The Peanut Gallery: Another Kremlin Atrocity! Girkin Gets Four Years! Rise up! Rise Up for the Pickle!
January 25, 2024
Welcome to the Peanut Gallery! Your daily dose of unfounded speculation.
Please remember that I know nothing.
Storyteller here, bringing you today’s most super important headline:
Russian authorities issued prison sentences in a number of high-profile cases on January 25, including that of imprisoned Russian ultranationalist and former officer Igor Girkin.
Why, Girkin?! Four years behind bars! Four! Truly he is our generation’s MLK, minus the charisma. Seriously, if he could just be less of a human slug, then maybe the fascists would have a symbol to rally around. But no. Instead, their Furor is a fat incel in his fifties.
Ladies, please, God, go to your local comic bookstore! Just hang out—don't let people like Girkin become real.
Save us.
Ukrainian and Russian authorities opened criminal investigations into the January 24 Russian Il-76 military transport aircraft crash in Belgorod Oblast.
Oh, are we still on this fucking plane? I’m glad to see there’s common consensus to obey international law. Huzzah. I’m sure that the Kremlin will now allow independent investigators to get to the bottom of the matter. Right?
No? Ah well. Was worth a try.
The Kremlin is reportedly no longer offering pardons to convict recruits and is significantly changing the terms of their service, likely in response to the reduction of the pool of convicts suitable for recruitment into Russian force generation efforts.
Look, folks, I know it’s a bit of a jolt, but it turns out releasing the incarcerated (now upgraded with PTSD!) carte-blanche back into society with blanket pardons is a bit of a shit idea. Shocker, I know. Luckily Putin came to his senses and decided to cease the mass conscription of prisoners. Right? Right...?
Ah, no I see here now he’s just decided to cease pardoning them. Or releasing them at all, actually. Apparently they’re still prisoners...just on the front line. Forever. As literal cannon fodder. Turns out, Hell is real, and it vacations in our realm under the guise of War. Lucky us.
Looking through what the ISW has outline, I do not see any advantage to serving in the (now) Storm-V units. Prisoners aren’t paid; they aren’t released; they’re still prisoners; and they’re not getting a pardon.
Folks, I’m beginning to think these people are literally slaves.
Russian forces are reportedly increasing their use of chemical weapons in Ukraine in continued apparent violations of the Chemical Weapons Convention, to which Russia is party.
You aren’t hearing about this because the West is practicing a new strategy. We aren’t responding, not publicly. Missiles through NATO sky? “No comment.” GPS downage in Poland? “Don’t recall.” Slicing of Baltic data cable? “Wasn’t worth our time to investigate.” By not rising to the Putin’s taunts, we stifle him in a narrative vacuum. It’s Putin’s initiative, constantly. Every action is because of him. Every taunt is from him. Every comment is from him, and it means we’re constantly exposed to a hideous view of the world, one we wish to change.
Here, though? I think we should say something. Privately, at least. Make Russia understand this sort of thing isn’t okay. That the West will act if this escalates. We definitely have significant room for escalation. Passing a Ukrainian military aid package would be a damn good start, for one thing. A big one.
The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) reportedly conducted a successful drone strike on a Rosneft oil refinery in Tuapse, Krasnodar Krai on the night of January 24 to 25.
Yeah they did!
Y’all notice how these hits on Russian refineries are growing more and more common? They’re widespread, too—geographically speaking. Destruction of this industry is going to cripple the Russian economy to an incalculable level.
The Kremlin’s entire power structure, all of it, rests on its ability to export fossil fuels, and the collapse of that capacity will mean the collapse of Putin’s government. No fossil fuels means no revenue; no revenue means no pensions; and no pensions means no regime. That is the current fundamental conundrum Putin faces. The moment the pension payments cease to match inflation is the moment the Russian people will take to the streets.
Bloomberg reported on January 24 that labor shortages in Russia have increased wages in civilian sectors enough to compete with relatively lucrative military salaries, likely making military service even less appealing to Russian citizens.
Yeah, Bloomberg, that’s called inflation.
There’s a labor shortage because the Kremlin is scooping up every migrant with a pulse, meaning the wages are high, and shit’s expensive because Ukraine is blowing up the State’s chief source of revenue. Russia doesn’t produce too much stuff, to be honest, so most everything needs to be imported. Putin is slowly coming to realize that he doesn’t have enough people to pull all the levers. Russia isn’t the Soviet Union, and he isn’t Stalin.
Russian Health Minister Mikhail Murashko confirmed that Russian authorities have deported over 2,100 Ukrainians, including 500 children, to Russia for medical reasons in 2023.
Please give Ukraine what they need to bring this to an end.
'Q’ For the Community:
So Ukraine’s blowing up Russia’s refineries. How will this impact the Kremlin?
Join the conversation over on /r/TheNuttySpectacle.