"All of Vlad's forces and all of Vlad's men, are out to put Humpty together again." (34 Viewers)

[SplitRz]

I don't perceive any hypocrisy on NATO's part. If anything the signatories of the cluster munitions ban are sticking to their commitment.

Its interesting to note who's signed (a majority) - and, who hasn't. The whys and wherefores of that beg some questions.

Its also interesting as to whether support for the Ukraine is a multi-national affair, with broad agreement on conduct and coordination of supply, or one more dependent upon differing domestic imperatives.

Encouraging liberal minded European voters and the governments they elect that their tax dollar/euro needs to at least attempt to match a percentage of the biggest spender in the room depends upon the optics of what has been, to date, regarded as a 'clean' and worthy cause. Again, I don't think this example of a rift will kill that, but it will fuel the kind of cynicism the Ukrainians - and pro Ukrainian European governments - could do without.

 

[Denniss]

It seems Gerasimov has recently been replaced by a more capable general as commander of the forces in Ukraine.
At least he stays as Chief of the general staff so their military stays as corrupt as it was before

Putin sacks another top general in charge of the war against Ukraine

General Valery Gerasimov, 67, has been ousted as conflict commander and replaced by Colonel-General Mikhail Teplinskiy as Putin tries to regain control following an attempted coup.

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[MiTasol]

I agree and think that Ukraine needs to quickly get out a lot of videos of them gutting the containers and loading the bomblets on to drones.

Follow that with video of the drones dropping the bomblets into tank hatches and chimneys and trenches and a lot of the concerns will be reduced, but never eliminated.

I am surprised Ukraine has not developed drones that can carry multiple bomblets that it can drop individually as the drone follows a trench line.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

It seems Gerasimov has recently been replaced by a more capable general as commander of the forces in Ukraine.
At least he stays as Chief of the general staff so their military stays as corrupt as it was before

Putin sacks another top general in charge of the war against Ukraine

General Valery Gerasimov, 67, has been ousted as conflict commander and replaced by Colonel-General Mikhail Teplinskiy as Putin tries to regain control following an attempted coup.

www.dailymail.co.uk

I wonder how deep the sympathies/collaborations they think they found with Gerasimov actually are ... or if this is just stringing up a body at the city wall as a warning?

 

[SaparotRob]

I agree and think that Ukraine needs to quickly get out a lot of videos of them gutting the containers and loading the bomblets on to drones.

Follow that with video of the drones dropping the bomblets into tank hatches and chimneys and trenches and a lot of the concerns will be reduced, but never eliminated.

I am surprised Ukraine has not developed drones that can carry multiple bomblets that it can drop individually as the drone follows a trench line.

I think they have. I've seen video of a Ukrainian drone dropping several bombs that seemed larger than grenades.

 

[Admiral Beez]

The criticism of the USA stems because it is allied to a whole host of NATO (and wider nations) who've banned their manufacture, export or use - and who would probably have been expected the USA administration to have paid some regard to their predictable reaction and negotiated around it or come up with an alternative.

Another complaint may be how the cluster munitions will get to Ukraine. Presumably they're flown into Germany or Poland, both signatories of the cluster munitions ban, and then sent by train into Ukraine. If your nation bans their export, should you turn a blind eye when they're exported through your country? I suppose the needle can be thus threaded.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Another complaint may be how the cluster munitions will get to Ukraine. Presumably they're flown into Germany or Poland, both signatories of the cluster munitions ban, and then sent by train into Ukraine. If your nation bans their export, should you turn a blind eye when they're exported through your country? I suppose the needle can be thus threaded.

I bet the Poles will go full-on Ray Charles in this case.

 

[GrauGeist]

Cluster Munitions at a Glance | Arms Control Association

www.armscontrol.org

 

[MiTasol]

This is really good news as it shows that Russia is now keeping a lot of the missiles that would have been scheduled for attacks on Ukraine so they can use them for self defence.

Air defenses shot down Ukrainian missiles over Russian border regions, local officials claim

From CNN's Mariya Knight, Uliana Pavlova and Svitlana Vlasova

Air defenses shot down missiles in the Russian border regions of Rostov and Bryansk, local officials said Sunday.
Rostov's regional Gov. Vasily Golubev claimed a Ukrainian missile was shot down in the area between the Russian towns of Kamensk and Donetsk, adding that shrapnel partially damaged the roofs of several buildings.
Russian defenses also shot down two Ukrainian missiles over the Bryansk region, located at the northern end of the border with Ukraine, according to the region's Gov. Alexander Bogomaz.
Neither official said anyone had been wounded or killed.
Ukraine has not yet publicly commented on the attacks, and CNN cannot independently verify battlefield reports from either side of the conflict.
Attacks across the border: The governors' reports come one day after officials in the western Russian region of Belgorod reported heavy shelling that wounded two people. The region's governor said Ukraine had launched over 100 artillery shells at Belgorod over the course of 24 hours.
There have been more reports of drone attacks, shelling and incursions by anti-Kremlin Russians in the past few months as the effects of Moscow's war in Ukraine reverberate back onto its own territory.

 

[Greg Boeser]

This is a good thing. The idea that Ukraine is only allowed to engage Russians within Ukraine is simply ridiculous. It reminds me of the ROE US forces have had to contend with since Vietnam. Don't even get me started on the ROE, or more correctly the RO non-E forced upon the various UN peacekeeping missions over the years.

 

[GrauGeist]

This is really good news as it shows that Russia is now keeping a lot of the missiles that would have been scheduled for attacks on Ukraine so they can use them for self defence.

Air defenses shot down Ukrainian missiles over Russian border regions, local officials claim

From CNN's Mariya Knight, Uliana Pavlova and Svitlana Vlasova

Air defenses shot down missiles in the Russian border regions of Rostov and Bryansk, local officials said Sunday.
Rostov's regional Gov. Vasily Golubev claimed a Ukrainian missile was shot down in the area between the Russian towns of Kamensk and Donetsk, adding that shrapnel partially damaged the roofs of several buildings.
Russian defenses also shot down two Ukrainian missiles over the Bryansk region, located at the northern end of the border with Ukraine, according to the region's Gov. Alexander Bogomaz.
Neither official said anyone had been wounded or killed.
Ukraine has not yet publicly commented on the attacks, and CNN cannot independently verify battlefield reports from either side of the conflict.
Attacks across the border: The governors' reports come one day after officials in the western Russian region of Belgorod reported heavy shelling that wounded two people. The region's governor said Ukraine had launched over 100 artillery shells at Belgorod over the course of 24 hours.
There have been more reports of drone attacks, shelling and incursions by anti-Kremlin Russians in the past few months as the effects of Moscow's war in Ukraine reverberate back onto its own territory.

I'm a bit confused: "between the Russian towns of Donetsk and Kamensk"?

First of all, Donetsk is a Ukrainian town and Kamensk, which is in Russia, is a fair distance to the east of Moscow.

So that "between" covers quite a bit of real estate.

 

[MiTasol]

Yes Donetsk is a Ukrainian town but this is a Russian report so in accordance with Putins edict they call it a Russian town.

Even better if they are keeping weapons to defend such a wide area though. I did not realise that Kamensk was so far to the east.

 

[JDCAVE]

A sobering read:

Why China is the key to avoiding Ukraine's worst nightmare

Nobody can predict with certainty the outcome to the Russia-Ukraine war, but we can look at all the various pressures at play and then use those to try to assess the most likely direction from here, writes John Lyons.

www.abc.net.au

Interesting, but he lost me with this:

"Even using all the state-of-the-art tanks that it has been given — such as Leopard and Challenger tanks — it would not be able to make much progress. Russia's air superiority would take out many of these tanks."

Except that neither side has air superiority. That's the one of the most baffling issues with Russia's offensive, IMO.

Jim

 

[Glider]

It seems Gerasimov has recently been replaced by a more capable general as commander of the forces in Ukraine.

This may well be an assumption that he is a more capable commander. Considering the quality of the troops in the Airborne Forces they have suffered huge losses and achieved relatively little.

 

[SaparotRob]

This may well be an assumption that he is a more capable commander. Considering the quality of the troops in the Airborne Forces they have suffered huge losses and achieved relatively little.

He may be a more capable commander but that bar is set kind of low. He was born in Ukraine. As to his troops, "there aren't quite as many as there were a while ago."

 

[GrauGeist]

Haven't most of Russia's capable commanders been killed by Ukraine, so far?

 

[RogerdeLluria]

I am surprised Ukraine has not developed drones that can carry multiple bomblets that it can drop individually as the drone follows a trench line.

They did. Actually they have this capability for quite a long time.

Plenty of examples here.

Ukraine Is Fielding A ‘Heinz 57’ Fleet Of Heavy Drone Bombers Against Russian Forces

Ukraine is fielding a bewildering variety of improvised drone bombers to rain down mortar bombs and grenades on Russian forces. Though far from military grade, they seem highly effective.

www.forbes.com

 

[SplitRz]

Yet Turkey is in fact a NATO member as well. They are distinctly not a "lone state".

From a general European political perspective, they pretty much are a pariah though. The simmering military antagonism between Turkey and Greece (also a NATO member!) needs to be remembered and the European perspective and view of Turkey's recent actions need to be seen in that context. (What happens within NATO in the case of a conflict between those two nations?)

I have European friends who won't holiday in Turkey because of press and political repression in Turkey, as well as their handling of the Kurdish issue. I can't think of another NATO state that's motivated anyone I know to do that. Erdogan is widely seen by European governments as bad news and ensures that the running sore of Turkeys serial failure to be granted EU membership will continue for the time being. Turkey sits on the economic well as cultural border of Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Thats why its ended up in NATO - as much as anything to stop it falling into the orbit of the others. But the fact remains that the nation has its foot in many cultures, but has never entirely embraced any of them, including liberal democracy. Its partly an accident of geography, but it was and remains a lonely path.

I think the earlier comment about the transparency of Erdogan's courting and appeasement of Putin now pivoting away towards a farcically obvious middle digit, shows the nature and lack of depth to Turkish foreign policy. Unity and a moral consistency with other nations *is not* part of the current Turkish agenda.

 

[SplitRz]

I don't perceive any hypocrisy on NATO's part. If anything the signatories of the cluster munitions ban are sticking to their commitment.

Whats the consistency of a NATO in which a majority of states have banned a weapon system as inhumane, whilst its most powerful member and largest bank-roller of military aid to Ukraine, supplies that system to an active european war zone, overtly ignoring the troubled reaction of its key allies? As previously noted, what credibility on the world stage do the nations who are signatories to the ban hold, when their land or airspace needs to be crossed to deliver those systems? How does this affect the external global perception of NATO and the rectitude of both the cause and the conduct of the war?

Extremely messy at best. You might not perceive hypocrisy. But plenty will

I worked in PR and the world of spin for years. If I were a pro Russian blogger, diplomat or propagandist in Russia, Iran, India, South Africa etc etc. I'd be dancing a little jig in front of my keyboard. This situation would a total coup.

 

[ThomasP]

re Kamensk and Donetsk being Russian towns

There is a town named Donetsk in the Rostov Oblast in Russia, and there are several towns named Kamensk in Russia. I assume the Kamensk referred to is Kamensk-Shakhtinsky (also in Rostov Oblast) about 45 miles ESE of Luhansk, Ukraine, and about 10 miles E of Donetsk, Russia.