ATTENTION!
The Russian Army channel predicts an Ukrainian artillery attack on Ukrainian-held #Mariupol!
http://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mi...61953-ndt2.htm …
General Clark: „More than half of OSCE monitors in East Ukraine are just Russian Military personnel…“
ATTENTION!
The Russian Army channel predicts an Ukrainian artillery attack on Ukrainian-held #Mariupol!
http://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mi...61953-ndt2.htm …
U.S. Preps for Infowar on Russia
http://thebea.st/2kcdTdu
9PM - Heavy outgoing fire from #Horlivka, flashes towards north.
Now also shelling audible in #Toretsk
Shelling also audible in Krynychna
Meanwhile, Russian Ground Forces logistics & transport battalions continue to replenish, resupply and repair DPR/LPR
https://twitter.com/tassagency_en/st...60099392614401 …
Last edited by OUTLAW 09; 02-06-2017 at 07:33 PM.
Russia cranks up lie machine claiming "apartheid" regime in Latvia--odd that Russians there don't emigrate to Russia
http://www.pravda.ru/video/politics/21324.html …
Hell freezes over: guest blames Russia for war in Ukraine on Russian state TV live [VIDEO]
http://euromaidanpress.com/2017/02/0...state-tv-live/ …
21:06 #Horlivka @062_Region #Mykyrivka direction rumbled with something powerful, and strange green flashes. Now it's been loud at #Stroitel
21:55 #Popasna @hu_popa "Booms, booms, booms. In short, good evening"
21:55 #Mariupol @Jonsonal72 Loud booms are heard
21:54 #Mariupol @zanzy1975 "Incoming artillery in the area of #Shrokyne by sound, it sounds very loud for the #left_bank[=E]"
21:53 #Mariupol @sir_T_Lawrence Tough rumble in #Shyrokyne direction. Howitzers
21:56 #Yenakiieve @ZloyEnakievec They shell from 4 points by turns. 2 in Horlivka, 2 in #Yenakiieve
22:07 #Horlivka @tgorlovka They keep firing. Heavy [artillery] in the W-NW
22:10 #Kadiivka @pro100_zen Loud. Outgoing [rounds]
Last edited by OUTLAW 09; 02-06-2017 at 08:21 PM.
22:19 #Svitlodarsk Bulge @_svetlik__ Tough fighting
Intense battle in #Svitlodarsk_Bulge now.
22:19 #Holubivka @thisnameerror #Kalynove rumbles and 120 mm shells fly, #Bakhmut road rumbles too
Shelling in #Popasna area already since a couple of hours now.
What's next for Russia (to invade)?
I've harped on about Belarus and Kazakhstan for some time, and it was encouraging to see Michael Kofman of CNA recently agree with me that Russia was more concerned about Belarus than the Baltic republics.
Here is an article from WIB on increasing Russian-Belorussian tensions: https://warisboring.com/belarus-prep...468#.jzj2wk180
My response to the article would be to say that Russia has had past tensions with Lukashenko, Yanukovych and other allies or clients.
Selected excerpts:
Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko, often called “the last dictator in Europe,” had long kept his country aligned politically, economically and militarily close to Russia. But this relationship deteriorated after the Russian invasion of Crimea — and as Lukashenko began to hedge, albeit slowly and very cautiously, toward the West.
In a more than seven-hour news conference on Feb. 3, 2017, Lukashenko blasted Russia for reimposing border controls — a response to Belarus relaxing visa rules for foreign visitors — and categorically rejected a Russian plan to build an air base on Belarusian soil.
Lukashenko also ordered the arrest of Russia’s top food safety official, and accused Russian president Vladimir Putin of “practically appointing Trump.” The strongman further criticized Russia for sharply cutting oil exports to Belarus.
And on Feb. 5, the Belarusian strongman gave kudos to a “fraternal Ukraine” which is “fighting for its independence” — noting that he was referring to an economic fight. Just days before, the Belarusian military conducted a large readiness test.
Separately, these reports — especially the one sourced from Donald Trump’s White House — and Lukashenko’s knocks on Russia are noteworthy. In a series, they’re quite remarkable. TV Rain, a Russian independent news channel, described the row as the “worst crisis” between Belarus and Russia in their recent history.
Lukashenko has begun to experiment. Liberal advocates from the West now meet with Belarusian officials, which was unprecedented until recently. But Belarusians are hurting. Russia has cut its oil exports to Belarus by half, and pushing too fast on reforms could threaten the stability of Lukashenko’s regime.
“With the status quo of the past two decades looking increasingly unsustainable, some regard his predicament as unenviably similar to that of Mikhail Gorbachev in the 1980s,” Foreign Policy observed in September 2016.
Fortunately for Lukashenko, Western countries have given up on trying to reform his authoritarian ways, and in 2016 the European Union lifted most sanctions it imposed because of the regime’s abysmal human rights record.
Meanwhile, Russian state-controlled media outlets have aired speculative stories that the West could topple the Belarusian government or provoke instability. Irredentist, nationalist commentators have even taken to advocating for the absorption of Belarus’ territory … by force, if necessary.
Russia may also seek to deploy troops in Belarus to match a NATO tank buildup in Poland. But what happens if Lukashenko says no?
The Belarusian military with its 48,000 active duty soldiers and airmen — plus an additional 289,500 reservists — would have a difficult time resisting Russia.
7:06AM #Avdiivka hearing heavy single incomings.
7:23AM #Starohnativka #Staroignatievka
"Fun morning, the shelling continues"
Artillery duel near #Berezove.
~1 hour ago
Artillery in #Horlivka last night
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PooSu7r_iI#
…
http://liveuamap.com/en/2017/6-febru...livka-tonight#
InformNapalm: geolocation of provocation shelling of house in #Donetsk by Russian forces
pic.twitter.com/sJn1tdTXcT
http://liveuamap.com/en/2017/6-febru...tion-shelling#
Russia’s Little War in Ukraine Does Not Help Kremlin to Befriend Trump
https://jamestown.org/program/russia...efriend-trump/
Publication: Eurasia Daily Monitor Volume: 14 Issue: 13
By: Pavel K. Baev
The sharp escalation in artillery battles in the Donbas (eastern Ukraine) war zone one day after the January 28 telephone conversation between United States President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin was certainly not a coincidence. No leaks about the content of the 45-minute-long exchange have appeared in the Russian media, and the official summary amounts to mere platitudes. But the anticipation had been extraordinarily intense (see EDM, January 30). Commentaries about a possible lifting of sanctions came so thick that for the first time in years, it was not Putin’s name that was mentioned most often in the Russian media but the name of a foreign leader (Interfax, February 1; see EDM, January 2). Public opinion surveys have duly registered the quick decline in Russians’ negative attitudes toward the US, from the peak of 81 percent in early 2015, down to 49 percent now. Of these unfavorably inclined Russians, only 9 percent expressed a strongly negative attitude, compared with 39 percent two years ago (Levada.ru, February 2). Ukraine is presently seen in Russia in a darker light than the US, with 15 percent expressing a strongly negative attitude; and this perception quite possibly informs the behavior of the combatants enduring a harsh winter in the Donbas trenches.
The two-year-old ceasefire in eastern Ukraine has never been stable, and tensions were building for weeks before exploding in the massive cannonade during the closing days of January (Novaya Gazeta, January 31). It is possible, but improbable, that an order to open fire from the big guns came directly from Moscow—or for that matter from Kyiv. It is certain, however, that junior officers and minor warlords on the ground have plentiful incentives to take military matters into their own hands (Republic.ru, February 2). For Ukraine, it is important to ensure that this tragic war is not forgotten in the West; and for the motley Russia-backed rebels, it is essential to establish they are a key party to this major European conflict (Polit.ru, February 2). The degree of control over the tactical situations along the “ceasefire” line by the top brass in Moscow is uncertain, but Russia surely could have stopped the shelling of civilian targets in Avdiivka—and did not (Novaya Gazeta, February 2). This industrial satellite of Donetsk is of no great strategic importance, but it is perfectly positioned to test the changes in the big political picture of this deadlocked war (RBC, February 1).
The Kremlin put the blame for the Avdiivka battle squarely on Ukraine, emphasizing that this war was not a topic of conversation between Putin and Trump (Newsru.com, February 1). That omission kept the Russian war-maker-in-chief in the dark about the position of the new US “decider.” Putin wanted to be sure that Trump really did not care about the Ukrainian calamity (RBC, February 3). But what he ultimately heard from Washington days later was not quite the message he had hoped for: Nikki Haley, the newly-appointed US ambassador to the United Nations, spelled out in her first statement at the UN Security Council a “strong and clear condemnation of Russian aggressive actions” (Moscow Echo, February 3). The artillery duels are still raging, but the intensity has since remarkably subsided.
What made the timing of that surge in fighting rather unfortunate for Putin was that the Iranian leadership decided the moment was right for a ballistic missile test. The response from Trump’s skeleton administration was swift and demonstratively tough: the US Department of the Treasury announced new sanctions targeting 13 persons and 12 companies, including from China (Kommersant, February 3). In the agitated domestic US political arena, this step is unusually uncontroversial, and Defense Secretary James Mattis followed it up by calling Iran the world’s main sponsor of terrorism (RBC, February 4). This resolute stance puts the carefully cultivated Russian-Iranian proto-partnership under pressure (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, February 3). The Kremlin had announced preparations for a visit to Moscow of Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani. But now, such a good-neighborly meeting becomes quite awkward and unhelpful for Russia’s much-desired improvement of relations with the United States (RIA Novosti, January 31). The war in Syria is the only “marketplace” where Putin has assets for bargaining with Trump. Yet, without Iran, the Russian plan for pacifying Syria by empowering President Bashar al-Assad’s embattled regime cannot work.
Another disturbed political arena where the Ukrainian crisis resonated most strongly is Europe, and Putin’s intrigues on this continent combine the export of corruption with cyberattacks (RBC, February 3). He paid a visit to Hungary last week (February 2) seeking to reward those European leaders who remain on speaking terms with him (Kommersant, February 3). He is also keen to hear how these leaders respond to Trump’s casually skeptical attitude toward the European Union (Novaya Gazeta, February 2). The sound of big guns reminds the fidgety Europeans about the need to unite in the face of a direct threat, so Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko has been able to reenergize his cause. The escalation of fighting in Donbas forced him to cut short the visit to Germany but reinforced his proposition to hold a referendum on Ukraine’s application for joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) (Gazeta.ru, February 2). Germany is certainly the main force behind formulating the EU’s policy response to each new crisis, and Putin is keen to add to the visible discord between his resourceful opponent, Chancellor Angela Merkel, and Trump (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, February 3).
A violent spasm in the unwinnable war could have accentuated Europe’s fatigue with the Ukrainian mess and illuminated US indifference to it—but it actually did not. Putin can shrug off this episode and wait for another opportunity, but his best chance to influence the mapping of the course in Washington may actually be now, while many choices are still in flux. The seasoned politician Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka may feel that time is not exactly on Putin’s side. During Lukashenka’s seven-hour-long press conference last Friday (February 3), one particular point that stood out was the firm rejection of a proposal for establishing a Russian airbase in Belarus (Newsru.com, February 3). Today’s Russia is not rich or generous enough to buy friends, and neither is it intimidating enough to induce submission. As long as Ukraine is able to withstand the aggression and fight back, other European states can feel relatively safe. But every sign of a crack in transatlantic solidarity is an invitation for Russia to try another test.
Kremlin turns Donbas aggression on & off like a tap. Evidence: Over 200 trucks munitions & fuel crossing Russian border B4 recent escalation
Trump "doesn't know" who is controlling Russian-backed separatists in #Ukraine. Probably shouldn't have rejected those intel briefings then
Note the tone coming out of Germany.....
Editors of @SPIEGEL_English not fooling around
Last edited by OUTLAW 09; 02-07-2017 at 11:11 AM.
Kremlin announces a "very important phone call to be made by Putin today", no other news given.
Kissinger calls for recognition of Crimea as part of Russia, treating Crimean Tatars as invisible ppl.
http://neweasterneurope.eu/articles-...ict-on-crimea#
Trump on the recent, intense fighting in #Avdiivka: "We don't really know exactly what that is."
https://nyti.ms/2jWrNzt
#
A flow of misinformed and misguided analysis dumbing down #Ukraine's position on the #Donbas war continues.
http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/02/06/...mpaign=buffer#
Separatist ex-cdr Bezler calls upon Donetsk "People's Republic" leader to resign: "Be a man, stop being top clown"
https://vk.com/wall283528124_252#
Last edited by davidbfpo; 02-07-2017 at 01:44 PM. Reason: fix links
https://informnapalm.org/en/russia-p...asion-ukraine/
Is Russia paving the way for admitting its “polite” military invasion of Ukraine?
Russia has changed its official stance on many issues many times. One can hardly expect anything else from a country whose past is rewritten by every new ruler. Presumably, we’ve encountered a situation when Russia will start admitting its involvement in the war against Ukraine. However, they will be doing it gradually and with the familiar cynicism.
Putin has been telling stories about the local “people’s militia” in Crimea with the uniform and equipment purchased from a “surplus shop” since the very onset of war against Ukraine. However, he admitted later that the Ukrainian military units were blocked and disarmed by Russia’s regular forces; InformNapalm—international intelligence community—covered details of the Crimea occupation operation in its OSINT studies a number of times.
Gradually, Russian “political technologists” seem to start paving the way for the admission of the Russian military incursion in Ukraine. Local separatists, numerous Russian mercenaries, and Novorossia advocates have always been aware of the presence of the Russian regular troops and equipment. They’ve even coined a special term — Northerly Wind — to refer to this.
Russians — and Soviets before them — frequently replace conventional terms with some oblique euphemisms or come up with an altogether new terms. For instance, all Soviet Union’s military operations abroad were referred to as “brotherly assistance” or “international duty” in spite of their being acts of aggression and intervention in fact.
Military equipment supply to Donbas is referred to as the Voentorg (“military surplus shop”); Russian troops are known as Otpuskniki (“vacationers”) or Ikhtamnet (“they-are-not-there”) etc. This substitution of terms is a fine psychological move. For instance, the Russian media pushed the term “little green men” upon us, and we have accepted this euphemism instead of referring to the Russian Army.
Is it mere coincidence or a result of the conscious effort of professional media psychologists?
Putin’s jocular reference to rumors of Donald Trump’s adventures in Moscow is a recent example of such substitutions. The word “prostitute” would sound too gross, direct and confrontational, but a comment about “girls with reduced social responsibility” made the media almost ecstatically happy. So, is it mere coincidence or yet another result of the conscious effort of professional media psychologists?
However, let us get back to the Russians’ attempts to make overtures for the admission of the fact of involvement of the Russian military in the War in Donbas. Political scientist Sergey Markov made a statement on Osoboye Mneniye show on Echo of Moscow radio.
His style of speech is somewhat reminiscent of Zhirinovsky at the early stage of his political career. They play similar roles by voicing ideas that have been hatched by the Kremlin, but are too outrageous to be officially announced.
“Yeah, I believe there are “surplus shop” supplies, there are some “vacationers”. According to my sources, there were two “vacations” of one week each. Do you remember that critical moment with the encirclement at Ilovaisk? Indeed, there were some vacationers there, who, so to say, contributed to tightening the noose at Ilovaisk, and they also helped later with the encirclement at Debaltseve. Otherwise, everything has been done by the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) army which Stockholm Institute of Strategic Studies ranked, I believe, fifth or sixth in Europe in terms of its potential.”
#
One can readily notice the euphemisms, such as “vacationers” or “surplus shop”. Markov effectively admits the participation of the Russian military in the war against Ukraine in both Ilovaisk and Debaltseve. So, Russians are trying to console us instead of admitting the fact of the aggression: Yes, there was some involvement but only twice. And “just a bit” doesn’t count.
Russian agitprop might gradually move to such an interpretation of this war with time. For the first three years, Russians kept demanding proofs (“Where’s the evidence?!”) However, the rhetoric can change gradually along the lines of their being unable to stand aloof and having to intervene twice. Merely twice. Many Western partners would even be glad to “accept” this version.
However, let us recall that the first officially recognized Russian POW Andrey Balobanov was captured by the Ukrainian Army on July 16 or 17, 2014, one month before the Battle of Ilovaisk; two more Russian soldiers—Petr Khokhlov and Ruslan Garafiyev—were captured in early August. Both these events occurred before the Battle of Ilovaisk.
GRU special forces soldiers Aleksandr Aleksandrov and Yevgeniy Yerofeyev were captured on May 16, 2015, long after the Battle of Debaltseve. Russian Army major Vladimir Starkov was taken captive in summer 2015, also long after Debaltseve.
InformNapalm analysts have been observing activities of Russian troops in Ukraine from the very beginning of the war until now.
In addition to the regular infantry, there is regular technical military personnel deployed to Donbas on a permanent basis to maintain sophisticated equipment in service only with the Russian Army.
It is important for Ukraine to steal initiative at a right moment and demonstrate their permanent presence. Interestingly, it was after the presentation of our group’s materials to the NATO and the OSCE that LPR and DPR propagandists became more active trying to discredit investigations pursued by the Ukrainian volunteers.
Sooner or later, courts will pass their judgements. Sooner or later, courts will resolve that Russia has been supplying arms to Donbas. Sooner or later, the Northerly Wind will be called the regular Russian Army. And sooner or later, Russia will have to pay reparations to Ukraine for the military aggression and inflicted damage. And this agression will not be reduced to the two episodes.
This publication was prepared by Anton Pavlushko, translated by#Oleksandr Ivanov, edited by Artem Velichko
Latest combat video from front line trenches in #Avdiivka, eastern #Ukraine how Ukrainians repel Rus proxies' attack
http://www.radiosvoboda.org/a/28294572.html
Will Belarus Be Putin’s Next Victim?Originally Posted by Azor
Another Kremlin-driven crisis may be coming to Eastern Europe
http://observer.com/2017/02/belarus-...ladimir-putin/
Belarus rarely makes it into Western news reports, and hardly ever in a positive way. Governed since 1994 by Aleksandr Lukashenka, a Soviet-era throwback strongman—in a perfect touch, he once ran a Communist collective farm—Belarus for decades has been bemoaned as Europe’s last dictatorship thanks to its poor human rights record and less than democratic ways.
Lukashenka has shown little interest in currying Western favor until quite recently. His regime, guided by the strong hand of the secret police—still termed the KGB in fully Soviet fashion—has imprisoned and occasionally disappeared journalists and politicians who get on Lukashenka’s bad side. As full-time Soviet nostalgists, the regime and its leader have pined for days of lost Communist glory, and efforts at liberalization of the economy and society have made little progress in Minsk.
The ramshackle Belarusian economy remains mired in statist inefficiencies, and the only thing that has kept Lukashenka afloat all these years has been Kremlin help. Vladimir Putin long courted Minsk with loans and low prices on imported Russian energy, in exchange receiving Belarus as a vital buffer state against NATO and the West.
Its geographic location, bordering on three members of the Atlantic Alliance—Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia—gives Belarus an undeniable importance to Russia, one which has only increased since 2014, when Moscow’s ties to NATO soured after Putin annexed Crimea and invaded eastern Ukraine. Given perennial Russian fears of invasion from the west, Belarus looms large in Moscow’s military imagination—and war plans.
In practice, the Kremlin has long considered Belarus hardly more than an extension of Russia in security terms.
For years, relations between Moscow and Minsk have been close in defense and intelligence matters, and joint military exercises with Russian and Belarusian forces have been commonplace. Since the latter uses Russian weapons and defense doctrine, and both armies speak the same language, the Kremlin has considered Belarusian forces to be fully interoperable with its own. In Russian war planning, Minsk’s military has counted in the Kremlin’s numbers.
That is changing, however, and the resulting alteration in the strategic balance in Eastern Europe has set off alarm bells in Moscow. There is irony here, since for years it was Lukashenka who wanted closer ties to the Kremlin, not the other way around, even expressing a desire for full political union with Mother Russia. Yet Putin was careful about getting too chummy with the dictator in Minsk, whose unsavory human rights record caused bad headlines on a touchy subject where Moscow didn’t need additional attention from Western governments and NGOs.
The White House is either parroting ridiculous Russian fake news or it is consciously pushing Kremlin disinformation on our Intelligence Community.
Over the last couple years, however, Lukashenka has been quietly distancing himself from his longtime patron, seeking discreet ties with the West. Here the Kremlin’s reducing some of its financial aid to Belarus—for instance, cutting back supplies of cheap oil—has been a key factor.
In reply, Minsk’s position on controversial topics like Ukraine has grown less supinely pro-Russian than Putin expects from longtime clients. Lukashenka’s increasingly pro-Ukrainian position is now out in the open, as revealed by his recent statement that “brotherly Ukraine” is fighting for its independence. Although the Minsk strongman was politic enough to omit whom his neighbor is struggling for independence from, the message was received clearly in Moscow.
Relations between Moscow and Minsk are now on the verge of full-blown crisis. Last week, Lukashenka said that the new airbase which Putin plans to put in his country to serve the Russian air force wasn’t going to happen, lashing out at Moscow in an epic press conference that lasted more than seven hours and brimmed with anti-Kremlin sentiments. In response to deteriorating relations, Moscow has reinstated border controls on its western frontier.
The previously unguarded frontier with Belarus will now be patrolled by the Federal Security Service, Putin’s powerful FSB.
Lukashenka is deeply worried that the displeased Kremlin may try to overthrow his regime, replacing him with someone more pliant to Putin’s wishes. Minsk fears the sudden appearance of Little Green Men, saboteurs and terrorists from Russian intelligence, the shadowy operatives who led the invasion of Crimea three years ago, trying to evict him from power. Here
Lukashenka’s fears are entirely valid, and he faces the difficult predicament that, given the exceptionally close ties between his KGB and Kremlin security services – most Belarusian security higher-ups have been trained in Russian spy schools—he can’t be sure who in Minsk is really on his side.
Therefore, it’s no surprise that Lukashenka is flexing his muscles right now, trying to send a message of strength while assessing who in Belarus is loyal to whom. There’s a major military exercise underway right now that includes building obstacles on the main highway that runs from Minsk to the Russian border.
Reservists have been called up for these exercises, including retired military officers returned to service, to practice stemming a possible Russian invasion.
Arseniy Sivitskiy, director of Minsk’s Center for Strategic and Foreign Policy Studies, which is Belarus’ only think-tank devoted to such matters, in a new interview suggests that Putin may be using the current chaos in Washington, with the still-forming Trump administration seemingly at sea about which direction its foreign policy will take, to move against Lukashenka.
What’s coming may range from subversion and intimidation by Russian intelligence to all-out invasion, according to Sivitskiy. Although Sivitsky doubts that the worst-case scenario will happen, the real nightmare is that Moscow may resort to the use of tactical nuclear weapons against NATO if any aggression against Belarus does not go according to Russian plans.
Then there’s the knotty issue of what exactly the White House would do. Belarus isn’t in NATO and it cannot expect overt Western help against Putin.
But would President Trump do anything at all in the event of Russian aggression against yet another neighbor? The new administration’s repeated public fawning over the Kremlin, plus its exceptionally tepid support for Ukraine as fighting increases there between the Russian military and Kyiv’s forces, provide ample room to wonder which side Trump is really on here.
Not to mention the weird question which the White House recently asked the Intelligence Community about Belarus. According to a new AP report, “national security aides have sought information about Polish incursions in Belarus.”
It should be noted that Poland, a stalwart NATO member, has conducted zero incursions into Belarus, and the notion is frankly bizarre outside the paranoid halls of the Kremlin and pro-Russian websites that seek to stir up anti-NATO sentiments with fake news.
However, Polish military incursions into Belarus have featured prominently in recent Russian military exercises, namely ZAPAD (West) 2009 and 2013, where a Drang nach Osten by Warsaw was the exercise scenario—twice.
Therefore, the White House is either parroting ridiculous Russian fake news or it is consciously pushing Kremlin disinformation on our Intelligence Community.
Neither option bodes well for security and stability in Europe right now. Belarus is on NATO’s doorstep, unlike Crimea or eastern Ukraine, and the possibility for any military crisis there spiraling dangerously out of control is real. It would be best for all sides if any such crisis is averted before it unfolds.
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