it's all Xed out.A few maps showing the recent losses or points of pressure for Russia;
Why would Putin want to state an event that made him look weak and ineffectual?If this is legit it makes me wonder if Wagner marching on Moscow wasn't some sort of ruse and staged. Some people are damn good with Photoshop, tho.
Why would Putin want to state an event that made him look weak and ineffectual?
So you have Putin and Prigozhin in the same building rubbing shoulders with the same people -- if Putin believed the scenario made him out to look weak and ineffectual it wouldn't be happening. If there was bad blood and this were to be found true Prigozhin wouldn't be walking around Russia.Why would Putin want to state an event that made him look weak and ineffectual?
I think the more likely answer is that Putin is actually weak and can’t kill him.So you have Putin and Prigozhin in the same building rubbing shoulders with the same people -- if Putin believed the scenario made him out to look weak and ineffectual it wouldn't be happening. If there was bad blood and this were to be found true Prigozhin wouldn't be walking around Russia.
As for staging an event, perhaps to portray Wagner is no longer an active concern (no longer attached to the hip with Russia) only to drive south from Belarus at a later date after they're fully regrouped ... perhaps with the Belarusian military in-tow who they're allegedly training at this moment.
If that actually did pan out people 200 years from now would still be talking about it. Or, the picture from that tweet is a complete fabrication which I hope is true instead.
Even if this were accurate, and I don’t think it is, that doesn’t answer my question. What benefit accrues to Putin for faking a mutiny?We've been over this though: that isn't how Russians think. period.
What matters most to them is who is in charge. No matter what happens, as long as that person maintains control, he is always strong, always in charge. Russians are extremely subservient people across most of the population and generations of gaslighting keeps them in a state of perpetual autocrat worship. Until he is killed in such a coup or displaced, the Russians will always consider him strong.
It's really the only explanation for repeated instances of the same exact thing happening in Russia for generations. This is why people like Trump and the GOP are so jealous of Putin and very much want to turn the US into that kind of unredeemable shithole.
If Putin gets killed and displaced: fine, he was too weak. There it is, and probably within a month it will be like he never existed. He suddenly gets ignored in their history.
Every Russian to a person is brought up being taught that WW2 was started by the Germans and was only between Germany and Mother Russia. That's it. They never learn about the allies. They certainly never learn that Russia actually started the war, and was allied with Germany for most of it. It was about glorious Russia killing Nazi Germans. To this day, most any Russian that grew up in Russia, or in the Baltics in those cloistered Russian enclaves where they never think they are anywhere but Russia, believe these complete fantasies about much of history.
They don't have the tools to think any other way, because this kind of information is long forbidden there, and it isn't coming back any time soon.
By doing something that will encourage more disloyalty? That makes no sense.^^^^ Uncovering possible disloyals in upper ranks.
I've wondered for over a year now why Belarus isn't more involved in the war.Even if this were accurate, and I don’t think it is, that doesn’t answer my question. What benefit accrues to Putin for faking a mutiny?
The Reagan arms buildup was awesome. We've killed off a bunch of US arms companies - he quoted a17k figure (this is bad - and more complicated than an Op-ed can address). Even if we threw a $1T US every year, we couldn't restore our military industrial base (probably true). We need a WWII type effort to supply ammo to the AFU (true to an extent). We buy stuff for the military from all over the world including China (okay, that's a bit nuts if true). Biden is a bozo because he isn't acting fast enough and doesn't even listen to is own advice (my paraphrase - whatever). So, pretty standard George Will stuff."It's time to end the era of the Great Distraction."
Can somebody scan the George Will word spew and give me a hint as to what he's on about? Or on?
I've wondered for over a year now why Belarus isn't more involved in the war.
This AP article makes a good point about pinning things on Belarus and taking some heat off of Russia itself.
If that actually does pan out it has been very, very slow to come to fruition. I think Belarus ends up in the mix before everything is said and done. Putin has placated Luka by delivering nukes to Belarus, who to Luka provides some security assurance because you don't attack a country that sports nuclear weapons. You just don't. Nobody does. Nobody is going to. Everybody understands this.
If that article turns out true at all, Putin could behave very badly behind Belarus and if Prigozhin really is in that tweet above he's completely in on basically taking over Belarus from behind the scenes in conjunction with Putin. But you wouldn't see it coming, because Wagner marched on Moscow. Because you have people asking on forums why would Putin permit appearing weak and ineffectual, lol.
But hey man, I'm no fortune teller. We'll find out won't we.
Wagner runs an African enforcement and mineral extraction empire.So you have Putin and Prigozhin in the same building rubbing shoulders with the same people
They just had a meeting about who's beaks get wet.Wagner runs an African enforcement and mineral extraction empire.
Prigozhin is needed as a representative of the company to address concerns associated. The African dictators each get a profit share from Wagner operations of the enslaved workers at the mines.
And if any of them would host former Russian politicians in 'retirement'....They just had a meeting about who's beaks get wet.
Why Belarus isn't more involved is simple. They're poor, the army is mostly poorly trained conscripts, their hardware is bad, the army is generally politically unreliable, Lula is unpopular and always at risk of being overthrown, the war isn't popular, they don't have deep stocks to draw on, so they'd be little help and also Lula would be very vulnerable.
I think the more likely answer is that Putin is actually weak and can’t kill him.
If this was staged it was the dumbest stunt ever as Putin undermined his own rule.
that was a great movieHow Americans imagine Russia:
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Accurate Russia:
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There can be more than one mafia in that place that calls itself a state.My take away as well. The cook's got enough money/siloviki on his side he's protected, it's the only way he wasn't disappeared or locked away in Lefortovo. Putin is very much still on thin ice.
Russians care how they look to the outside world, Putin cares. Look at them boil away over their African summit being a total embarrassing flop. There are easier less humiliating ways to conduct purges, and this has been anything but standard OP for Putin and the Kremlin lately. Those artisanal choppers and the guys in them that got smoked by Wagner, that's not ruse fodder. Not when you're running out of things during an active invasion.
Hmm.. those Boebert genes gets around...Can't make this stuff up: