Millions of us might be **** if we ignore the Russian-Ukraine war

[John Hill]

If I understand correctly the Pope's message is that one should not continue a war if there is no prospect of winning. Who is of the opinion that Ukraine should give up the fight?

[probes]

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Multiple reports that Russian freedom fighters, including the Freedom of Russia Legion, Russian Volunteer Corps, and the Siberian Battalion, have started assorted actions.
Regions appear to include Kursk and Belgorod.
Attacks are reported to be co-ordinated between these units. Obviously the Ukrainians won't be officially co-ordinating.
Claimed destruction of a Russian border force BTR in this video - locaton unknown at preswent, but someone will probably ID it within a couple of hours.

https://mstdn.social/@noelreports/112081580366907412

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

This is what I was expecting this year.
There will probably be a 2-3 day bunch of attacks now, with putin's re-election coming up at the end of the week.
Then there'll be a bunch more starting in May.
They will attempt to get Russian regular units redeployed back to the Russian border.
The Russians will probably send reinforcements/rotation troops to the border, leaving those on the front line in Ukraine weaker/more tired.
Then the fun will really start in late June with a Ukrainian attack somewhere.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

I have ID'ed the location of the BTR destruction in the previous video.
It's in Tetkino, Kursk, Russia, here
https://www.google.com/maps/place/51%C2 ... ?entry=ttu
Only a couple of miles over the border, with forest approach. Standard MO.

Update:
There's a second incursion at Lozovaya Rudka, about 90 miles further along the border, nearer Kharkhiv.
Standard MO again, and also fits the pattern of separation of attacks that they used 2 years ago.
The Russians will have little or no armed presence in the small settlements occupied, and will need to deploy two separate units to deal with the two incursions.

[probes]

Yep, + Budanov's warnings on the Crimea where they "are preparing ground (and air) for further operations".
Birdstrike, they say. "crashed on the territory of a cemetery", they say.


And an explosion in metal works plant in Bashkorostan.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Looks like the #4 engine caught fire.
Also looks like they got it extinguished.
Presumably some other problem caused the crash, such as wing damage.

Looks like there's some serious stuff going on in Belgorod itself.
The Russian military have evacuated and closed the central bus station.
There's a video from the outskirts with at least 3 large explosions audible.
A large admin building in the centre of town shows artillery/explosion damage.

There are a couple of other video floating around which do not come from the already known incursion points (I've checked).
Like this one. We can hear small arms fire in what looks like a significant town, then a drone impacts the building right in front of the camera!

https://mstdn.social/@noelreports/112082498712787475

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

The Russians claimed to have repelled all border incursions, destroying 6 tanks, 20 APCs, Caesar SPGs, and 100 troops (and, as some wag put it, the Starship Enterprise also).

Meanwhile, the insurgents claim to currently have complete control of Tetkino, Russia, and have shown video of what they say is the remaining Russian troops running away.
There's also video of an insurgent tank firing. It's sporting an EU flag.
There's not enough detail to geolocate the videos yet.

Take your pick.

There's also been a drone strike on the corporate office of a chicken products company, in a town south of Belgorod.
Looks like a very precise strike on a particular room in the building, straight through a window.
My best guess is either the Russian military were using it, or the room housed some particular company boss who also had a regional war/police function.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

The Vatican is backpedalling like mad about the Pope's comments.
It's what we discussed, about any Russian peace offer having to be genuine.
They are only speaking to 'Vatican-friendly' media.
I expect he'll keep his mouth shut for a while now.

There appears to be a border breach at the Kharkiv-Belogorod main highway crossing point.
There is damage to both sets of customs facilities.
Russia is claiming a destroyed insurgent tank.
Well, it's lost a track, but the engine is clearing still running as the sprockets are going round.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

The Su-35s are apparently there as close fighter escort only for the Su-34 glide bomb carriers.
No extra bombs on the Su-35s

The drone in the earlier video appears to have hit a hardware store in south Belgorod city.
It is right next door to a power station, which I guess was the intended target.
I would also speculate that the small arms fire was local troops trying to hit the drone, which they may have done, causing it to miss.
No indication yet that there are any insurgents in Belgorod itself.
The troops occupying the bus station were probably requisitioning the buses to get troops to the border incursion areas, and/or co-opting the station as a loading point for other transport.
We may infer that the border troops have insufficient organic transport due to it all being in Ukraine.

The Russian border troops running away are about 30km NW of the Lozovaya Rudka incursion.
Unknown whether they are running from insurgent troops, which would mean at least a fourth incursion point, or UAVs.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

How important is your journey?

A memory from 2 years ago

[PHXPhlyer]

Looks like a shuffleboard player could be of some use there.

PP

[probes]

Now, let us imagine. Generally it's considered quite a done deal that putin will get his votes (82% set as a goal) even without any fraud. What if there were more facilities in fire every day? Would people think twice before going to a specific address? Per putin's propaganda the UKR are killing ruz noble nation brutally (in contrast to them, who are progressing very slowly, deliberately slowly, to spare civilians - heard it with my own ears!), so...
And he can't have air defence for every single oil refinery (petrol export is stopped already) and mil facility. ruz is vast...

P.S the birdstricken plane had a A-50 crew onboard. Too good to be true, of course, but.

[probes]

The Lukoil refinery fire: Industry sources told Reuters on condition of anonymity that the main crude distillation unit (AVT-6) at NORSI was damaged in the attack, which means that at least half of the refinery's production is halted. Lukoil declined to comment.
NORSI refines about 15.8 million tonnes of Russian crude a year, or 5.8% of total refined crude, according to industry sources.
It also refines about 4.9 million tonnes of gasoline, 11% of Russia's total, 6.4% of diesel fuel, 5.6% of fuel oil and 7.4% of the country's aviation fuel, according to industry sources.

Ryazan Refinery on fire, too.

[probes]

air defence wasn't effective (it's a big facility actually), and equipment hit, not just the storage tanks. Big deal.



that's a funny one - the blokes are discussing: flying, see? shoot, f* someone, shoot! see, falling... f* shockwave! (and it's far evedently). Another refinery, two more hit today.
drones and blast

As for the 'birdstricken' plane - an engine caught fire and somehow its pilot couldn't do anything much (the reports say). Also, as there were so few people on board, it must have been above 'average' level flight (= some VIPs).

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Claimed destruction of a Russian BMP-1 in Gor'kovskyii, Russia.
This is just over the border, usual MO.
I have geolocated it to here
https://www.google.com/maps/place/50%C2 ... ?entry=ttu

There's no indication one way or the other of a ground incursion here, which would be a new location if it were. It could just be a drone strike from across the border.

In fact, there are an awful lot of videos, from both sides, which are difficult to assess the reality of with regards to these incursions.
With the Russian volunteer insurgents, this is understandable. This is the first time they've used drones in any numbers, and their video editing / media unit is probably two old guys from a local newspaper that went bust 10 years ago.
Or, it could be a sophisticated attempt to spread misinformation that's been made to look like two old guys..etc.
The Russian material looks mostly staged, but could be real because it is to be expected that volunteer insurgents would make basic errors that result in the Russians hitting them early.

We will need a day or two until some of these videos can be verified one way or the other, or more corroborating evidence emerges.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

The Lukoil refinery fire must be really serious - the vice president of Lukoil, Vitaly Vladimirovich Robertus, just died!

https://lukoil.ru/PressCenter/Pressrele ... o-lukoil_1

Probably an acute case of PublicFarkUpFourDaysBeforeputinsReelectionitis.

For our regular readers of Russian fatal "accidents", there is no indication yet of which floor the balcony was on

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Update to earlier post on Gor'kovskyii
https://mstdn.social/@noelreports/112089340723912725
Not a BMP-1, but two BRDM-1Ks claimed destroyed.
It's a very long time since I knew all the Rooskie vehicles, but I think they are both BMPs, and BMP-2s at that.
Take a look at the blown hatches at 0:12 and 0:19
The BMPs are the ones with the trapezoidal front panel, and the circular hatches on the port side.
The first one at 0:12 definitely has two turret hatches, i.e. BMP-2, and the BMP-1 only has one.

[probes]

Bad news about 3 UKR mil MI helicopters being hit.

To balance, the burning oil refineries are more effective to cut profits for ruz than the sanctions up to now.

I read an interview with a UKR-side trooper, who said it's beyond any mind how the ruz sends group after group until the UKR guns are hot red or shells run out and the ruz blokes just keep coming to certain death, wave after wave.

[tango15]

Bad news about 3 UKR mil MI helicopters being hit.

To balance, the burning oil refineries are more effective to cut profits for ruz than the sanctions up to now.

I read an interview with a UKR-side trooper, who said it's beyond any mind how the ruz sends group after group until the UKR guns are hot red or shells run out and the ruz blokes just keep coming to certain death, wave after wave.

From my own dealings with Russians over many years, I think it's something in the mindset. Many times I talked to otherwise rational people about death or circumstances leading to it, and they were quite fatalistic about it. "Что будет, то будет," (what will be will be), they used to say. I can only imagine that a high proportion of those who are pressganged into going to the front have a similar view. If you read the Russian classics, there is a lot of sadness in them, and since they were basically the only books available for 70 years, (apart from a couple of Dicken's books, so no change there!), I can imagine how this slips into the consciousness.