The Peanut Gallery: Kremlin Inexplicably Assigns AA Specialists to Storm Trooper Duty - Predictable Result Likely to Follow.
February 2, 2024
Welcome to the Peanut Gallery! Your daily dose of unfounded speculation.
Please remember that I know nothing.
As a rule, I try not to hold to formal rules. I’m a Taoist, so rigid structure? That ain’t for me. Like a river, I typically follow a predictable path, a groove I carve into the land, but over time the banks erode, the course subtly shifts. Yes, the destination is always the same, but the river? She is always new.
That is the essence of the Tao. Maybe. Probably not, actually. By calling it the Tao I make it not the Tao.
The point is sometimes a name is going to appear above your head. I attempt to acknowledge each of them, sometimes I’ll forget, and frequently it will take me several days to get around to it. Deep down in my core is a student putting off doing his homework.
Like for example, just forty years ago I got toasted in a hookah lounge in Jericho, right? Just stumbling out into the night absolutely shit-faced. I should have been back home to study for a chem exam...but fuck that noise. Now the Quran frowns on the matter of alcohol, but it is still very easy to find. Especially in hookah bars. Prohibition has never worked, neither federal nor divine. And when you mix the two? Bliss. I assume. I never could suffer tobacco. ..now what they sold under the table on the other hand...
That’s when I saw her: the most beautiful woman I have ever met. True, she was a bit hairy, and her horns were super pointy, but there was something about her cloven hooves, the sideways shift of her jaw as she chewed a mouthful of hay. It was mesmerizing. She was my Madonna, and I stumbled after her...but she was a nervous one and fled into the desert. And so I chased my nymph, my muse, my flighty infatuation, for what else is a man to do?
Jericho is not the most hospitable place, and it’s doubly so when you’re plastered. I soon got lost and come morning I still couldn’t find my way home. So I set to walking, and I’ll tell you I must have been marching through that desert for a long-ass time before, up ahead, through the haze and the heat, I saw Her. My Jezebel. The traitor who left me to my fate.
And yet...still I yearned for my love. I longed to feel her touch, the caress of her warm and insistent tongue. I swept her in my arms, but before we could become one, I heard a horn: a triumphant declaration from over the horizon to welcome the dawn. I looked and there I saw the city, and a puff of smoke...a puff which heralded the spinning form of /u/yaki_kaki cartwheeling through the sky. They slammed into the sand, smoldered for a bit, and took in the scene. Eventually they raised a single finger and stated, “That’s a goat.”
Anyway that’s the story of how /u/yaki_kaki stopped me from making a horrible mistake. In recognition of their deed, I award them the ‘Joshua’s Clarion Call’ flair. May they wear it with pride.
Don’t do ayahuasca, kids. You’ll fail your chem tests.
Russian President Vladimir Putin evoked a wide Russian social and economic mobilization reminiscent of the Soviet Union’s total mobilization during the Second World War during a February 2 speech despite the fact that Russia is undertaking a far more gradual but nonetheless effective mobilization of its defense industrial base (DIB).
The thing is, even the ISW recognizes that Russia doesn’t have anywhere left to go, industrially speaking. Their economy is suffering critical labor shortages, and the front is chewing through migrants at an alarming pace. Forty percent of the RF GDP is going into the war effort. Is that not mobilization? Seems like it to me.
Putin’s problem is that he’s a cartel masquerading as a government. He is chief oligarch among many oligarchs, all of whom get their wealth from appointments granted to them by Putin. Each, in one way or another, owe their position, their very livelihood, to Putin, intrinsically tying their lifestyle to his success. It means that if it doesn’t give Putin a cut, then it doesn’t exist, and more and more lately that’s just been the oil sector. Minimum pensions keep the Muscovites calm, and everyone else kind of just fends for themselves. Maybe the government sometimes does something. Maybe.
The point is, if industry is suffering labor shortages, and the front chews people, and if another mobilization will only exacerbate this dichotomy, what the hell else can Putin mobilize? Five? Ten more percent of GDP? Woopie! Anything more than that and austerity will begin to kick in, likely corresponding with a reduction in pensions.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu stated on February 2 that Russian forces retain the “strategic initiative” along the entire frontline in Ukraine, a notable departure from Shoigu’s previous characterization of Russian operations as “active defense.”
Yep. And the tone has changed as well. Russia is trying to sound triumphant, which I imagine plays no small part into the impending presidential elections. It’s such a shame they don’t have any victories to show for this initiative, especially for the strength the Kremlin has committed,
Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Captain Ilya Yevlash stated that Russian forces have concentrated 40,000 personnel, 500 tanks, 650 infantry fighting vehicles, 430 artillery systems, and over 150 MLRS systems in the Kupyansk direction, and that there is a total of 57,000 Russian personnel in both the Kupyansk and Lyman directions. Ukrainian officials and sources reported that Russian forces had concentrated roughly 100,000 personnel in the Kupyansk and Lyman directions as of October 2023. Yevlash may have been referring to a geographically smaller sector of the frontline area than the other Ukrainian sources.
Here’s a thought, ISW: what if she’s referring to the same sector of the frontline? What if Ukraine has killed 43, 000 Russians since October? What if she’s telling us there are only 17k Russians in the Lyman direction because the Kremlin’s concentrated everything they’ve got in Kupyansk? What if they’re having trouble replacing their losses? Maybe due to all the riots out east?
The world may never know.
Still, that’s a lot of crap. Good luck to Ukraine in the coming weeks.
Open-source investigations indicate that Russian forces are benefitting from Ukraine’s ammunition shortage and inability to conduct sufficient counterbattery warfare.
Ukrainian ammunition shortages appear to be enabling the Russians. They’re concentrating artillery again, like in Bakhmut, smashing towns to smithereens before their advance. Drones are effective close, but they often can’t travel 25 kms to the artillery in the back line. To do that, Ukraine needs effective volume of fire to chase off any guns that get too close. They can’t do that with what they’ve got, at least in the Kupyansk direction.
Russian outlet Izvestiya stated on February 2, citing sources within the Russian military, that the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) is forming air defense units as part of assault units to defend Russian infantry against Ukrainian drones, frontline air strikes, and shelling.
Wait...air defense units as part of assault units? The guys that storm the trenches? The rat food? What.
The example this outlet gave was driving a SAM platform right up to the front line to protect against drones...which was somehow supposed to accomplish something. To be honest I think this is just an excuse to force VKS troops without an AA gun to grab a rifle and man a trench. It’s not like S-400s are just rolling off the factory line, and Ukraine (supposedly) lacks an airforce, so what are these people even doing?
Nobody dare tell Putin this is a terrible idea. Because it’s not. It’s a great idea. Sending skilled SAM operators on pointless assaults prior to the arrival of F-16s is just the sort of ‘can do!’ attitutde that got Putin where he is today.
Ukrainian and Canadian officials announced a new coalition to return Ukrainian children from Russia to Ukraine.
Please give Ukraine what they need to make this objective a reality.
'Q’ For the Community:
How severe in your estimation are the reports of Ukrainian shell shortages?
Join the conversation over on /r/TheNuttySpectacle.