Tech decline bites Musk

A long time back I remarked that eye of Soros has fallen on Musk. It is starting to look like that the hand of Soros is going to fall upon him.

American technology has been declining across the board. Some stuff started declining in the seventies, and as time went by, more and more things went into decline.

Apple is still advancing cpu design, but they have no in house capability to actually implement those designs in hardware. They depend on Taiwan Semiconductor. AMD and Intel just put more circuits of their old design on the chip when TSM upgrades its chip fab technology.

But the one shining counter example to tech decline has been Musk and SpaceX.

Musk’s internet in space has the highest satellite technology (those laser links are a big advance in space to space communication), but the key requirement is the capability to launch huge numbers of satellites cheaply.

For which he needs Starship. Not to mention making mankind interplanetary.

Currently the FAA is slow walking approval. When something gets slow walked in this manner, chances are that approval will never be forthcoming, or will be approved with poison pill conditions.

The vast majority of the objections that they are supposedly so carefully evaluating are just random variations on a script, a very familiar pro forma script, with the word “pipeline” replaced by “rocket”. This is a stalling tactic while bureaucratic infighting over the real decision continued. Reading between the lines, it starting to look like the bureaucratic infighting has ended in victory for a priesthood that sees techies as adherents of a hostile faith. They no longer need to manufacture stalls, they can just stall.

On the other hand, it is going to be mighty embarrassing if the US government has send men to space station by hitching rides on Russian rockets again. The rhetoric of progress is a key part of progressive ideology. We are supposedly so much wiser than our ignorant racist sexist predecessors, and supposedly all this wonderful technology makes the advance of the left inevitable and irreversible. They don’t want to kill off space access, but may be unable to restrain themselves.

If, as is likely, Starship is sitting on the launch stand ready for its first orbital test, and the FAA is still indefinitely stalling the launch, some top level pressure may be applied to approve it. I was quite surprised when the obvious desire for war with Russia was reigned in from above. Perhaps the same may happen with Starship.

They perceive access to space is status and power for an enemy faith. One big reason for Musk’s success is that when he hires people, he shows profound disrespect for official Ivy League qualifications. He and his organization are not putting the right people in power over his rockets. They don’t like that. (They don’t like open source software either, and Linux has succumbed to the demon worshipers.)

If Musk wants to get us to space, it starting to look like a launch facility on the periphery of the Chinese hegemony or the Russian empire might be necessary, or the borderlands between the US empire and the other two. The Russians seem to have given him an invitation for a launch facility in Russia, but that is likely to prove a little close to the bear’s embrace.

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680 Responses to “Tech decline bites Musk”

  1. Cloudswrest says:

    Re: Tech decline. Just noticed this tidbit factoid from the past regarding the construction of the Empire State Building. ~13 months from star to finish.

    Construction started: March 17, 1930
    Opened: April 11, 1931

  2. Steven C says:

    I recall a series of science-fiction novels in which an American space-resources billionnaire, faced with punitive taxes and regulations, relocated from the US to Mexico. I’m not saying that Mexico would be the best destination for Elon Musk, but there might be some jurisdiction better than the US.

    • jim says:

      Mongolia is interesting. Reasonably high IQ population, buffer state foreign policy. Chinese ruled Mongolia gets a long leash from China, and Russian aligned Mongolia gets a long leash from Russia, because both China and Russia want buffers between them, and the Mongolians cheerfully milk that.

      UAE is interesting. US aligned, but very much aware that the Global American Empire is in decline and quietly hedging its bets. Significant high IQ racial minorities.

      North East Asia is interesting, lot of Chinese level IQ populations, but more initiative and creativity than Chinese among some substantial racial groups. Still weak compared to whites, but considerably stronger than the Chinese. US aligned, but hedging its bets.

      • Aryaman says:

        Who are the high IQ minorities in UAE?

        Singapore / Malaysia? If a significant number of white people emigrate – India?

  3. Curious Anon says:

    Hello Jim. May you tell what’s your opinion on this blog’s claims?

    [*shill link deleted*]

    He has a rather decently researched history on the current global elite’s coming (linking occultism for one). He also critiques the Alt-Right’s positive stances towards China and Russia, nothing that both countries are in activity rather pozzed (Russia having swarms of Muslims within it for one).

    2ndly, do you think it’s inaccurate to say that the elites as a whole like George Soros etc. Al rather than puppets like Biden and Hillary are cunning and know what they’re doing?

    • jim says:

      As soon as I saw the blog post title “Interactive 3D principal component analysis of the human race” I knew this was a shill link. If a real link, would say “human races”.

      Upon examining the “”Interactive 3D principal component analysis” I found it supposedly showed that Anglos are about half way between plains apes and Russians, being slightly closer to the Russians, which does not seem very likely for any genuine principal component analysis.

      The article “Naming the Enemy” starts off with all sorts of good stuff, and accurately references all sorts of good memes without misrepresenting them. And then reaches the conclusion that the enemy is the matador’s cape.

      It correctly describes the ngos as the enemy, while neglecting to notice that the top of the ngos are run by people who have a state department hat and an ngo hat at their disposal, and a Soros budget and state department budget at their disposal, and were which ever hat is appropriate to their latest action, and bill their activies to whichever budget is appropriate, and that Soro’s wealth was ultimate granted by the American taxpayer.

      The target of the “Naming the Enemy” shilling operation is the meme “Global American Empire”. The target of the race related shill article is race realism.

  4. Starman says:

    Fun part.

    The niggers that globohomo imported into Ukraine to replace its White population are trying desperately to flee.

    I don’t think the niggers will have a future in White countries after the old DC regime falls.

    https://twitter.com/Damilare_arah/status/1497654141350522880

    • Pooch says:

      LOL!

    • Drie-By Reactionary says:

      For a second I thought “why are they being prevented from leaving?” but then I remembered Ukraine is part of GAE and therefore does exactly the opposite of what I would do.

  5. The Cominator says:

    Jim your take on the retarded insane booting of Russia from SWIFT on a weekend day after saying all week they wouldn’t do it…

  6. Pooch says:

    Now it’s clear why Ukraine is really ramping up the underdog the can still vibe to insane levels which Western press just mindlessly repeats. They are trying to convince the US that Russia is actually a much weaker foe than anticipated and US intervention will put Ukraine over the top to victory.

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      The twat you shared led to an interesting rabbit hole…

      https://twitter.com/wayofftheres/status/1497608619386228738

      https://twitter.com/TuckerMax/status/1497609615151800323

      The comments are illuminating as well. You see other people intelligently corroborating the assertions, as well the pr-programmed “RUS bot!/Putler lover/etc” responses.

      • Guy says:

        You asked Jim below for a timeline on the kazak color rev attempt compared to corona restrictions ending. It may not line up exactly, but as they planned for that attempt, likely motivated by knowledge Russia was about to mobilize, they might have started priming for the corona narrative wind-down. So maybe it didn’t start after the color rev. failed, but as they were prepping for this whole event in general.

        Media stage managing of the conflict didn’t mean it’s”fake”, but that they’re trying to take advantage. This war might just be some window dressing for further”great reset”related plans, but Putin’s Christian signaling makes that harder to believe.

        Criticism of the prediction that COVID worshipping would continue until we’re all dead (also from below) seems premature. I didn’t think Jim literally meant until every single person is dead, but enough might have AIDS by now that it’s basically good enough.

      • ExileStyle says:

        Something is definitely way off about this all. The near absence of authentic images/info coming organically from the ground suggests almost complete, wartime-level censorship.

        Arab Spring, a decade ago: thousands, tens of thousands of organic on-the-ground reports from obviously real people. Maidan 2014, similar. Even Kabul as late as last year. Now? Almost nothing, and that little which gets out is all almost identical and half later proven to be fake and from years ago.

        Hell, Kiev is a city of 3 million people. 40 millions in Ukraine. Before 2/22/22 there was probably more social media action of people walking their dogs and eating kebap on the streets than there are now in the midst of “the most super-duper-serious-hyper-important war since 1945!!! Omg Zelenskyy, syuch hyero.” (I guess we’re spelling everything with more Ys now?)

        In 2020 they so completely fine-tuned the censorship apparatus – maybe with the help of machine learning when everyone was home all the time – that it seems a whole damn country’s worth of information can simply mysteriously all but disappear.

        I get more reports about gun action in my old American hometown than about in Ukraine, and I haven’t spent ungodly hours searching for it over days…”social media” is about as grassroots, organic, and democratic as a cheap broadsheet in Moscow in 1937…

        Creepy, but not surprising anymore sadly. The internet is just dead.

        • Joe W. says:

          The flood of propaganda and almost total absence of real news has been unreal. I didn’t think it was possible to pump out that much propaganda in such a short amount of time.

  7. Adam says:

    There was a lot of surprise in recent posts that the cathedral has backed off Corona demon worship. Now looking at this conflict in Ukraine, does it seem likely that the powers that be needed to focus their attention on Russia? Something took their attention. I had thought another apple cart was about to be looted, but maybe pressure from Putin had more to do with it.

    • jim says:

      The backoff happened shortly after color revolution was suppressed in Khazakstan.

      This may be similar to strangely sudden end of first wave feminism in America after the 1933 German elections.

      Normally when a color revolution is suppressed, the Cathedral intervenes militarily to protect the oppressed and victimized protesters, which is why they are able to use violence against the state that they are overthrowing, and the state is unable to use violence against them.

      This may have been the moment when the USG started reading reports of its profound military weakness.

      But if that was the case we would expect a sudden end of jabs for the military, and a sudden forgetfulness about the rights of women, gays and transgenders in the military.

      We should also start seeing movies depict that manly violent men.

      I still recollect that story within a story depicted in Avatar, the last airbender, where the Avatar gang, in very thin disguise, go to watch a play about themselves. It was a thinly veiled complaint by the screenwriters about the story they were writing, and it parodied the themes you saw in Avatar and see in every story – the utterly emasculated hero, and the manly kick ass warrior women. Those screenwriters were not happy with the restrictions on story telling.

      • Red says:

        If they’re going to get ready for war, they’re going to have to let Musk finish his rockets. We’ll see.

        • Starman says:

          @Red

          “If they’re going to get ready for war, they’re going to have to let Musk finish his rockets. We’ll see.”

          Elon is the only reason the USG has space superiority over Russia and China.

          • Pooch says:

            USG has no type of supremacy with niggers and women at the helm regardless of technology. Indeterminate if they’ll be able to role that shit back in actual war like they did in the 40s.

            • Starman says:

              @Pooch

              ” USG has no type of supremacy with niggers and women at the helm regardless of technology.”

              The USG has space supremacy over Russia and China because of Elon (two thirds of global annual orbital up mass with just the Falcon 9).

              But it has no air superiority anymore.

              And it’s ground armies and police are a joke. To be overtaken by PMCs eventually (like South Africa).

      • Kunning Drueger says:

        Jim, can you corroborate that assertion (back-off on Coronachan and Kazakhstan) with a timeline? It is not that I don’t trust you, I trust you implicitly specifically because of how many times I’ve been flat wrong in disagreeing with you. But 2 thoughts occurred when I read your comment: midwits and busybodies love timelines ( i can vouch), and we don’t seem to use a lot of those in this tribe. The meme potential of a well crafted timeline is excellent because it jogs the big thonk for people with short attention spans. I might be off base on this, but I think that is a particular meme/psyop that could be pretty darn useful.

      • Kunning Drueger says:

        Also, we are not the same America that we were in the 1930s, so there would be an equivalent tone-softening, not an exact replica. The forgetfulness will probably be about pedo-normalization and other fringe concepts but leave “bedrock” progressive principles intact.

    • Attention says:

      Predictions around here have been poor lately. Disastrous faith put in Trump, prediction of the Corona Worship being pushed until we are all dead, prediction that Trump would be imprisoned and the insane Left grabbing the reins of power.

      While Namefag Yarvin’s predictions have been fairly good.

      • Starman says:

        @Attention

        ”Predictions around here have been poor lately. Disastrous faith put in Trump, prediction of the Corona Worship being pushed until we are all dead, prediction that Trump would be imprisoned and the insane Left grabbing the reins of power.

        While Namefag Yarvin’s predictions have been fairly good.”

        You’re exactly right. That’s why I’ve stopped paying attention to most of the comments here.

        • jim says:

          > > While Namefag Yarvin’s predictions have been fairly good.”

          > You’re exactly right. That’s why I’ve stopped paying attention to most of the comments here.

          My prediction has always been total war, mass murder on a very large scale, or total collapse around 2026 or so.
          Events remain on track for that prediction.

          I have been predicting it for twenty years or so, and on this blog, for at least ten years.

          We still have “everyone must get vaxxed endlessly” enforcement in most places, despite increasing indication of cumulative damage.

          We still have a solid diet of weak men and strong women in the media.

          The courtship dance may not be realistically depicted.

          We still have hordes of enemies being flown in.

          The flooding of America with enemies has escalated. We are seeing some hesitancy in vaxing everyone to death, but the vax enforcement is still at levels likely to kill most normies if vaxing has significant cumulative effect, and it rather looks as if it does have significant cumulative effect.

          Money printing continues to escalate.

          The general trend to greater and greater abnormality at shorter and shorter intervals is still in place. Yarvin’s prediction was that it would slow down, or somewhat stabilize. This has not happened.

          2012/07/14:

          The long predicted crisis has arrived. The question is does the current order collapse around 2026 or so, when we have some technological and cultural capability remaining, or do we, like post Roman Britain and today’s North Korea, go all the way back to the stone age around 2080 or so, with only a handful of the rich elite possessing metal artifacts, while the masses scratch at the ground with digging sticks?

          2012/11/05

          I say collapse or civil war II in 2026. He is saying 2022.

          If it is 2022, I will surely say I was right, and if it is 2026, he will surely say he was right.

          Well it is now 2022, and things are happening a whole lot faster than they were ten years ago.

          2018/04/11

          As we approach the left singularity, infinite leftism in finite time, it becomes increasingly hard to make predictions.

          I think things blow up around 2026. I also think elections will have ceased to matter some time before 2026.

          There will be increasingly dramatic events next week, next month, and next year. The new abnormal will soon become even more abnormal.

          Am I a good prophet, or a damned good prophet?

          2019/04/29

          I suspect that elections may well become transparently irrelevant by late 2020.

          But if elections still matter in 2020, the Left’s response will likely render elections irrelevant not very long thereafter.

          I still estimate the left singularity for 2026, but as we approach 2026, expect the unexpected.

          Well am I damned good prophet? Give me an answer?. Did Moldubug predict what has happened, and what is continuing to happen? I did.

          2020/12/17

          If Biden gets in, then the people pulling his strings will find that the way they got in makes it impossible to get anything done. Until they start shooting judges and public servants, which I expect to start happening around 2026 or so if Trump fails to start shooting people sooner than that.

          It is not that moderation and sanity is prevailing, it is that incapacity is prevailing.

          2021/08/01

          I continue to predict very large scale violence in 2026 or so, as I have been predicting for decades, but I was thinking that with Trump out of the way we would continue to see escalation in the violence as left wing factions turned up the heat on each other- and in some respects we have seen more violence, for example the Churches burning, but the coalition is holding quite well. The left factions are not turning up the heat on each other. I was expecting some more Epsteins by now.

          I conjecture that we are still in the phase of coalition building preparatory for serious power struggle. Which could continue for quite a while. The plan, or a plan of several mutually incompatible plans, is to eliminate the Republicans in the mid terms, and, Republicans eliminated, then go for each other.

          You heard it hear first. As you heard that democracy was shortly going to abandoned here first.

          We shall see.

          • Pooch says:

            Yarvin’s prediction was that it would slow down, or somewhat stabilize

            He never said that. Yarvin’s prediction, given in 2008, is that our future is South Africa and Venezuela. He has never deviated off that prediction. I don’t see that being proven wrong. In fact, seems going right along as predicted.

            • The Cominator says:

              Venezuala as the future is possible and its extremely bleak.

              South Africa isn’t possible, South Africa relies on the American Empire to keep 100 white guys from banding together and taking over the government. If America becomes South Africa than it will be ruled by a white warlord who seizes power a month later.

              • Pooch says:

                South Africa is already here in plenty of places. Go to Baltimore and decide what continent you are on.

                • The Cominator says:

                  Various corrupt negropolises is not South Africa

                • jim says:

                  The blacks in South Africa are the Cathedrals pets, and the blacks in Baltimore are the Cathedral’s pets.

                  Yarvin’s prediction is that there will be a petkeeper forever. But South Africa and Baltimore are incapable of keeping pets. If America becomes South Africa, no more pets.

                • Pooch says:

                  Yarvin’s prediction is that there will be a petkeeper forever.

                  Not his prediction. You keep confidently asserting what his predictions are, yet admit you never read his blog.

                  His prediction is that we will slowly slide into a barely functioning third world country in similar fashion of the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

                  Maybe when it becomes a non-functional failed state, 100 whites take over. He hasn’t ruled that out, but it is going to be a rather painful period of anarcho-tyranny until we get there in the same way South Africa is experiencing a rather painful state of anarcho-tyranny to get there.

                • Pooch says:

                  Various corrupt negropolises is not South Africa

                  It absolutely is.

                • jim says:

                  Baltimore does not keep pets. They are pets. No petkeeper, no pets.

            • Neofugue says:

              Namefag Yarvin in one of his newer interviews predicted Brezhvevian decline, that once Trump would be out of office the Left would begin to cease insanity as they would no longer feel there was resistance against their power.

              Obviously given the events of the past two years this prediction was false.

              • Pooch says:

                Have not heard that. Do you have a link? I am an avid Yarvin reader and listener and what I’ve heard and read is Brezhevian decline into a third world country. Seem like thats going right on as predicted.

                What I heard about Trump was that he predicted with Trump out of power the energy level of the left would lower. That prediction was true.

                • jim says:

                  > he predicted with Trump out of power the energy level of the left would lower. That prediction was true.

                  That prediction will be tested come November.

                • Oscar C. says:

                  I like Yarvin despite his horrible diction on podcasts/interviews and his tendency to fill his articles with trivia.

                  However, predicting “Brezhnevian decline into a third world country” is quite an easy guess.

                  America becoming a new Brazil, albeit richer and nuclearized, seems the obvious development right now. The only question would be whether the 21st century USA can siphon enough high IQ human capital from across the world to stay relevant against China.

                  Which is what the famous David P Goldman columnist defends:

                  https://asiatimes.com/2022/01/us-needs-more-asians-to-avoid-demographic-death/

                  Jim’s predictions are way more risky. I think that is what makes them more interesting.

      • The Cominator says:

        We had to put faith in Trump while there was any chance of victory, Trump failed on the same thing Yarvin failed on. He believed in Covid for a time. Perhaps he could have seized power on January 6th, perhaps he could have installed better people and perhaps not. Perhaps he was hamstrung… Hard to know. I like to think he could have picked better people and that he had a real choice but perhaps not…

        But he could have denounced covid and lockdowns strongly from the beginning without once making a break and pounded the table on the South Korean data… and I think that would have saved him and saved us.

        Now I never did much believe in covid except as perhaps some flu or engineered cold variant that may have been slightly worse. Predicting the future is hard and nobody is very good at it because you never have all the information and you must do multivariable analysis beyond what even the greatest human minds are capable of, seeing bullshit in the present is easy. And I am good at that.

  8. Severian says:

    Russian troops already fighting in Mykolaiv, west of the Dnieper.
    The southern front seems to be collapsing rapidly.

  9. Red says:

    Normiecom tier article on why the invasion’s happening.

    https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/ukraines-deadly-gamble

  10. Basil says:

    You, as before, proceed from the false premise that Putin is not globohomo. In reality, he just wants the progress of globohomo to freeze at a certain level of decay, and this simply never works, just like vanilla conservatism does not work. Perhaps this is due to sentimentalism in relation to the most progressive state of the twentieth century – the Soviet Union. Do you really think that Ukrainians need to endure defeat and the costs associated with it in order to get such an insignificant and unstable improvement? Do you think that the position of the Russians will improve after the conquest of Ukraine?
    Modern Russia is not the northern snow kingdom of the ancient Rus, in which courageous men on bears valiantly fight the hordes, while their pregnant wives in headscarves cook borscht in elegant wooden huts for them. Modern Russia is a dying socialist garbage dump. You might as well support the CCP, Napoleon or Hitler, expecting them to bring back the good old days. Will not return.

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      “It is not perfect, so cannot be good. Give up. Abandon hope.” There, I saved space and time.

    • Oog en Hand says:

      Maybe hohols are the lesser evil.

    • Varna says:

      In structural terms:

      1) Globohomo is a conglomerate of corporations ran by stateless psychopaths and predators. Over the last 15 years this faction mostly took over on all levels, propped up by holiness generated by symbiotic liberasts. They are trying to usher in a post-human reality.

      2) Russia is trying to be an old-fashioned corporation-state Mussolini/Bismark style. It is fighting back against constant attempts of a hostile takeover and brutal breakup by globohomo conglomerate forces.

      3) China — in the past it did not have enough wealth or natural recourses to be a specific target for hostile takeover and breakup. Today it is the yummiest target in the world. However, the current middle-aged and senior elites are still mostly a consolidated group of solid material.
      Xi purged the infected that had crept up over the last 25 years, and now China is back to the original maoist-capitalist vision that kicked off in the 1970s: 5% of the population communist apparatchiks leading a prudent frugal lifestyle (not counting a few rockstar fat cats in the business sectors), 95% of the population just leading normal productive lives inside a Chinese universe, while protected and managed by the 5%. That is the implied social contract. Soviet managerial matrix + lessons learned from capitalism + local cultural foundation.

      Neither globohomo, nor Russia, nor China, nor borderlands such as EE or EA are “the good guys”, but they do offer at the current historical junction competing forms of corporate managerial philosophy and practice.

      In the Anglospherical 5 eyes and Europe and elsewhere, there are people who either:
      A) Do not want to live by the rules of Corporation X, but prefer Corporation Y or Z.
      B) Despise the very molecules of the world created and maintained by corporate reality. Those latter ones are the deplorables, with their fascist-terrorist notions of liberty, free will, inalienable property rights, right to privacy, free business choice, level playing field, fair play, control of institutions by a free citizenry, and so on.

      The ones in point A, who are theoretically shopping around for better corporate functioning may have a point. For example the corporate states of Japan, gay Korea, or Singapore, do not appear to be as genocidal toward their citizens. To the contrary, the institutions appear to believe that they a responsibility toward the citizens.

      The ones in point B, who feel that the very concept of a managerial corporate society, especially on a planetary scale, is the antichrist matrix, have two plays:
      1) Go to the borderlands where the corporate matrix is weakest (Eastern Europe, South East Asia, parts of Latin America or Africa, if the deplorable in question is a normal black)
      2) Constantly be on the lookout what changes in the patterns of force result from the internal processes of their corporate matrix, combining with the interaction with external corporate entities.
      Or, of course, a mixture of the two approaches.

      A deplorable who has admitted the situation of what his society is, but has not been broken by this knowledge, has a number of political priorities that include:
      1) Not wanting a planetary victory of just one corporate model, be it globohomo, Russian, or Chinese. Without an external competitor, the corporate overlords lose their last shreds of pretending to be human.
      2) Trying to subtly or publicly influence events so that at least some parts of the toxic globohomo social tissue around him is replaced back by healthy tissue, or at least slow down the opposite process of civilizational toxification.

      Some inter-corporate or intra-corporate developments can be used for a deplorable’s benefit. Lessons can be learned, opportunities can be taken.

      My condolences to the poor devils in the Ukraine. During the 19th and 20th century almost every place in EE experienced what it is like to be a pawn in games between great powers. Sometimes your country hits the jackpot and the result is positive, for example when at that specific moment it worked out best for everyone if you get independence, or you get investments etc. More frequently the result is negative, and while great powers duke it out, the little guy in the middle is the one losing territory, population, and experiencing a national trauma.

      We can cheer when we see some positive development happening in any of the managerial corporate entities, because any glimpse of humanity is always invigorating. But yes, we should not lose sight of them being corporate entities; we should not lose sight of the push against the toxic corporate forces around us; and we should lose sight of the poor bastards who pay the bill when direct or indirect kinetic war between planetary factions erupts.

  11. Mike Thalassitis says:

    Can someone explain to a brainlet like myself what it means to remove Russia from SWIFT payments and what the implications of this would be? I’m hearing that this might be on the cards within a few days.

    • Gauntlet says:

      It basically means to turn off a big chunk of the flow of dollars and demand for dollars. India already said they are setting up a clearing house for commodities to trade with Russia if it happens. It wouldn’t be hard to see China, Russia, India trading amongst themselves completely without dollars. What would happen if half of the worlds oil stops trading in dollars? Nothing good for the US. I’m not saying Russia is half of the worlds oil trade, but it wouldn’t take many producers/consumers to reach 50% of all oil traded in something other than dollars, if Russia doesn’t participate in Swift.

    • jim says:

      What it means is that if a Russian, or Putin, or Russia, has money in a bank outside of Russia, the money is frozen. So Russia cannot pay for imports in US$ or the money of countries of the US hegemony, nor be paid for goods its sells to the US hegemony.

      It is another nail in the coffin of the US$.

      • Red says:

        > It is another nail in the coffin of the US$.

        The damage done to the US would be 10X than what would be done to Russia. It’s an insane idea.

      • The Cominator says:

        I do not believe they will actually remove Russia from SWIFT, Yellen and Larry Summers still have some cathedral influence and they are sane enough and smart enough to know the result of removing Russia from SWIFT would be the end of the dollar.

        • The Cominator says:

          Holy shit I may be wrong, there is increased chatter about doing it. Fucking retards.

    • A2 says:

      Both China and Russia have (early) replacements for SWIFT. These will of course be more difficult to use initially. SWIFT is a company in Belgium, I believe, but for all practical purposes controlled by the US. International payments go through this hub, which is quite useful for many purposes.

      The long-term drawback of forcing Russia to run their alternative instead of SWIFT is that the US loses their current eagle’s eye view and control of international payments. If the alternatives grow too popular, there will be headaches in Washington.

    • Mister Grumpus says:

      What confuses me about SWIFT, every time, is what a big deal it is.

      So one bank account goes down, and another goes up somewhere else. Payment made.
      Wow. Big deal.

      But it is a big deal, because it’s still the only game in town.

      The conventional wisdom is that everyone in banking has dynamite under their beds to make sure they’re too scared to do payments any other way, other than crypto or flying around with suitcases full of cash or gold bars or whatever.

      But I wonder if it’s also laziness, cruft, bloatware, and having no one left who actually understands how the whole system actually works, so it’s impossible to actually change or improve on it, just for practical reasons.

      • jim says:

        > But I wonder if it’s also laziness, cruft, bloatware, and having no one left who actually understands how the whole system actually works, so it’s impossible to actually change or improve on it, just for practical reasons.

        The latter.

        Like NASA rockets, the international finance system is falling apart.

        It has a lot of different nails in its coffin. And a lot of different people hammering new ones. It has termites in the rafters, and cancer in its bowels. It has more terminal ailments than you can shake a stick at.

  12. Leon says:

    Thoughts on the ground in a red state: most “conservative” normies buy the media story on Russia hook, line and sinker. Big bad Putin is picking on poor little Ukraine. If we were let to fight all out we could totally kick Russia’s ass. That sort of shit. They acknowledge things have changed, the housing market sucks, Brandon sucks, but cannot or will not acknowledge some red pill truths. To make things worse, they have failed the lefty shit tests from invading blue states. I am increasingly thinking there is much more pain and sorrow for the Amerikaner.

    • Leon says:

      To offer a counter arguement, Founding Questions (formerly known as Rotten Chestnuts) says that we are winning in an article from today. Not sure if I buy that.

    • Joe W. says:

      If they were smart enough to see past the “media story on Russia,” they wouldn’t be normies.

      The average American can’t find Illinois on a map, let along Russia, let alone Ukraine. But many Americans are starting to wake up here at home, and that’s what matters.

    • Pooch says:

      Tucker is still on point, but yes every other show on Fox News is basically in lock step with the inner party. I don’t think this should be a shock. When the Russian flag goes up over Kiev in a few hours or a few days it will be good for the boomercon to see that.

    • Red says:

      Propaganda works and always has worked.

      • Pooch says:

        The Cathedral is loudly proclaiming the Ukrainians are valiantly defending, killing many Russians, and may actually still win.

        In reality, the Russians are giving the Ukrainian regular army the opportunity to desert en masse, which they are doing, and sorting out who the Nazis and nationalists are who will be fought to the death, with limited casualties.

        It’s going to be something when reality pops this intense completely fake propaganda bubble.

    • Upravda says:

      Same in my country.

      Suddenly, all of the left/ progressives, cuckservatives, football fans (!?!), Serbs by profession (that is, supposed “representatives” of Serb minority in Sabor), professional Ustashes, 🙂 feminazis, my paps and my wife’s paps, all kind of people are decidedly asking the Putin’s head. In mainstream press, campaign against Russia is decidedly becoming witch-hunt, even more so than with fake vaxx and covid demon worshiping.

      Sadly, even a few purplish-pilled, somewhat reactionarish politicians, including those I used to vote for, fell to hysteria.

      There was voting in parliament about some resolution in support of Ukraine. If I was a parliamentary representative, I’d cast a “restrained” vote (neither “no” nor “yes”, don’t know exact English phrase).

      There was one restrained vote. One.

      From an otherwise totally crazy leftist lady.

      • Pooch says:

        I’m even seeing conservative American women on twitter becoming attracted to Zelensky given that every press outlet is painting him as some defiant war hero amazing leader, saying he’s got “big dick energy”. He’s probably not even in Kiev. Absolutely, pathetic.

        • Red says:

          He’s an actor playing a role. Women have terribly poor instincts about alpha.

        • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

          Once American women realize what a hollow shell of a man he is, he is going to be the most prolific rapist in American history. Twitter raped, the poor things.

    • The Cominator says:

      What state, I’m not seeing that in Florida.

      • Pooch says:

        The entire GOP is universally in lock step with the Democrats backing Ukraine. I would assume DeSantis is saying all kinds of dumb think of the poor Ukraine shit like Abbott just did. Reminds me of the Floyd negro riots when Tucker was literally the person publicly saying wtf is wrong with you people.

        • The Cominator says:

          Maybe DeSantis made a token statement but the stupid Nikki Fried bitch here initially condemned DeSantis for keeping his mouth shut.

      • Pooch says:

        I will say this is bad. When you have Democrats and Republicans in lock step then the recipe for war is there.

  13. Mister Grumpus says:

    I’d like to re-open the question of what the hell Musk can do now to get the Starship going again, perhaps even in response to the (today presumed) near-future success of Vladimir’s QuantumKrieg in Ukraine now, which started like hours after Jim hit “publish” on this very OP.

    Karens are going to be madder than ever after this, which will mean all sorts of terrible things for their subjects like Musk.

    I can’t imagine any partnership with/in/around Russia now.

    My clinging hope is that the floating platforms can shake Karen off Musk’s tail for a little longer, because they move the launching, landing, and fuel handling away from land-based jurisdictions, which is most of them.

    But beyond that?

    One great thing about the floating platforms is that they float, and can be tugged to anywhere. Tugged to where?

    Maybe a fenced “semi autonomous region” of Yucatan Mexico, like with its own dock, Houston commuter/Fedex airstrip and no passport checks.

    If Mexico is too close, then I wonder: Are there countries that are still officially in the Cathedralsphere, but actually part of Outer China? Maybe there’s an arbitrage play there.

    Taiwan screams out, for instance.

    If I’m reading my maps right, there are also launch paths out of southern Vietnam and the NE tip of Malaysian Borneo. Heck Brunei is on Borneo too.

    And after that it’s Australia, Tanzania, Brazil and New Zealand. New Zealand!

    Most of these ideas must be stupid, but all of them?

    • alf says:

      My pessimistic view: he’s shit out of luck. He does not have the time and political capital needed for a mars colonization. No one has. Maybe migrate to China, maybe relocate to border empire countries, but it is many hoops to jump through, with uncertain results.

      • Red says:

        Musk’s only real chance is a US military coup. Seems very unlikely.

        If the US gets too hostile to him he’ll move to China to make cars and probably assist them with their space program but he’ll never step foot on Mars.

        • Jehu says:

          I wonder if Musk has considered contingencies for this sort of thing. But I don’t think the US Military has enough life in it for any such sanity.

          Things to look for: a lot of people are being and will be forced from the military because of failure to venerate the Corona Demon. Has Musk been picking them up disproportionately with job offers? They’d probably be useful to his companies just as employees and having a lot of them gives you…options, should things go nonlinear.

          • Red says:

            Musk isn’t going to overthrow the US government. But a military coup would prioritize towards military supremacy and heavy lift capability is at the top of that list.

            • Starman says:

              @Red

              ”Musk isn’t going to overthrow the US government.”

              USG ground forces (army and police) are a joke.

        • Pooch says:

          I wouldn’t completely rule out military coup, but yes it seems very unlikely.

          Total ejection of the outer party would need to happen which would cause the inner party to turn the insanity level of up to preposterous levels unrestrained causing loyalty of the upper social classes to the regime to collapse thus creating the necessary pre-coup conditions.

          I don’t see that likely even a little bit.

      • Mister Grumpus says:

        Jim-compliant social networking (with payments) will blow all kinds of “impossibles” right open, like a grenade in a pinata. It would be like the Trump Spring of 2016 all over again, but with foot-thick steel plating. And I’ll keep on reminding you guys of it too (because I’m not smart enough to do the work myself).

        Never will so many owe so much to so few!

        But beyond that, just straight-up Paperclipping himself and his most devoted followers to Reunified Taiwan, on a Hail Mary Joint Twinkie Mission to maybe save the human race from the Global Haiti, has a certain Von Braun romance to it.

        • Starman says:

          @Mister Grumpus

          Global Haiti died in Ukraine.

          • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

            I think it died in Kabul and Ukraine is just where the smell started to show, but we are in agreement. America is dead, and progressivism needs to die with it.

            • Starman says:

              @Wulfgar Thundercock III

              USG army and police forces have became a joke after Iraq and Afghanistan.

              And the USG Air Force (the “Chair Force” really) is on its way to being a punchline in Ukraine.

            • Mister Grumpus says:

              “and progressivism needs to die with it.”

              Well Rome fell while the Vatican kept going, so we can expect Harvard to keep going too.

              But the Vatican didn’t have much competition either. Beats me.

              • jim says:

                Holiness spirals always expire catastrophically. Harvard will die first.

                • Mister Grumpus says:

                  Can we say that the Vatican kept going through the dark and middle ages, but didn’t holiness spiral because it couldn’t command the (kings’) warriors?

                • jim says:

                  Rome did holiness spiral from time to time, but was checked because Kings got pissed with it, and because Bishops who were more worried about their Kings than their Pope got pissed with it, so the spirals never went very far.

      • Starman says:

        @Alf

        ”My pessimistic view: he’s shit out of luck.”

        Nope. The USG ruling class is shit out of luck. They have no ground force supremacy. And they have no air superiority. Elon is the only thing providing them with space superiority over Russia and China.

        If they stop Elon, then nowhere will be safe for them, as Putin promised.

        • alf says:

          Yes well something something about the scorpion and the frog…

          • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

            That’s funny, there must have been something vibrating in the aether, since i had posted something just like this in response to another comment at the same time, without even seeing it.

  14. Red says:

    Putin’s spiritual destiny
    The religious president wants to rebuild Christendom

    https://unherd.com/2022/02/putins-spiritual-destiny/

    Leftist shithead writing it, but he’s not entirely wrong about Putin.

  15. Karl says:

    Until very recently I had assumed that the coalition governing the US contains a faction that wants war with Russia and that this faction is barely suppressed by a less insane faction that wants brezhnevian stability and stagnation.

    What is the insane faction doing now? For them this should like an opportunity to get the war they want, but as far as I can see they are not pushing for escalation. Why?

    Were they suddenly cured of their insanity? How so? That would be very unusual for a leftist group.

    My guess is that the less insane faction of old relatively smart leftists is much more powerful than I thought previously. This would also explain why Trump was not yet arrested, why BLM has (for now) largely stopped from burning, looting, and murdering.

    Or is the pro-war faction simply stunned and surprised? If so, that might last for a few more days, but then they’ll start pushing for war, at least if Russia has not won by then and the fighting in Ukraine stopped.

    • Pooch says:

      There is a pro-war faction pushing for a NFZ in Ukraine but they don’t seem to be all that loud or powerful. Yes the less insane left is firmly in power. Has been firmly in power since 1776 and I don’t think that will change. There is a reason why America did not go down the path of the French Revolution in the 18th century and the Russian Revolution in the 20th. The same insane leftists were present and they were quickly shut down by the less insane leftists. It is a very stable system on gradual decline and slow boiling the frog.

  16. The Cominator says:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10551327/Chechen-special-forces-hunters-unleashed-Ukraine-detain-kill-Kyiv-officials.html

    If this is true and not propaganda it means Russian forces probably already are mostly in control of Kiev.

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      This seems like a propaganda thing, but it isn’t immediately clear for what purpose. Chechens are terrifying creatures in war, the few GWoT guys i’ve talked to (that i actually trust) said they were terrifying to face in AFG. But that is a place they would easily blend in, going against Americans who may not be able to tell the difference between an Arab, a Persian, and a Chechen. So i could see RUS spreading this story to cause defection and panic, as well I could see UKR spreading it to demonize RUS. But I wonder if there’s any utility to the idea, as in, did they get para-dropped in, or just dropped off by RUS regulars? Wouldn’t it be easier to use Spetznas that speak or even are Ukrainian?

      • Kunning Drueger says:

        https://twitter.com/RWApodcast/status/1497467132950548486

        At this point, the only mounting death toll is the number of false narratives. Of course, this could be propaganda too, but the whole “and then they all died singing the national anthem” thing seemed as preposterous as two Ilyushins getting swatted down with no debris.

        • Red says:

          The Snake Island stuff was such obvious bullshit it surprised me anyone took it seriously.

          • The Cominator says:

            The ghost of kiev shot down 6 million russian planes and then totally destroyed 81 million Russian APCs, then he became a she as she announced she was a brave transwoman and then everyone clapped and said fuck Blonald Blumpf.

          • Pooch says:

            Fox News seemed to be pushing it more than anyone. Every time I put them on out of curiosity a host was mentioning it. Sad and pathetic that cons are eating this crap up.

            • Kunning Drueger says:

              I think the relationship dynamic is the reverse: Fox knows what Boomercons want, and very high on that list is a return to normalcy. Fearing the evil bear is about as normal as they can imagine.

              • Pooch says:

                True, in many ways they relish in the Cold War when they could call the Russians, commie bastards.

  17. Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

    Second wave of russian airborn assaults hitting targets now – this time with massive fire support.

    • Red says:

      Awesome. Got a link?

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      The “Russia has bungled EVERYTHING” narratives seem to be ramping on both Twitter and 4chan. It may very well be the case that we are witnessing a stunning martial victory that will set the tone going forward for peer/near-peer conflict. I know everyone thought it was going poorly/slow, but for goodness sake, everyone said it wasn’t going to happen a week ago, then they initiated a true combined arms invasion and have, thus far, kept collateral damage to a minimum. There’s still power and internet. Looks like American invasion of Iraq is going to be relegated to Old & Busted status way sooner than I thought.

    • Red says:

      Sounds like the Russians are using lots of drones now too.

  18. Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

    > Why would he bomb his own people and his own industry?

    That is a sentiment I agree with; that Putin sees the men in Ukraine as brothers in blood to those in his own columns; and that any casualty on either side is ultimately striking at his own patrimony; and that looming above all in mind nothing was more catastrophic than the european civil wars of 1906 and 1939; something that has ultimately necessitated something equivalently bloody to burn out the cancer that has grown up in it’s wake.

    The question becomes rather whether one course or another will actually result in less destruction in the long run; and that is what i’ve had in mind when discussing the matter.

    • The Cominator says:

      1906?

      • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

        Typo for the war to end all wars.

        The Pig War was stoking up to a sizzlin’ heat about then tho.

    • Aidan says:

      That is a good question. For my part, I believe that merely making the American Empire look weak enough will shake it apart, as its colonies ignore its dictats or openly rise against it. The Amerikaner, in my estimation of history, is also a janissary people of the Carthage-esque rule of Harvard. But provoking the US’ military wrath and then defeating it utterly may prove faster and better in the long run. Who can say? War has its own logic, and Athena and Ares both get a say, though only one of the two is a demon with no sanctuary but the battlefield and no offerings save the blood of men.

      I expect that Russia will prove friendly to those struggling against the GAE, and I hope that one day in the not-too-distant future, we will be cracking open a case of munitions ‘from Russia with love’.

      • Aidan says:

        Though of course I should not forget the timid and petty nature of the Classical Greek, and the linguistic entanglement of Ares and arete, both hearkening back via linguistic memory to the fury of the aryan against the Mediterranean peoples he bent to the ground. And we should recall those who did build Ares a temple, though they called him by a different name.

      • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

        >But provoking the US’ military wrath and then defeating it utterly may prove faster and better in the long run.

        The way i see it expediting the destruction of enemy forces with greater force is in terms of social reality no more provocative than the choice to fight at all in the first place; in certain ways, perhaps less so even.

        Russiamania has been percolating for years, and bluechecks are whipped up into full putler derangement syndrome now anyways, though the notion that part of the target audience is fence sitters in the region is also an interesting angle to consider.

        Not escalating would be not invading to begin with; but then the herd of cats presently occupying organs of power in the global anti-american empire have by turn and turns backed him into a corner on the matter, so that’s out. There is a great deal of argument that all ultimately add up to the notion that if you are going to invade, you should *invade*; that a shorter war is almost always preferable to a longer war, in so many ways (but that you should also never count on it, and always look to a strategic posture capable of handling long war).

        Though perhaps Biden’s handler’s words of ‘a minor military incursion’ were rattling around in the back of his mind.

      • ExileStyle says:

        One thing to keep in mind, though, is that the US can still only be “defeated” through own-goals and needless internal decay. There is still no “defeating” this thing in a traditional sense, i.e. on the open battlefield. Perhaps not even in terms of nuclear war – there’s a chance Moscow and Petersburg would be glass while Russian missiles are disintegrating like mosquitoes in a bugzapper over California. The US is the third most-populous nation in the world and the wealthiest, with a highly uniform linguistic culture and, though we may lament it, strong consensus on a number of political ideas.

        Look at how half these fucking jackals started calling for blood and concentration camps because some MAGA moms in Idaho or some shit refused to wear fucking face masks. Organize that bloodthirsty energy outwards and I doubt the entire world together could take them. Hell, if ZOG were extinguished tomorrow, even I’d become a patriot again and would be happy to die for what my great-grandfathers built.

        I mean, why has Globohomo come this far? Because US wanted it…and not even that much. Not like Nazi Germany want. What that beast could do if provoked – well, look at WWII whatever you think of its causes or significance. In the 1930s the US was full of rabid feminists and communists and then, boom, war machine engaged, and they were gone like that.

        Long way of saying let’s not hope for US direct engagement in service of Globohomo any time soon…

        • jim says:

          What counts in war is not individual wealth, but total GDP. China now substantially exceeds the US is total GDP, and official figures to the contrary are the result of counting wealth transfer as productivity (that is how those blue states are so productive – the FIRE economy) and gaming the CPI.

          • Varna says:

            >official figures to the contrary are the result of counting wealth transfer as productivity

            The Soviets were prone to the opposite GDP fudging — counting pre-market and pre-utilization productivity. You make a 100 tractors or a 1000 pipes, and then they sit in a warehouse rusting due to crap state planning. In effect the only real gain from the exercise is the salary the workers received, while everything else is a total loss. But the very fact of producing counts toward the GDP, in spite of the actual product instantly dropping out of reality.

            So on the one hand you get the globohomo fake GDP of loans and debts and sheit, as in “if your GDP is so great how come you’re not making anything”; and on the other hand the Soviet fake GDP of massive numbers of real production which then does not enter the market, as in “if you’re producing all those millions of tons of stuff, where the heck is it?”

        • Joe W. says:

          > Organize that bloodthirsty energy outwards and I doubt the entire world together could take them.

          90% of that “bloodthirsty energy” is from fat Karens who get winded walking to the refrigerator. These people are internet tigers and nothing more.

        • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

          The US is collapsing and is in no way culturally unified. The people are becoming more and more stupid. As Jim pointed out, the economy is in shambles and is based on unproductive sectors. The manufacturing that you need to be great is long gone, and will take decades to reintroduce and get competent again. Science and engineering is dying like the manufacturing industry. Militarily, there is no competence or cohesion, and all of the lessons learned on war are the wrong ones. Long story short, if America goes forth to conquer the world with steel and fire, they are going to get crushed.

        • i says:

          For all the so called Wealth. It has the most hideous architecture in the world. The buildings are pure garbage.

          The art is garbage.

          I cannot call that wealth.

    • Pooch says:

      From Putin’s comments today:

      “Moreover according to the information we possess, the Banderovtsy [WWII Ukrainian Nazi collaborator, hero of the present day radical nationalists] are placing heavy artillery, including volley fire systems, in downtown areas of major cities including Kharkov and Kiev. They are planning to attract return fire from Russian attack units straight into residential blocks. Essentially they are operating just like terrorists around the world. They take cover among civilians in order to then level accusations against Russia for killings of innocent people. It is well known that all of this is happening on the advice of foreign consultants, above all American advisers.“

      • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

        It’s troublesome when dealing with craven foes who do such things; and the only and best solution is to just fire anyways; it can be quickly told that so-and-so battalion showing up means the non-combatants are being put at risk themselves, and make them to take a hike, or take a hike themselves, and in any case not support them.

        • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

          Agreed. Outright slaughtering people who do this sort of thing sends two messages. One, to civilians: if these guys show up, you had better bug out because the fighting is coming and we are not holding back. Two, to the enemy: if you take noncombatants hostage, we are not taking surrender or offering quarter; you are all going to end up dead if you pull this shit.

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      https://twitter.com/RWApodcast/status/1497381377855135751
      ebbin

      Hey St. John, when i went to post this link, i noticed there was a bunch of characters after the long string of numbers. I removed that and the link works fine. do you know what the characters/ code is for? pasted below:

      ?s=20&t=aBiKLjTS76GIFTxNVS5ecw

      • Pseudo-CHrysostom says:

        I don’t use twatter so i could only guess it has something to do with referral tags or the like.

  19. Yul Bornhold says:

    Jim, you’ve written about women congregating at places in hopes a gang of men will show up and claim them; for example, at the beach. The alpha takes his pick and assigns the remaining women to his underlings.

    At church, we’ve half our young men married and half not. Am thinking maybe some kind of event or party where we signal mannerbund. This is in contrast to the more ordinary meet-up/group-date which lacks display of male cooperation and instead presents each man as weak and atomized individual.

    Advice please.

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      I’m only responding in the hopes that Jim and others take note and respond with better suggestions.

      Maybe some kind of event where there is a bit of physical competition, some activities that require a bit of organizing, and then a celebration to end it? This may be too pagan, but have a wood splitting competition, then a pyre building competition, then a few bonfires with singing and eating as the stars come out? This may sound silly to the city dwellers among us, but just writing that out got me excited because i love axes, fire, and song.

    • Red says:

      I’m an sperg and generally not good with women, so my advice isn’t worth much. But I’ve long noticed that any sort of public gather of men even for something as gay like smash brother competition brings women out looking for alphas.

      • Drive-By Reactionary says:

        So should I start watching RT now or do I have to continue to rely on Twitter threads from people like Russians With Attitude, which sound to me to be the Russian equivalent of “Don’t tread on me” people in the US.

        • jim says:

          Russia Today and Sputnik have been banned in Europe, for reporting on what they don’t want Europeans to know.

          I don’t follow the official news, because nothing is true.

          Russians with an Attitude cover stuff that you will not hear elsewhere. And not on Russia Today either.

    • Adam says:

      Flag football game.

  20. Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

    Seems like the uke order of battle is dissolving with rather dramatically increasing rapidity; the irregulars in Kiev Zalensky handed avtomats out to turning into bandits taking shots at each other before Russian troops even show up.

    Might turn out that those advising the wisdom of circumspection would be both correct but also irrelevant; like a fighter plotting out a detailed gameplan in preparation for his opponent, only to knock them out in the first exchange.

    • Severian says:

      The Uke channels are all claiming the Kiev attack was repelled, truth is there is no more gun sounds. Just don’t know what to believe.

      • jim says:

        A probing attack hoping for collapse. There will be more probes.

        • Severian says:

          Really? Throwing paratroopers in there like that.
          Apparently the US confirms two Il-76 were really shot down in an airborne operation near Kiev. That would be a significant loss of paratroopers.

          • Pooch says:

            And the Ghost of Kiev has 100 confirmed kills. They say she is the best shot in all of Ukraine.

            It’s all propaganda with a total break from reality. Well reality is going to reach Kiev soon enough.

            • Severian says:

              No images, but we did see airborn vehicles with parachutes strapped to them during the mobilization. Nuts is they really attempted that airdrop.

              • Kunning Drueger says:

                Shot down planes scatter debris everywhere, much of it recognizable. Stealing this from a tweet comment “Syria has shown us that if planes are shot down, pieces are found.” 2 Ilyushins will leave plenty of evidence. My guess would be it isn’t so, but we shall see.

  21. Pooch says:

    Good analysis from a knowledgable Russia watcher I’ve been following. Gives a sobering view of where the invasion stands currently.

    https://gilbertdoctorow.com/

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      Very interesting, excellent find.

    • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

      > In recent days, some of my peers have expressed the pious hope that Washington would find the political courage and rise to the occasion of the Russian demands from 15 December 2021 by agreeing to revise jointly the security architecture of Europe in a more equitable manner, thereby bringing Russia in from the cold.

      NATO was conceived and continues to exist for a simple purpose, presenting a threat of military force to Russia. If this purpose does not exist, then NATO does not exist; and so as long as NATO continues to exist as such, they will keep compulsively returning to this purpose as such, quite regardless of the situation.

  22. Severian says:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Q7FuPINDjA

    Heavy gunfighting heard from Maidan Square, maybe they do take the capital soon.

  23. Red says:

    >That nowadays if you kill one civilian, five more vecome combatants, hence a chain reaction and you do yourself a disservice.

    Utter bullshit. We mass murdered the Japanese and Germans civilians by the hundreds of thousands. They become docile puppets.

    Arqiduka you’re spreading straight up leftist lies. Nor do the leftists believe it, as evidenced by them burning to death 91 Men, Women, and children at Waco and then posing for glory shots in their ashes.

    • Arqiduka says:

      Look mate, with all due respect, I’m rather tired of this cycle. Some discussion comes up, I take a position that is not in line with consensus, i am accused of being a shill without being accused of being a shill. Since some (not all not even most) have an issue with even considering that they may be wrong, I bow out of this particular discussion. Have at it.

      • Red says:

        > I take a position that is not in line with consensus, i am accused of being a shill without being accused of being a shill.

        You’re taking a position that is well established leftist propaganda.

        KD an idiot for supporting the idea, but he’s never claimed to be the brightest. What’s your excuse?

        Better yet, lets hear your reasoning for this idea.

        • Arqiduka says:

          And here’s the next step of the cycle, but this time I’m breaking it. You won’t hear my reasoning, no great loss anyways, just well known historical episodes.

          • Red says:

            What a faggot.

            • Kunning Drueger says:

              Unproductive.

              My original question, the one that hasn’t been answered, is thus:

              Logic, free of crimestop/anti-wrongthink/whatever, suggests that you should just absolutely wallop your enemy on day 0, then use that as an example to the rest. “You see those smoldering bones? You don’t want to be smoldering bones, Vasili. Put down that pop gun and let’s have a drink.” But no one seems to be doing that. I get that GAE has us (me in particular, please use me as the punching bag, no need to beat up on my boy Arqi) programmed to think that violence begets worse violence, winning is actually losing, etc. But why would the Russians or Chinese follow that same program? Thinking about it, both CHI and RUS have remarkably consistent Covid messaging to GAE. Is the very Art of Modern War converged?

              Going further, if Grasping The Nettle will be successful, then who is going to do it, and when? This seems like the perfect opportunity, and RUS didn’t do it.

              Theory aside, we have some nice, arbitrary deadlines to use as a measuring tool: 1 month to subsume Poland, 3 weeks to take Baghdad, 8 weeks to flatten Afghanistan. There are plenty of others. By any measure, RUS could still be way out in front. And this conflict, unlike the ones i mentioned, is basically near-peer conflict. I don’t think Kiev is the goal. I think a global paradigm shift is the goal. Hypothetically, what is Grasping The Nettle when obliterating Bretton Woods is the goal? Sorry for the word vomit.

              • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                >Hypothetically, what is Grasping The Nettle when obliterating Bretton Woods is the goal?

                At a tactical minimum, bombardment of enemy troop positions and or other materiel.

                The going tactic seems to be to simply advance, and open fire on any opposition they come in sight of. No ‘rolling barrage’ as self-propelled ordnance races ahead with the troops.

                The ukes are obliging the czar’s forces by in most cases just falling back in the face of any hostilities, but that is less something that speaks well of the approach, and more something that speaks badly of the paper country’s larp army.

              • Red says:

                > Unproductive.

                A man who refuses to defend his position while implying he is still right is a faggot who deserves no respect.

                > Is the very Art of Modern War converged?

                Seems to be. Fighting ISIS in Syria Trump simply had the US airforce/special forces flatten ISIS. Turned was was already a long grinding war for years into something that went away in 3 or 4 months. Same with Iran. Trump flattened the Iranian General who dared to order the killing an American and Iran left us alone despite everyone screaming about WW3.

                A demonstrated willingness not to fuck around leads to much fewer deaths in the long run especially if it helps you win quickly.

                > Theory aside, we have some nice, arbitrary deadlines to use as a measuring tool: 1 month to subsume Poland, 3 weeks to take Baghdad, 8 weeks to flatten Afghanistan. There are plenty of others. By any measure, RUS could still be way out in front. And this conflict, unlike the ones i mentioned, is basically near-peer conflict. I don’t think Kiev is the goal. I think a global paradigm shift is the goal. Hypothetically, what is Grasping The Nettle when obliterating Bretton Woods is the goal? Sorry for the word vomit.

                They’re already getting ready to turn the Ukraine into what Iraq was for the US with the non stop heroic Ukrainian propaganda designed more for the resistance to the occupation than for winning the war. They’ll bleed Russia dry until Russia realizes they’re going to have to flatten a bunch of mother fuckers to get the point across. Unfortunately much like Iraq it’s going take a lot more dead Ukrainians to make the point the longer they wait.

                Monkey brains respond to powerful displays. Failure to make those displays and monkey brain think you are weak and should be attacked, which is what happened to the US in Iraq.

                • Kunning Drueger says:

                  Excellent points regarding ISIS and Iran, as well the hootin’ an’ hollerin’ followed by fuck all nothing.

                  I think Putin is playing this right. Pooch linked some very interesting analysis, Doctorow, and he is pointing out that Latvia has been acting very similarly to UKR. So while the battle is in UKR, the “targets” of the psyop are in EE. As they watch the nazis get BTFO’d, they’re going to be wondering if Colonel Shaniqua and her merry band of 3000 bennies collectors are really going to deter Moscow.

          • jim says:

            Nuts

            Again this is a shill approach. “The evidence is well known”. The hell it is.

            The lies that no one believes are well known, because shouted continually, but they are not evidence, just utterly unsupported unexplained lies, that those shouting never attempt to justify or explain, because to justify or explain them would imply that someone could doubt what no one believes, but no one is allowed to doubt.

            Stop doing this or you are going back on moderation.

            • Arqiduka says:

              Disregard my last post, I did not see this response of yours. This is all I need to read. Never been in moderation AFAIK, so can’t go back into it. But I’ve had enough of this now, going back to lurking.

              Sincerely wish all here all the very best, you are being dishonest in this particular stance, but in general you are on the side of truth and – Gnon willing – shall prevail.

              Gjithë të mirat!

              • jim says:

                I wish my commenters would all use legitimate methods of debate, methods that lead to clarity and truth, but if a commenter stubbornly insists on using illegitimate methods of debate, methods that muddy the water, methods likely at worst to mislead, deceive, distract and confuse, and at best to endless repetition and waste of space, he is no loss.

                You are not being criticized for deviating from consensus. You are being criticized for arguing in ways apt to mislead and muddy the water.

                No one should be criticized for deviating from consensus. And to the best of my ability, I try to make sure that no one is.

                They should be criticized for arguing using methods of debate unlikely to lead to truth. And they are.

            • Kunning Drueger says:

              I want to believe in Grasp The Nettle because it theoretically and spiritually makes sense. I’m concerned that in a fallen world with wide gulfs between the Conflict and the Commentary, any approach deemed brutal/beyond the pale/barbaric will be spun by the Powers that Speak into a “moral loss,” or some other gay shit. As it stands right now, applying the proper level of violence (Rhodesia) will be memory holed and/or twisted into an anti-concept. Until there is actually a narrative bifurcation, it appears that this will continue to happen. And I don’t think it is intellectually honest to consider RUS or CHI as alternatives to GAE; they don’t want to be different, they just want to be in control, as evidenced by Covid narratives and rhetoric about the primacy of democracy.

              • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                >any approach deemed brutal/beyond the pale/barbaric will be spun by the Powers that Speak into a “moral loss,”

                They do that anyways in any case.

                • Kunning Drueger says:

                  And it works. When will it stop working? When will men everywhere embody the meme and, when challenged with “how could they?!” “i can’t even!” and “literally genocide!”, stare back and say

                  “Yes.”

                  I don’t really want an answer because I don’t think anyone has it, not yet. Among many potential outcomes to this war, I hope the widespread adoption of brutal responses to disgusting acts becomes the rule.

              • Aidan says:

                I agree with you. Russia, right now, is fighting a Westphalian war. Destroy the other guy’s army, force his government to do what you want. The Westphalian model of warfare is predicated on the underlying assumption that if you destroy the other guy’s army, and he doesn’t do what you want, but starts throwing hastily equipped and untrained peasants at you, then you have free reign to brutalize his people, burn his cities, and loot his goods.

                Some people here speak as if taking the former course leaves the latter off the table, or if it is a binary choice between total war and defeat. Putin has military superiority, which gives him the freedom to restrain his targets to the strictly military. If he needs to, he could bomb Ukraine back to the stone age at the drop of a hat. But he is not fighting a holy war of survival for fucks sake. He is taking back his own lands and excising a cancer. Why would he bomb his own people and his own industry?

                The GAE will demonize Russia no matter what he does. But potential allies between the two powers, with the GAE slowly crumbling, are watching very closely. Defeating the enemy while showing restraint is a display of strength, and saying “these are Russia’s people, and we’re going in to remove the puppet state mobilizing them against us”, and then doing exactly that, proves agreement-capability. It makes Russia attractive as an imperial suzerain.

                Although I am excited and hopeful for the defeat of globohomo, Putin is not waging an existential war. If I were to find myself conducting a civil war in the US for the future of my people, I would not leave a structure within ten miles of the enemy standing. But this is just not that kind of war. Yet. Putin has been winning against the GAE for twenty years straight. I trust the man’s damn judgement over internet commenters dismayed by the fact that Ukraine did not fall in the first two days of the war. This war has been an almost perfect replay of the war with Georgia, where Putin went around the contested territory that everybody expected to be a bloody stalemate and cut the head off the snake.

                • Red says:

                  That’s a good point, Putin can switch up anytime he feels like it and he’s a paramagnetic man, not an religious nut case like we’re used to as leadership. Thinking it over he probably plans to make a very public example of the Uki Neo-Nazis which will probably get the point across.

                • i says:

                  “The Westphalian model of warfare is predicated on the underlying assumption that if you destroy the other guy’s army, and he doesn’t do what you want, but starts throwing hastily equipped and untrained peasants at you, then you have free reign to brutalize his people, burn his cities, and loot his goods.”

                  For the latter:

                  Deuteronomy 20:12-14
                  12And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it:

                  13And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:

                  14But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee.

      • jim says:

        > I take a position that is not in line with consensus, i am accused of being a shill without being accused of being a shill.

        Well, when you take a position that is not in line with the consensus around here, need to phrase it as if the idea is not in line with consensus around here, likely to be controversial and your interlocutors are likely to push back.

        Argue that the position is true, or at least mention that such an argument exists somewhere, or at least imply that you expect pushback and demands to justify your position.

        The problem is that sometimes you do sound like a shill, because you confidently assert a leftist position, as if everyone knows and agrees that it is true, when even the leftists themselves know perfectly well it is a blatant and absurd lie. Don’t do that. I find it offensive and obnoxious.

        • Arqiduka says:

          https://blog.reaction.la/science/tech-decline-bites-musk/#comment-2816412

          Jim, read this again. Tell me that I have stated the leftist position assuming agreement, instead of presenting the claim, acknowledging that is a claim that need to be dealt with.

          A short reply will suffice.

          • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

            >A short reply will suffice.

            That you are ESL and so do not necessarily realize how you come off. Need to signpost that you are taking words out of some other bad guy’s mouth instead of your own better.

          • jim says:

            You are presupposing that Gambetta was obviously right and Bismark was obviously wrong. This presupposition presupposes your claim, rather than being evidence for your claim.

            This resembles the Troofer method of argument. When their premises are doubted, they go right on making claims that presuppose their premises.

            It is not a method of debate that I want to see on my blog.

            What happened in France is that Bismark was fighting the left with the old imperial warfare of Throne and Altar, while the left was fighting with leftist warfare of that time, of total mobilization and total war, to which Bismark responded with the quite effective methods of imperial Throne and Altar warfare. The left was, of course, outraged and indignant, and still is.

            Bismark was correct, and his methods lead to the imperial warfare of throne and altar prevailing, which is is enormously less bloody and destructive than the warfare of old type leftism.

            Left indignation about imperial throne and altar style warfare was totally and blatantly fake then, and still is blatantly fake now.

            When Gambetta took the position that he did, it was a wicked and evil lie, for the leftist warfare of that time was enormously more destructive than Throne and Altar warfare. Still a lie today when piously proclaimed by the Cathedral, but less wicked, for Globohomo warfare is less destructive.

    • Pax Imperialis says:

      When a military is allowed to ruthlessly eliminate the enemy, eventually the enemy runs out of people and no one wants to join up with certain death and defeat.

      The warfare the current American military fights does not allow for eliminating the enemy and gives enough breathing space for the enemy for people to feel safe enough to join the enemy.

      Hence for every civilian that is killed five more become combatants looks to be true but only because America allows it to be so. America kills just enough to anger the occupied population by not enough to scare them from fighting.

      A great example of this is Vietnam war in which areas controlled by South Korean military had little problem with communist insurgents because villages quickly found out supporting insurgents got them purged. The South Korean controlled areas were avoided by enemy combatants and were remarkably safe.

      The American military had quite a different experience and the rest is history.

      • Pooch says:

        What about the 2003 Iraq invasion? USM was pretty savage, not really making much distinction between combatant and civilian. Hundreds of thousands per deaths. Doesn’t seem to have caused a docile population.

        • Pax Imperialis says:

          Resistance shortly after the invasion was minimal and certainty no where near the level of ISIS during the Obama years.

          What happens after the invasion mattered just as much. Rules of engagement quickly became extremely restrictive and huge media circuses were carried out over supposed American war crimes.

          Iraqis are not illiterate idiots who can’t read the newspapers about US service members and PMCs being put on highly publicized trials for largely doing their jobs (and under stress making mistakes).

          Being an Iraqi insurgent during the invasion or shortly after was not very appealing. Being an insurgent several years after became increasingly appealing.

        • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

          They were assiduous in signaling the opposite immediately antecedent to nominal achievement of occupation, and for years hence during the non-occupation.

      • Aidan says:

        The existence of an insurgency relies entirely on sponsorship by foreign powers, not the manner in which war is conducted. There was no insurgency in Vietnam; there were NVA troops in black pajamas pretending to be angry South Vietnamese civilians. History is full of restrained wars with only military targets that did not result in insurgency.

        Putin is quite good at crushing insurgents. He is not going to have to worry about guerilla warfare, the mythology around which is entirely fake history.

  24. Kunning Drueger says:

    This has been pointed out by others, we are seeing a significant incongruity between what the MoDs and official outlets are saying, and the raw reportage appearing on social media. If official sources are to be believed, thousands of Russians are dead, thousands more have surrendered, and the UKR is speeding towards the border in mixed companies of babushkas and patriotic teenagers. From my very limited review of raw footage and moment-by-moment reporting by locals, UKR forces that aren’t being held together by political partisans are melting away as RUS forces move steadily towards the capitol. There were multiple posts about UKR border guards surrendering and/or switching sides, particularly near Donbas, but those disappeared. Another interesting line of thinking, expressed by a number of people here, is that somehow the RUS forces are failing to hit objectives. No one says what those objectives are in a granular sense, but somehow they aren’t being met because the entirety of UKR hasn’t been ingested in 48 hours.

    The ways of modern war are cucked in the extreme. Give a Prussian general of no renown a modern army circa 1990s and he’d probably be the Emperor of Terra in a year or two, just by fighting as he knew how. Nonetheless, there is an important PR battle that hasn’t even begun yet, and I think that is the fight Putin is most concerned with. It is pretty clear that UKR is going to go with the Hamas Defense, and there will be lots of opportunity for so-called atrocities. UKR has a blank check, for the moment, in the eyes of the West. That won’t last forever. While I agree with what’s been said here, succinctly and best stated as “grab the nettles with no timidity,” that is a theoretical position. I think it really comes down to goals. Is Putin’s goal to restore UKR to its rightful place in the Russian Empire, or is this an unavoidable step in a long process of restoring the balance of power in Eurasia? Are the RUS reserves for UKR battle, or is there a concern that they will need to pivot West? Putin and Xi released a pretty comprehensive joint statement (here’s the link, but i can’t get it to connect; could be being blocked, DDOS, or something: http://en.kremlin.ru/supplement/5770). That, coupled with the speech Putin gave, suggests that there are potentially some very large shifts in motion, and I think UKR conflict is just the next stage of that, I don’t think it’s the endgame.

    It very well could be the case that RUS was unreasonably optimistic, and the UKR military is going to put up a real fight. Putin has been doing a fairly good job up to this point, but maybe he did falter. I don’t think so, and I think a Chinese shoe is going to drop in the not too distant future. I really wish there was an actual source of information that wasn’t so biased in any direction, I just don’t trust the internet. The last 14 hours I’ve spent on twitter, my first real foray onto the platform, has been a nightmare, and I’m starting to understand why people seem so fucking dumb to me. It is truly a cesspit of midwit mediocrity and steaming hot takes.

    • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

      >Nonetheless, there is an important PR battle that hasn’t even begun yet, and I think that is the fight Putin is most concerned with.

      It’s reasonable to be concerned with PR.

      And the best PR of all is victory.

    • Severian says:

      I’ve checked into pro Russian telegram, it’s a completely different world from twitter.
      OSINT twitter is very pro Ukrainian so most of the casualty videos you’ll see are Russian.

      Quote:
      “While Ukraine wins battles on twitter our boys are winning actual battles on ground!!”

      • Arqiduka says:

        One of the accounts I’m following, and obviously very pro-Uke. But they never said that Ukes are winning, just that this vanguard element of this Russian force has been pushed back with loss of life. The pro-Uke accounts I’m following make it clear that delaying and causing tactical defetats amd delays are all they are hoping for. Not sure where people age getting these reports of victorious battes from the Ukes tbh.

      • Pooch says:

        Yeah it’s looking like OSINT Twitter is just blantant fake news and propaganda. I’ve stopped following. I think the pro-Russian accounts are much more close to the actual facts on the ground which makes sense given that the Russian Empire is much more based in reality than Globohomo.

    • Pax Imperialis says:

      There is the possibility that Putin did not fully commit to the invasion due to caution in case NATO as a whole or a NATO country unilaterally did something stupid. In such a case keeping forces relatively dispersed and in reserve is necessary in order to react to changes on the ground.

      Initial Russian forces seemed relatively small with few convoys on first day. Mostly trucks with some APCs and some tanks. Western opposition was nonexistent. This may have been to test western response and/or probe Ukrainian military defenses.

      Second day appears to have had much larger convoys with mostly big guns moving in like tanks and artillery. Moving the big guns in Eastern Europe over shit roads is difficult. Best to only move them in where you know the enemy is least they get suck in a worthless location. It could be that much of the invading forces were kept in reserve as the initial wave was more recon than offensive in nature.

      • Mike says:

        Follow Anatoly Karlin, Irkutyanin, and RWA Podcast coverage on Twitter. Everyone is idiotically expecting Russia to carpet-bomb Ukraine and somehow cover hundreds of miles of territory in two days. Stop with the ridiculous expectations, Russia never was going to defeat Ukraine in a day and never was going to firebomb urban centers. They don’t want to devastate land filled with their own people that they may plan to annex.

        • Bouncer says:

          Known Russian tactics involve maximum dispersion, use of DF, EW, UAV and TacSat intel to identify and locate key enemy force concentrations (C3I nodes, supply dumps, etc.), and use of tube and rocket artillery to eliminate those concentrations leaving actual enemy fighting forces impotent to act more than locally.

          It’s important to remember that even during the peak of OIF, the frontline of the US advance averaged one mile per DAY. Even fast incursions were followed by long periods of consolidation and linking-up.

          • jim says:

            It appears that the Russians now control Kiev east of the Dnieper river, since among the numerous spectacular defeats of Russian advance forces that our media are reporting are defeats on the river running through the center of Kiev.

            The frequent announcements that Russia is having a hard time are starting to develop a Baghdad Bob sound. When a major part of the capital has fallen, then end is likely near.

            It appears that Russian forces are now about three miles from the center of government in the Ukraine, but, inconveniently, a big river is in the way. One of the bridges has been blown up, and the rest are likely to explode if the Russians try crossing them. However Russians are approaching the capital from two directions on the other side of the river.

            Despite the Ukrainian government having supposedly recovered the Kiev airport numerous times, it appears to be still under the control of Russian paratroops.

            • Bouncer says:

              Oh, and for anyone who understands this, there was a video on one of the ‘chans where a Topol-M could very briefly be seen in a military column, presumably one heading westwards. This might explain why GAE hasn’t gone in balls-deep like might otherwise be expected.

            • Upravda says:

              Croatian press reports that Kiev airport is “firmly in the hand of Russians”.

              In the meantime, The Spice still flows.

              I mean, Russian gas. 🙂

  25. Pooch says:

    Apparently all the militia groups that were given AKs in Kiev are fighting each other before the Russians even get there. What a mess.

    https://twitter.com/200_zoka/status/1497340407558017026?s=20&t=VEn-zXx2nPDCS8Rx24q9Pw

    • Severian says:

      If it looks that way they are likely not infighting but infiltrated spetsnaz. Maybe creating open pockets for advance.

      • Pooch says:

        Could be that. Hard to tell.

      • Herman says:

        It could also be some people though: “Man we got these free guns and lots of ammunition, lets open our private shooting range right here in Kiev and do some target practice. ”

        If you get a new gun it is essential to practice with it so you know if you shoot you will hit something.

        • Kunning Drueger says:

          Who says Germans can’t tell jokes lol.

          • Aidan says:

            You say it’s a joke, but you and I both know that’s the first thing we’d do if the feds started handing out free Kalashnikovs

    • yewotm8 says:

      Russian sympathizers vs “defend my nation to the last”ers. One group just wants to surrender so the war can end.

  26. Severian says:

    Looks like are getting ready to assault Kiev soon.
    The footage I’ve seen suggests pretty high morale and effort by the militias, they are being led by the Klitckho brothers on the ground who are literally
    heroic figures. Wouldn’t surprise me if this gets insanely bloody.

    • Pooch says:

      I think the Russians want to force terms before a full invasion of the city proper.

      • The Cominator says:

        If the Ukranian government is already asking for terms they’ll probably want to avoid storming or flattening any major cities to see if they can get the terms they want.

    • Adam says:

      Loved watching those guys fight. The older brother specifically had a grit and determination that was above the rest. Alpha male head to toe.

    • The Cominator says:

      Are these the Azov battalion wignats.

      Wignats are tools of globohomo… same as it ever was.

      • Severian says:

        No, Klitckho brothers are former boxing heavyweight champions. They are millionaires who could have bounced but promised to stay and fight. One of them is the actual Mayor of the city.

        Azov from what I read are holed up in Mariupol. Maybe that’s where they’ll send the Chechens.

      • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

        The tactics of leftism are always relative to the milieu they inhere in.

        For any given milieu, there would be no reason for them to advertise themselves as something if it was not valuable to folk to begin with.

  27. Severian says:

    Interesting, pro-russian account that’s becoming increasingly pessimistic.
    Take it with a grain of salt.

    https://twitter.com/AndreyZhukovv/status/1497286228793831430

    • The Cominator says:

      No reason to be all that pessimistic, if the Ukraine was really going to pull an Israel in 1948 or Poland in 1920 and survive this… they wouldn’t be asking for a levee en masse on day 2.

      Levee en masse is a desperation measure normally used to delay inevitable defeat and try to finagle a peace treaty.

      • Pooch says:

        Seems to me to be a massive army on Kiev’s doorstep with not much in their way.

      • pyrrhus says:

        But probably the Russians don’t want to deploy their heavy weapons against Kiev and its population…If they do, of course, there will be mass slaughter with small arms being pretty much useless…

      • Pooch says:

        There are all these preposterous stories coming out now about Russian jets and transports going down left and right. The Ukrainian misinformation campaigns are intensifying which means they are desperate. This has the feel of the Battle of Berlin in 1945.

    • ExileStyle says:

      It is looking more and more like Putin at al. were trying to play this thing soft, both to avoid NATO “humanitarian intervention” outcomes and, as this guy’s talking about, a naive belief in UKE-RU “brotherhood.” Almost no doubt Russia will pull this off, and quick (as this guy points out), but there will now be more casualties on both sides and I suspect there might now be potentially millions of formerly fence-sitting, indifferent residents of “the Ukraine” who are now full-blown “Ukrainians.” A this-might-be-a-shitty-country-but-it’s-my-shitty-country reaction.

      I for one did not expect them to go straight for the full invasion option, and I honestly thought the Russian-speaking half of the country would be done by now. Maybe they thought that, too.

      Russia might have to do a lot more mopping up militarily and politically than they expected. We are only in the second damn day, though.

      By the way, going out and vaguely threatening Sweden and Finland with military repercussions, though hilarious, is not a very good look. Making the propagandists’ jobs easier. NATO is already beefing up in Eastern Europe. There’s now a non-zero chance of real escalation, which is wild.

      • Pooch says:

        Apparently Ukraine has agreed to negotiations in Belarus with Putin which is a sign that a conclusion is drawing near.

        • The Cominator says:

          Predictions of peace settlement

          1) Ukraine recognizes Donbass et al as independent countries, Russia will not actually annex them though they will become small “independent” states allied with Russia.
          2) Ukraine is restricted in its military size and scope, it will be part of a Russian alliance and not join NATO.
          3) No more persecution of Russian language in Ukraine. Its now a bilingual country like Quebec Canada.
          4) Ukraine recognizes the Russian annexation of Crimea.
          5) Free trade between Russia and Ukraine.

          Any other ideas.

          • Arqiduka says:

            Seems about right, except they would probably settle for demilitarizatuon and neutrality as opposed to membership in a Russian alliance. Finlandization, in other words.

          • yewotm8 says:

            I feel like Putin doesn’t get to kill enough globohomo carpet baggers that way, but maybe he just goes ahead and does that without putting it in the treaty.

      • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

        Escalation probably goes to nukes pretty quickly. The Russians have not been terribly impressive in this fight so far, and European militaries are a joke. It look like it will be either a slap fight or nukes.

        • Aidan says:

          It’s easy to be impatient. Even Hitler’s legendary curbstomp of Poland took a month.

          • Pooch says:

            And 3 weeks for peak USM to take Baghdad. They are well on their way to beat that pace.

          • ExileStyle says:

            That was with Russian help, too. And more than 16,000 fucking German casualties.

            God have we gotten soft.

          • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

            I am not talking about speed. I am discussing capability. Maybe they are being very restrained in handling Ukraine, but it seems like they have made a lot of unforced errors, and have not adapted to modern warfare. No serious use of drone weapons, still armored columns in the open, dropping unsupported paratroopers, that sort of thing. Even if they are merely trying to take it easy on their Slavic brethren, it seems careless.

            • Arqiduka says:

              Not much better than their Georgian performance? Perception in Europe on the “they hobbled themselves or they are still fighting as if its the 80s” axis will be key, as will determine if they emerge stronger or not from this, from a purely military standpoint.

              I have come to think that -if you want to take it easy on your foe – the best way is to encircle them and give them the guilt-free way out. If you don’t have the sort of army that can do this at scale, and if they won’t run, there is no taking it easy once you start.

            • Aidan says:

              It looks to me like intentional restraint. The wisdom of restraint is another debate. The effectiveness of drones as close air support, fulfilling the role attack helicopters do now, is a very recent development. A large military adapting to that new paradigm takes a lot of time.

              I have heard reports that the first Russian strike destroyed Ukraine’s Bayraktars in their hanger. Clearly they were a high priority target if this is true, which would mean that Russia understands their importance even if its military has not updated tactics to account for their use. And clearly Ukraine was not planning on properly utilizing them if they were keeping most of them in one place.

              Dropping unsupported paratroopers seemed to work. The elite paratroopers managed to capture a small area and resist assault until they were reinforced. It kept enemy guns pointed away from the front and probably had a significant effect on their morale to be suddenly fighting the enemy in their capital city. The paratroopers might have also been sent in to capture or eliminate a specific high value target at that airport, the importance of which is still secret.

              • Pooch says:

                A lot of this is likely to age like milk as we are still in the fog of war period with intense propaganda coming from all angles. We probably won’t know the full factual details of the paratrooper story until well after the fact.

          • pyrrhus says:

            Hitler lost 16,000 dead and hundreds of vehicles and airplanes taking half of Poland…not a walk in the park…

            • Aidan says:

              Which seemed like a quick and bloodless victory in comparison to the western front of WWI, which is why it got remembered as an easy win.

              I don’t think it will be as fast as the German invasion of France. France had plenty of capacity to resist, but their lines were broken so quickly and the German advance was so rapid, that the government in Paris had been captured before most of the troops knew what was happening. But we might be looking at something similar to the German invasion of Poland, which I would still count as a clean and relatively fast win for Russia.

              • Pooch says:

                The problem for France was that they heavily fortified their border with Germany and then Germany just went around it through Belgium which immediately surrendered.

                • The Cominator says:

                  Not quite that simple, the particulars that lead to the success of the Manstein plan are more complex than that.

                • The Original OC says:

                  The French and British obligingly “attacked” towards Germany in the Netherlands leaving a gap between this attacking force and the Maginot line.

                  The Germans attacked through the gap and encircled and destroyed the attacking force, which was most of the French army.

                  There was nothing wrong with the Maginot line, but there was something wrong with the French leaders’ brains.

                  Difficult to tell what’s going on here, but the Ukrainians at least don’t seem to have charged their army forward to be encircled and destroyed.

                  I agree that people have got too used to bloodless victories. In past times 20-50,000 dead and months or years of fighting would be considered “bloodless” for conquering a country the size of Ukraine. Nowhere near that yet.

                • The Cominator says:

                  The Original OC basically has it right, the French command was retarded, they left a huge gap in their lines at the Ardennes (they were convinced the Germans were following the Schlieffen plan) which they believed was impassable for armored columns but that Manstein Guiderian and Rommel believed was very passable for armored columns as long as they did some light engineering work on it.

                  “Difficult to tell what’s going on here, but the Ukrainians at least don’t seem to have charged their army forward to be encircled and destroyed.”

                  But they look like they are going to get encircled and destroyed regardless. I tend to agree that the Russians should have demonstrated an early willingness to flatten towns if they have to… Putin having shown that he is very reluctant to flatten towns will encourage the Ukranian military to try to defend them house to house.

                • Kunning Drueger says:

                  It could also encourage the UKR rank and file to consider that Zelensky and the neo-nazis will drive them into death’s waiting arms, while the RUS will let them surrender.

                  In the near future, we should ahave a managed discussion here about the pros and cons of unrestricted warfare, after UKR war is over. I think all the points made here about going hard right out of the gate make sense, but I am puzzled as to why modern militaries don’t seem to understand that. Could be mass delusion and groupthink, but it is strange nonetheless.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  >I think all the points made here about going hard right out of the gate make sense, but I am puzzled as to why modern militaries don’t seem to understand that.

                  Taking action is scary, and taking ‘more’ action feels ‘even scarier’, even if there is no relationship between it, and you’ve already crossed a threshold anyways, and you would actually be hurting yourself instead. Even Hitler got nerves, and ordered the encircling panzer spearheads in the 1940 campaign in the west to halt, allowing the British army to consolidate at Dunkirk and eventually escape, which was quite possible the single greatest mistake in the entire war.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  The “grasp the nettle” position is well know here. With what would a guy like Creveld reply to this? That nowadays if you kill one civilian, five more vecome combatants, hence a chain reaction and you do yourself a disservice. In the days of Prussia people didn’t really care who ruled them, until Bismarck has his Gambetta moment and the world changed (or maybe it didn’t, we’ll discuss)

                  This is the claim, I think it needs to be adressed (Creveld himself presents two solutions, and I would add a third, of which three two are in the mould of “grasp the nettle”).

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  >That nowadays if you kill one civilian, five more vecome combatants, hence a chain reaction and you do yourself a disservice.

                  Which is the blue tribes message to the red tribe they intend to dominate and destroy.

                  In reality of course, a humanoid being has a supremely evolved instinct for sensing the winds of power, and an equally evolved instinct for following with the winds of power.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  So the first step of the discussion is complete, and we went from “I don’t understand why no one does X” to “OK, but the claim that X is counteproductive is enemy propaganda”. Now we can discuss historical instances.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  “Trying to win means you lose, defeating terrorists proves them right, so roll over and be rolled over. If a boot is stepping on you it must be your fault somehow, so accept the boot.”

                  It’s a message that at the same time implicitly betrays what it tries to explicitly deny.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  Of course, exactly what bluegov/whigs would propagate so that redgov/torries would self-handicap.

                  Also, completely irrelevant to whether the claim is true or not.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  Pretty relevant to the fact that it’s not true. The experiment has been run; messieurs may refer to test chambers Indo-China, Rhodesia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria.

                • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

                  We may argue about shock and awe ta tics, but KD is right. If the Russians go easy on the Ukrainian army and allow them to surrender, then they will be more likely to surrender. That way, if they face resistance later, then they can flatten the area to show that if you dig in your heels, you will end up dead.

                • Red says:

                  >We may argue about shock and awe ta tics, but KD is right. If the Russians go easy on the Ukrainian army and allow them to surrender, then they will be more likely to surrender.

                  Going hard on someone then allowing them to surrender is more likely to be effective. Surrenders are driven by fear.

                  > That way, if they face resistance later, then they can flatten the area to show that if you dig in your heels, you will end up dead.

                  Flatting an area then offering people a chance to avoid being flattened is far more effective. Humans don’t take threats seriously unless you establish a baseline that the threat is real. Which is why you want to skull fuck you foe right away and then offer the rest a chance to give up before they to get skull fucked.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  >If the Russians go easy on the Ukrainian army and allow them to surrender, then they will be more likely to surrender.

                  Limbic system being taught that you are easy, and so it has a shot; need to teach the limbic system that you are hard, and so it doesn’t have a shot. It’s going to drag the prefrontal cortex around either way.

                  The fallacy here is that in these kinds of matters many people get different social instincts mixed up; that they are projecting their own instincts for appeasing power to the targets whom they want to appease to them. ‘If i were an insurgent i would appreciate it if my enemy restrains himself in trying to fight me.’ Certainly, i would – not in the way *he* would appreciate, though, of course.

                  The two ingredients missing from the cake are one, a concerted effort to signal to principals that you would like them to surrender, what good it would be for the to surrender, and what bed it would be if they don’t; and two, in the inevitable case the first guys you come across ignore it, you carry out your threat in full. This is what will allow the rest to surrender.

                  It is precisely that tentativeness that leads to more suffering in the end, not less.

                • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

                  I am actually looking at it from the perspective of, “Russians attacking, do I bother surrendering only to be killed in a death camp later?” Not saying be kind, but that given Russian-Ukrainian history, there might be some reticence to trust that a honorable surrender will be honored. By offering a bit of velvet glove, and then using the iron fist, it sends another message. “Surrender will be honored, and you can trust us, but we will kill you to a man if you stand and fight.”

                  Think like Jews in Poland, hearing about Auschwitz. Do you think any amount of overwhelming force was going to get them to surrender, knowing that they would be shipped to a death camp? No, not a chance. You have to give a man an out or he will fight like a rabid animal. In death’s ground, fight. The Russians may be trying to show the Ukranian army that there is a way out of the war that is not the Holodomor 2.

                  Put simply, who here surrenders to the FBI when they come knocking on your door after having seen what they did to the I.VI protesters? Not I. I will kill them all, then go hunting the local fed offices, because I know the alternative to dying on my terms is dying on theirs. Prison, torture, no trial or defense allowed, and eventually death. Therefore I fight. Putin might be trying to avoid triggering that sort of response in Ukranians.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  >By offering a bit of velvet glove, and then using the iron fist, it sends another message. “Surrender will be honored, and you can trust us, but we will kill you to a man if you stand and fight.”

                  Certainly, this is also what i am arguing.

        • Upravda says:

          They went from Pripyat marshes to Kiev suburbs im less than 2 days. That’s 120 km.

          Seems pretty impressive to me.

      • Severian says:

        The chance for escalation has me anxious too. Even though NATO rapid response was obviously going to be activated.

        And apparently the Russian navy keeps firing missiles at random cargo ships for no reason, which is not helpful.

        • ExileStyle says:

          Sometimes I feel the world might benefit from a quick, restrained, mid-level tactical nuclear war. To break the trance a bit.

          War never hurts spiritually.

        • Arqiduka says:

          Those vessels are obviously ferrying fuel to the Ukraine, hence the ‘warning’ hits. Not sure about the theoretical legality of either firing on neutral vessels or ferrying fuel to a combatant.

  28. The Cominator says:

    https://twitter.com/terror_alarm/status/1497053077618188289

    If you ever have any doubt that you are right to root for Russia in this situation (perhaps someone brings up that Putin for whatever reason cozied up to Klaus Schwab temporarily I hope in an attempt to learn information but not to join him)… the position of this child torturing and sacrificing literal witch should remove all doubt.

    • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

      The piece of art they posted right below it is fucking metal as anything. *CHRISTIANITY INTENSIFIES*

      • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

        Someone needs to take that and edit it to have them glow with golden light, and then meme the shit out of the left with it. Dear God, that picture makes me want to go sign up with the Russians right now.

    • Pooch says:

      Very ugly bitch.

      • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

        The evil within becomes the evil without. When we take Washington, that woman needs to be burned at the stake. No exaggeration; I mean literally tied to a stake and literally burned. She is pure evil.

      • The Cominator says:

        Do you remember the pizzagate thing (its something even I try to forget sometimes)…

        This is a child torturing and sacrificing witch, also despite ugliness she appears pretty youthful for someone over 70 years old almost like shes sucking out life from her sacrifice victims.

        I’ve only ever see Suzanne Sommers and Christie Brinkley look that much younger than they are…

        • A2 says:

          The cannibal buffet arranged by Abramovich and attended by the great and god of New York told me all I needed to know, really. Not that there wasn’t more. (“Spirit cooking”.)

          • A2 says:

            I also do wonder what happened to James Alefantis, the curiously influential Washington pizza place owner.

  29. The Cominator says:

    While in some ways the Ukranians are resisting harder than expected it doesn’t look like this will last long to me.

    The greatest verifiable Uke success so far is holding the capital airport and preventing it from being reinforced by air. Not sure why the Russians did the operation without neutralizing the air defenses 1st (maybe NATO did develop some defenses against their jammers that they gave the Ukes) probably lost some of their best specops unit trying to do that…

    But otherwise clearly looks like the Russians are crushing everywhere to me and the reports to the contrary all sound fantastic and backed by no evidence.

    • The Cominator says:

      The other thing is the Ukranian government is already doing a fake and gay parody of the “Volkstrom” by trying to call up every male and put a gun in his hand…

      Not a sign that your regular armed forces are doing well at all.

      • Pooch says:

        Yes I agree. There seems to be a massive propaganda operation from Western media to paint the defenders as inflicting huge losses against overwhelming odds yet all the videos I see are of burned out Ukrainian equipment and Russian missile strikes. Perhaps this is to make them think they are winning and to fight on. Apparently the story of the Russian paratroopers being the scattered into the woods is bullshit too. They never lost the airport.

        • The Cominator says:

          Yeah I’m now hearing reports that they did hold the airport but it doesn’t fit the timeline where the Russians did not push back against claims it was retaken (and then they were missleing it).

          I’m going to continue to believe the Russians did at least originally lose the airport but otherwise have taken all their objectives.

    • Aidan says:

      What? The Russians took Gostomel a couple of hours ago

    • Severian says:

      That airport has now been decisively retaken by Russian armor when they finally got there.

      Btw look at this, massive Ukrainian convoy destroyed on the southern region.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RR8BVr_B338&t=1s

    • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

      One thing the episode at the airport illustrates is, besides the importance of follow-on support, the importance of man portable ordnance.

      Arms like the chinese LG5 or US XM25 already exist; a long arm firing explosive shells provides an exponentially greater kill probability on a target for a trooper than point to kill kinetic rounds – it’s almost too easy even.

      The RFM can already be halfway there with lightweight AGL systems like the atlant and balkan. The only reason really one isn’t seeing such things as the standard service arm for triggerpullers already is simply the inertia of convention; an ineffable feeling within one that such advancements to the next logical stage of capability would be ‘uneconomical’ – even though on a macro scale the economics of different long arms are basically identical – or ‘impractical’ – even though practicality is reliable success by definition.

      • Aidan says:

        As far as I’m aware, the reason the XM25 was shelved, and is only used by some special forces, was that (buried under a pile of politically correct rationalization) the average grunt lacks the ability to use it effectively. A 25mm shell has a far rounder trajectory than a rifle bullet, which makes aiming them harder than merely estimating range to the nearest hundred yards. Weapons like that could be used very effectively by smart and well-trained troops, but it there is a shortage of those.

        • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

          One often likes to think if something happens, it happened for a good reason; but there are a lot of things in the modern military that happen for no good reason.

          It was tested with regular army troops in Afghanistan, who all loved having it – and then all abruptly canceled on account of usual bureaucratic dysfunction; legal morasses, committee stupidity, a thousand figures who can say no, and no one figure who can say yes.

          • Kunning Drueger says:

            It could also be the case that it was way too effective, making the units that had them a bit too powerful.

            • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

              I wouldn’t rule out the possibility; or if we may more precisely put it, that the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of a weapon system was and or is irrelevant to the thought process of those making the decisions.

              As a rule of thumb the lower the velocity a round has the more skill it takes to get a hit with, if you are using hit to kill kinetic rounds.

              But if you are firing a high explosive fragentation round, then getting a ‘hit’ is easy. Very easy. Almost dead stupid easy.

              When i mentioned ‘exponentially greater kill probability’, that is not just figurative, but also quite literal; an area of effect is a geometric exponent of a single point.

      • yewotm8 says:

        There’s a reason the kids these days call it the “noob tube”.

  30. Severian says:

    I encourage you all to read this assessment the first day of fighting so far by Michael Kofman, who has made very accurate predictions in this buildup up to the start of the war.

    https://twitter.com/KofmanMichael/status/1497222922431254531

    • Aidan says:

      Kofman assumes the Russian objective is a crushing total victory from the outset. He puzzles over the fact that Russia is not using massed fire. Well, I do not think that Russia wants to completely destroy Ukraine. I do not know for sure, but I think that Putin wants to hand Ukraine some clean defeats to force regime change if it is possible. It looks like Russia has not committed all that many troops yet.

      At the same time, the surrender of the regime is far from guaranteed. I’m seeing reports that Ukraine is putting its anti-air in residential areas. If the Ukrainian military wants to force Russia to fight a total war, I am sure they will. Russia’s invasion, attempting to cut off the capital from the bulk of Ukraine’s forces, resembles a chokehold. First you ask for compliance, then you make the guy pass out, then if you keep choking you kill him.

      • Pooch says:

        Yes Putin’s objective from the start was regime change. As others have stated, regime change may or may not be possible, in which case they will need to annex.

    • jim says:

      Putin expected Ukraine to quietly fold, and I expected Ukraine to quietly fold.

      Ukraine is not quietly folding.

      But Globohomo, unlike the old nationalist leftism, is not an ideology conducive to creating total war machines. Globohomo thinks a nation is a hotel, and its citizens are guests in the hotel, and they are sick of those guests that have the warrior mindset. The old left nationalism thought that a nation was blood, soil, culture, and language, and was covetously eyeing the crowns of emperors and the splendid uniforms of colonial administrators. When emperors and splendidly wealthy and uniformed colonial administrators of aristocratic lineage were no more, then they lost interest in that applecart, and lost interest in blood, culture, and language.

      Will guests fight for hotel management?

      Ukraine has a foundational core of old type nazis – old type leftists. Blood, soil, culture, language, and socialism. They are certainly capable of activating and manning a total war machine. They are the commies that Putin referred to in his speech. But Globohomo does not like them either.

      Putin can defeat them, but it will cost. The ideal solution would be to cut a deal with the Nazis where they have the Ukraine west of the 1914 border, and Globohomo does not.

      Putin could attempt to do to the Ukraine Nazis what the Cathedral did to the German Nazis, but the Cathedral had a live state religion. Putin is attempting to revive Russian Orthodoxy as a live state religion and having some success, but Russian Orthodoxy is Russian Orthodoxy. He cannot impose it on the Ukrainians west of the 1914 border. He has to impose Ukraine Orthodoxy, and recognize a Ukraine Nation west of the 1914 border.

      • Pooch says:

        The ideal solution would be to cut a deal with the Nazis where they have the Ukraine west of the 1914 border, and Globohomo does not.

        This is a good summation of nationalism and why nationalism can argued as actually leftism, but does not seem like the Ukrainian Nazis are anything that can stand on its own without globohomo funding and management. Without Globohomo, the Ukrainian Nazis are probably half a dozen people or so.

      • Pax Imperialis says:

        The Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) did not exist prior to 2018. All Orthodoxy in the region fell under the Moscow Patriarch. It was only after the American State Department setting Orthodox Schism as a policy objective that the UOC sprung into existence. In effect State Department was directly attacking Russian spiritual security and is partly why this has turned into a holy war.

        Putin has historically seen the loss of Ukraine as mostly a major strategic fuck up, but recent speeches show he now primarily sees Ukraine as the religious and cultural heartland of Russian identity.

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      The replies to that thread are pure cancer, and I feel as if you owe me reparations for exposing me to them. jk

  31. Aidan says:

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/02/24/report-biden-to-divert-agents-from-u-s-southern-border-send-them-to-assist-with-russia-ukraine-conflict/

    Lol. The job of the border patrol is to let people through, so of course Biden sends them to Poland to help let people through.

    In all seriousness, this could just be a way to get even more spics through the southern border., using trouble abroad to get their agenda accomplished at home. But there’s a possibility that US troops or mercs are put in BP uniforms and sent to join in the fighting. Also a slim possibility that they are used as live targets for a false flag, though I find this unlikely. The US already had cassus belli within historical norms, and turned it down.

    • The Cominator says:

      Almost sure the border patrol is not subject to the UCMJ and they can’t be prosecuted for cowardice and refusal to fight or probably even easily fired (civil service protection as civilian federal employees).

      So for this reason unlikely to be sent to be killed by the Russians.

      • Aidan says:

        What I said and meant is that the US might put its special forces or mercenaries in border patrol uniforms and send them over to fight. Or a refugee column pouring into Poland is struck by a “Russian missile”, leaving dozens of Americans (“they weren’t even soldiers! They were police there out of the goodness of their hearts to help refugees!”) dead. False flags are the State Department MO, if you remember the “white helmets” in Syria, casting ISIS fighters as noble humanitarians being brutalized by the evil Assad’s forces.

        There are multiple factions in USG. The faction in control of Biden clearly does not want war. An enemy faction, whose employees are not necessarily clear as being of the enemy faction, puts this plan on Biden’s desk, and he signs off on it, his handlers not knowing that it will be used as a front by other elements of the government.

        My takeaway from Biden’s presser yesterday is that though his handlers do not want war, the media and those in control of them do. We will see if Brezhnev keep his hands on the reins, or if other factions manage to rope the US into war with Russia. If the latter, it is likely that USM will be humiliated and the GAE will be done before the year is out. Though if this happens, there is a slim chance that I will wake up one morning to eat nuclear fallout for breakfast, so I rather hope not.

        • Neurotoxin says:

          “We will see if Brezhnev keep his hands on the reins, or if other factions manage to rope the US into war with Russia. If the latter, it is likely that USM will be humiliated and the GAE will be done before the year is out.”

          No way! Few things are smarter than getting involved in an unnecessary land war in Russia. In winter. What could go wrong?!

          Seriously, if whoever is controlling Biden tries that – war in Russia in February – I’m 75% sure Biden will suffer a “debilitating stroke, necessitating Kamala Harris taking up the reins of the Presidency,” in about 0.00000003 pico-seconds.

          But really, they won’t try that. Our enemy in DC is insane, moronic, and incompetent, but they’re not yet that insane, moronic, and incompetent.

          One may hope.

  32. Pax Imperialis says:

    Ukrainian military is forcibly conscripting men 18-60. Videos of them dragging men away from their families are coming out. Ministry of defense advising civilians to use Molotov cocktails. Reports of missile attacks by the Ukrainian military on Russian military inside Russia proper.

    This is utter madness by a government who’s apparent objective is to bleed out the Russians as much as possible regardless of losses in a war they’ve already lost. It was lost as soon as Ukrainian air defense as neutralized.

    What they don’t seem to realize is that had Ukraine folded fast with minimal casualties inflicted on the Russians, Putin would only need to enforce break away client states in the east and a demilitarized friendly government in the west for a political victory at home. The higher the cost Russia pays, the more imperative tangible loot becomes to showcase for domestic political consumption. By carrying out missile attacks on Russian soil (justifying Russian fears of Ukrainian ballistics weapons program) and bleeding out the attack, any level of independent Ukraine becomes impossible. Putin my now have to outright annex all of traditional Ukraine to save face.

    • Arqiduka says:

      Lol, let them walk all over you so you don’t make them mad. Easy to advise others to act so, harder to think of one’s own people in this situation. One is never vanquished until he is, to throw the towel a second earlier than necessary is to suffer humiliation in the eyes of those who came before you.

      Much better to say” why fight for Soros”, but “why fight for your country?”

      • Pax Imperialis says:

        The political and historical reality is that Ukraine has always been a rump state of the Russian Empire. They had no prestige to lose and only existed in the first place because Moscow got drunk in the 90s. They exist because of Russian complacency. That is the political reality.

        Almost all nations and people exist because they are willing to fight. Ukraine is completely alien in nature because it popped out due to happenstance and was tolerated because they were not willing to fight. Their independence was only possible by at least being neutral/harmless and they couldn’t even do that.

        All I’m pointing out is that fighting and being a problem since allying with the west is what changed the calculus for Russia, and the more they bleed out Russia, the more likely annexation becomes vs demilitarized client state.

        • Arqiduka says:

          You’re probably right in you assessment of the nationhood of the Ukraine. Russia is 100% right in their assessment of the government of the Ukraine. It doesn’t matter. What matters is will they fight or not, and it seem like they are to a greater degree than anticipated had they thought of themselves as mere appendages of the Russian nation.

          Now, if Russia went into this hoping otherwise, this is their problem. But to ask of the Ukraine to stop fighting not because they are Russian or because they fight for Soros or they shield war criminals, but because Russia may get mad? You wanted to fight? Do. Not even the Italians asked the Greeks to stop fighting once the going got hard.

          • Pax Imperialis says:

            What I’m attempting to explain (and I admit I’m quite drunk currently and rambling) is that the harder they fight the worse it becomes for them. I’m not saying people should never fight, but diminishing returns do in fact exist.

            Ukraine’s problem is that they’ve gone way beyond diminishing returns into the world of negative returns and they keep doubling down on a lost hand. European history and tradition contains numerous cases of honorable and limited warfare between Christians, and rulers knew when they were beaten to kneel and submit in the best case or beg for mercy in the worst, Both Ukraine and Russia are sharing in the same Christian heritage and were participating in a limited war since 2014.

            This idea of total war was only for dealing with outsiders of Europe who did not share in Christian values and only became common in Europe during the post Christian era of the 20th century. However Russia and Ukraine were very much fighting a limited war inline with their cultural and historical background. One that Ukraine was losing from the onset and should have prompted them to negotiate in good faith. They did the opposite and are now attempting total war in a hopeless situation. That is complete madness and will doom any hope for Russian mercy.

            A limited war would have resulted in a limited peace deal. By escalating to total war Ukraine forces Russia to demand unconditional surrender. I’m not saying that they should never fight. They’ve been fighting and losing since 2014, I’m saying that they should have realized they lost and that the last thing they should do is escalate which is what they are doing. By mass arming/mobilizing the population and turning everyone into a combatant they escalated drastically. There can be no limited war or limited defeat anymore and in turn they have increased the scope of what is at stake.

            You keep bringing up Soros, He is irrelevant in regards to what Ukraine should do.

            In conclusions Ukraine was going to lose just the east and become a client state, by escalating to total war behavior they now risk being completely absorbed.

            • Pete says:

              Ukraine is just trying to prolong the fight long enough that the US and/or some Euro countries join in. Too bad for them that US leadership is feckless and retarded.

              I don’t think we should actually intervene. It’s none of our business. But the US government did tell Ukraine that we had their backs. At this point no country should be foolish enough to believe such promises.

              • The Cominator says:

                You can’t conscript men to fight in a losing fight nowadays and have them actually fight, in the age of linear tactics (up till WWI and in some aspects WWII) you could… nowadays you can’t.

                Even if they can’t leave the area their unit is assigned to… they just sort of hide in a ditch or something.

                • Herman says:

                  But you can give them some free Kalashnikovs to sell on the black market. Or to form a gang and use the war to extort someone.

                  Forced conscripts these days will probably lead to a lot of “friendly fire”.

              • Herman says:

                If they can hold out for a few weeks they might get another 5000 Helmets from Germany.

                If they hold out a few month the sanctions might bite and the Russians will run out of European made high tech products. That will certainly stop them from fighting and make them apologize.

            • Oog en Hand says:

              Why not become full Pagan, and invoke Swantewit?! Or become a vassal of Poland instead of Russia?

              • Aidan says:

                Ukrainian nationalism already necessarily has a pagan character. Because Kiev is where Saint Vladimir converted the Kievan Rus to Christianity and fathered the Russian nation, Ukrainian nationalism needs to go way back to before the evil Varangians stole Slavic land and then forced an alien religion on them, in order to claim a nation.

                For example, the Ukrainian nationalist black metal band Nokturnal Mortum, which I enjoy, but there is nothing really as cucked as being a pagan nazi fighting for a jewish president and globohomo. https://youtu.be/fEnAYPw9FEY

                Looks like Putin sent in his own pet war criminal Chechens to fight Azov in Mariupol. Fuck, I should have signed up with Azov straight out of college just for the hell of it, even though it’s the wrong side, but I was distracted by pussy. Would have made a damn good book.

            • Arqiduka says:

              Limited war died in 1871, which limited war only really ended in 1945. Maybe this is because of Europe becoming post-Christian, but I guess Russia didn’t get the memo.

              • Pax Imperialis says:

                Christianity in post soviet areas was resurrected from the dead. Every post soviet war Russia has participated in has been increasingly limited starting with the first Chechen war. Look at the Georgian war for example. Extremely short and limited in scope.

                Contrast that with American wars in the middle east which aimed to completely occupy and reshape all of society.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  So, this is a model which predicts that this war should be limited and the Ukes should act like it. They aren’t, the prediction has failed. Maybe time to revise this model (spoken by a guy who made a bunch of mistaken predictions, lol, full disclosure).

                • Pax Imperialis says:

                  This is not a model but an observation that Russian conflicts of have been limited in scope since at least the Chechen Wars and have grown more limited since. Diplomacy and warfare should have taken that into account.

                  The Ukrainian war was limited as of FEB 24th and even more so back in 2014-2022 time frame. The stated Russian war goal in the beginning was limited and on FEB 24th was limited to just demilitarization and recognition of the two break away states. The Russian invasion force was limited to a small fraction of available troops. The big artillery guns have not been used and vast majority of ground fighting is small unit tactics. Russian air strikes and missile attacks were limited to military targets almost entirely outside civilian centers.

                  And then the Ukrainians decided it would be a good idea to attempt to arm the entire civilian population turning them into uniformed partisans, mass conscript all available men, and start operations inside Russian boarders. They are attempting to escalate to a total war which changes the costs for Russia and in turn how much Russia will need out of the peace deal for a tangible feeling of victory.

                  The point is that should Ukraine succeed in making this a total war, they are going to find they pay significantly more in the peace deal.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  “The point is that should Ukraine succeed in making this a total war, they are going to find they pay significantly more in the peace deal.”

                  Fully agree. I still cannot blame them for doing it nevertheless.

                • jim says:

                  They still have the old Nazi leftism, the old leftism of blood, soil, race, culture, and language that was weaponized against emperors and colonial administrators. Tsar Putin is undeniably an emperor.

                  This brand of leftism, unlike that of globohomo, is absolutely capable of total mobilization and total war.

                  To compete with this militarily vigorous brand of leftism, need the rightism of Throne and Altar, which suffers the disability that it is considerably less capable of total mobilization and total war, though a lot more capable of war than Globohomo.

                  A time of aristocratic warfare is coming up, in which that difference will matter considerably less for the rightism of throne and altar, but for now both sides are still using twentieth century style warfare, in which the difference matters quite a bit.

        • Herman says:

          Not all of Ukraine today has been part of the Russian Empire.

          Lviv in the very west has been part of the Austrian Empire. The west of Ukraine is the area where all the Ukrainian nationalists are from. These are the guys who fight.

          The Russian speaking population in the east is not opposed to Putin.

          • Pax Imperialis says:

            Was trying to get at that with the term “traditional Ukraine.”

            Modern economy and legacy of WW2 resulted in Russian speaking population as far as Lviv. Partitioning Ukraine will get very messy.

          • Drien says:

            Why do Europeans care about what Russians in the east of the country do or about keeping such a country united?

            • Pax Imperialis says:

              They care because pathological hatred for the Russians still exist due to the legacy of WW2 and cold war. Same reasons why many Germans still hate themselves and the German state. Ukraine is really just a big Fuck to to Russia.

    • Encelad says:

      It looks they are trying to conscript underage boys as well.

      https://mobile.twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1497130688981655552

      “Official statement of the Commander of the Troop Forces Yuri Galushkin:

      ‼ ️Today Ukraine needs everything. All procedures for joining TPO are simplified. Carry only your passport and identification code. There are no age restrictions.

      If you have problems on the ground, please refer to this official statement.”

  33. Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

    Advance elements of the northern force are inside Kiev already.

  34. Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

    One interesting thing about these events is, the fact that smartphones are everywhere; and so there are nigh instant eyes on force movements everywhere.

    Cell towers and switching stations are high value targets, too.

    • ExileStyle says:

      There is way less footage than I expected, almost all from randos in their Kiev apartment blocks it seems, or just Ukraine/GAE propaganda. Probably a ton of censorship going on by Twitter & co. The fall of Kabul was a more vividly documented event than this war so far, which is strange. Very hard to tell what is actually going on.

      • jim says:

        > The fall of Kabul was a more vividly documented event than this war so far,

        The left can’t meme.

      • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

        Twatter has blocked or ‘age restricted’ basically any and every video or picture of action now.

        Not exactly clear what good that would do for them, or if this is just a spandrel of their schoolmarm nanny algorithm.

      • Pooch says:

        I think the regime understands the horrible imagery and damage to their legitimacy documenting Russian flags go up over former globohomo territory in the same way Taliban flags went up over Kabul. I wouldn’t be surprised if when Russian tanks enter Kiev the US Media pulls the video feeds altogether for propaganda purposes.

      • Pax Imperialis says:

        Lack of footage likely due to two main factors. Most combat is at distances too far to record and typically destructive enough that being close enough to record is likely means you’re not living to upload the footage. Secondly the initial invading force was quite limited as far as boots on the ground goes so there’s not much to record. This is certainly not 100,000+ man invasion. Much of the Russian forces are being kept in reserve.

  35. Severian says:

    Russian columns from Belarus are reaching Kiev now. Expecting big battles for the outskirts on day 2.

    • jim says:

      If I were in Putin’s shoes, I would wait for the other groups to arrive and encircle the city.

      The column from Belarus was the closest column. Should wait for the rest to catch up. Things always go smoother the more overwhelming your force.

      On the other hand, might take Kiev with only two columns, then attack the large concentration of forces west of Kiev from the rear with the eastern force attacking from the front. Encircle Kiev, take it, then encircle the forces west of Kiev. Maybe the eastern Russian force is there to distract the western Ukrainian force from rushing to the defense of Kiev. If they rush to the defense of Kiev with the eastern Russian force hot on their heels, it will turn into a rout, and Ukrainian army will collapse.

      • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

        >The column from Belarus was the closest column. Should wait for the rest to catch up.

        As both Patton and Guderian found out, when things are still moving, attacking is often actually safer than it is to stop. Attack and loop back around to someone else’s sector even if you have to (also known as ‘lightning runs’ in later days).

      • Severian says:

        Russian tactics in this offensive seem to be speed at all costs.

        Also, notice how these reports of great Ukrainian victories keep getting closer and closer to Kiev city center.

        • The Cominator says:

          “Russian tactics in this offensive seem to be speed at all costs.”

          Deep Operations.

        • Neurotoxin says:

          “Also, notice how these reports of great Ukrainian victories keep getting closer and closer to Kiev city center.”

          This is amazing. I specifically remember this exact same thing from a TV show about WWII, where a German vet said, “The official accounts were that we were having great victories, but we knew they were lying because the ‘great victories’ kept happening closer and closer to Berlin.”

          History does repeat itself.

      • Upravda says:

        A couple of week ago, I predicted that Putin would not invade.

        Obviously wrong.

        Also, it’s obvious he was “pressed against the wall”.

        Now, it is only a question where will he stop, between Kiev and Lavov, or in Panonnian plain.

        I only hope it will be over fast.

    • Mister Grumpus says:

      Whatever those Russkies are going to do I hope they do it fast.

      There must be CIA and Mossad guys running around in Kiev right now setting up dynamite and chlorine cans around orphanages and nursing homes and oh God what next.

      Meanwhile this USA trucker convoy is allegedly starting and every road sign says Reichstag Avenue.

  36. Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

    Chernobyl complex taken, along with the Pripyat area.

    The northern front is moving more quickly than the eastern front, though it’s likely the eastern force was never really intended to advance far anyways. The southern force from Crimea advancing almost unopposed; the bulk of uke forces, concentrated in the east, could be at risk of flanking attacks from the rear.

    Well, a great deal of success in war depends on local commanders taking strategic initiative based realities on the ground.

    • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

      Report of russian heavy bombers finally going up. Hopefully means Putin is realizing you can’t just dip your toe in the pool, you gotta jump all in.

      • Pax Imperialis says:

        Has more to do with Ukrainian Air Defense being largely destroyed. You typically don’t want to fly heavy bombers into contested air space especially if they don’t have stealth technology built in.

        • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

          Tue enough; there’s the fact they haven’t really been widely deploying many other large scale fire support assets in terms of arty or SSMs, either, though.

  37. The American Empire is literally crumbling before our eyes. Biden now literally begging India to condemn Russia which India is wisely refraining from doing, merely limiting itself to call for ceasefire and urge “both sides to explore peaceful diplomatic solutions.”

    https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/in-consultations-with-india-on-ukraine-invasion-says-us-president-joe-biden-101645734477209.html

    • Pooch says:

      Great to see if you are an Indian. India sees which way the wind is blowing.

      • I think everyone outside the globohomo echo chamber realize how lame economic sanctions are and how much prestige the USM has lost since Afghanistan. Nobody takes these US diplomatic threats seriously any more.

        Besides india have always been close to Russia even in the Cold War days.

    • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

      It’d be the perfect cherry on top if West Taiwan decided now would be a good time to make a move on China too. It’s not really in their nature to Carpe Diem like that though.

    • Red says:

      I’m starting to feel a lot more optimistic about our future as nation. Get some elite leadership and the Cathedral might crumble from a few thousand Americaaners.

      • Joe W. says:

        That’s all it would take. It was fairly obvious before Jan. 6, but now it’s crystal clear. Our “elites'” power is entirely illusory.

        • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

          There are three events that show the helplessness and madness of the “elite:” I/VI, the Fall of Kabul, and the Vaxx cover up. Means, motive and opportunity. The I/VI protesters showed that we have people who will fight if we lead them. Means. The Vaxx cover up shows that then need to be destroyed and the institutions purged rather thoroughly due to their demon worship and human sacrifice. Motive. The Fall of Kabul shows that they are weak, stupid, and out of touch with reality. Opportunity.

          Time to get ready for rough times.

          • The Ducking Man says:

            But so far we cannot answer the fact that there is no person with balls big enough to take down globohomo.

            • jim says:

              Tell it to the Taliban.

              Afghans are kind of white, being descended from Alexander’s troops and Hebrews, and not much mixed with the South Asians. But they are Muslim, and less white than the Russians. If white Orthodox Christians whip globomhomo’s ass, it will be a game changer.

              • The Ducking Man says:

                But talibans only play covert operation and propaganda race in US soil (i.e. don’t have the balls to face globohomo).

                I can understand their spirit as radical muslim, but their way of doing things does not scream authority.

                • jim says:

                  The Taliban does a better job of memeing against globohomo, than the vast Cathedral propaganda apparatus does of memeing against the Taliban.

                  The Cathedral thinks it is a soft superpower, that the Taliban are helpless against Hans Soylo, and the black female James Bond, because they were helpless against Hans Solo and James Bond.

                  The Cathedral thinks their comedians are still funny, and their heroes still heroic. They think that someone with a Harvard degree must be smarter than Musk, and an official scientist in Rocket Science Administration must be better at rocket science than Musk.

      • Kunning Drueger says:

        I’m less optimistic. While I don’t believe GAE is competent, I do believe they retain capabilities for punishing enemies, and I think they have massive institutional inertia. So incompetent people with working tools and a widely held perception that they can, will, and should win. I’m only saying this for myself, but I need to see an instance of clear flouting of GAE will by obvious opposition in core territory that doesn’t get punished before I’m going to believe there’s an opportunity there. Something like IVI that gets treated like Kabul. Remember, half of DoD and State treated the Taliban, Haqani, whatever like they were the good guys, and an equivalent number wanted the US to lose and withdraw. I know there’s a lot of important details I’m glossing over.

        FWIW, this is why I was hopeful for the Canadian truckers, not that a bunch of basically leftist peacemongers would overthrow Justdel Casdeau

        • Kunning Drueger says:

          Phonefag sorry

          …I was hopeful that a bunch of dissenting, straight, white males would get away with little to no consequences, because that would be a very clear sign of potential for elite defection.

      • Pooch says:

        It’s a huge whitepill. Not sure what it will ultimately mean for the center of the empire, but people watching pieces of the empire just collapse utterly on their tv screens can only be a helpful thing for us I think.

    • More signs that India will move even closer to Russia
      https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/india-abstains-from-un-vote-that-condemns-russias-aggression-against-ukraine/articleshow/89838946.cms

      Don’t forget that Russia is India’s biggest defense supplier. And have been friendly to India when the West was hostile during the Cold War era.

      And except a few cathedral mouthpieces in the Indian media most people seem to be supportive of this approach.

  38. Severian says:

    So the Ukrainians are putting up a fight in the Kharkiv and Kiev fronts.

    The Russians tried this big flashy airborne operation to take an airport outside Kiev. They were apparently countered and scattered into the forest. The Ukrainians clearly still have enough command and control to stage limited counter attacks.

    Also, AA batteries are still active in Kiev, I suppose that’s a surprise.

    • Red says:

      Also, AA batteries are still active in Kiev, I suppose that’s a surprise.

      That explains why didn’t fly troops in after taking the airfield. Initial air defense suppression was less effective than they thought it would be.

      • Pseudo-CHrysostom says:

        Wild weasel operations is – or rather was – more of a USM thing. Not a lot of militaries have a well developed tradition of SEAD.

        Big radar installations were all hit, and likely some of the larger multi-axle semitrailer systems as well; but smaller vehicular units are harder to keep track of, and several were likely already staged inside the urban terrain to begin with.

    • Arqiduka says:

      https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1497079071292936204?cxt=HHwWmMCy0fje2MYpAAAA

      These niggaz really thought they could land paratroopers right in the middle of the capital with the nearest friendly support hours (if not days) away and the enemy would just take it LOL.

      The second time Russian try this exact scenario (99 Prishtina Airport siege) with the exact same conclusion.

      • Severian says:

        Yeah what the fuck were they thinking? Maybe something else went wrong, or they had no idea of the force around that area.

        • Red says:

          That sort stuff works but only if you have close air support to fight off counter attacks.

  39. The Cominator says:

    So whats this about the rumor that someone blew up the lead tomb around the old Chernobyl reactor core?

    • Pooch says:

      Have not heard that. Linkfag?

        • Pooch says:

          A bit of a cooky source, prob will need to see some verification on that. I wouldn’t put it past globohomo to try something like that though.

        • Severian says:

          The core is fine.

          Big RUS armored columns are moving through the exclusion zone and that’s turning up the dirt, increasing radiation levels a bit.

          • Kunning Drueger says:

            I was going to comment this. MSM and shills are doing everything they can to reinforce the Putler narrative.

            Anyone heard about “US Bio-warfare labs” in UKR being target by the initial missile fusillade?

              • Red says:

                Jesus Fucking Christ.

                • Kunning Drueger says:

                  Yeah… yeah. This (the UKR invasion) is starting to feel like one of those things that feels like a really big deal while it is happening, but later will be seen as a minor footnote to the events that followed. The generals in charge of the GAE militaries will soon be in a “use it or lose it” situation with a lot of weapons projects and other hi tech shit they don’t understand and cannot use correctly, much less replicate. Can you imagine that dumb buck SecDef getting a briefing on ICBMs, while his glazed over eyes stare through the pencil dick officer trying to explain that the nukes don’t work?

                  I wonder which domino will topple tomorrow…

              • Arqiduka says:

                The nerve of the Chinese, who were obviously in fro.day one, to now claim that this was all the US’ doing. Only sullies what Russia is trying to do if true.

                • Kunning Drueger says:

                  Maybe they weren’t? Maybe they got blindsided by the release and just rolled with it? Probably not.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  Very hard to explain how they acted otherwise. Could be wrong of course, but never had cause to revisit my origin hypothesis since March 2020.

                • Red says:

                  I rather doubt the Chinese intentionally launched it on their own people. Way to easy for China to get blamed for it.

                  Would have been far easier to release it in some place like South Africa, Thailand, or pretty much anywhere else. It either got out before it was finished (they had a woman running the place) or the Cathedral released it.

                  Once released they probably told China either roll with it, or we’ll blame you for it.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  The original strain wasn’t infectious enough that you could just drop it somewhere and hope it would catch. You would have needed to cultivate it at the same time across a minimal number of people in the same community, incidentally giving lie to the whole “lab leak” theory. So, either China tolerated US agents going around Wuhan for months and infecting people, or else it was carefully planned and executed.

                  On the other hand, the timing re the election was far too fortuitous for China to have acted alone.

                  Thus, joint Chinese and DNC operation to tank the econ.

                • Red says:

                  The original strain wasn’t infectious enough that you could just drop it somewhere and hope it would catch. You would have needed to cultivate it at the same time across a minimal number of people in the same community, incidentally giving lie to the whole “lab leak” theory. So, either China tolerated US agents going around Wuhan for months and infecting people, or else it was carefully planned and executed.

                  That comes back the same problem: If it was a carefully executed plan, they wouldn’t have released it in the same city as the lab. They would have gone to a nearby city that didn’t have a biolab working on COVID viruses, lol.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  Maybe, but what to do when gain of function comes to light and bat soup doesn’t fly anymore? Why, Wuhan is right next to this lab don’t you know, obviously a leak which we are clumsily trying to hide, wink wink.

  40. Kunning Drueger says:

    Would anyone care to dump links to follow what’s going on? I don’t use social media, but if I need to set up a Twitter I guess I will. Sorry for newfagging but I’m just not finding trustworthy stuff. I guess there may not be any good sources.

    So the first real war of the 21st century, and I missed it while gardening lol. Is it true that RUS doesn’t have NVGs? Seems like a pretty severe handicap.

    I know the USM is being actively purged and converged, but what are the chances that our heroic GWoT veterans will rally to the flag?

  41. Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

    Majority of Uke forces were concentrated in the forth and east, where the going is slow, while the break out from Crimea in the south is advancing rapidly.

    The forces on the border started falling back almost immediately upon engagement, engaging in fighting retreats, which may have been the plan – probably their best one, giving up space to buy time, and concentrating into more defensible positions, to turn a rapid situation into a drawn out slog.

    If the forces in the south can cross the Dneiper in force before they do, the Kharkiv pocket could be cut off, which would be a huge coup.

    An airborne assault briefly took the airport next to Kiev; a counterattack scattered the first wave into the woods surrounding the area, but if i were the russian general i wouldn’t leave it at that.

    Lack of nightvision and other forms of sensors in many units necessitated a daytime attack on the eve of invasion; this is a very important capability to have.

    Tanks on both sides seem largely to be serving as bait for pgms; most visible signs of casualties are highlight reel cellphone videos of burnt out columns of armoured vehicles along the roadsides.

    • Pooch says:

      Hard to say if this is a good outcome for Russia on day 1 with propaganda coming from both sides. May god smite the forces of globohomo quickly and justly to minimize civilian casualties.

      That is a shame the Ruskies don’t all have night vision though. I would think that would have been a priority for a modern army.

    • Driet says:

      I don’t understand why fight if you have no chance of winning. All you are doing is ensuring death and destruction. Like Belgium in ww1 or Poland in ww2. This isn’t Atilla the Hun. They aren’t going to murder everyone and raze it to the ground. What does it serve to futilely fight?

      • jim says:

        It serves a political objective – delegitimizing those who conquer you.

      • Red says:

        No one respects a people who won’t fight back. While those who show themselves to be fierce fighters often become among the elite of an empire. See the Cossacks for an example of this.

      • Arqiduka says:

        The tribes who didn’t fight against all odds didn’t make it to our days. Both the poles and Belgians are stil there, and no defeat is forever. But ignominity is.

      • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

        They likely feel that the longer the action gets drawn out, the more likely other powers will get drawn into the conflict, and or other developments that would be in their favor. Putin likely feels the same way.

        The reluctance to use mass fire-support works against this though; it is a basic principle of combat operations that when encountering pockets of resistance, you dissolve them with a storm of steel. Unlike the last time the Russian army rolled over the plains of ostfront though, no mile deep fronts of katyushas letting fly here. It’s a tale as old as time; hesitancy at the thought of collateral in the first place, leading to a lot more ‘collateral’ in the long run.

        • Kunning Drueger says:

          I see your point, and I agree. But according to Putin this is a “police action,” of sorts. He is restoring legitimate governance in UKR and obliterating the foreigners, and their local proxies, that were running the place. So doesn’t it make sense to show restraint and keep targets narrow? He very well could be intentionally creating pockets of resistance with the expectation that, once the ones willing to fight and die are cloistered, they will be liquidated with overwhelming force.

          I think it is going to take 2 weeks, but only if Potato Joe doesn’t do something insane. I hope it is a done deal in 3 days and GAE just lets it happen, but they are just so fucking dumb and evil, it almost seems like a certainty that terrible decisions will be made.

          • Red says:

            >So doesn’t it make sense to show restraint and keep targets narrow?

            I can’t think of any time in war where showing restraint on your foes during the initial clash is useful. Overwhelming shows of power is what our monkey brains respond best to.

          • Pete says:

            If you show restraint, you end up like the US in Iraq. People will fuck with you for years, knowing you’ll never hit back.

            If people understand that attacking your troops will result in whole towns getting annihilated, they won’t fuck with you.

    • Red says:

      As expected Choppers are going down regularly to manpads. The Russian’s don’t seem to have taken the clue from Turkey and replaced their close air support with drones.

      The US is likely to be drawn into the fight if it goes on for too long. The Ukrainian army isn’t completely disintegrating and the allure of using drones and other weapons the US can deny involvement with will grow.

      • Arqiduka says:

        I am surprised by the amount of fighting going on compared to yesterday, as well as what look like limited gains. Russia will of course prevail but there is a huge difference between winning in a week, and winning in 3 months. If the latter, the ethnogenesis of Ukraine (or at least Ruthenia) will be complete. Fighting against the clock.

    • Red says:

      My over all take: Putin is soft. If you’re going to do an invasion you want to use maximize firepower to flatten things but he was worried about bad PR. He went in hoping for an easy victory, but it’s not going that way.

      • Pooch says:

        He’s trying to avoid civilian casualties because ultimately the Ukraine’s rightful place is as a province in the Russian Empire. I say good on him.

        • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

          The sentiment is admirable, but this is a old lesson frequently trafficked in such spheres as these; that grasping at a nettle tentatively causes more pain than gripping it with force.

          • Pooch says:

            Surely can be said of the Japs. Nuked to shit only to then turn into a loyal globohomo janissary.

      • Arqiduka says:

        Looking forward to the discussion in the coming days, but am unclear as to what does going i harder entails. Leveling what, Kiev? The Uke army? Its not like they sit down waiting to take the barrage. Ultimately you either have the sort of army than can encircle the enemy or you attrite them, little to do with how much force is being used. Just innitial thoughts.

        • Pooch says:

          If they have air superiority then they could potentially go USM style and high altitude bomb the shit out of anything and everything with reckless abandon.

          • Arqiduka says:

            I don’t think they have the capacity to do that, the Syrian force they deployed was optimised for that, the broader RuAF appears to be nowhere near that level of skill for now.

      • The Cominator says:

        Its been slightly more than 24 hours, if it falls in 5 days thats fine. There is a lot of propaganda out there.

        • Pooch says:

          There is. Some are saying the Ruskies are only a few hours from Kiev and it could fall in 48 hours. People forget it took US 3 weeks to take Baghdad.

          • The Cominator says:

            Yeah and the US military was still in its still in its prime at that time.

            • Pooch says:

              And Saddam’s military was not close to current Ukraine’s with more favorable terrain. I believe Iraq is smaller land wise too but not 100% sure on that.

          • The Cominator says:

            Also the Uke english language propaganda keeps claiming shit which is turning out not to be true, while Kiev may not fall in 24 hours (I was shocked when people here were saying that) having a lot of Baghdad Bobs on your side is not indicative of a force kicking ass and taking names.

            • Red says:

              Kiev could have fallen in 24hours if the Ukrainian military had decided not to fight. Which is why they ran the airborne operation on the airport. I’m still not sure why didn’t follow up with more troops being flown in.

              I expected them to flatted the border areas and every large concertation of Ukrainian troops to induce a rout then charge ahead, but they’ve been very limited in their air strikes. I also haven’t have seen the sort of drone attacks I thought the Russians would deploy.

              It never pays to play nice at the start of a war. Attack hard and fast, then be mercifully once your foe is broken.

            • Pooch says:

              Yeah there seems to be a massive propaganda effort to try to make it seem like the Ukrainians are valiantly defending waves of attacks and the Russians are taking heavy losses. If this was the case we would be seeing tons of pictures of dead Russians. A lot of it smells likes bullshit.

              https://twitter.com/Nikolaos1389/status/1497035923732803593?s=20&t=VlDPl0nujzyO5ZREy1I-Lg

            • ExileStyle says:

              Yeah, this is the first war we have fought with anyone during the Twitter et al. era, when we all think we are high-level operational intelligence agents because we get some grainy pictures from some spook’s phone every few minutes, and we expect everything to happen instantly: ‘Oh, wow, Russia hasn’t taken Kiev in the first 48 hours…must be a fuck-up.’

              It took Germany, WITH Russia’s intervention, like 5-6 weeks to take Poland, for God’s sake. It’s not that it was a difficult war with the outcome in doubt, just that Poland is a big-ass country, which brings with it logistical problems. And yes, the Poles were actually still fighting well into October.

              • Arqiduka says:

                Poland is big, and was bigger still back than, but not so big that you needed 8 weeks to cross on horseback. It took them 8 weeks because the Poles fought and never thought of not fighting, never thought they were being subject to anythongbut an invasion from an alien people. Part of what Russia is trying to do is establish that links betwee the Russian and Ukrainian peole have never been breached, and thus at least some of the people and armed forces will not resist and turn to them instead, thus giving lie to the machinatuons of Lenin and Soros. All from that speech everyone liked so much.

                Hence, this sort of resistance is very problematic, as it establishes that outside of the two regions people may not want anything to do with Russia, even though most would probably agree with what Putin was saying re the depredations of Soros.

                In other words, of this takez 8 weeks I can assure you that Russia would have lost, and their winning streak against globohomo will have come to a screeching end. Even the 3 weeks to Baghdad timeline is too much. If Kiev is leveled, well, you know the drill.

                • jim says:

                  Three weeks to Kiev, no problem.

                  Eight weeks to Kiev, no problem.

                  Needing to level Kiev, that would be a problem.

                  If Putin has to level Kiev then after leveling Kiev needs to withdraw back to the 1914 boundary, and declare victory.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  Not to Kiev, 3 weeks to Lviv.

                  Can’t install a friendly government in half the country. If they won’t take it all, they need to open negotiations from a position of strength rather soon.

                • jim says:

                  It is clear that the Putin intends the negotiations to proceed with Putin sitting in a tank, and the other party to the negotiations in front of the tank.

                  Kiev it is.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  “Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Lavrov says that negotiations with the Ukrainian government will begin as soon as the Ukrainian Armed Forces lay down their weapons, “let them return to their families” he adds.”

                  https://twitter.com/RWApodcast/status/1497157410435313688

                  Don’t know how to interpret this stance, it read like “all the way to Lviv”, but could be “give us Kiev and then we’ll talk”.

                • Mister Grumpus says:

                  > Kiev it is

                  Gotta leave your opponent a way out, like the highway to Lviv.

                  There has to be a crisp line, so that any false flag stuff, like in Lviv, was obviously done by someone other than Russians.

                  So an independent Globohomo Ruthenia in the west, and a Novorussia buffer state in the east. I’m not strategic genius but it sure makes sense, especially now.

                • Mayflower Sperg says:

                  If Putin has to level Kiev then after leveling Kiev needs to withdraw back to the 1914 boundary, and declare victory.

                  Kiev was deep inside Russia in 1914. The modern oblasts of Lviv, Ternopil, Chernivtsi, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Zakarpattia belonged to Austria-Hungary; the rest was Russia.

                  Maybe you meant “withdraw to the boundary of the 2010 election”?

                • jim says:

                  Return to the 1914 boundary, including the leveled Kiev. So that he does not have to level everything beyond the 1914 boundary.

              • Mister Grumpus says:

                The game theory of all this is amazing and confusing.

                How much faster would Saigon have fallen if they’d had Twitter and text messages?

                OK, and next ask yourself, how would Saigon 1975 have gone if they’d had Twitter and text messages, but then lost them all at once?

                I look at Kabul and I see an “Oh Shit Cascade” that was only possible with smartphones. Everybody freaking out and defect-defect’ing all at once, including the Globohomo people.

                This implies that Russia needs to make sure that Kiev keeps electricity and cellular data working, so that they can trigger the people in charge to “pull a Kabul” and bug out quickly.

                But on the flip-side, if cellular data still works then false-flaggers can still gas orphanages and nursing homes and send out false flag pity bait videos.

                So who wants what to keep working, or stop working, to help them win quickly? Anyone who can lend some context or clarity to this question, please do.

                • Mister Grumpus says:

                  To get the discussion started, I understand that during the Arab Spring, different regimes shut off Twitter, cellular and/or internet at different stages in the game, to different results.

                  Perhaps some kind of hypotheses can be pulled out of those comparisons.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  Would think that the default is: the party with military superiority wants as little publicity as possible, and vice versa. Not sure that I buy the cascade scenario, mere rumor may be sufficient in causing that.

        • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

          Kiev is close to the border in the north, wouldn’t be unusual for it to be lapped long before the rest of the country is.

        • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

          All wars become long wars eventually. It is that statesman who makes plans assuming ‘the boys will be home by christmas’ that winds up prolonging his travails the most in the end. ‘Blitzkrieg Legend’ by Colonel Karl-Heinz Frieser is a topical study that touches on the matter.

          • jim says:

            > All wars become long wars eventually.

            Lots of short wars happened in the past, and will happen in the future.

            The problem is that such short, small, victorious, wars are apt to result in one hegemon coming right up against another hegemon.

            When Napoleon brought order to France, Russia and Germany started getting nervous about this revolutionary left nationalism, that up then they had expected to self destruct with famine and terror annihilating France. So they decided to do something about, and were defeated instantly in a single devastating battle. War over.

            Britain asserted control of the oceans to prevent Napoleon from invading Britain. That war also quickly done.

            Then, a year later, the Russians and Austrians had another go. And another instant defeat, leaving Napoleon with total dominion over Europe.

            Then Napoleon gets a bit too big for his pants, and invades his allies Spain and Portugal. This turns into a long war. He wins instantly, but faces a prolonged guerrilla struggle against guerrillas armed, funded, and helped to organize by Britain.

            And then he attacks Russia for what he deems insufficient submission. Goes all the way to Moscow with the Grande Army. Discovers that Moscow is a long way, that the Grande Army needs a huge logistic tail, and that the Napoleonic state has devoured the logistic capability of France. Two years later, war over and Napoleon exiled to Elba.

            • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

              >Lots of short wars happened in the past, and will happen in the future.

              >The problem is that such short, small, victorious, wars are apt to result in one hegemon coming right up against another hegemon.

              Yes, using an absolute declarative here would be imprecise – as it often is.

              We certainly can say it is the going tendency though.

              Sometimes conflicts are shockingly abbreviated. Many times, somehow, some way, for one reason or another, they start stretching on a lot longer than it’s principles wished for them to.

              Such is the way of Mars.

  42. obvious desire for war with Russia was reigned in from above

    That’s “reined” in from above, as in “pulling on the reins”

  43. Pooch says:

    Putin’s problem show in one picture: a bunch of dumb masked young girls protesting against the war.

    https://twitter.com/ABarbashin/status/1496927794131050498?s=20&t=9HYCpDfrNkToISsoEiemPw

    This tells me he has globohomo influences rotting the minds of the youth because lack of strong state religion.

    • The Cominator says:

      BAP has gone through that Russia has a real problem with this in his podcasts with other Russians. However I think general Cathedral insanity has probably curbed any young Russian enthusiasm for globohomo.

      • Red says:

        However I think general Cathedral insanity has probably curbed any young Russian enthusiasm for globohomo.

        I would bet that most of the worst insanity is never published overseas. Russia’s biggest problem is men still don’t own their women. Their daughters need to be married off by 14 by law and divorce made illegal for women.

        • The Cominator says:

          Russia female situation is much better though perhaps not ideal…

          • Red says:

            Not based on their young women’s behavior. Women want to be owned and most seem to be adopting Globohomo as their religion because it appears to be the strong tribe.

            • The Cominator says:

              Most Russian women are politically normiecon. They vote more heavily for United Russia

              They are emancipated but not high status, hence they are “whores” but not American high status dyke princesses. Whores are better than dyke princesses.

              • Red says:

                Men won’t fight any harder for a whore wife than they will for no wife.

                • The Cominator says:

                  I’ve addressed this before, “whores” are not the trad waifu ideal but they are many many times than the fat bitter insane evil parodies of women you see in the West.

                • Mayflower Sperg says:

                  In the 2006 Russian miniseries “The Storm Gate”, there’s a scene where a Russian soldier comes home on leave and discovers that his wife had an abortion (she left the receipt lying around, probably on purpose). She mocks him for being a private and says he doesn’t deserve children until his rank improves. Instead of killing her on the spot, he goes back to Chechnya and becomes a war hero.

                  Even patriotic Russian war propaganda says Russian women are whores. What the fuck?

                • Red says:

                  I’ve addressed this before, “whores” are not the trad waifu ideal but they are many many times than the fat bitter insane evil parodies of women you see in the West.

                  The sex is better, the family life is not. Whores have fewer children and fathers often treat the children they have with them poorly because they can’t be sure they’re actually their kids.

                  I like whores, but whores being normalized instead of stigmatized is a sign of a dying civilization.

                • The Cominator says:

                  “In the 2006 Russian miniseries “The Storm Gate”, there’s a scene where a Russian soldier comes home on leave and discovers that his wife had an abortion (she left the receipt lying around, probably on purpose). She mocks him for being a private and says he doesn’t deserve children until his rank improves. Instead of killing her on the spot, he goes back to Chechnya and becomes a war hero.

                  Even patriotic Russian war propaganda says Russian women are whores. What the fuck?”

                  Russia dare not introduce Talibanesque style patriarchy at the current time, that problem is jihad complete (they did go as far in decriminalizing domestic violence). In the absence of Taliban patriarchy if you are too hard and negative on whores you have to be soft on career girls and soft on feminism and that is much worse. Denying that many women are natural whores is to spread bluepilled thinking among men.

                  “The sex is better, the family life is not.”

                  Whores more likely to end up married than career girls, drugs are the failure mode. They have far more pleasant personalities.

                  “fathers often treat the children they have with them poorly because they can’t be sure they’re actually their kids.”

                  If you don’t let your woman know you are going to demand a paternity test you’re an idiot.

                • Red says:

                  >If you don’t let your woman know you are going to demand a paternity test you’re an idiot.

                  I don’t know a single guy who got a paternity test until after he caught his wife fucking around. It’s considered quite evil to doubt your whore wife.

                  We’ll know what direction Russia is going soon since the last shackles of Gobohomo is about to come falling off.

                • The Cominator says:

                  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTuzDt-dGxA
                  They should listen to based Mr. Garrison on this subject.

        • Oscar C. says:

          The Chechens seem to be on that line, it caused some uproar in Russia proper

          https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/18/chechen-teenager-forced-marriage-russia

  44. Basil says:

    Sending Russian boys to die, and not some kind of Magogs, of your own people (well, or very close, if you believe that Ukrainians are a separate nation) is much easier than solving the women’s issue or pacifizing ethnic minorities in the Russian Federation itself.

    • Varna says:

      It’s super depressing seeing footage of a banal drab EE Slavic country undergoing shit like this. In the amateur vids you can hear the poor sods behind the phones swearing in obvious provincial Russian, which just adds another dimension of melancholy to the whole affair. The bigger players responsible for this now have another major reason in the basket of reasons to hang them by their heels.

      In the short term I see three major gifts to globohomo from all of this:
      1) The economy will be collapsing and the inflation soaring not because of them, but because of evil Hitler the 2nd, and enduring the shortages and being perpetually skint will now be a sign of virtue, a price to pay for stopping the new Hitler (in Europe especially). Yet another case of “we fucked up” turned magically into “we are doing this because of virtue”.
      2) Criticism of globohomo from castrating kids to forced injections will now be a sign you’re an agent of Hitler to a much more vivid extent. The censorship now has an excuse to go full Andropov.
      3) The first wave of real data about the effects of the clot shot can be muffled by the artillery fire, giving globohommo breathing space to prepare and introduce more fake narratives to obscure the data and kick the can of explosive truths down the road.

      • The Cominator says:

        You’re severely underestimating how massively hated the Democrats are right now at least outside of deep blue cities. They even have recently sort of admitted this. Invoking the Russians won’t help them.

      • Pooch says:

        I will say this is energizing the left in a way reminiscent of Trump appearing on the scene in 2015/2016. Trump derangement syndrome is rapidly turning into Putin derangement system. Every propaganda institution in the entire Cathedral memeplex is pumping out Putler hate 24/7 now.

      • Doom says:

        It’s clear from their attempts to ramp up propaganda and restrictions that they are fucked.

        No one in their right mind will accept, in the US, paying $6 a gallon for gas “to support democracy in the Ukraine”. It is an insane position to take and everyone can see it.

        Bidens initial response to Russian military action included “And nordstream 2 definitely will not go ahead”. In the parlance “tell me you had an agenda without telling me you had an agenda”.

        Canada also trying to install a social credit system is being instantly called out for what it is “No bank account if you have the wrong idea” – they’re fucked too, since no one in Canada will agree to this and they’re already primed to protest. Expect more protests.

        It seems that all of the elites have been trying to grab as much as possible in as short a time as possible and it is becoming obvious to everyone.

        Who was it that talks about elite oversupply? Yeah, we have that now, and they’re all trying to grab the spoils of failing systems. Good to see, frankly, now maybe we can have some competent people in power? Please? Can we?

        • Karl says:

          People will soon be paying a lot more than $6 a gallon for gas. Of course they won’t do it to support democracy in the Ukraine. They’ll do it because they want gas.

          Price increases in an inflationary environment accellerate as soon as people realize there is inflation. Maybe that realization will take some more time, but then there will still be the (by now normal) year by year increase of money and credit.

  45. Pooch says:

    I have to say Yarvin was 100% right in endorsing Biden over Trump in the Machiavellian sense. Biden, in his demented incompetence and cluelessness, is doing more damage to the the regime than Trump could have ever done in a 2nd term, given that Trump was never going to cross the Rubicon.

    Watching the Global American Empire crumble in real time on tv could have only been possible with a Biden administration.

    • Red says:

      Sounds like they’re going to be no real sanctions either. Joe Biden and the American empire is signaling immense weakness to our monkey brains. Things are likely to start moving very quickly shortly as other nations start making moves.

      • Pooch says:

        Apparently, Latvia has an oppressed ethnic Russian population as well so that could be the next one to watch after Putin consolidates his gains in Ukraine. Putin is very careful and calculating though (which is why I was surprised he even moved on Ukraine). I don’t think he would expose himself to more risk than he needs to.

        • The Cominator says:

          Putin obviously moved because the US was putting false flag assets in place to create some kind of horrible pretext with some 9/11esque atrocity.

          • Pooch says:

            Yep, that and moron Zelensky was practically begging for nuclear weapons at the Munich conference. What an idiot.

            • The Cominator says:

              Zelensky was just a puppet zero power over foreign policy, from what I heard his internal economic policy plans (the one area he had limited power) were actually good.

              But puppets are just puppets, none of these events had anything to do with him.

              • Pooch says:

                Not true. He was a frontman for the Maidan installed junta that actually ruled the government and answered to the US overlords but he still had some latitude on what he could say.

                It may have ultimately not mattered, but verbally pressuring NATO for nuclear weapons with a possible withdrawal from the Budapest Memorandum of 1994 that had denuclearized the country in exchange for security guarantees in a public conference was something he could have controlled and made Putin’s decision easy for him. Apparently even other countries in NATO, like Poland, were uneasy with Zelensky’s aggressive nuclear initiative.

                I think it was definitely something Putin took into consideration, among many other factors, and hastened his decisiveness for the invasion.

                Aidan predicted would Zelensky would defect to Putin. Well he actually did the opposite and took an even more aggressive stance against Putin than the US would have preferred. Maybe he had to because of the junta that ruled Ukraine behind him, who knows.

                • The Cominator says:

                  “It may have ultimately not mattered, but verbally pressuring NATO for nuclear weapons with a possible withdrawal from the Budapest Memorandum of 1994”

                  Various oligarchic faggots he had to answer to likely including Soros probably told him he had to say that.

                • Pooch says:

                  Could be.

                • Aidan says:

                  Yes, I was wrong. I read Zelensky as fearful of war and confident that it would be averted. He might have been both of those things, but he did not act like it. Turns out he was simply stupid, or overestimated the support his puppetmasters would give him.

                • Pooch says:

                  Turns out he was simply stupid, or overestimated the support his puppetmasters would give him.

                  Seems to be exactly this. He’s making statements in complete shock and anger that “nobody wants to fight for us” and no apparently forcing the mobilization of every man and not allowing them to leave the country.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  Don’t despair yet brave Sir Aidan. If the dude hasn’t fled yet, who knows. Bitching about Italy more often than Russia recently.

  46. The Cominator says:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iJeUh3zSz8

    I know its a communist era song but I always loved it…

    • Pooch says:

      LMAO!

      I’ll add one to the list:

      https://youtu.be/qLcc19mt4eA

      • Red says:

        It’s always pissed me off how awesome the Russian national anthem is, while the US one is a shitty sounding drinking song.

        • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

          We will have to have Sabaton write the next national anthem.

          • The Cominator says:

            No fucking modernistic or metal shit in the National Anthem, the National Anthem should be beautiful and melodic… I love early Rock and Roll but the National Anthem shouldn’t be that.

            Star Spangled is not a good anthem though, America the Beautiful or God Bless America which isn’t great would have been better but still not great. There should be a contest…

          • Kunning Drueger says:

            TC is a nogunz virgin faggot. There will be only metal in the Restored Empire.

            • The Cominator says:

              I know some metalheads okay, but it doesn’t belong in the National Anthem which must sound fairly classical…

              • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

                Just add metal and classical together. The national anthem should be something that your fighting men can sing as they are going to fucking ruin someone else’s day, and played with pomp and circumstance when played at official events.

              • Pooch says:

                Does the US even have any sort of classical tradition whatsoever?

                What has been sort of a learning experience about this in that seeing that the Ukraine is basically a fake and gay country with a fake and gay nationalism is making me kind of think America is a fake and gay country with a fake and gay nationalism too as sad as that is.

                • The Cominator says:

                  The problem is post 1965 third world people are not and will never be Americans and the alliegance of the Ellis Islander types is very questionable (with the Italians being the best of these groups right now by far).

                  The prospect of America as a strong ethnostate with real nationalism died with the Irish flood. If there were less of them at any one time it could have worked but the way it was it did not.

                • Red says:

                  >Ukraine is basically a fake and gay country with a fake and gay nationalism is making me kind of think America is a fake and gay country with a fake and gay nationalism too as sad as that is.

                  Every group had it’s own sort of nationalism in the US and their own sort of special songs. Religion is a better binder than nationalism and the state religion in the US is gay, so our national songs are gay because of it.

                • Pooch says:

                  Not seeing it. Even if America was 100% Anglo it still was a fake and gay Whig creation just like Ukraine was a fake and gay Whig creation. Without Whigs, America’s rightful place is in the British Empire and Ukraine’s place is the Roman Empire.

                • Pooch says:

                  Russian Empire*

                • Pooch says:

                  Religion is a better binder than nationalism

                  Exactly. A divine right Monarch who enforces the state religion on his people is the reactionary state we are after.

                • The Cominator says:

                  Pooch don’t think its quite fake and gay, the Revolutionary War may very well have been fake and gay with the British whigs mostly trying to lose but the 1812 was a real attempted reconquest by the then battle hardened British army (at the time the best army in the world) in which they were absolutely trying to win.

                  The 1812 war made America a real nation at least for its Anglo population… as Bill the Butcher alludes to in the Great (if not quite historically accurate) Gangs of New York.

                  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4_4p15iGlU

                • Arqiduka says:

                  The ease with which you dismiss any sort of blood ties over synthetic ties (religion) amazes me. It’s a program one sees over and over and it never ends well for the would-be empires, ex. GAE. Maybe a fresh round of conflict will remind people yet again.

                • The Cominator says:

                  Nationalism beyond a certain scale is always partially religious in nature, its a mix of blood and soil and religion. Without religion its me and my brother against my cousin, me and my cousin against the world.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  Of course, but you need both, and religion alone can’t compensate for genetic heterogeneity, though genetics alone with no binding religion is also very hard to do, especially at scale.

                • Pooch says:

                  Lack of blood ties is not the underlying cause for why the GAE is failing, its a symptom.

                  It is failing because the state religion is the worship of satan and all things demonic.

                • Pooch says:

                  Every successful empire in the history of the world was multi-ethnic and organized itself for that in common sense ways.

                  The ethno-monostate is a 20th century creation.

                • Arqiduka says:

                  True. It would have failed anyway though, but on a much longer timescale. At some point local elites are either formed or reinvigorated and start thinking of when to defect. Too many times to recount.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  The south african Afrikaner is a man of europoid extraction – but he also can not quite be placed in any one particular nation living on that continent.

                  This is an example of ethnogenesis; where here sections of men from the netherlands, any of whose particular exigencies would, in the normal course of things, resume into the mean of the whole folk in that place over time, as it naturally gyrates across a certain range, were instead set apart and isolated, by the phenomena of their colonial adventure, and so their particular ‘snapshot’ in genetic time grew out into it’s own clade.

                  This is something that has been happening in America for a long time now. Ethnogenic selection has resulted in at least two, new, and notably different species of europoid on that continent. Subconscious echos of this reality can be seen throughout popular discourse. When a bluetribesman says ‘America has a problem’, he is not including himself in the notion; when he says ‘white people have a problem’, he is not including himself in the notion (and when ‘he’ says ‘men have a problem’, of course, he is also not including himself in the notion).

                  The worst Americans in the world don’t even actually identify as American. In the national discourse, terms like ‘America’ are implicitly coded to really mean ‘red tribe Amerikaners’ specifically. And that is where the potential is; you can be more than happy to agree with them. Turn the magic trick into reality.

                  There are many beings, nominally denotated as ‘american’, that are not Real Americans; and you can tell they are not Real Americans by the fact of their incoherence with divine law; for of course a Real American is a a godly man of virtue; and it will be Real Americans who pass through the selection filter of these coming times of troubles – and who will themselves also constitute it – remaking Real America.

        • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

          Battle Hymn Of The Republic is an inspired song.

          • Red says:

            I could never take that song seriously after years of interacting with niggers. Fighting a war to free them so they could harass and abuse white people is the opposite of inspiring.

            • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

              Yes, the circumstances of it’s provenance were quite execrable; but the article itself holds spiritual power superior to it’s contemporaries, and it can easily be worked to more righteous purposes.

          • The Cominator says:

            Agreed, even if you dislike the themes as 1800s leftism… it is beautiful.

          • Aidan says:

            Agreed, though most modern arrangements leave out the best lyrics, and we’ll need to rewrite a few of them to make it more… imperial

          • Aryaman says:

            I’ve remembered this comment for more than a year now, and meant to reply then. `Battle Hymm of the Republic` is an inspired song, and more moving than any other American song (except possibly `America the Beautiful`). And it is thoroughly Leftist. “As he died to make us holy, let us die that all be free”… Nevermind the overarching theme of a God endorsed arc of the moral universe bending towards justice.

            But it is also a martial song, and a moving song.

            It is not accidentally Leftist, but Leftist in its very essence, and yet ” “battle hymm of the republic” site:blog.reaction.la” indicates universal awe. It isn’t like Soviet propaganda, which was obviously better than GAE propaganda, but just outright good propaganda worth mulling about.

            Look at the links on this thread. Is there some other song that compels people to submit various renditions they found moving?

            • jim says:

              “All men are equal” is a lie, which was subsequently escalated to men and women are equal, and then further escalated to men menstruating and women having penises.

              A lot of men, about one third of better white races, considerably more of inferior races, are natural slaves. God did not give those the right to keep and bear arms. He set a King over Israel for a reason: – theocratic anarchy was failing.

              “Dying to make men free” who are incapable of freedom was an inspiring idea, but piss poor stupid. In the end, they died to take away the freedom of each state to have its own state religion. The rest of the first amendment has now followed.

              The modern economy does not have much use for slaves. Whatever we wind up doing with those men, should not allow them to reproduce. Some of them quietly incel, some of them shafted into monasteries, and the ones disinclined to take it quietly, hang them. Since we are never going to succeed in making monogamy stick one hundred percent, and should not try too hard, the excess females will get mopped up.

              • Oog en Hand says:

                “Since we are never going to succeed in making monogamy stick one hundred percent, and should not try too hard, the excess females will get mopped up.”

                As this means de facto polygamy, I can now accept your demographic strategy.

                • Kunning Drueger says:

                  Wrong. It means closeted, elite, and exceptional polygamy. It means the fiercest warriors, the most profound priests, and the most subtle merchants will be able to have some measure of polygamous family structure. It will be tolerated while they are exceptional, and it will be the petard on which they are hoisted when they fuck up or fail. The short sighted will attempt to normalize their predilection, or undercut the moral maintenance of culture, and they may succeed in some way, but this will put them firmly within the purview of the Inquisitors, to eventually become cautionary tales for commoner lads about why being faithful is easier and preferable.

                  And, whatever form it takes, it’s certainly not relevant to you, or any of the pseudo pagans like you. The men who will take many wives are not the type to demand others write their laws and policies to be inclusive or favorable to them. It’s ind of like drug use: the aristos that will be allowed to get away with some kind of substance use aren’t going to lobby for “legalization,” or “decriminalization,” there just going to do what their status and smarts allow. Anywho demands the codification of their little predilection in the general law is a subversive faggot using the state to make up for their lack of competence or agency.

      • The Cominator says:

        I prefer the non communist version of the Internationale…

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4P-2DjUAliM

      • Pooch says:

        It’s a pretty epic song. Need one with a montage of Putin and the invasion of Ukraine video.

      • Pooch says:

        Another one with world war 2 footage

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFy_-R2tVVg

    • Herman says:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4kfhy5Kzkk

      Chinese Song, I think the style of the song and military parade is quite good

    • Kunning Drueger says:

      https://youtu.be/ZzZ1qmXZBuY

      Hej Sokoly

  47. George C. Wilson says:

    How does israel fit into all of this with operation talpiot and the massive tech transfer from the US to israel? intel is now an israeli company and they backdoored all of their chips.

    Israel also wants (or maybe already has) control over critical infrastructure which relies on tech. the worst part of that is they are buddies with xi and putin so america doesn’t seem like they will ever get ahead anymore.

    • Aidan says:

      Hail fellow right-winger, I like you am greatly concerned about Israel’s friendship with our natural enemies, Xi and Putin. What do you propose we do about it?

  48. Anon Poaster says:

    Musk is planning for the bulk of Tesla’s productive capacity to be in China. Giga Shanghai is now producing more cars than the original Fremont factory, he is building up a new Design Center in Beijing, and is brazenly defying the Cathedral moral orthodoxy by opening showrooms in Xinjiang. But I doubt that USG will allow him to do the same with SpaceX. Tesla is ultimately just an automaker; not so for SpaceX. No sane government would allow a capitalist to transfer their strategic spacelift capacity to a rival empire, and Musk is disliked at best by the people in charge of the Biden regime. Either Starship will go to space from American soil, or not at all.

    • Starman says:

      @Anon Poaster

      “Either Starship will go to space from American soil, or not at all.”

      With American air superiority over, and American space superiority completely dependent on Elon Musk. The USG will have absolutely no ability to have any authority on this.

    • Red says:

      I thought it over and I think there’s an easy enough way to move the workers to China. Just have Chinese front companies hire them bit by bit. Russia would be hard, but China’s got most of the USG on it’s briberoll.

  49. C4ssidy says:

    According to the lefty cesspits, colonising Mars is impossible anyway. It is a thoughtcrime to notice that high functioning people without leftism imposed on them are capable of capable of living in tunnels and greenhouses and rearranging atoms to create what they need, and they latch onto all kinds of scientific anecdotes to support that view . In their worldview, natural resources are everything. It is for this reason that I predict Elon Musk to get away with reaching Mars, for they cannot comprehend the project succeeding even when he does arrive there . I noticed something similar with an article on Elon’s test tunnel. Thousands of educated leftists came to comment that tunnels cannot solve traffic since extra lanes do not increase flow of traffic since they are still bottlenecked by junctions, therefore the whole idea was a capitalist distraction against the only acceptable future which is one of trains. When I pointed out that tunnels are three dimensional and can therefore have junctions which are three dimensional, I received so many downvotes that the relatively-fresh account is now useless for its comments will automatically be spam filtered. It would take me a few weeks of farming karma with bot-like responses on a fresh account to become visible to them again. But I think that Elon has a chance of getting away with both Mars and tunnels because to even admit that these ideas could work, even if approved, is itself a degree of thoughtcrime among the left

    • pyrrhus says:

      Yes, living just under the surface of Mars (to avoid the nasty weather and intense radiation) looks very doable, probably in the polar regions where there is substantial water…Problem is getting there and back, and in a reasonable period of time..Only Musk can solve that one, but he would obtain too much fame and power if they allow that…

    • A2 says:

      I recently saw this enticing title: “How to create an artificial magnetosphere for Mars”

      … For a long-term human presence on Mars to be established, serious thought would need to be given to terraforming the planet. One major requirement for such terraforming is having the protection of a planetary magnetic field which Mars currently does not have. In this article we explore comprehensively for the first time, the practical and engineering challenges that affect the feasibility of creating an artificial magnetic field capable of encompassing Mars. …

      https://arxiv.org/abs/2111.06887

      Haven’t read it yet, alas.

      • Aidan says:

        Apparently a planet does not need a very strong magnetic field at all to shield it from solar radiation. Earth’s is quite weak. Might even be possible with a network of satellites, not even needing Jim’s proposal of rotating magnetic rings at each pole.

        • Cloudswrest says:

          As far as protecting the inhabitants, a breathably thick atmosphere is fine for cosmic radiation shielding. What a planetary magnetic field does is protect the planet from loss of atmosphere over aeons. Not sure what relevance this would have in the human time frame.

  50. StJohn Piano says:

    Hello, Jim.

    My name is StJohn Piano. I’m Head of Engineering at Solidi Cryptocurrency Exchange (a UK company).

    I’m a long-time reader, but never commented before.

    I admire your direct style of thought.

    I think about many of the same problems as you do.

    Recently, I did my best to map out a plausible rise to power of an American Caesar. He starts as an influencer, working for cryptocurrency tokens.

    http://edgecase.net/articles/the_rise_of_the_american_caesar

    The process of writing it was an illuminating experience. I drew a lot of inspiration from your comments on the original Caesar, the death of the Roman Republic, a potential American Caesar, and religious rebirth. I cite your influence in my preface.

    I hope you enjoy it, and perhaps find it useful.

    Regards,

    StJohn Piano

  51. Calvin says:

    While Putin is busy with Ukraine, the Cathedral is boldly shutting down anti Chinese spying programs because racis:

    https://www.politico.com/news/2022/02/23/doj-shuts-down-china-focused-anti-espionage-program-00011065

  52. Starman says:

    The USG no longer has air superiority. So if it wants to keep its space superiority, it better give Prophet Elon what he wants.

    • Starman says:

      Or else…

    • Red says:

      God I hope so.

      • Starman says:

        @Red

        Putin pretty much said that nowhere will be safe for the USG priesthood, not even the New Zealand bunkers.

        It pretty much means that if the USG Harvard priesthood stops Elon Musk, they will have signed their death warrants. Alex Soros will have a target on his back. No private island will be safe.

        The good news for the USG is that the FAA has already approved Starship for KSC Pad 39a. And the Roberts Road Starship factory is big enough to house dozens of manufacturing tents (Boca Chica only has three).

        • jim says:

          If they stop Musk from launching from Boca Chica, not long thereafter, will be stopped from launching from Kennedy Space Center. Not immediately, but there will be one thing after another, the death of a thousand cuts.

          • Starman says:

            @jim

            “If they stop Musk from launching from Boca Chica, not long thereafter, will be stopped from launching from Kennedy Space Center. Not immediately, but there will be one thing after another, the death of a thousand cuts.”

            And then they will be killed.

  53. Gator says:

    Currently living in Belarus and worried. Should I evacuate? If so, where to?

    • jim says:

      I think Belarus is going to be quite safe.

      Belarus, as is wise for a country between two empires, has been making nice noises of submission to both of them, primarily to Russia. I think the only change you will see is that the noises it makes to EU grow quieter, and the noises it makes to Russia get louder.

      Russia is not going to invade Belarus. The EU might invade, in which case one hundred men will likely be able to take care of it.

      • Pooch says:

        Your analysis is old and stale. Belarus is not a country between two empires. Belarus is a full member of the unofficial Roman Empire and is attacking Ukraine, along with Russia, as we speak.

        • Anonymous says:

          And your analysis is consistently stupid and wrong Pooch.

          “Pooch says:
          2022-02-24 at 03:58
          Army is coming in from Belarus as well. Kiev may be taken within an hour or two.”

          “:Pooch says:
          2022-02-24 at 03:57
          It’ll fall tonight. The speed is shocking.”

          • Pooch says:

            Don’t read it then, homo. Where is your amazingly accurate analysis and predictions?

          • Pooch says:

            And this is called hyperbole. Obviously Kiev is a much longer drive than an hour or two from the border.

    • Gauntlet says:

      Belarus has almost become another oblast in Russia. I do not see a will to fight in western forces. While Russian forces go in with God on their side and crucifixes hanging around their necks, with bold and focused determination. I expect Russia to crush the Ukrainian army, destroy missile installations and then move back to secure the newly recognized republics. If there is no US or NATO intervention, this will be over by next week. Sanctions will be put in place and Europe will bleed money like never before.

      • Herman says:

        The way this looks Putin wants to keep the whole Russian speaking areas.

        They are already raising Russian Flags in conquered cities.

      • pyrrhus says:

        And Russia will doubtless create a land bridge between the new Republics and the Crimea, enforced by Russian forces…

      • Gauntlet says:

        Herman – Yes, I am aware now. Seems like an actual clean up operation right now. As Putin said himself “de-nazifying” Ukraine. Extraordinarily interesting.

    • Pooch says:

      And move to a globohomo client state so you can be forced to worship the covid demon with masks and vaccines? Are you insane?

      • Anonymous says:

        Cute how you don’t realize that Belarus and Russia worship the covid demon with masks and vaccines, and far worse restrictions than most of America, or even some other European countries.

        • Pooch says:

          Belarus doesn’t, faggot.

          • Anonymous says:

            LOL ^ This faggot doesn’t realize the Belarussian government has sponsored numerous ads encouraging everybody in Belarus to get vaccinated, as well as having mask mandates in 2021.

            • Pooch says:

              Still less than anything globohomo enforced. I saw no video of Belarusian police beating grandmas for not wearing masks alone outside, only them beating the commies who tried to color Revolution them.

              So cope more you Cathedral faggot. Your mother is a whore.

              • Anonymous says:

                Enormous levels of Cope. I’m a supporter of the real Russia, the Russia of Dugin. Everybody on the “far right” in Russia knows that Putin is still a half establishment Globohomo figure, and Lushanko is a literal Communist faggot. I’m not a Cathedral faggot, you probably are but you are a massive faggot that doesn’t realize how deep Cathedral power goes and willingly allow their AIDS ridden hands into your head.

                • Pooch says:

                  Fuck off faggot. You’re gay, retarded, and have no idea what the Cathedral even is or how it works.

                • Anonymous says:

                  Lol okay whatever you say you special ed faggot, maybe I would feel offended if I and everybody around here didn’t already know that you regularly make retarded, gay, wrong predictions.

                  “Pooch says:
                  2022-02-24 at 03:58
                  Army is coming in from Belarus as well. Kiev may be taken within an hour or two.”

                  And then just a little bit after that

                  “:Pooch says:
                  2022-02-24 at 03:57
                  It’ll fall tonight. The speed is shocking.”

  54. Red says:

    Russian propaganda twitter:

    https://twitter.com/RWApodcast

    • Pooch says:

      Not propaganda. I’ve been listening to Russians with Attitude for a while. They are Russian reactionaries. But being Russian, Obviously biased towards Russia.

  55. The Cominator says:

    Rumors Chinese ships have crossed the median line on Taiwan too…

    I’m not so in favor of that, I hate Xi and Taiwan falling will cause real economic problems… dollar crashes big tomorrow if true.

  56. The Cominator says:

    The question is will this extreme humiliation lead to elite defections… with Biden likely facing a 20% approval rating after this I think it will.

    • Red says:

      Next step is probably open dictatorship in the US. They’ll want to punish Americans who’s racists thoughts obviously caused this.

      • Joe W. says:

        “Open dictatorship”? Who, exactly, is afraid of Joe Biden?

        • Starman says:

          @Red

          “Next step is probably open dictatorship in the US. They’ll want to punish Americans who’s racists thoughts obviously caused this.”

          That open dictatorship will last about as long as the Afghan National “Army” and the ZOG Ukrainians.

          • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

            Give it about a week after the declaration goes out and we will be drinking out of the silvered skulls of the Cabinet and Joint Chiefs.

          • pyrrhus says:

            Agreed…Not many going to salute this clown out here in the Southwest…

      • Pooch says:

        It’s hilarious that even Fox News is crying about it. Our elite are being embarrassed in front the world. I’m loving this.

      • Karl says:

        Not sure what dictatorship would qualify as “open”. Even the UDSSR had elections and pretende to be no dictatorship.

        Anyway, dictatorship would be a step to the right, wouldn’t it? Power in one hand or a small group rather than numerous commitees holding tiny slices of power.

    • Jehu says:

      At minimum it is likely to shrink the casualty budget that the US Military has within the US. I don’t think it has any significant budget outside of it.

    • Pooch says:

      Doubtful. No one cares about Ukraine except the corrupt managerial class anyway.

      • Jehu says:

        I suspect China is watching carefully to see what they might profitably do. In particular, they’ll be interested in just how much of a fight the Ukrainians and NATO actually puts up. My guess is less than 1000 Russian KIA even if they overrun the whole country. China will put that into their estimates with respect to Taiwan.

    • Red says:

      You have to love Mike Cernovich:

      According to General Millie and Secretary Austen, vaccine mandates are a troop readiness issue. You literally can’t serve without one. That’s what a priority it is.

      Let’s all hope the Ukrainian armed forces are fully jabbed.

      https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/1496710840438833152

      • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

        Thernovich is funny when he thinks the wind is blowing the right way. He is a weathervane. Not someone to take seriously, but good to use to clown on our enemies.

        • Red says:

          He’s trolling up a storm tonight.

          Mike got a bunch of things right about the Trump Whitehouse that we missed like that it was Mike Pence’s staff that was keeping all the MAGA hires out which is why I was telling people that Pence was a traitor. It’s good to have a broad range of people to read from since no one ever gets it right 100% of the time.

          • Pooch says:

            Yeah I don’t have a problem with him.

            • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

              He is unreliable, is all. He will predict every single outcome of an event, then when one inevitably occurs, will claim credit for the prediction. Scott Adams does the same sort of thing. You have to take whatever he says with a grain of salt.

              • Red says:

                Taking anyone’s predictions seriously has been a lose lose as long as I can remember, including our group. Predicting the future is hard.

                • Pooch says:

                  There are commenters here who are almost always around the bulls eye with their predictions and others who are almost always off the board. I won’t name names.

                • Anonymous says:

                  Since Pooch is modest and doesn’t want to name himself I’ll name him, he’s one of the commentators as he says who “are almost always off the board”. The Cominator is kind of like that too but at least he has the balls and decency to admit when he’s wrong seemingly.

                  “Pooch says:
                  2022-02-24 at 03:58
                  Army is coming in from Belarus as well. Kiev may be taken within an hour or two.”

                  “:Pooch says:
                  2022-02-24 at 03:57
                  It’ll fall tonight. The speed is shocking.”

      • Red says:

        Here’s the picture that probably convinced Putler than invasion would be easy:

        https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/1496711408590880774

        • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

          We should not call him Putler, even in jest. No need to provide our enemies with memetic support, even incidentally.

          • Jehu says:

            Well, to be honest, I’d kind of like it if Putin dismantled Nato and shattered the prestige of the Cathedral irrevocably.

            I can sort of see a scenario where that happens. Putin takes the Ukraine. Cathedral imposes obscene levels of sanctions. Putin decides, in for a penny, in for a pound and takes the Baltic States (because it’s conceivable that the Poles might actually fight) and threatens Germany demanding that it leave Nato and Finlandize.

            • Pooch says:

              That would be epic.

              • Jehu says:

                In Putin’s place, I’d lean on the Germans and the Baltics. They have no stomach for a fight. I’d be leery of the Hungarians, Romanians and the Poles. They might well fight. Ditto the Turks. Once Germany is Finlandized France will probably leave Nato of its own accord, and that’s all she wrote.

                • Pooch says:

                  USM likely gets involved as soon as a NATO country is invaded. The will and stomach for a fight I’m not sure but nukes would be on the table because are our rulers are deranged.

                • Jehu says:

                  USM will be involved in the Ukraine. Almost certainly some US forces there. My guess is they do nothing and are allowed to flee. I don’t think they’ll stand and fight if Putin gets froggy in the Baltics, and I think they’ll fold over Germany too.

          • Red says:

            I’m not joking. Watching Globohomo get it’s shit wrecked would be awesome.

        • Anon says:

          Despite Duterte the Philippines has extremely gay laws, not defending the visiting Secretary because he’s obviously a faggot, but the reason all these Filipino soldiers and the visiting American secretary all have the visor and mask is that this area of the Philippines apparently had a law requiring both to be worn everywhere in public.

        • Anon says:

          Despite Duterte the Philippines has extremely gay laws, not defending the visiting Secretary because he’s obviously a faggot, but the reason all these Filipino soldiers and the visiting American secretary all have the visor and mask is that this area of the Philippines apparently had a law requiring both to be worn everywhere in public..

          • Joe W. says:

            The Philippines’ insane Covid rules aren’t “despite Duterte,” they’re because of him. He’s been a Covid maniac since Day 1. Really pathetic and disappointing.

      • pyrrhus says:

        I think the mercenaries, at least, will be running for the border…One pilot already flew his plane to Rumania and surrendered.

    • Karl says:

      Apporval rates matter as long as voting matters. Approval of elite factions matters, but it can’t measured by polling random people.

      There is already infighting among the elite, e.g. the old, less crazy leftists against the younger, dumber more cracy lefstists. So what do you mean with “elite defections”? More infighting with lethal means?

      • jim says:

        Voting does not matter.

        • The Cominator says:

          It’d be interested to see if they can do fraud in a 75-25 election as opposed to a 60-40…

          The Biden regime may well be looking at a 75-25 election in terms of real voters…

          • Red says:

            They are acting like they’re concerned about losing. Or at least concerned they don’t have a good cover story for cheating their way to victory.

        • Pooch says:

          Voting matters. The regime depends on people voting for approved “conservatives”. Without “conservatives”, loyalty of the upper social classes to the regime will collapse.

          • The Cominator says:

            I think loyalty to the regime died last night. Fucking everything up combined with being weak ridiculous and impotent…

            Not a good look.

            • Pooch says:

              It is a massive whitepill for people to see the crumbling of the Global American Empire happen in real time on their tv screens.

      • Pooch says:

        Apporval rates matter as long as voting matters. Approval of elite factions matters, but it can’t measured by polling random people.

        They don’t poll random people. They only poll people of the upper social classes, which is why Trump always had massively unfavorable polls.

        So polls do matter. And voting does matter, in so far you are voting for a regime-approved candidate.

  57. Tech Priest says:

    I suspect the US government may be able to block SpaceX from moving to a non-submissive country via ITAR.

    I think a sea-launch platform like those oil rigs SpaceX bought might be their best bet, though probably a lot harder to work from than a land site. Even there, someone’s going to complain about whale eardrums or whatever. I don’t know how obvious they can get away with being in their obstructionism though.

    • Starman says:

      At this rate, the USG will eventually not be in a position to block anything.

      Can’t enforce ITAR with no air superiority and no space superiority.

  58. The Cominator says:

    Well if Putler really is going for it good, they will fall in I think 5 days.

    • Red says:

      Less than that. They’ve already occupied the Kiev’s airport. They’ll be flying troops in.

    • Pooch says:

      It’ll fall tonight. The speed is shocking.

      • The Cominator says:

        I’m sure there is no Uke army coordination as the Russian jammers turned off their comms and air defenses like flicking an off switch… its like the attack in the 2nd Battlestar Galactica series that way.

      • Joe W. says:

        > It’ll fall tonight. The speed is shocking.

        Shocking? Not at all.

        There’s a lesson in there.

        • Jehu says:

          I’m really curious to see what degree there actually IS a fight. I’m open to updating my priors as to the stomach for a fight on the part of Cathedral proxies. My priors would tend to say Russia can conquer the Ukraine with about 1000 KIA or less.

          • Pooch says:

            It likely folds like a cheap suit in a repeat of Afghanistan.

            • Jehu says:

              That’d be my prediction based on the prior that there’s no fight left in the Cathedral’s janissaries outside the US. But I’m open to seeing it revised.

              Where it really gets interesting is if Putin decides to really put the screws to NATO after seeing its impotence and settle some old scores.

        • Starman says:

          @Joe W.

          “> [Pooch] It’ll fall tonight. The speed is shocking.

          Shocking? Not at all.

          There’s a lesson in there.”

          I agree. The USG ground mercenaries fold like cheap paper.

      • A2 says:

        So far any resistance seems sporadic at best. How quickly can one drive a tank across Ukraine?

    • Arqiduka says:

      I am humbled by how wrong I read the situation, never did I think they would cross the Dniepr, which looks like they are if reports of landings in Odessa are right.

      But I will stick to my mistaken ways: he just blew the Turks off and sent them and the French back into the arms of the US. Probably no alternative left, but this is done.

      • Red says:

        I thought this would happen after reading Putin’s speech. The case he laid out for war was quite convincing.

      • Pooch says:

        The French will be lucky if they can field an army of more than a dozen.

        • Red says:

          The French do have working nukes.

          • Pooch says:

            Under control of the USM. The EU are not sovereign countries. They are colonies of the Global American Empire. It’s shocking to me how many regular commenters here don’t understand that.

            • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

              As the USM ceases to be a relevant force, anyone with a relevant force is going to start chafing under their rule. If the US cannot beat Afghanistan, and Russia takes Ukraine, what then? How many defeats can they stand before someone stands up and says, “If the Afghans can beat them, then we sure as fuck can!” Defeat has momentum.

            • Arqiduka says:

              Nuance is key. The French have gone through a lot of trouble and expense to make sure that their nukes are independently operated and the US has no influence at all over them in this regard. Not fully independent of the GAE but the closest to the door.

            • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

              The francophone world has always chafed under the anglo-american establishment, particularly in terms of always looking to maintain their own cultural institutions and global arms market. Unlike Germany, they were never fully subordinated by a purge of all society at gun point.

              • Aidan says:

                The french claim descent from a different strain of liberalism, and thus occasionally diverge in policy from the dominant anglo-american strain. France is eager to present itself as a full peer of American leftism, and thus may take opportunities to diminish the AE’s influence and status and cultivate its own.

        • Arqiduka says:

          I’m afraid we shall see.

    • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

      There is a distinct lack of morale on the side of the anti-american empire.

      Which is to say, their faith is hollow. It does not move them.

      Those who could fight lack faith; and those who look like they have faith… also lack faith, besides the fact they can’t fight anyways. There’s no conviction, no guts, no glory.

      The only reason orders continue to be given and obeyed anywhere inside the wire is because it is simply habituated custom; every functionary is going through the motions because those are the motions they have always gone through.

      But the spark is gone. There is no longer anything holding the state of affairs in place, that would impel them back on the tracks, in the event of shocks that may bump them off…

    • Arqiduka says:

      Ukraine is claiming some 40 casualties from the day, which I find astoundingly low

      https://www.9news.com.au/world/russia-ukraine-update-invasion-state-of-emergency-declared/5ced99ae-b31d-4bd0-b95c-e05e83e056cf

      This army has nothing at all to do with the ’90s forces, but is a proper modern fighting force.

    • pyrrhus says:

      Tomorrow, I would guess…Russia destroyed the Air Force before coming in, who’s going to fight?

  59. Red says:

    Invasion of Ukraine underway, Kiev airport already taken by Paratroops.

  60. Calvin says:

    “To those who will get involved from the outside. Don’t even think about it, or you will face consequences like nothing before. The decisions have been made.”

    If this translation is right, then Putin’s really going all in on Ukraine. Only question is if globohomo is dumb enough to escalate.

  61. bdog says:

    “Linux has succumbed to the demon worshipers”

    where can i find out more about this? what alternatives do we have?

    • Adam says:

      I don’t know specifics but there are codes of conduct being followed and enforced that are pozzed. The usual fake and gay stuff, producing the usual fake and gay results.

  62. Leon says:

    Looks like Idaho is succumbing to leftist invasion: https://cdapress.com/news/2022/feb/16/council-oks-comp-plan/

    Boise is leftist too. Wyoming, Montana and the Dakotas have all had their housing prices go up like crazy.

    • Red says:

      All those thinly populated Red states are fucked as liberals flee the hellholes that are blue cities. But they bring their demon worshiping religion with them and will soon turn their new places into new hellholes.

      • Kunning Drueger says:

        Let’s be very clear about this: these areas are fucked because Bible thumping conservative land owners sell their farms to developers who parcel it up and create section eight corridors. The leftists don’t magically gain footholds, the right sells them the rope they hang us with.

        • Red says:

          Moralizing over economic transactions isn’t effective and it’s frankly a leftist tactic. Force is required to stop such movements, not moralized economics.

          • Leon says:

            The left’s tactic of invading cities, turning them into metropolises and using them to conquer the rest of the state is super effective against right wingers. For whatever reason, the right cannot defend cities. Colorado is gone, all of the west coast (red during Reagan’s day) is gone, and it is looking the like the rest of the intercontinental mountain area/ far west states are soon to follow. It seems like red states can only resist if they have a strong sense of culture, are already developed and have had to deal with repeated attacks by the left and resisted those attacks. There is no return to the 1950s though. Just a state and culture under constant attack and will eventually have to go forth and conquer or be conquered like Constantinople.

            • jim says:

              > The left’s tactic of invading cities, turning them into metropolises and using them to conquer the rest of the state is super effective against right wingers. For whatever reason, the right cannot defend cities

              There have been plenty of efforts to defend cities, which would have easily succeeded except for state terror against those attempting to defend what they built.

              The blacks drive people out, and the state stops people from stopping them.

              • Leon says:

                Colorado and Oregon have no blacks, still fell to the left. Idaho has no blacks, appears to be falling. Admittedly, they might not be far enough down the rabbit hole of leftism yet, or the left is using college students, lgbt and other groups as their enforcers, as I have seen those groups causing trouble in red states.

                • Pooch says:

                  Portland is Antifa territory. The elected officials are literal Antifa members. Not sure how that came to be though.

                  Colorado I don’t know a ton about but Boulder is chok full of shitlibs who fled other places and there actually is a lot of spics in the state now.

                  Having blacks burn, loot, and murder as violent enforcers seems to be more of an advanced state of leftist takeover such as happened to Minnesota.

                • jim says:

                  You don’t see big mobs of blacks except in advanced leftist takeover, but there is continual small scale state encouraged and state tolerated violence in the early stages of takeover.

                • The Cominator says:

                  White shitlibs are the main driver of leftism, though black Stacey Abrams sheboons in control of the local political apparatus seem to be a prerequisite for extreme vote fraud and corruption.

                • Joe W. says:

                  >Having blacks burn, loot, and murder as violent enforcers seems to be more of an advanced state of leftist takeover such as happened to Minnesota.

                  Enforcers of what? Blacks only burn, loot, and murder in places full of shitlibs where the businesses are owned by shitlibs and Globohomo (but I repeat myself). BLM hasn’t dared step foot in a civilized area.

                • Pooch says:

                  Yeah the white shitlibs arriving is the prerequisite. They are better organized and energized to take over the local politics from the poor unsuspecting sheltered cons who have no idea what they are even dealing with. Then once they gain control of the local government, in come the pets.

                • Red says:

                  Yeah the white shitlibs arriving is the prerequisite. They are better organized and energized to take over the local politics from the poor unsuspecting sheltered cons who have no idea what they are even dealing with. Then once they gain control of the local government, in come the pets.

                  It’s their churches. They’ve been consumed by Globohomo and without a religious telling them that shitlibs are enemies of God, it’s difficult to resist.

          • The Cominator says:

            This is why they all have to go if we ever get the chance…

        • Anonymous Fake says:

          [*deleted because you ignore the state’s thumb on the scales.*]

          • jim says:

            I lived in San Francisco, I know why I moved out.

            The right gets the hell out of cities because our houses get robbed, our wives and children get assaulted, and if we attempt to do anything about we are swiftly going to jail, while those robbing and assaulting remain loose.

            • i says:

              They have already taken the Government by this point.

              And I believe its partly because Conservatives being more instinctively ethnocentric are more likely to see White Leftists as Kin since they are both White.

              This is the reason why the Conservatives keep trying to educate them away from being “Dumb Liberals”. Or try to warn them. And continue to treat them as wayward family members. Rather than as a hostile element ready to pounce.

              In many cases Conservatives also have liberal family members who share their blood.

              But those liberal family members won’t hesitate to stab them in the back when the time comes.

              I believe also the Machievelian types are more prevalent on that side also. And have secured power especially in regards to the local organized violence in question which is the government.

              They are first let in because they are more likely to be treated as kin because of being the same race. And then they take over the Government.

              And then the right gets driven out.

            • i says:

              That’s the reason why we have more people on the right side of the aisle talking about “Loving your race” and “Loving your own people”.

              Those are definitely good things. But it can lead to fatal shortcomings.

              And also the importance of race over ideology. Why its better to have a white atheist/satanist and consider them more their people than Black Orthodox Christians because Blood is far more important.

              I see this very often on 4chan and other anonymous forums.

              But they underestimate the religious/spiritual dimension of life.

              Efforts should be made at conversion. But don’t think that Salvation would cut neatly across racial lines.

              Honor and Righteousness doesn’t distribute itself neatly either as a result.

              • jim says:

                Whites are wolf to whites.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  Which, ultimately, is a failure mode.

                • ten says:

                  Evolution demands competition, the top collective organism must fracture or stagnate.

                • ten says:

                  Aka the tower of babel.

                • Pseudo-Chrysostom says:

                  That’s the thing; weren’t actually insuperable when they started turning on themselves. Leading to present affairs.

                  Ordinals of conflict. Unless a superorganism is already standing alone on the stage of Being, irresponsible to turn to itself, going after beings lower down the chain of ordinals, while beings higher up the chain still exist.

                • Oscar C. says:

                  Yes, totally. And in a country with a strong work ethic like America, even more so. More clannish societies may never develop much, but they avoid those pitfalls

  63. Red says:

    The anti Musk shilling has been off the charts since shortly after Joe Faggot stole the election.

  64. Calvin says:

    I wonder if Putin will offer him citizenship. Russia has a metric ton of unsettled lands and a persistent demographic problem.

    • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

      I would, if I were Putin, but I would do it surreptitiously. I would not want the USA to do something stupid to him and lose him, but I would make the offer.

      • Red says:

        Putin would need more than just Musk. Musk has spent 20 years recruiting and training the men needed to complete his dream. He’s need to move those workers as well.

        • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

          If I worked for Musk and got asked to move to Siberia so that in 10 years we could put a man on Mars, I would be packing my shit before he finished asking. I would have everything set to move in a couple days, and be on the plane to Siberia in a week. You do not work for SpaceX if you are not passionate about space travel.

          • Red says:

            That’s kind of the issue, the US isn’t going to let those workers do that.

            • Wulfgar Thundercock III says:

              It will not be able to stop it. The US is becoming increasingly incapable of any effective action.

  65. Joe says:

    Crabs in a bucket.

  66. jorgen says:

    Musks success was based on government contracts; but because he has been becomkng a bit more conservative over time those will be cancelled.

    • jim says:

      Musk’s success was not based on government contracts.

      Government contracts were based on Musk’s success.

      The government did not enable him to get into space. He enabled the government to get into space.

      The implied presupposition of “based on government contracts” is that if only those government contracts had been issued to Shaniqua, a childless obese black woman with room temperature IQ and an Ivy League degree, the magic of government technology and Ivy League intellectual superiority would have gotten us into space without our evil capitalist overlords skimming off all the gravy.

      “based on government contracts” implies “If only those contracts had been issued to someone more deserving”

  67. Charlie says:

    [*deleted*]

    • jim says:

      I have seen that script too many times.

      • Charlie says:

        What script? Musk is a hell of a marketer, and not so much of a space genius.[*rest of script deleted*]

        • jim says:

          You are being willfully stupid and ignorant.

          Rocket technology has been stagnant at best and for the most part declining for five decades. Musk rockets are huge technological advance. The engines are substantially superior to anything built before, and they are the first rockets to land as a rocket should land.

          Today, Musk owns most of the power to lift stuff to orbit, owns several times as much lift to orbit power than formerly existed in all the nations of the world. Where did this lift power come from? If academia and government were capable of creating it, why did they not have it decades ago? Why the shuttle program?

          Lift power to orbit is strategically significant for nations. It means you can spy on the other guy better than he can spy on you, and you have more capability to blow his stuff up than he has to blow your stuff up, which means that even if no one starts blowing stuff up, negotiations are apt to wind up in favor of the nation with more power to lift stuff to orbit. So every nation wants more lift power, which urgent desire started seven decades ago. For seven decades they have wanted more lift power. How come there is now suddenly a whole lot more lift power than ever existed in all of history, most of it personally owned by Musk?

          And personally supervised in detail by Musk, who often winds up sleeping on the factory floor, while nonetheless being able to father his numerous and impressively capable sons.

          Musk has produced more lift to orbit than all the governments in all of history combined, at a small fraction of the cost of all previous lift to orbit.

          If not Musk, where did this capability come from?

          I know that in your response, you will stick to script. All scripts that do not attempt to engage the question of where this huge increase in something vitally desired by all major governments in the world came from will continue to be deleted.

          So everything you say is going to be deleted unless you engage the question of where did this huge increase in lift to orbit capability came from.

          • Charlie says:

            I’m trying to engage in good faith. My “script” is my honestly held belief, but I could certainly be wrong.

            I got involved in trading Tesla stock a few years ago (to my ultimate detriment–I don’t do it anymore!) This may have biased me a little, but the activity also forced me to learn a lot about Elon Musk, his activities, etc. Maybe I misinterpreted what I learned about him.

            What you’re saying about lift power to orbit is interesting, and I didn’t realize that SpaceX now owns “most” of the lift power to orbit capacity on Earth.

            My impression is that Musk and SpaceX did indeed focus on and figure out ways to make the development and operation of rockets much more cost effective, which is great.

            But I didn’t realize and don’t understand how the engines are far superior to what came before. But I accept it–I’m sure you’re right. And I guess the lift capacity you’re talking about comes not only from them producing rockets but from the fact that each rocket has much more lift capacity.

            I do have a few questions, though:

            First, why was rocket technology so stagnant/declining for five decades if governments consider it so strategic? Was it literally that some tech breakthrough was required that SpaceX finally provided? Or was rocket technology mostly strangled by bureaucracy/bad public sector incentives?

            Second, do you not agree that “sleeping on the factory floor” is more part of Musk’s mythology than the reality? By definition, the time he spends at SpaceX facilities is limited by his multiple competing CEO gigs and his choice to live far away from any SpaceX facilities. I tracked his private jet movements for more than a full year (during 2018 and 2019) and I can tell you that at least in that time period there were precious few nights he was anywhere near SpaceX. (Granted, he’s certainly a workaholic and has slept on factory floors on occasion.)

            Third, does it really follow that Musk’s ability to restore some forward progress in rocket technology translates into a clear path to making mankind interplanetary? In 2017 SpaceX officially announced that they would fly two people around the moon in 2018. Some may say his priorities changed, but it looks to me with the benefit of hindsight that SpaceX was being deliberately (inspirationally?) misleading about their technological capabilities. It’s just hard for me to extrapolate 20 years to “bigger better satellite launches” to “landing humans on other planets very soon!” And the reason that I commented originally was because I was surprised to see you in particular making that extrapolation.

            Fourth, if the U.S. government was stupid enough to make decades of *negative* technological progress in rocket tech in spite of a national security imperative to do the opposite, how were they smart enough to outsource to Musk? Did they finally learn that five decades of negative progress was their limit and that positive progress required outsourcing to the private sector? I had cynically thought that USG was outsourcing space stuff just to make their looting and waste less transparent and less auditable. It sounds like you’d probably say there are different factions within USG, some who know they need Musk, and some who feel compelled to bureaucratically block him where they can.

            I accept that Musk is a titan. Peter Thiel has a book Zero to One which complains about how most innovators these days squander their talents on iphone apps and don’t tackle the big things (partly because the government and other rent seekers often don’t really want them to). Musk is clearly willing to tackle the big things.

            Anyway, sorry for my previous posts replaying a boring old script. And thanks for enlightening me about some SpaceX progress beyond what I had realized.

            I would love any thoughts you might have about any of my questions.

            • jim says:

              > First, why was rocket technology so stagnant/declining for five decades if governments consider it so strategic?

              Governments cannot simply command technology to exist, or even command it to continue to exist.

              Technology is hard. Creating value is hard. Growing wheat is hard, though nowhere near as hard as rockets. Plenty of governments have not only been unable to keep technology going, but been unable to feed their armies.

              > Was it literally that some tech breakthrough was required that SpaceX finally provided? Or was rocket technology mostly strangled by bureaucracy/bad public sector incentives?

              No big breakthroughs. The full flow engine was envisaged a long time ago, probably back in Heinlein’s day, but no one was able to actually build one that worked as it should. Because actually building one is hard. We knew that rocket engines should be full flow from the beginning of liquid fueled rockets.

              And the beginning of liquid fueled rockets was Wernher von Braun, who probably also knew his rocket engine should be full flow, but did not bother because he was building the very first liquid fueled rockets.

              And when Wernher von Braun retired, progress in rocketry stopped, and did not resume until Musk showed up.

              Good ideas are worth two cents a bale, but only if they have already been bailed.

              I am full of good ideas about how to do the blockchain and what should be done on the blockchain, but actually doing them is harder, and if I had a staff of ten thousand engineers, it would not be a whole lot easier.

              To build the first working useful item of high technology requires a great man, and to continue producing it after he is gone requires engineers that trained under him, or trained under engineers that trained under engineers … that trained under him.

              Thus you always need an engineer in a high status leadership role that trained under … the original great man and if you do not, then in the next generation, the technology starts to fall apart.

              > It’s just hard for me to extrapolate 20 years to “bigger better satellite launches” to “landing humans on other planets very soon!” And the reason that I commented originally was because I was surprised to see you in particular making that extrapolation.

              I build to live forever, I build for my posterity. It is not whether it happens soon, but whether it happens at all, or whether we go into a dark age and the higher races disappear forever.

              • Charlie says:

                Thanks for the great answers, Jim. I appreciate you engaging even after I managed to annoy you with my initial comments.

                As you lay out your answers, I have to mostly agree with you. My framing “how much of a rocket scientist is Musk reeeeaaaally??” was wrong. His precise level of engineering acumen isn’t really the point. The point, as you lay out, is that great things can’t be built (or even maintained) without great men. Some of the key requirements are boldness, force of will, and a willingness and ability to actually execute on good ideas.

                Given the context you remind us of, Musk’s showmanship and force of personality become clear assets to the engineering mission, not evidence of charlatanry.

                It’s funny–I was a fan of Trump and a detractor of Musk back when I was trading Tesla. Even though the two men had much in common (force of will, larger than life, “master persuaders,” etc.) And I knew I was contradicting myself by liking these traits in Trump while criticizing them in Musk. If only I had listened to that little voice telling me “if you like Trump, you SHOULD like Elon Musk,” I would have lost less money!

                Anyway, thank you for your original post and for the thought-provoking follow-up.

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