022, 05:12:25 PMUS announces $800 million more in military aid to Ukraine

Where we we getting Russian helicopters?

Quote from: PopeyesPappy on April 13, 2022, 05:15:23 PMWhere we we getting Russian helicopters?

Russia, apparently.  LOL

In other good news, pro-Putin oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk was found and detained by Ukrainian Security Service (equivalent to Secret Service).  He was previously under house arrest but escaped just days before hostilities broke out (suspicious).  Since he is very close to Putin, he is a valuable bargaining tool.  Moscow is not happy at all about this, of course.

This guy's wiki page is something else.  He and Putin practically have matching tattoos.

The flagship of Russian Black Sea fleet has sunk.

Russia says it caught fire (spontaneously?) and its ammo exploded, but its crew evacuated safely and it's still afloat.  (At least one of those statements is likely to be a lie)

Ukraine says they distracted it with a drone while they launched a missile that hit it and caused a fire that spread to the ammo.

Imo, it seems likely that there were casualties, from the initial strike and/or from the exploding ammo.

It should be noted that this Neptune anti-ship cruise missile system was domestically produced and just came online last year.

Near Izium, Ukrainian forces blew up a bridge while a Russian column was crossing, inflicting significant damage to the convoy

Russian naval units are backing away from the Ukraine coast, lest they mysteriously catch on fire, too.

This just occured to me, but I doubt I'm the first to have such an epiphany:

Russian naval/land/air units aren't supporting each other most of the time, they're essentially fighting their own battles without coordination.  No such thing as combined arms with Russia.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian drones and air forces are frequently supporting ground forces.  And Ukraine gets phenomenal Intel, so they're often able to engage the enemy on their own terms - like hitting convoys while they're still en route or hitting artillery while they're still setting up, etc.

People love to compare numbers - tanks on the field, aircraft in the air, etc - but imo, there's a huge qualitative difference here to take into account as well.

Ukraine simply is doing more with less.  And what few areas it has a definite advantage - like intel - is being put to fantastic use.  Imagine what they could do with more!

Only 54 crew rescued from sunk Moskva out of ~500

With the loss of the flagship Moskva and the assault cruiser Saratov (famously hit by missile while at harbor due to bungling propagandist giving away its position on video) the remaining Black Sea fleet is looking awfully vulnerable since they relied heavily on the flagship for anti-air and ant-missile defense.  Let's hope nothing happens to further reduce the Russian presence in the area...